Scooby’s Story
Many of you followed our journey to China and back for our
daughter Maili in 2008. Maili was four when she became part of
our family. Now she is a bright, energetic first grader and the
light of our lives. She was also to be our last child, or so we
thought. You see, we never planned to have more than two
children. Ever. It just wasn’t something we considered. Not even
a little bit. But God had other plans for our family, and slowly
but surely we began to realize those plans.
About a year after she joined our family, Maili began talking
about her sister. According to her, this sister was the same age
as Maili, she was waiting for our family to come get her in
China, and her name was Scooby. Often she would ask “When are we
going to China to get my Scooby?” and we would laugh and brush
her off, thinking that it was just a phase and that she would
forget about it. But rather than forget about it, she never let
it go. Many times a day she would mention this sister, even
going so far as to set aside clothes and toys for her, setting a
place for her at the table, and picking out clothes for her at
the store. No matter how many times we reminded her that our
family was complete already, she continued to insist that her
Scooby was waiting for her in China and that we needed to hurry
up and go get her.
Being an active member of the adoptive community, I receive
frequent e-mails from numerous groups and individuals advocating
for children who are waiting for families. Occasionally I would
open these or glance at the photos, more often I simply deleted
them without even looking. After all, our family was complete,
right?
One day in September I received one such email and opened it,
glancing at the photos of the waiting children. One of the
photos caught my eye because the little girl in the photo bore
an uncanny resemblance to Maili. Not the Maili whose joyful
laughter fills our home each and every day, but the Maili we met
in China almost three years ago. The one whose downcast eyes
spoke volumes about the sadness and loss she had endured in her
short life. The photos we have of Maili from that day show fear
and sadness, and this little girl’s eyes had the exact same
look, a look which has long since been erased for Maili and
replaced with an absolute sparkle and joy for life.
I clicked on the photo, curious. According to the information
given, she was just eight months younger than Maili, with an
unrepaired heart condition. This was the same special need we
were told that Maili had, although it later turned out that her
heart is perfectly healthy and normal. Sighing, I closed the
file. Too many children with sad eyes and not enough families to
bring them home. I put it out of my mind and life went on.
A month or so later, I spotted a familiar face among a different
group of waiting children. Surely a family would have come
forward to bring her home by now, I thought. Meanwhile Maili
continued her campaign for “my Scooby” as she called her, and I
began to wonder what if. What if we just took a look at the
file. It wouldn’t hurt to look. By this time Maili had become so
insistent that I began to wonder if maybe she knew something we
didn’t. I mentioned it to Jamie, who by then had grown quite
tired of Scooby talk and responded with a resounding NO. I told
him that for some reason I felt led to look at her file, and I
had no idea why, since I certainly didn’t see myself as the
mother of three. He reminded me that even if we wanted to pursue
another adoption, which we did NOT, that we had no money saved
for one and that we were still paying off the loan from the
previous adoption. At that point, I told him that if this was
meant to be, the doors would open instead of close, and that we
would find a way to pay for the adoption without borrowing a
penny. He looked at me like I had lost my mind and said that if
I was so certain of that, then to go ahead and look at the file,
because those doors weren’t gonna open any time soon. He had no
idea just how wrong he was.
Once we looked at the file, we discovered the reason that this
little girl was still on the list. She had some pretty
significant medical issues which should not be taken lightly.
After doing some research into her specific heart defects, we
realized that her needs were probably too great for our family
to handle. However, we did send the file to several different
specialists to review, just to see what they thought about her
prognosis. Amazingly enough, once everything was explained to
us, her needs didn’t seem so scary after all. In fact, they
seemed pretty doable. There were still a lot of unanswered
questions, however. We requested more information from the
orphanage, thinking that at that point the doors would close. It
is almost unheard of to get an update from China on a file you
are reviewing before you even commit to accepting a referral.
However, every single test we requested was done, every single
question we had was answered fully, and everything piece of
information we were provided pointed to the fact that this
little girl could live a normal, healthy life if only she were
given the opportunity to have the life-saving surgery she
needed. If only she had a family to give her that chance. Were
we that family? We began to wonder.
We spent almost three months reviewing the file from the time we
had first seen this little girl’s picture. Three months during
which we listed all of the reasons why we should just go on with
our lives and forget about this little girl, who, we later found
out, had been on the list for over a year because no one had
stepped forward for her to make her part of their family.
Eventually we both realized that this was indeed meant to be our
daughter, and that if we just took that leap of faith, the rest
would work itself out. When Maili saw her photo on the computer
for the first time, she said without hesitation “That’s my
Scooby. We need to go get her in China, she’s waiting for us.”
The journey to Scooby had begun.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, a family was
praying for that little girl. A foster family who never gave up
hope that the little girl they had loved and lost would someday
find a family of her own. When this family left China, they had
to make the heartbreaking decision to return this little girl to
the orphanage, this child who had become a cherished part of
their family during the time she spent in their home. Almost
three years went by, but the family never stopped praying that
she would find a family to love her and care for her and provide
her with the medical care she needed to live a long and healthy
life. They had named her Allison Hope, and called her Allie.
When we discovered quite by accident that this little girl whose
eyes we could not forget and whose situation we could no longer
ignore was the same little girl that this family had loved and
cherished as their own, we decided to name her Callyn Hope, in
honor of the fact that they never gave up HOPE for her during
the time she waited for her forever family to claim her. One by
one, all of the doors which should have been closed to us were
opened , leaving us no doubt that this little girl was indeed
meant to be a part of our family. One day we will tell Callie
the story of how she came to be part of our family, and she will
be as amazed as we are at the miracles which took place. Not one
penny borrowed, but somehow every penny needed has been saved or
raised just in time for each payment. We are still in awe of
that one, and looking back now we have no idea how that was even
possible in a six month period of time, but it happened. One
family and one little girl who never gave up hope that Scooby
would find her forever family, and two hearts which changed
completely in a matter of a few months. I guess it’s true what
they say. If you want to hear God laugh, start telling him your
plans.
Look at the nations and watch, and be utterly amazed. For I
am going to do something in your days that you would not
believe, even if you were told. ~Habakkuk 1:5 |
First Glimpse of Callie
Maili on her Gotcha day, 2008
Age 2
Around 2
Age 3
Around 4
Age 5
Callie now, age 6 |
