Our Adoption Story

"Once our eyes are opened, we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows that we know, and holds us responsible to act." ~Proverbs 24:12 This is our story of how God opened our eyes to adoption and our incredible journey to Annalyn Wu (pictured to the right at 3 years old). Mike and I had been married for almost 11 years when God spoke to us about adoption. We were married in 1998. We had our first daughter in 2002 and our son in 2006. Mike and I have always been very involved in our church. Mike has been the music director at our church for many years. I was blessed to work with the children of our church on Wednesday nights for about 8 years. When we found out in March of 2009 that our son was mildly autistic, I had to make a very hard decision of stepping down from the Wednesday night service at church in order to get Anthony on a consistent bedtime schedule. It was right before that time that God spoke to me about doing a musical with the children called “I Am a Promise”. Little did I know that it would be my last time. I know now that God was using that musical to speak to my own heart. I had no idea at the time what God had in store, but I see now that He was obviously preparing my heart for what He had in store for our family. One of the songs says "I’ll say yes, Lord, yes, to your will and to your way. When your spirit speaks to me with my whole heart I’ll agree, and my answer will be yes, Lord, yes." The whole musical spoke to me, but this song in particular spoke to me. For the previous 2 years, Mike and I had talked about whether or not we would have another child. We both felt like our family was not complete, but we did not feel led to have another baby at that time. One day, on July 15, 2009, I was talking with my good friend, Courtney Goodwin, about our 3rd child indecision and how I would love for Gwendolyn to have a sister. She just said in passing sort of just like a fleeting thought, “have you ever thought about adopting a girl from China?” And then she left the room. I just honestly felt the spirit just sweep over me like I have never felt before. My head was spinning as I told her that I would love to but Mike would never go for it. As I was driving home, I thought about it all the way home but knew that Mike would never go for it because he had expressed to me prior to our marriage that even if we could not have kids, we would not adopt. Not that he was hard-hearted, but because there was a couple in his small town that had a terrible experience with their adopted child and that’s all he had heard about adoption. So I made a decision in the car that I would not talk to him about it because he knows that I know how he feels about it and I did not want him to get upset. He came home late that night from church and so we went to bed late. But we started talking and sharing our hearts with each other and in the midst of this conversation I brought up the “a” word. I did not even mean to, it just slipped out. It just seemed like the right moment. Well, I was prepared for him to get upset and tell me again what he had told me before. But…he did not “shoot me down”. He spoke in positive sentences and even gave a few hypothetical situations. I was blown away. We really didn’t talk that much about it because it was late and we were both tired. But the next morning, he got up and mowed the grass and when he came in he said, “Hey, you know that thing we were talking about last night…it kinda fired me up.” I said “What??!!” He said that about 2 weeks ago, he was listening to Christian Talk radio as he usually does on the way to work. The topic was adoption and how God adopts us into his family. He said that it really spoke to his heart. We both decided that this could not just be a coincidence. So I asked him if he wanted me to research the topic, because we knew absolutely nothing about it…how long it takes, how much it costs…nothing. We were starting at the bottom. So I did a little bit of research (as I LOVE to do). When he came home from work that night, I had an adoption agency website pulled up on the laptop. It had an advertising picture of three precious girls across the top of the page. He walked over to it and pointed to the last one and said, “She looks like a Pritchett.” I was floored!! I knew then that only God could have changed the heart of this man. We both felt led from the start that if we were going to do this that we would pursue an adoption from China. The year before this, God had put a sweet Chinese friend (the first friend that I’ve ever had from a foreign country) in my life and we both felt like it was for a reason. A couple of days later, I found out that one of our local adoption agencies was having an informational meeting at a church across town on Anthony’s birthday. So I asked him if he wanted to go and he said yes! I was floored again! So I asked our very dear friend, Phyllis Hawkins, to babysit for us and we were set. (We both knew that Phyllis could keep a secret.) I really didn’t know what to expect of him at this meeting. We were very impressed with the heart of this agency and God seemed to be the center of what they do. Of course, we both cried through the short film. I was very surprised though when Mike started asking serious questions to the director of the agency. So as we were driving back home, we talked for a few minutes about what we had just heard about adoption. Then, we were silent for a while. I think we were both processing in our own way. Then, out of the blue, Mike’s starts whistling. He is not a whistler. Of the all the years that I have known him, I can probably count on one hand the number of times that I have heard him whistle. So after a while, I recognized what he was singing. I said “Do you know what you are singing?” He seemed to jump a little bit like I had just startled him out of deep thought. He said “no.” I said “you are whistling “Trust and Obey”. He said “oh my goodness, I am.” We both looked at each other and said “oh, no.” It was great. If you have ever spent much time around Mike you know that he has a gift for God giving him just the right song at the right time for any event, especially church. We knew that this was not a coincidence. So with this new information from the meeting, we prayed and researched a little more. Our next hurdle was the agency. How do you choose? They all sound great. Most of them say that they have some type of Christian connection. How do you choose? Most of the advice that I received