Why Vietnam? | Reece's Rainbow

The first question most people ask us when they learn we are adopting is "Why Vietnam??!" and that is an excellent question! It took Heavenly Father years to tell us, so here is the story in the 10 minute version.

When Mark and I were in China we got to go to the World's Fair in Shanghai in 2010. If you haven't had a chance to attend a World's Fair before, you should definitely go! Basically every country in the world showcases their country, culture, customs, and uniqueness. It's so fun! Larger countries with the means to do so construct entire buildings to exhibit their country, other smaller countries have a booth next to other smaller countries. When we got there we purchased a little fake "passport" and every country you "visit" stamps your book with their country stamp. It's the best! Anyway, long story short, Vietnam was my favorite exhibit. As soon as we walked in there I said "we have to go to Vietnam!" I can't even say why it struck me so much, or what was so great about it, but it was meant to be. Heavenly Father was talking to us in any way he could and at that point in our lives it was to put that little thought in my heart. "We have to go to Vietnam."

Fast forward years later, after learning of our infertility and learning to love life just the way it was, we embarked on many different travel adventures. Vietnam was of course on the list and we had our chance last year. Mark's parents were serving a mission in Hong Kong and we knew we wanted to go visit them. We also wanted to go somewhere we hadn't been before since you know... we were over there anyway. This was our chance! We took a fast break in the middle of our trip visiting Mark's parents to take a quick flight over to Vietnam. Because of work schedules, we were only able to stay for a couple days so we missed out on a bunch of the things we wanted to do and see, but we got to explore Hanoi and loved it! We had pho for every meal and sweat bucket loads while we walked around the humid city streets, but that is what vacation is all about right? While we were there Mark had the prompting that "maybe we should adopt from Vietnam." He shared it with me, and me being me immediately shot it down. "It will be way too hard!" "You're just thinking that because we are here and you see poverty and people in need and want to help." "It's because we are here and we have been talking about adoption a lot lately."

Then, at the beginning of this year Mark's family was all gathered in the living room while his parents were opening their next mission call. Hanoi, Vietnam! As soon as Mark heard the call he was overwhelmed with the prompting that we needed to look there to adopt. He pushed it away with the same kinds of things I had said before. "No, it's too hard." "I'm just thinking that because my parents are going to serve a mission there." But that prompting wouldn't go away. In fact it just kept getting stronger. (I, in the meantime, was feeling simultaneously proud of myself that I had guessed the mission destination correctly and terribly sorry for myself that his parents were leaving AGAIN so soon and for so long.) Soon after everyone had said their congratulations and had done all the hugging, Mark pulled me aside and took me into the back office. He was crying (which I had NEVER seen him do to this extent) and as soon as I looked at him I knew too. We are adopting from Vietnam. I think's Mark's exact words were "I'm sorry, I know you don't want to, but we are supposed to adopt from Vietnam." I of course started crying too and while we were crying and hugging Mark's dad awkwardly walked in on us and I'm sure he thought we were fighting or something.

Now that we have "the plan" I can see how Heavenly Father was watching out for us and I'm sure wanting to give us the answers we were so desperately seeking the whole time. We just weren't ready to hear them until all the links were in place for us. He told us as soon as He could so that we would understand.

That night we went home and immediately started researching what adoption in Vietnam looks like. We quickly learned that the twists and turns and surprises were only beginning. We had the place we needed to adopt from, but that "infant/newborn" that I wanted to adopt was not what was going to happen. Not only that, but only special needs children are adopted from Vietnam. My mental image of what our family would look like was changing faster than I could comprehend. But there was a sweet peace that accompanied these new revelations. This is what Heavenly Father has in store for us. It's not anything close to what we expected or planned... it's so much better.