Meet The "Wampler Zoo" Part II

Good morning ladies, so sorry I had to leave you hanging two weeks ago, but life as a mom of 11 children is always jammed packed with things to do. So, let’s see where did I leave off? Oh yeah, my heart was broken because we had filed intent to adopt forms for a baby boy we had been fostering when the courts order he be given back to his birth mother. That’s when the heartbreak became so deep that I did not want to keep fostering children. My husband and I discussed it and I called the office to let them know we were not going to continue to foster anymore. My heart could not take the pain of letting go. BUT as always God had a plan that He did not discuss with me first….

…..The very next week we received a call from the office, they had a baby boy that needed a home. They were in a bind and could we just open our home to this child for a few weeks until they found him a home? I said, “No, I can’t do that” and hung up! The next day they called again, and again, I said, “No! I just can’t do this. Find him another home.” The very next day the director called and played on the mother in me, “This child was a legal risk adoption” meaning that when he had been in care for 12 months they would seek to terminate parental rights and he would be available for adoption. This special little boy was born without an esophagus and was not to live past 5 years of age. He had never been loved by a real mother and they just needed him to stay until they could find him a good match.

I called Rich and we discussed it at length, deciding we would meet this child and we would pray over it. We setup the visit; Rich could not get off of work so I would meet this child first and let him know what I decided. I will never forget the day that I met this angel unawares. This little boy with a huge square head, so short his shorts came to his ankles instead of his knees, his snow white, curly hair framed his face making him actually look angelic. I opened the front door for him and his foster mom, and he raised a fat little hand as high as he could reach and said, “ Hi, Mama!” and pushed by me. From that moment on he had my heart in his little fat hands. His foster mom left us and we played for an hour, talking about all the things that an 18 month old little boy loves to discuss, from bugs, to Barney the dinosaur, to dogs, to blocks. When his foster mom came back to pick him up I didn’t want to let him go, I wanted him to stay forever. I immediately called the office and told his social worker that we wanted him to come and live with us. I didn’t know how I was going to deal with losing my child at five years old, but I left that up to the Lord, when the time came He would give me the strength I needed to live through that part of life.

The next week, our sweet Richard moved in with us. He helped me put his clothes up and we put all of the toys into his toy box, then we went down stairs for our snack, while waiting on the new daddy to come home from work. Rich still had not met this little boy that had won my heart with just two words. Richard helped me make supper, hot dogs and French fries and we played for a while waiting on the other foster kids to come home from school.

When Rich came home he had the same immediate love of this little boy, how could you not fall in love with such precious innocence. God had given us an angel to love. We had supper and we put on a kids movie, and sat down to watch TV with the kids. What fun we had, I gave everyone a Popsicle to eat and we just played, tickling and rolling all over the floor. God taught me something special that night, He taught me that all it takes is a little love to make a family from the pieces that He gives us. And it is not hard at all to give your entire heart to a child no matter how hard you try not to.

As time progressed, we finally arrived at the time to terminate parental rights so that we could adopt Richard, by this time he was four years old. The judge granted our petition and the rights were terminated. We began the process of adoption. Because we adopted through family services, the adoption was paid for, Richard was considered medically fragile. We went to so many doctor appointments, in fact our adoption date was set for Sept. 3rd and he had surgery scheduled for Sept. 4th, I cannot express the fear in this old heart knowing that my son, was going to have surgery again, he was only our son for less than 24 hours and the doctors were going to take him and operate one more time.

The Lord did not hold my fear against me and Richard came through the surgery and did so well. God never works on man’s schedule. As he approached 5 years old my heart became so fearful that I had to make every second count as we were not promised any days more than five years old, we spent every moment together and we played and just enjoyed life. By this time, Richard was the only child we had in our home. We had requested our home be put on hold so that we could concentrate our love and time with Richard.

The day finally arrived when I had to take Richard for the check up on his esophagus; my heart was heavy with fear for what the doctor would have to say. As I sat in that waiting room, I prayed that the Lord would not take this precious child out of my life, I had friends all over the world praying with me that God would reach down and heal his fragile little body. The doctor came in to the room he had a huge smile on his face, and then I heard the words I thought I would never hear.

“Mrs. Wampler, I do not know what you have been doing with this child, what kind of care you have given him but I am ordering you to continue. He has never looked so good, so healthy and so happy. Also, I think it is important to note that I have looked over the test results and what I am reading is nothing shy of a miracle. Unless I look very closely I would not even see a scar from where we put in his esophagus. I can with all authority tell you that there is no time limit on how long this little boy will live, Only God knows and we will leave that up to Him. I want you to take your son home with you and I want you to love him, spoil and enjoy him for many years to come.” As I sat there crying, I realized that God had given me another miracle, He had taken the little faith that I had had on taking Richard in to our home and caring for him and had turned it into a life time of love.

On December 4, 2009, Richard celebrated eight years of being a miracle of God; (he is 13 years old now) he beat death for the eighth time. Richard knows how special he is and he is the reason that there are 10 other children in our home. Richard is also the reason that I chose my life verse to be Hebrews 13:2, “Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” (KJV)
I look forward to telling you more on our family and how God put the puzzle of our lives together.



With much love,
Rise’

My next blog is Tuesday, February 9th, hope to see you then!

Wednesday’s Blog: Michele, “Single working mom”