Sep 4, 2016
By Lori LeRoy
From Vietnamese Mangroves and a Loving Mom
The runway was not much more than a lightly paved strip of soil which popped out of the rice paddies and mangroves like a long, rectangular oasis. As I exited the 1950’s prop, much like the one that Indiana Jones rides in Raiders of the Lost Ark, I felt stifled instead of being freed from the tight quarters that I’d just ridden in. The density and weight of the atmosphere made it hard to inhale deeply– and it was more than just heat and humidity of the southernmost part of Vietnam – Ca Mau, a peninsular province with the Gulf of Thailand to the West and the Pacific Ocean to the South and East. I was stepping foot on the same soil where my son was born, breathing the same sticky, tropical air that he did. The son I had not yet met, and the son that I would not be bringing home to Indiana after the eight days that I’d be there.
As excited as I was to meet my baby — the one that I dreamed of and had dreams for — I needed to guard my emotions. Upon seeing my first photo of him, my heart skipped a beat when I gazed into those deep brown eyes and saw the shock of black hair standing up on his head. I knew that without a doubt that he was my son. It was my moment of a doctor handing my child to me to put on my chest and feeling a love like no other.
Much like the southern Vietnamese mangroves’ intertwined roots, strong and complicated, his homecoming was constricted by the fact that he was stuck — stuck in an orphanage due to political posturing by both the U.S. and Vietnamese governments not willing to move an inch to finalize his adoption, despite him living in squalid and unsafe orphanage conditions.
I flew half-way around the world and was there with two other moms in the same situation to help care for our children and the others in the orphanage. It was the one small thing we could actually do to help our kids, while we lobbied Congressional leaders and the State Department on the homefront.
Within minutes sweat was streaming down my face and soaking my clothes – a combination of the oppressive heat and my anxiety. My friends and I headed out to the orphanage in a taxi. There were few cars on the road, mostly bicycles and motor bikes. We raced along the tropical landscape – passing roadside markets where vendors sold pineapples, roosters in woven basket cages, plastic kitchenware and even python meat. Our taxi driver honked incessantly as he passed cars, though few, and played a game of chicken with oncoming traffic. A movie of mangroves and long boats with weathered fishermen, and the occasional water buffalo grazing in a yard ran through the car windows. Children with bare feet and dirty faces dotted the fast-moving landscape – all of it beautiful, colorful and full of life.
Finally, we turned down a one-lane dirt road lined by shallow canals, lush mango and tamarind trees, and tin roof-shacks with hammocks as beds. My stomach dropped to my knees when I saw the orphanage building.
My 22-month old son was literally imprisoned in his tiny room — it had bars on the windows, a former internment camp from the Vietnam War.
I had many conversations with him before I got to Vietnam (all in my head), promising him that I would do whatever it took to get him home to Indiana. I’d say “good night” to him when I woke up in the morning and whisper “good morning” before I fell asleep at night, living with my heart twelve hours ahead. And that week, I told him in person — kissing his smooth, tan cheeks, my tears wetting his sweet face as I held him close. And, then having to leave him.
Twenty-six months later, in the most unusual of places, we found refuge surrounded by luggage carts, drug-sniffing Beagles and a melody of different languages at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. His two tiny feet touched U.S. soil, and I felt palpable relief from my shoulders, fighting back yet another set of tears as my husband squeezed my hand and hugged us both.
Sitting at our departure gate for the last leg of our journey home, he sat in my lap and munched on a banana and French fries.
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About the Author
Lori LeRoy
Lori Green LeRoy is a communications professional and the author of The Inadequate Conception – From Barry White to Blastocytes: What your mom didn’t tell you about getting pregnant and the blog www.theinadequateconception.com She also is a contributing author to Martinis and Motherhood: Tales of Wonder, Woe, and WTF? LeRoy loves traveling, running, horseback riding, and talking about her kids. She is also an advocate of international adoption and orphan care reform.