Ben's Gotcha Day

Six years ago today we anxiously awaited having our son, Benjamin, all to ourselves. Our journey to him took less than 6 months from the time we started the adoption process, but this was a journey that God had planned for us for a long time. Our son was born before we became eligible to start the adoption process with Korea. He waited patiently for his parents to come to him.

We tell him about our first night as a family at the SWS Guest House. Justin tells Ben how he had a poopy diaper as soon as we got to our room. I tell him about having to give him medicine for his cold and having him throw it back up each time I gave it. I learned by the third time that it was not worth giving it to him just to have him get sick and us have to clean him up. We bonded that night as we took turns sleeping next to him. He had a cold, so neither of us really slept. We prayed for an open flight coming home. A side note...we had take an Asiana flight going stand by (or space available). This is usually not the best option when traveling close to the holidays. Flights are typically oversold and one can spend anywhere from several hours to several days trying to get a flight out. We had called the airline the next morning to find out our flight was oversold, but we decided to take a chance anyway. We checked in around noon for a 4pm flight. The gate agents told us to wait. We were finally told at 3:30pm that we would be able to have 3 seats on the flight! We hurried through customs and was whisked onto the airplane by some Asiana employees. They had us skip all of the other people waiting since we were traveling with a child. We were overwhelmed by the kind service they gave. We were especially thankful that Ben had a wonderful 14 hour flight to LA. He was happy and ate well and even slept really well. We met Allison, Austin, and Kylie in the LA airport in between that flight and our flight on Midwest Airlines to Milwaukee. Since our Asiana flight was a little late and customs took longer than anticipated, we had only a short time to spend with them. We appreciated the long drive Allison made with her 2 kids to see us. It meant a lot to us to have family there as arrived in the U.S. We made our Midwest flight and slept almost the entire 4 hours back to Milwaukee. We were blessed with a wonderful flight crew, including one flight attendant who has 2 children she adopted from Romania.

Although 6 years have passed, it still fills my heart with joy as I remember our first trip to Korea. We were so excited and scared as we knew our lives would forever be changed.

Today we celebrated by surprising Ben with a Milios sub at lunchtime. He thought it was a special treat for mom and Ian to bring him a special lunch. I also brought a treat for his class, which he passed out and explained to the other kids in his class what Gotcha Day means. We celebrated at home as a family with a special present for him and his current favorite meal of Taco Bell (which he has only had once, but he declares that it is his favorite). He enjoyed putting together some new legos and then talking more about when we went to Korea to bring him home. So long ago, yet seems like yesterday.

Our prayer is that our son will forever know how much he is loved and how much he was wanted. We celebrate Gotcha Day because it is the day we finally GOT each other.