My phone rang as I was about to step into the gym. The countdown began. I had five minutes to make a decision that would change the course of my life forever. And even more than mine, it would change the life of a ten-day-old baby.
Allow me to go back in time a little in order to fill you in. Two years before that phone call my wife and I walked into a foster and adoption orientation classroom. We had only been married for two months but we both knew we wanted to adopt. We wanted to try to help a child out of the Los Angeles county foster care system and I naïvely thought we should get certified so we would be able to adopt when we were ready. Ideally after we had a biological child. That was the plan. Oh how naïve we were.
That was just over two years before the phone call.
Four months before the phone call we had a ten day old little baby boy dropped off at our house by a social worker. We were still new to the system so when we were told this little baby would be adoptable, we believed it. Learning the ropes of the foster care system has a tough learning curve, and it hit us right in the face. It is a very long and sad story but two months later the little boy was no longer in our care. I cried for a week after we lost him. I still cry when I share the story.
I was devastated. I needed time away from the system to recover. But my wife needed something else for her recovery. She needed to know that they could call us again with another child. I felt my wife needed to try again more than I needed to wait, so we put our name back on the list to receive phone calls for children in need of a home.
Two months after that, my phone rang as I was walking into the gym.
My wife was on the other end of the line, she told me to keep an open mind. She knew I wanted to adopt a boy as our first child. But she said there was a little baby girl at the hospital that needed a home. The social worker didn’t have very much information to pass along to us so it only took my wife a few seconds to share all the information available with me. We needed to call the social worker back to tell him if we would take her. We had five minutes.
I didn’t need five minutes. I didn’t need one.
I couldn’t say no.
That was one year ago.
Now we are on the path to adopting that little girl. The last year has taught me many lessons about the foster care system. It has also given me many more reasons to adopt than I originally had. I would like to highlight just three for you.
- My daughter’s smile
Adoption is hard, especially adoption from the foster care system. And there were many times during the process when my wife and I wanted to quit because it seemed like we would never be able to help a child. There were times when we discussed taking an easier path. But we are glad we didn’t. And you know what has made the whole journey worth it? My daughter’s smile.
My daughter loves to smile. She smiles all the time. In the last year we have never taken her out of the house without getting stopped by a stranger who comments on her cute smile. Not once.
Which leaves me with two thoughts: Would her smile be as big as it is without us? And would my smile be as big as it is without her?
- My daughter’s strength
I once lifted a pickup truck and turned it sideways. Another time I lifted 730 pounds in a deadlifting contest. I have worked out consistently for over 18 years. But my daughter is the strongest person I know. She has been through more struggles in her short life than most people go through in their entire lifetime. She is a survivor. For the sake of her privacy and the safety of the system I wont go into details, but I will say that I’ve never seen a human who is tougher than my daughter.
Her strength inspires me. Her resilience impresses me. Her toughness encourages me. As her dad, I know I’m supposed to be her hero, but sometimes she is the one teaching me how to be brave and strong.
- My daughter’s story
As an author, I love to write about adoption and the foster care system. As a member of the entertainment industry, I’m embarrassed to say these are two subjects that we have gotten wrong for a long time. Adoption and foster care stories are poorly portrayed in movies and on television and poorly covered by the news. I want to help change that. That is one of the reasons I like to tell our story. And it’s my dream that one day my daughter might want to join me and tell hers. Maybe together all of us can change the way society views adoption. Until then, I have one job. My job is to make sure my daughter’s story has a happy ending.
Pardon me while I get back to work.
“The premise of The Nephilim Virus is exceptional, original and unlike anything I have read before. I loved the many themes and elements explored throughout the book; topics such as religion and ancient history are excellently explored by Prather, and he does this by lacing these interesting themes throughout the text flawlessly and weaving them with the story. The result of this makes The Nephilim Virus a highly addictive and fascinating read that is never once lackluster or predictable. Prather really has accomplished the near impossible, Prather has managed to write an entertaining, bewitching and flawless story that will perfectly unfold in readers minds like a movie.” – Redheaded Book Lover Review
