Most of the stories I share are stories of parents learning their child has Down Syndrome. The diagnosis process can be brutal for some, whether it happens prenatally or at birth. However, for those who are never able to wrap their heads around parenting a child with special needs, whether it be due to the time in their lives, the situation they find themselves in, or just fear, there are families who are specifically interested in adopting a child with Down Syndrome. This is one such story, a beautiful tale about adopting a child with Down Syndrome.

I would like to start this story by introducing myself and my family. My name is Lubov and I am 48 years old. I live together with my sister and 6 adopted children, 5 of which have DS. We live in the Saint Petersburg’s area in Russia. My sister and I both have birth children who are already working and living outside home.

Our story started in 2006 when I started to work in one of the St. Petersburg’s adoption centers for the children younger than 4 years old as a medical assistant. 3 Months later I have adopted a 1.6 years old boy, who looked a lot like my son at this age.

Within the 6 years that I was working there, I had seen many children being adopted, but babies with DS were never taken. From these adoption centers, babies with DS were further transferred to the orphanages for disabled children, where the living conditions are much more difficult that in the adoption centers and children are more likely to stay there forever.

I was always worried about these children and during the sleepless nights thinking about their lives and future. During the Soviet times, it was very common to leave your child with Down Syndrome after the birth in the hospital as people didn’t know anything about this condition and were afraid to fail, as well of being criticised by the public for having an “unhealthy child”. Of course, now the situation is much better and most of the children with DS grow up in the families. However, there are still many babies with DS in the adoption centers and orphanages but now there are many families who adopt them and give them the love they deserve.

Marina

I was looking at the websites of the adoption centers and In 2012 I found Marina, a girl with DS and made a decision to take her into our family. She was only 3.6 years old, was only 84 cm (33 inch) and almost couldn’t walk. Marina has easily adapted to her new home and family and started to go to the developmental preschool. Although due to the health problems she couldn’t attend preschool every day I have realized how much she loves other children and being a part of the group so I started to think about another baby.

Yana

One of my friends told me about a girl with DS that has been directly influenced by the new law of “Dima Yakovlev”. This law has prohibited foreigners to adopt children in Russia and one American family who came to meet Yana, didn’t manage to adopt because of this law. In December 2013 I took Yana into our home. She is very sweet and funny girl, although she had huge problems with tvision, because of this, she almost couldn’t walk. We had to do an operation and purchase special glasses. Yana started to feel much better, started to develop faster, walk and even run. Marina and Yana became very good friends and Marina started to teach Yana how to play and help her around. After awhile they became real sisters.

 

 

Sima

In 2014 the local adoption center has offered us to take another girl with DS who was only 7 months old and we couldn’t let her stay there. Both Marina and Yana very enthusiastically accepted her as a family member and were always trying to touch her and to play with her. After a few months, it has been identified that Sima has various somatic health problems and was developing with quite a big delay. Her situation needed special attention and treatment which only a family can provide.

 

 

 

 

Vladik

One of the orphanages for the children without disabilities was located next to our home and once when passing there I saw a boy with DS seating alone in the snow, other children were playing and not giving him any attention. I was very surprised, as usually children with DS stay in other institutions. On a few occasions during this winter, when going out, we had been going around this orphanage and saw this boy always seated alone. In the spring we caught his attention and he smiled at us. For the next few next days we were coming closer and calling him to come to the fence and talk to us, so after awhile he started to recognize us. We began to think about adoption, but the decision to adopt was not coming easy until we heard this boy’s story. He was living with his family until he was 4 years old, but in November 2014 his family had another “healthy” child and decided to give Vladik away, that is how he came to the orphanage. In September 2014 Vladik came to our home. He turned out to be very independent and serious boy who could do many things by himself and was trying very hard. I think for a long time he was very scared we would give him back so we changed so we would never walk close to this orphanage where he was located before.

 

Milana

Within the last years many children started to find families and adoption centres started to get closed as it was no need for so many anymore. Out local adoption centre was also closing and we were asked if we would want to take the last child – a girl with DS. We though that a house with 4 children has a place for the fifth one and she was the same age as Sima. This is how Milana became a part of our family in December 2016, which is less than a year now.
All of our children go to the institution for the early development wherein they are working with several teachers on early intervention programs. Unfortunately it is possible only once, sometimes twice a week as it takes us over 2 hours one way driving to get to school as we live outside the city. Also we have teachers coming to out home. Although next year our oldest children will need to go to the special school and right now we are working on the plan how to make it logistically happened as it is around 100km (63 Miles) from our home to this school.
Our children are very happy, all of them develop fast and make big steps forward and most importantly love each other and enjoy each other every minute of every day.

 

Luba and her sister, Vera, live in Russia with their 5 adopted children.

