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Families Thru International Adoption

by his mother

In February 2002, Bill and I decided that we were no longer continuing fertility treatments. We had been trying unsuccessfully for 2+ years to have a second child and we weren't making progress.

We had always been interested in adopting; we had discussed adoption as an option that we were both interested in early in our marriage. We had also seen my cousin adopt her second child, a wonderful boy from Columbia, 11 years ago, and one of our best friends in our neighborhood also had a second child that was adopted, so we were very comfortable with expanding our family through adoption. We felt that an international adoption was the best option for us.

I went on the internet and was overwhelmed with the number of agencies and countries. We had no idea where to start, so we visited Baker Victory Services in Western New York and met with the director for her guidance on where to start. Since we were very hesitant about bringing our 5 year old, Sam, along with us to another country, and we did not want to leave Sam for weeks while we went to another country, the director recommended adopting through Guatemala which was only a 3 day stay. It was a perfect choice for our family.

Judy gave us FTIA's name, as well as a few other agencies that coordinated Guatemalan adoptions. We contacted references and FTIA's came back "glowing." The other agencies' references were "ok." FTIA was our agency!

We sent FTIA our application in July 2002. That same week the Pope was in Guatemala City canonizing Guatemala's first Saint, Pedro. We decided that our new son would have "Pedro" or "Peter" in his name in honor of St. Pedro. We named our son Gabriel Peter Misael.

It took us about 4 months the get our dossier ready; it really wasn't difficult, just time consuming. We just worked on it in small steps and got it done. We included Sam when possible; we brought Sam with us to get our fingerprints and he got a tour of the police station at the time, so he loved that!

In January 03, Salome, our case worker from FTIA, called me at work with the referral for our son Misael Monterroso. The whole experience felt very similar to finding out we were pregnant. It felt almost unreal. We found out that Misael was born November 12, 2002. Some quick math indicated that he was conceived the same month that we stopped the fertility treatments.

We had to wait until August to get our son. There were some delays in 2003 in Guatemala, as the government was considering some changes to adoption procedures, so our wait was a few months longer than we had originally anticipated. We were lucky though, our wait was actually short compared to many others. (These delays have all been resolved!). When Salome called us in July to say that we were out of PGN and could travel soon, she sounded very excited too. It was also good news for FTIA because PGN had finally started to clear families again.

We finally felt at that point that Gabriel was officially "ours" now. We had both been guardedly optimistic up until that point; we were concerned that something could have gone wrong in the process and we would not get to adopt him. Salome's call made it official that he was our son!

Now that the good news was official, our friends and families had several parties for us before we traveled. Sam was thrilled that his brother was coming home soon.

On August 9th we traveled to Guatemala City. It was beautiful, but we had been warned to not spend a lot of time in the general public; the political environment was not stable at the time and there had been rioting a few weeks prior to our travel. Because of this, we basically stayed in the hotel, except for the trip to the U.S. Embassy.

August 10th was "Gotcha Day." We met our son and his foster mom, Rosa, in the lobby. The FTIA representative had arranged this for us and stayed with us through the meeting. He interpreted for us. It was overwhelming. Our first glimpse of Gabriel was while he was sleeping in his foster mom's arms. He had a full head of beautiful hair and looked much older than a 9-month-old. Rosa held him on her lap for the 1½ hours we spent together. This worked out well because Gabe got used to looking at me, so when it was time to take him with us, he wasn't scared. The FTIA representative let Rosa and Bill and me take all the time that we needed. It was very emotional. We were tired, overwhelmed and felt so bad for Rosa! She had raised him from his first day.

The rest of our trip just flew by. Gabriel never cried or seemed upset about his separation. He just went right to our room with us and we all got acquainted. He was a hungry boy though! We had expected him to be on formula still, but he was eating solids. We had to go to the grocery store twice for food!

While we were at the Marriott, we met many families also adopting or visiting. It became apparent at that point that we had made the right decision with choosing FTIA. It was apparent that the children and families were FTIA's greatest priority. We saw a big disparity in what our experience had been compared to other families with other agencies.

The first night with Gabe, he slept like a baby. No problems! Night two we were not so lucky. He wouldn't sleep. Or when he did, it was only for 30 minutes and then he would start crying again. Finally, at 3:00 a.m., it occurred to us that this must be an ear infection. We probably would have figured it out sooner, but I think we weren't thinking clearly due to being tired and a little overwhelmed (very similar to how we felt when we brought Sam home from the hospital). We had to take a shuttle for the airport at 5:30 a.m. and we did not want to fly until a doctor checked Gabriel out. We called the front desk at 3:00 a.m. The Marriott throughout the trip was wonderful. When they said "at your service," they really meant it. They got a pediatrician to our room by 4:00 a.m. The ear infection was confirmed but the doctor said he was ok to fly! The doctor wrote a couple prescriptions and one of the Marriott employees somehow got them filled by 4:30 a.m. Ok, now we needed someone to interpret the dosage. "At our service" again. It was humorous when we received our 4:30 a.m. wake up call because we had been up all night!

I would like to say the flight home went well, but it was bad! Gabe's ears must have hurt a lot because he cried for hours. Fortunately, a wonderful woman from Guatemala sat next to us in the plane and held him and talked to him occasionally. Her speaking Spanish to him was comforting to him; between losing his Rosa and being in pain, this must have been very difficult for him.

Landing in Atlanta felt so good! We zipped through customs and made our flight to Buffalo. Buffalo never looked so good. Our family was waiting! Sam got to approach us first. Sam said "Hi Gabriel, I'm your big brother."

When we got home, we found that our neighbors had decorated our house and were waiting for us. Two homecoming gatherings! Everyone was so excited to meet the newest neighbor!

That night, Sam and I camped out in Gabe's bedroom with him and he slept!

It has been 9 months now since we brought Gabe home. We keep forgetting that he is adopted. He has completed our family and we are having so much fun!

Bill and I felt so strongly about how well FTIA handled our adoption that we are references for them now. We also got to meet with other adoptive families at Baker Victory Services on behalf of FTIA. We are encouraging whoever will listen to adopt. It is very apparent that Gabe is adopted when you see our family. This has been wonderful because so many people approach us and inquire about adoptions and we want to share our story and get the word out about adoption. We want to help more families see the benefits of completing their families through adoption.

One final story, when we were waiting to adopt Gabriel, we tried to find the Spanish to English interpretation of his birth name, Misael. I went on many websites trying to find out what Misael meant in Spanish and never had success in finding the name. We had then decided that we were going to name him Daniel. Unfortunately, my brother and his wife also wanted to name their future son Daniel. Instead of a family feud or two Daniels in the family, Bill and I decided on naming our son Gabriel.

After we brought Gabriel home, a family friend inquired about his birth name. When she was told it was Misael, she said that name is from the Bible. Misael was one of the three companions saved in the Book of Daniel (referred to as Mishael or Meshach). They were saved by an angel. Well, we checked and she was correct. It never occurred to me that Misael wasn't a Spanish name. And although the Book of Daniel doesn't specify the name of the angel that saved Misael, our guess is that the angel was Gabriel!

Lynne, Bill, and Sam