O’Byrnes recount adoption experience

March 1, 2010 • Dylan McAlexander  
Filed under News

One miracle. That’s all it took for the O’Byrne family to meet their four newest members of the family. The story started in 2006, when their daughter Emily, 16 at the time, when to Haiti on a mission trip. While she was there she worked in an orphanage where she met a young boy named Blandy. Soon the two became close. Each night Emily would pray that this little boy would some how touch the hearts of her parents, and they would give him the kind of home he deserved.

While interested in adopting a child, Emily’s mother, Alecia, was dubious about having just one child from Haiti in her home. The family ended up adopting another boy named Blanco and brother and sister, Jackson and Woodlyn.

During the long adoption procedure, a church in Topeka asked to pray over the family. After the prayer, the congregation sang “Mighty to Save,” a hymn that fit the situation perfectly.

Four years after the whole process started, and two since the family had seen the four kids, a monstrous natural disaster suddenly hit. On January 12, 2010 Haiti was hit with a 7.0 earthquake, sending the lives of many into mass chaos. For the O’Byrne family, it put their trip to Haiti on hold.

“We were supposed to leave the Tuesday before, but due to paperwork issues we couldn’t,” Alecia said.

After the earthquake hit the family was very worried about where their children were, and if they were safe. A friend of the O’Byrne family was in Haiti at the time a mission trip. Right after the disaster hit he called home to his wife in Topeka and later that night she contacted Alecia and Tim.

The family friend had international calling available to him on his t-mobile phone and just knew in the back of  his mind that this was going to be a large phone bill, but well worth it. The cell phone lasted five days without being charged, and when they asked the phone company about the bill, they had no record of his calls.

“It was such a miracle he had a phone, and that the phone lasted as long as it did,” Alecia said. “The funny part was that as soon as he got back to the United States his cell phone died.”

With the earthquake’s sudden arrival the adoption was quickly pushed into high gear. The O’Byrne family was able to take home their newest children with in a matter of days and they were the first kids to get to leave Haiti.

“I then knew it was a miracle. God was working with us and he knew our family would give him praise,” Alecia adds.

While sitting in an early Sunday morning service at the First Baptist Church of Holton, all of the congregation was anxious to know about the family and if they were all safe. As the congregation began singing “Mighty to Save,” the O’Byrne family rushed in with all eleven of their family members with them. Their prayers had been answered.

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