They were both born in Leningrad in soviet union times, (now St. Peterburg, Russia) where they have lived ever since. Luba has 2 birth children (a son who is 27 years old and a daughter who is 23 years old) Vera has a son who is 19 years old.

My sister’s life and mine are similar to many women in 90’s, not easy. Politically, we have experienced very hard times, monetary inflation, different wars and after revolutions’ instability. My husband and I had 2 children together, but during the 90’s it was hard to find a job and my husband went to look for a job in a different city. Besides finding a job, he has also established another family there. My sister had a similar story. A few years later my sister and I bought an apartment together and moved in.  That is when the next, and most important chapter of our lives is, rearing our children. 

You can follow Luba and Vera on instagram @stupnikofffamily

 

When a mama has a baby who is diagnosed with Down Syndrome there is often a process that occurs.  That process can include a time of grieving and tears but for this mama that was later followed by a love so big it spanned oceans and brought her not one, but two beautiful souls with Down Syndrome.

I married my high school sweetheart and we were able to do mission work in an orphanage in Romania. I have wanted to adopt since I was a little girl. Reading the book Lost Girls of China and our mission work only solidified this desire. Our plan was to have 3 biological children and adopt what would be our 4^th child.

Children 1 and 2 came relatively easy, but we then had multiple miscarriages, years of unsuccessful fertility procedures, and finally decided to stop trying. We started the foster adoption process (January ’13). Mid-way through we lost my little sister (March ’13) and knew we needed to allow ourselves time to grieve properly before bringing more children who were also broken into our home.

Related Post: A Down Syndrome Adoption- Peanut’s Story.

A year after our last fertility treatment and 6 months after the death of my sister, we found out we were pregnant with Jude (August ’13). We were stunned and blown away. After he was born (March ’14) and we had his Down Syndrome diagnosis I told my husband our family was complete and this was all I could handle.

I was terrified and grieving the loss of my “typical child” dreams. I had no idea what the future held for Jude and our family.

But then, as the months went by I began to learn that Down Syndrome was not this huge scary diagnosis that I had thought it was. I began to see the complete joy that Jude brought to everyone around him. When he was about 16 months old (July ’15), I saw a little boy with DS called “Scout” being advocated for and I told Michael I wanted to consider adoption again. Now always when I thought of adopting it was a healthy child that I pictured. I never dreamed of adopting a child with special needs. Scout gripped me though, and made me think that we could do this. In September Jude was chosen to be one of the people featured in the NYC Buddy Walk Time Square video. We traveled to participate and while there met a family who had adopted 3 little girls with DS. We were blown away and simply amazed. Seeing Scout and meeting the Baz family was God’s way of nudging us in the direction towards DS adoption.

Just one month later in October ’15 we saw Max’s picture on Facebook in an advocacy post. We called the agency he was listed with and started the process. We are now 8 months home and it was the best decision we have ever made for our family. The relationship between Jude and Max is absolutely amazing. I watch the two of them together and it brings tears to my eyes to see them interact. They are 3 months apart and I can see them growing even closer as they grow up.

Related Post: Choosing Wyatt- A Down Syndrome adoption story.

They challenge each other and learn from one another. Jude is more advanced than Max right now, but I firmly believe Max is going to bypass Jude as time goes on. You might think having 2 is double the work, but it truly is not. Yes it is in practical matters – double diaper changes etc. But they do therapy appointments and specialist appointments at the same time. They entertain and play with one another. As far as my older 2 children (age 12 and 9) – they have grown so much from having Jude and Max as siblings. They are more aware of differences in others and strive to make everyone feel included. They share with friends and others about Down Syndrome and disability.

My older children cheer the boys on and celebrate each milestone and accomplishment as much as Michael and I do. People often tell me how awesome we are for adopting another child with DS. What they don’t know is how selfish a decision it really was. Jude is an incredible child who keeps us laughing, smothers us in kisses and hugs, and lives life so beautifully and innocently that we wanted more of that in our lives. One of the questions I hate to be asked is did we know Jude had DS. Implying if we had known we would have done something about it. So in a way, I feel like our adoption of Max screams to the world we may not have had a choice with Jude, but we 100% had a choice with Max and we would do it a 1000 more times if given the chance.

 

Whittney married her high school sweetheart and together they have 4 children. After the birth of their 3rd son and his Down Syndrome diagnosis, the entire family became passionate about raising awareness to reduce the stigma of disability. This past year the Moody’s adopted their son Max from China who is also rocking an extra 21st chromosome. The Moody’s live in Georgia and have started a 5k race on World Down Syndrome Day to raise support for families adopting children with Down Syndrome.  You can follow Max & Jude on Facebook at Max and Jude More Alike than Different and on  Instagram @Max_and_jude