A Messiah College graduate finally brought her adopted son from his birth country of India to the U.S. after a four-year international adoption battle, requiring tireless work with courts in both countries, as reported by The Patriot-News for Pennsylvania Live.
It began when R.M. traveled to India to work as a missionary in an orphanage. She had been there twice before, working with the same orphanage located in the foothills of the Himalayas.
Soon she met an unwed mother – the woman had been hiding her pregnancy and planned on returning to her village alone in an attempt to avoid public condemnation.
The orphanage doesn’t take infants and, even if it did, they were filled to capacity with other children.
The woman was about to leave her 3-pound 2-day old newborn in a dump behind a hospital until R.M. gained the mother’s consent to take the child into her own custody.
R.M. had the mother’s signature relinquishing custodial rights and the Indian government named R.M. as his legal guardian with permission to remove him from India to the U.S. for adoption.
However, the sticky part was adopting him in India.
The U.S. wouldn’t allow the child, now named Kyle, into the country without his adoption completed first. An immigration attorney and an attorney that specializes in adoption in the U.S. helped – and the adoption finally went through in a courtroom in Dauphin County Court via Skype.
Mark Silliker, one of R.M.’s attorneys in Harrisburg, said that it had been “a bureaucratic nightmare” and “this is not what America is about.”
The battle didn’t end there. Even with the legal adoption completed, R.M. was held up by the American embassy in New Delhi when she sought to obtain Kyle’s visa.
R.M.’s family in the U.S. gained additional help from Congressman Tim Holden and Senator Bob Casey Jr.
Eventually all of the puzzle pieces fit into place and R.M. arrived in Philadelphia on March 24.
The child has since attended a welcome party at his mother’s church, the Calvary Wesleyan Church in Millersburg. Once his initial timidness wore off he was showered with gifts that included Easter baskets, balloons and a red wagon.
Later he also got a tour of the family’s farmhouse – slightly more on the grander scale that the New Delhi apartment the two lived in while awaiting the adoption out in India. Some of the things that Kyle never had seen before including the home’s vacuum cleaner, bathtub, washing machine and dishwasher.
C.M., R.M.’s mother, wrote in an e-mail, “He’s so sweet, and so active too!”
Now, entering the month of April, R.M. plans on continuing to help Kyle adjust to all of the changes. The future for the family includes R.M. obtaining a job and finding a home. She also has an idea for a book she’d like to write: the story of an American woman and an Indian boy becoming a family.
If you are in the midst of an adoption or custody battle contact a family law attorney for help. Lessen the length, and stress, of your battle with proper representation.