The day before we were to travel, I was at home finishing last-minute packing when the phone rang. It was our social worker. She did not congratulate us on our upcoming trip. She did say that she had the director of social services on the line with her. My heart sank and I sat down. I knew what was coming.
"I'm sorry to have to tell you this," she said. "In the course of doing final checks, the China Adoption Center learned that your baby has died."
She didn't have many details. The baby had a cold that might have turned into pneumonia. It happened quickly. The orphanage staff were said to be devastated.
Much later, I realized that I hadn't thought to ask when it happened. I assumed it was recent, but it is possible that it had happened months earlier and the orphanage had not informed the authorities.
I didn't burst into tears right away. I was in shock. Stupidly, I thought that perhaps we were still going to travel. I had heard of several parents who had arrived in China to find that their referred child was gravely or even mortally ill. They were given a new baby on the spot. All I could think was that we would still travel on schedule and receive a new baby. It would not be the baby I had loved for the past three months, but it would be a baby. After listening to our social worker and her boss talk for a while, I understood that we were not going to travel. They would let us grieve for a few days, and then we could decide whether we wanted to request a new referral soon or wait awhile.
I called A at work and told him. And then I cried. When A came home, we cried together. We started the painful job of contacting relatives. People were so kind. Not one person said, "Well, she wasn't really your child." They sent flowers and thoughtful messages. But my heart was hard. I didn't want flowers. I wanted my baby.
We told Abbey we would not be bringing the baby home. She cried. She wanted her baby too.
I cried off and on for days. I raged at God. How could this happen? How could it happen to us? Hadn't we been through enough? Why give us a baby to love and then take her away? Why give a tiny baby life and then allow her to die in an orphanage?
I looked at her sweet face one last time and put the pictures away. I would never know what it felt like to hold her, except in my imagination. But we still wanted a baby, and we were ready to request a new referral.
After some time had passed, I realized that I had to find some meaning in her life and death. Despite my anger, I do not believe that God causes or even allows bad things to happen to us. I do believe that He challenges us to bring good out of every situation, and that He will help us to meet that challenge. So I decided that our purpose had been to love this lost baby on the other side of the world. The orphanage staff may have cared for her, but we loved her. Out of all the babies in the world, she was the one we loved and prayed for throughout our summer of waiting. Perhaps in some way our love touched her; perhaps she was at peace as she left this life.
Still, ten years later, I cried as I wrote this post.
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