was pray about it and you will know. So we did pray about it. I went online and submitted requests for information package from several adoption agencies and waited patiently on the mail. One day I received an information packet that blew me away. The description of this agency sounded exactly like what I had been searching for but did not know how to put it into words. At the time that we were looking into adopting a waiting child, there were two options. We could look through the many children on the waiting lists for specific agencies or we could fill out the paperwork and wait until we were “matched” with a waiting child. We both felt like God was not leading us to adopt a baby. We really felt led to adopt an older child. Our initial thought was to maybe look at healthy children in the 3-6 year old range. But God had other plans. As we began to look through the many children on the waiting lists, God began to change our heart. There were so many children with minor special needs that needed a family. We both felt like maybe God was preparing us for this by giving us a special needs child. I’m not sure we would have even considered a special needs child if God had not already given us one. So on September 12, 2009, I decided to go to the website of this agency that I liked to see their waiting child list. I was not looking very seriously at it at the time, just casually looking. I don’t know how, but I was able to click on their waiting child list without a password. I was only able to read the paragraph descriptions of the children with no pictures. So I read through many, many descriptions and one just jumped out at me. It was Annalyn’s paragraph. This is a copy of the paragraph that I read. She was also featured in Great Wall’s September issue of “China’s Angels of Hope newsletter” under the “Angels in Waiting” feature. This is the description that I read that afternoon. Allison is 7 years old and is post-operative for bilateral clubbed feet and has limited bending in joints of arms and legs. She has an outgoing, loving and generous personality. She loves to look beautiful and wear pretty clothes. She studies well and is beloved by her teachers. Now she could recognize and write simple words, such as “up, middle, down, people, mountain, water etc”. She could count from 1-100, and could do addiction between 10. She is fond of reading books, she usually reads one book many times over, and puts the book beside her pillow. She knows to express her thoughts and feelings with language, can recite Tang poems, and sing Chinese Zodiacs. Her voice is ringing and loud, and she would like to perform before crowds. My heart melted, but I did not want to get my hopes up. After all, I was “just looking”. The very next Monday, I called Great Wall and told them what happened and they were very confused. They could not understand how I was able to read the descriptions of the children. They said that their computer system was down and that they couldn’t get to any files. So 2 days later, Leigh Anne called me back with Annalyn’s file. She basically read the whole thing over the phone to me. As she was reading it, she sounded just like my daughter. Then when she told me her Chinese name, I came unglued! Her name was Wu Ai An. An is the last name of my only Chinese friend!! Even though Wu is actually Annalyn’s last name, I was still blown away! A few days later we had her file reviewed by a doctor at the International Adoption Clinic, Dr. Jennifer Chambers. She was so sweet and an adoptive mother herself of twin Chinese girls. She gave a good report and we proceeded to pray more. Leigh Anne said that since Annalyn was on their agency’s specific list that they could lock in her file for us and wait on us to complete the paperwork so that no one else could look at her. So we started our paperwork at the end of September and beginning of October 2009. On October 5, 2009, the day after I had joined the Wuhan yahoo group, I received a message from the 2nd person to welcome me to that group. Her name was Laura Beth and she said “Is your daughter’s name Wu AiAn? I have been praying for a family to come forward for her!” I came unglued right there in the library that morning when I read her message. Apparently, this family was trying to adopt Annalyn along with another girl. They had already been approved to adopt the other girl and they found out that she would need more one on one attention so they had to drop Annalyn! What a blessing for us! It was just a blessing to be able to talk to this mother. I just knew it was a God thing. God has brought Annalyn through so much. I know that he has big plans for this sweet little girl! We love you Annalyn! And we can’t wait for you to be a part of our family! “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11 Our Adoption Timeline July 15, 2009 - God opened our eyes to the idea of adoption. August 4, 2009 - We attended an informational meeting hosted by Lifeline Children's Services in Birmingham, AL. August 22, 2009 - We met with Joyce London a representive with Christian World Adoption Agency. September 12, 2009 - Through a computer "oops", I found Annalyn (with no picture at the time) on Great Wall China Adoption's waiting child list. September 18, 2009 - We received Annalyn's electronic file for review (with pictures). September 23, 2009 - The International Adoption Clinic reviewed Annalyn's file. September 30, 2009 - Turned in application to begin homestudy. October 7, 2009 - Turned in application to Great Wall China Adoption to begin our paperwork trail to Annalyn. November 24, 2009 - received updated photos of Annalyn. January 6, 2010 - received updated growth report on Annalyn. February 19, 2010 - Alabama DHR received our homestudy for review. February 28, 2010 - Our Letter of Intent for Annalyn was sent to China March 9, 2010 - Alabama DHR approves our homestudy!! (2.5 weeks - AMAZING!!!) Happy Birthday in China, Annalyn! (China is 14 hours ahead of us). March 10, 2010 - Happy 8th Birthday, Annalyn!! March 17, 2010 - Letter of Intent Accepted - Pre-Approval for Annalyn from China April 15, 2010 - Homeland Security approval May 7, 2010 - Dossier to China (DTC) May 12, 2010 - Log-in Date (LID) July 2, 2010 - Letter of Approval from China (Day 51) July 23, 2010 - I-800 Approval Aug 5, 2010 - NVC Cable Letter and LSC Packet mailed to GW September 7, 2010 – Travel Approval!! Yaaaaaay! October 28-November 11, 2010 – Travel Dates! (Yippeee!!)

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