Military couple extends their family from Africa

Photo By Sgt. Adrianna Barnes | Tshion, daughter to Maj. Peter Hathaway, 1-229th Attack Reconnaissance Squadron S-3, and his wife, Kristen, patiently waits in Ethiopia for her adoption process to be complete in October 2012.  

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, UNITED STATES

09.25.2012

Story by Sgt. Adrianna Barnes 

16th Combat Aviation Brigade

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. - Adoptions can be both challenging and rewarding, but the challenges military couples face can often times be uniquely different due to constant change of duty station. For Maj. Peter Hathaway, 1-229th Attack Reconnaissance Squadron S-3, and his wife, Kristen, overcoming those challenges was a must in completing their family.

Both Kristen and Peter wanted to adopt a child even prior to meeting. When the couple first began dating, one of the things that attracted them to one another is their desire to adopt a child. They both wanted to adopt a child with a special need for a family.

“We knew there were a lot of kids out there that need a family and we just want to provide a family for a child,” Peter said. “We were lucky enough to find someone to fill that need for.”

Choosing the right time to take on the many challenges a person may face when trying to adopt was key. With their biological daughter, Amelia, now 2 years old, Kristen and Peter decided that they were ready to adopt.

“So when we were married, we prayed about when the right time would be, and about seven months ago we felt like God opened the doors and we began the process,” Kristen said.

While there is great need of families for children both domestically and internationally, the couple decided to adopt from Ethiopia because Kristen had done missionary work in Kenya for seven months. There, she fell in love with the people and culture and saw an immense need for adoption due to the orphan crisis in many African countries.

In Africa, a large majority of the children are orphans due to poverty or illness; the most prominent being HIV and AIDS. Ethiopia has more than 100,000 orphans in the city of Addis Ababa and more than 5 million in the country. About 800,000 of them are AIDS orphans.

“At that time [during her missionary work] I knew Africa would be where I chose to adopt,” Kristen said. “Pete felt the same way about Africa so it was natural for us to move in that direction when considering adoption.”

The couple set out on their path researching several adoption agencies and identifying which programs they were eligible for, which brought on its own set of challenges due to Peter being in the military and the family moving so frequently.

“Although all adoptions have some significant loss or grieving process, we felt the international route might be a better match for a military family,” Peter said.

After deciding on an agency, Kristen and Peter began the adoption process with what many adoptive parents affectionately refer to as the “paper chase.” The couple essentially laid their life out in paper form. Documents include everything from birth certificates, marriage licenses, financial worksheets, three letters of references, to background checks from every state they lived in throughout the last five years.

The biggest part of the report is the home study, which is conducted by a licensed social worker that met with Kristen and Peter three times in order to approve them to be adoptive parents. All their findings from the home study were put into a document that would be sent to Ethiopia. Once the dossier was approved by the agency, the couple then waited for a referral.

For couples requesting to adopt an infant from Ethiopia, current approximate wait times are about 2-4 years. For families wishing to adopt a child who is older or who has special needs, wait times range from one month to four years. The fastest way to adopt a child is to choose a child off of a “waiting child list.”

Kristen and Peter chose to adopt a child off the wait list because they felt those children were most in need of a family. After reviewing several children on the wait list, they chose to adopt and 8-year-old girl named Tshion, (see-on). Once the referral was received and accepted, a court date was set in order to award them custody of the child they wished to adopt. The court date was the couple’s first chance to meet their new daughter, Tshion.

“She is a bright, funny, vivacious, caring, kind 8-year-old that has been through more things than most people can imagine,” Kristen said. “She is athletic and has a dream right now of becoming a super model. Seriously, she has her own runway walk made up. She is so excited to have a family and we feel honored that we are going to be that family.”

“When we first met Tshion, one of her first questions was ‘where’s my sister?’ They both [Tshion and Amelia] seem very interested in being a sister,” Peter said. “She had a little pair of sunglasses she wanted us to give to Amelia.”

The Hathaways’ process has been simple and easy compared to what some families have experienced, they said. The challenge for the Hathaways was the quick time frame of the whole adoption. From start to bringing her home will be right at nine months.

Financially, having gone through the process so rapidly has put some strain on Kristen and Peter but they receive a lot of support from their family and friends, and set aside savings just for the fees associated with adoption.

“Right now the hardest part is the waiting. We will hopefully have her home by the end of October,” Kristen said. “It is hard being away from a child that is legally yours. It is hard not being able to care for her when she is sick and not being able to remind her every night of how loved and desired she is.”

At 8 years old, Tshion is very aware of her situation and circumstances. Currently Tshion speaks little English and for that reason Kristen and Peter want to keep her close to home for awhile before sending her off to school. Kristen and Peter are as eager to teach their new daughter English and American culture, as they are to learn and embrace her Ethiopian culture.

“Family is not just about blood, color or anything else that we like to separate ourselves by. It is about loving another human being. It is about living out your life sacrificially for another person so that they might see their worth or beauty,” Kristen said.

• Date Taken: 09.25.2012
• Date Posted: 09.25.2012 17:50
• Story ID: 95283
• Location: JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, US