Blog-matic for Burundi

Sometimes during this adoption journey I can feel very alone.  Especially since we moved from a community with several adoptive families to the UK, where I know one family, who has adopted from the foster care system.  Therefore, I am trying to seek out community by going online.

There are many adoption blogs out there, and many adoptive families feel blogging about their experience is therapeutic, and is helpful for them....and provides a place for updates on the process.  I have found several blogs that have been encouraging to me.  But here is the problem:

Not only do I long to find others going through the adoption process in general, I want to find others who are in the same boat as me.  I want to find other families who are adopting transracially, I want to find other families who are adopting from Africa, and I want to find other families who are adopting from Burundi. Though I can find some blogs of families that meet some of those desires, I can't find many adopting from Burundi.  I know that I can learn from people who have adopted from Ethiopia, Rwanda, Uganda, etc.  But it's not the same as getting first hand accounts from someone who has adopted from Burundi.  

Such is the nature of being a "pioneer" in the Burundi adoption program.  We are the trail blazers.  We will be the ones to set the course for hopefully many others.  But sometimes being "first" is not all it's cracked up to be.  As far as we know, there is one family before us adopting from Burundi, and I am thankful I am not in their position.  They have been waiting for a long time, while the courts/government in Burundi get everything sorted out.  But neither our family nor theirs has the benefit of countless blogs of families who have gone before us.  We don't have the benefit of videos and photos and slide-shows of the adoption journey of different families before us.

Sometimes I am just dying for information!  Please show me a photo!  Please let me find a video!  But there is not much available.  I think to myself, could I just sneak on a plane and go down to visit Burundi myself?  But I know that would not be the wisest decision.  There is just a huge desire for someone else to know exactly what we are going through.  And so, I end up feeling somewhat alone in this journey.

I know that God knew what He was doing when He called us to adopt from Burundi.  It is His purpose for us to be "pioneers" in this process.  Even though I feel alone, I know that I am never really alone.  "The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged." (Deuteronomy 31:8)  And God is the only one who knows exactly what I am feeling, because He knows my heart.  "And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will." (Romans 8:27)  I am thankful for a Savior who did not leave ME as an orphan.  "Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God." (John 1:12)

So, through my insatiable desire for information and community, I long to be satisfied in the fellowship with the Father, and trust that He knows what is going on, and He will reveal it to me in His time.

Thanks for sticking with me through my frustrations and raw feelings about this process.