My child's incredible story (# 2)

Sent by Malavika Bayangari Raghuram

Our incredible adoption story began just before the birth of our biological child. My husband and I had decided that the baby would be named Aalekhya if she was a girl and Akarsh if he was a boy. By God’s blessing our Aalekhya was born.

When Aalekhya turned two, we started thinking about our second child. When we got married, Raghu and I had decided that if we had our second baby, it would be by adoption. For about six months we wavererd about whether it was the right time to have our second baby and then we decided. Our daughter was (and continues to be) a mature child for her age and we involved her in the process from the beginning. Since we are Hindus and we knew that the baby had to be a boy, the baby was already named Akarsh in our minds and in our discussions.

We submitted our applications to a wonderful agency, Ashraya, in Bangalore and went through all the processes with the social worker. It was about 9 months after we had first met the personnel at Ashraya that my husband got a call that out baby was ready. I was at Hyderabad then and rushed back to B’lore with my mother. That whole night long, I had the name “Mohit” go on and on in my mind as I tossed and turned not able to sleep because of anticipation. I could not understand it as the baby had always been Akarsh for us.

The next day was a Thursday (and very auspicious for us) and Raghu and I went to the agency. We were given the profiles of two children and were asked to look at the profiles and then see which baby we would like to adopt. We were assured that we should not feel guilty that we were “rejecting” the other baby as there was always another family to which he would belong to. I looked at the first form, and yes, the name said MOHIT. That was the name the agency had given him. I did not even look at the second form. (This was 8 years ago and I still get goose pimples when I think of it). This was even more uncanny because Akarsh and Mohit mean the same thing – “attraction”.

We think Akarsh has ESP. In these last 8 years, there have been more than half a dozen incidents when he has casually said things which were impossible for him to know but were true. Maybe in his own way he was making sure that we would not make the wrong choice. For us, that was a sign that our baby was meant to be a part of us. We totally believe in God. I cannot proudly tell my son that he is more special than biologically born children or that he is born from the heart because that would hurt my daughter a lot. So we have always told them that womb or adopted, our babies are gifts from God and are both equally special, and in this we truly believe.