One Growing Family’s Story...
Katie Comes Home

Three years into our marriage we were blessed with our first daughter, Lindsey. She was a beautiful baby. By this time we were living in Louisiana, and we felt that we were prepared to deal with the issues a baby brought. We were very happy, but knew in our hearts that we weren't finished. Eighteen months later Lindsey's sister, Christina, joined the picture. Shortly after Christina was born we inquired about being foster parents. We took the classes and were trying to decide if we wanted to foster or adopt when we received a call asking, "Do you want a son?" Quick decisions and fast-talking brought us our first son, Mark. We were on the express plan with Mark, because he was 17 years old when he came aboard. He made his way into this family, and it was just like he was with us his entire life. We are not going to say there weren't bumps in the road, but those bumps were easily flattened.

After adopting Mark, we felt that our family was beginning to feel complete. We had 2 beautiful daughters, and 1 very active teenager. What more could we want? Well, 2 years later Heather had an unexpected pregnancy that ended in miscarriage. After the miscarriage we realized that we were nowhere near finished. So, 1 year later we welcomed Andrew to the family. Now, to keep everyone updated, that makes 4 very active, wonderful kids.

About this time we realized, as a family, that we were ready for a change. John was offered a position in Wisconsin, and we decided to make the move. We wanted our children to grow up near their grandparents. We also were living in a large city, and wanted our children to grow up in the country. So, in February of 2003 we moved to our present home in Elroy, Wisconsin.

It took the family a couple years to recover from the move. There was house searching to do, unpacking to do, extra-curricular activities to become involved in, and a now college-aged son to get settled. But after 2 years, we began to feel the "bug" again. Heather was at work when one day a friend emailed her information about a young little girl in China who needed a family. Something drew us to this particular child, but we still don't know what. We are not what you would call a "spiritual" family. We go to church, but we have always felt that you can't be passive in your life. Things happen only when you make them happen. Well, we are here to tell you that someone else was involved in this match, because this little girl never left our hearts. From that moment on, we knew she was our daughter. So we called La Vida International and began the adoption process in September of 2004.B
To be honest, we chose La Vida International because they were the agency that had the photo listing of our daughter. La Vida International had the information we wanted about her, and they were the ones who could bring her home. However, we are very grateful and pleased with the outcome. We can't really go into why we choose China, because that, again, was out of our hands. China had our daughter, plain and simple, and we needed to bring her home. We did research adoption from China and were very pleased with our findings. China had fewer restrictions than many of the countries, and the fees were quite reasonable. We also liked the fact that the process could be, as ours was, completed in less than 1 year's time. I was very pleased with the timely response from China in regards to the information we needed about Katie (Shifeng Dang). Everyone was helpful, the information and paperwork was done timely, and the entire process ran like clockwork. We had always heard horror stories about adoptions (paperwork being lost, never being received, fees increasing, child being misrepresented.) This wasn't the case with our journey. It has been a very rewarding process, and we will probably do it again.

La Vida planned everything for us and our trip was fully guided. We didn't feel comfortable leaving all the kids for 2 weeks without 1 parent, so Daddy John stayed behind and Grandma was more than happy to go in his place. On August 9th, at 1:30 a.m. China Time, we were welcomed at the airport by our new 6 year old daughter Katie Michelle Fritz. It was the most amazing experience. Shifeng Dang, born in January of 1999 and who we later named Katie, came to us immediately. She welcomed us, and knew that we were her parents. She was, and still is, bright, curious, and beautiful. She knew from the start that she was our daughter, and never had to be alone again. The entire process was beautiful.

The plane trip home was also a concern. Heather wondered how she was going to keep a 6-year-old entertained for 18 hours. Katie did wonderful. She played her CD we brought her, we read, and we slept. It was no problem. We have had Katie home for about 2 months now. The entire family has welcomed her with open arms. She loves her sisters, and tolerates her little brother. We are now a big family with lots of love to share.

There is one thing we haven't mentioned. Katie, like her father John, and like our older son Mark, is blind. The fact that we have waited so long to mention this is because it is a mute point in our family. Blindness is just one of Katie's characteristics. However, the blindness did add some excitement to the pot. Teaching a blind child English was one area that was unknown to us. We are here to say that the time we wasted worrying about that issue was just that, wasted time. We decided the expert was Katie, and let her take the lead. There haven't been many problems. Those that did arise, Katie figured out on her own.

Katie, like many of the children, had her list of possible illnesses. She was stated to have possible intellectual deficits, genetic disorders, and miscellaneous issues we don't even remember. We were lucky enough to look past most of them because our hearts took lead and told us to believe. Katie is very smart. She is in the public schools, in the same classroom with her sister Christina. She is learning English faster than any child we have ever known, and she has firmly planted herself in our family unit. She has also had reactions to immunizations, major surgery, and homesickness. But we have made it through as a family, and we are all stronger for it.

We have heard many people state that they can't afford foreign adoption due to the cost. They are correct, it's very expensive. But having a child today is very expensive, and there are never any guarantees. We were very lucky to come across many organizations that are willing to assist in the funding of adoptions, one being Brittany's Hope. Thanks to a grant from another family thousands of miles away, we were able to afford the adoption. La Vida International also assisted by waiving their fees and even provided additional assistance with a $7,000 "waiting child" grant. We now know that cost should never be a barrier to bringing home your child and that there are agencies out there willing to assist.

Anyone thinking about adoption needs to listen to their hearts. You can play the "what if" game for years, or you can spend those years with a child that will bring you more joy and happiness than anything else could possibly ever do. We have come to the conclusion that some things do happen for a reason. Do we know if our family is done growing? (And believe us, we have been asked.) We don't know. We believe that if another child is meant to be a part of our lives, our hearts will tell us, and we will follow.

La Vida recently received referrals of 20 children who need families. For more information about La Vida's Special Waiting Child Program and the children who wait, please click here.