[joannab74]

Hi, our names are Jason and Jo Anna. Our youngest daughter, Kyleigh, was placed with us through a private adoption agency on November 4th, 2002 at the age of 10 weeks. Her birthmother's rights had already been terminated and we were told that the birthfather had skipped town when he found out she was pregnant. We had been leery up to that point about accepting an "at risk" placement, but we felt that this was one of the least risky "at risk" situations we'd seen, so we agreed to the placement.

Kyleigh's birthmom is a single mom parenting 5 other children, and felt she could not handle the responsibility of a sixth child. We did not get a chance to meet her face-to-face, but we spoke with her over the phone and it was obvious that she was firm in this choice.

In January, we were informed at a post-placement visit that Ky's birthmom had lied to the agency about who the birthfather was. The birthfather was actually a man with whom she had 3 of her older children. Worse still, she had also lied to him. She knew that he would never agree to an adoption, so after Ky was born she told the birthfather that Ky had died. At the time, he had accepted that as the truth, but in December while spending time with his three other children at her house, he found Ky's birth certificate. He confronted her and she told him the truth. He immediately demanded that she take him to the adoption agency, which she did and he started the process of trying to get Kyleigh back.

After many court postponements, continuances and such, the judge was finally able to hear testimony on December 4th, 2003. The judge ruled that he had obviously believed his child was dead and that from the time he found out the truth, he had done what was required to retain his rights, and Kyleigh could not be adopted.

We will be traveling on Monday, January 19th, to transition Kyleigh back into her birthfamily. Because we live
so far away this transition will only be 1 week instead of the usual 2-3 months.

It's hard for us to believe that in 2 short weeks, Kyleigh will no longer be ours. She has been our daughter for almost 15 months. She only saw her birthmom at birth, and really has never known any other parents but us. She's never seen her birthfather. As hard as this is on us, I can't even imagine what it's going to be like for Ky. She is too young to understand.
I can imagine her waking up in the middle of the night and wanting Daddy, and the Daddy she knows won't be there. I can imagine her getting hurt and wanting Mommy, and the Mommy she knows won't be there. We know she will feel like we abandoned her, rejected her, and that is killing us.

We are thankful that our older daughter, Samantha (9), is old enough to process this and go through the grieving process. We know that this will be incredibly hard on her, but at least she can understand it to a point. She very clearly said to us one night "this is why you shouldn't lie. Look at all the people [birthmom's] lie has hurt."

Jason and Jo Anna