Lonely to Loved: The Journey of Lydia Mei (if you cried during the last one...don't watch this)

Thoughts from Elizabeth:

I just wanted to share with you the video that I created for the poems "Lonely" and "Loved" (for the original poems, I took a few lines out, see a couple of posts down) that I wrote. I also wanted to share with you the reasoning for the poems and the video.

The song that is playing with the video is Miracle of the Moment by Steven Curtis Chapman. I chose this song for three reasons (if you haven't listened to the whole CD you really should).

1. Our adoption of my wonderful sister, Lydia Mei, is a miracle and each moment with her is precious and should be enjoyed.
2. Steven Curtis Chapman, as you might know, has adopted three of his six children. His youngest three daughters are all adopted from China.
3. The last but definitely not least is that my parents wanted to adopt after my mom went to one of Steven Curtis Chapman concerts (she was in the first couple of rows!). I can still remember her coming home after going to one of his concerts in Spring 2005 saying that she wanted to adopt a girl from China. She asked me at one of Jacob's Little League games saying, "How would you like another sister? Don't tell anyone because I haven't talked it over with your father and we haven't started the process, yet." She said that it was the "look in his eyes" when he was talking about his little girls.

Throughout the adoption I remember telling people that it would be "after Christmas" then "next summer" then "by Thanksgiving". I've heard some people say that adoption is a pregnancy but four times as long and without the child. Everyday, I would wish that we would get the call and that our baby would be born today and that we would get her soon. Although, if that happened we wouldn't of ended up with our little Lydia Mei.

I wrote the first poem ("Lonely") one day after we got our referral. I remember coming home from school and both of my parents were waiting in the kitchen with the pictures. It was surreal, it was like "Seriously? This can't be happening! Finally!" The first thing I noticed was the distant look in her eyes, they looked empty like there was something missing. I thought about it more and realized that the something missing was us, her family. God created every child to want and need a family. It just melts my heart to know that there are tons of children out there who need a family and who have that look in their eye. But I know that God has a plan for each and every one of them because he wants them to have a family. I am positive that is why he stirs up an "adoption call" in His children.

When I wrote that poem, I wanted to make it so that Lydia Mei could read it when she was older and understand that it was no coincidence that she was placed with us and that it was God's doing and timing. Psalm 68:6 says that, "God sets that lonely in families..." I tried to make sure that it showed we loved her, love her and will love her (even through those very frequent sleepless nights).

The after poem ("Loved") came to me after I was playing with her about a month after she came home. She has changed, she has a spark in her eye that she didn't have before. I am sure that she knows that we are her forever family and that we are what she was missing for the first year of her life. She knows that we will come to her when she calls and will love her unconditionally.

We love you Lydia Mei!

Elizabeth