Small Town News

Out of Haitis earthquake chaos comes an adoption miracle

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Elliott Enyeart, 2, looked at himself in the mirror during a recent medical evaluation at the Center for Adoption Medicine at the University of Washington.

Julie Enyeart, a reading specialist at Issaquah Valley Elementary School, was just getting out of a late-afternoon meeting last month when she picked up a voice message from a friend: "I'm sure you're terrified about what happened in Haiti."

What? she thought, panicking. What happened? She drove liome to Redmond in a lashing rainstorm, speeding wildly through the dark, picking up the news on her car radio: A magnitude 7.0 quake had struck the island nation.

The 27-month-old boy she was in the process of adopting -- Dimy Pierre, now Elliott Pierre Enyeart -- was in an orphanage there.

Two weeks later, after a humanitarian airlift of 22 orphans, her son is home with her. Enyeart said her joy at their reunion is tempered by the knowledge of all the other adoptive parents still waiting for word that their children can leave Haiti.

"It's a miracle," she said of being united with her son under such circumstances. "I thank God every day."

Now, Elliott toddles through Enyeart's condominium above Lake Sammamish Parkway. He sits entranced before a musical helicopter. He stacks plastic blocks and plays hide-and-seek behind his mom's legs.

But there are signs of early privation. In his first doctor's visit, his height didn't make the growth chart for a 2-year-old. At 24 pounds, his weight is more typical of a child almost half his age.

His new mother has noted another habit: Elliott hoards food. Enyeart feeds him torn pieces of bread in his high chair and even when he's had enough, he continues to take more, hiding the pieces against his leg.

Elliott was taken to an orphanage at 11 months, malnourished and suffering from scabies and ringworm. His mother died when he was just a month old; his father told officials at the orphanage he could no longer care for the boy, Enyeart said.

"The suffering was awful before the earthquake," she said. "Now, it's horrendous."

Enyeart, 47, was expecting the adoption to be completed in late spring or early summer. She had signed paperwork in September from the Haitian government agreeing to take legal responsibility of Elliott.

She visited him at the orphanage in October, finding the boy "more beautiful than I could have imagined."

All of her paperwork -- eight copies of her home study, tax returns, references -- was awaiting final review and approval at the Haitian Ministry of Culture, buried now under rubble.

After the earthquake, what can be a frustrating and drawn-out bureaucratic process to bring a child home from a foreign country intersected suddenly with the international controversy of what to do with Haitian orphans.

The U.S. State Department extended humanitarian visas to about 900 orphans who had already been paired with American parents, but in some cases had not yet been approved for departure by the Haitian government.

About 400, including Elliott, were flown to the United States in the week after the Jan. 12 earthquake.

On Jan. 22, Haiti President Rene Preval said the Haitian government must approve every child's departure from the country, effectively stopping any expedited adoptions.

It was in that brief window, between when the U.S. issued emergency visas and the Haitians stopped airlifts of orphans, that Enyeart's miracle occurred. An anonymous Utah man chartered three helicopters and had them flown into Haiti, where they landed on the lawn of Elliott's orphanage.

A relatively new building constructed with reinforced concrete, it survived the earthquake nearly intact.

Twenty-two children between 4 months and 5 years old were loaded onto the helicopters and flown to the Dominican Republic.

Chances for Children, the Arizona organization that supports Elliott's Haitian orphanage, encouraged Enyeart to go to Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

She flew there Jan. 18 and waited that afternoon and evening at the airport with 16 other families.

When a CNN broadcast from Santo Domingo briefly showed the children preparing to board a plane for America, the families in the airport lounge erupted in cheers, Enyeart said.

When he's older, in addition to his baby photos, Elliott will be able to watch a CNN news clip of his arrival on the tarmac at Fort Lauderdale. He was one of the last children to leave the plane.

Enyeart spotted him in the doorway. In another moment, she said, "He was in my arms. I was squealing, 'My baby!' "

And thanks to CNN, she laughs, "We have that squeal. I had no idea my voice could go up that high."

In the news clip, Elliott looks out from Enyeart's arms and beams.

Lynn Thompson: 206-464-8305 or lthompson@seattle-times.com. Comment at www.issaquahpress.com.



Copyright 2010 The Issaquah Press, Issaquah, Washington. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from SmallTownPapers, Inc.

© 2010 The Issaquah Press Issaquah, Washington. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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