A family with fifteen children shares their adoption story.
My name is Harold. Harold Grant Phillips. We live in Olympia, Washington, "we" meaning myself, my wife of twenty years (Gunnel Anikke), and our children--all fifteen of them.
We have seven "birth" children and eight "grafted", or adopted. Our children range in age from two months on up to 17, and we have seven boys, eight girls.
Our children come from a wide variety of places: Honduras, Ecuador, Brazil, Russia, China, the United States, Vietnam. Our children are our world, our life, our very reason for living. We cannot imagine our family without any of the children.
The names and ages of our children are (from oldest to youngest): Yancey Thomas (17, ours), Rebecca Grace (16, ours), Trevor Michael (15, USA, adopted), Geneva Maria (14, Ecuador), Triva Elena (13, Brazil), Brantley Micah (12, Russia), Nancy Guan (11, China), Carollyn Michelle (10, ours), Wessley Bryant (10, ours--they're twins), Ryan Allen (8, ours), Evan Stephen (7, ours), Heather Alicia (6, Vietnam), Riley Le-Anne (5, ours), Eric Vaughan (4, Vietnam), and finally, the baby, Dakota Chance (2 months, USA, adopted).
Dakota came last week; he's the cutest little thing!
All of our children are healthy; however, our oldest son (Yancey) is autistic (he's in special education classes and is doing quite well, even with his disabilities), and Heather has spina bifida that requires her to walk with braces and crutches (for longer trips she uses a wheelchair).
Of course, whenever we go out in public we get stares because our family is so big. We just ignore the stares (or comments) and go on. We are too busy worrying about the welfare/well being of our children than to be concerned about stupid or silly comment people have no business making! If they can't get used to our family, too bad! They aren't the ones raising our kids, so they need to shut their mouths and keep to their own affairs instead of worrying about other people's!!
I'm just glad that we have the children in our lives. Because of our adopted children, our birth children have learned about different cultures other than their own, they have learned about tolerance of the disabled or different races, and they have learned about empathy, caring for others. Besides, they know if that they didn't do this, we'd be very upset! There's too many people in our world nowadays that just don't care, and I am raising our children to be better than that.
Our birth children have accepted their adopted brothers and sisters with relatively little problems. Of course, like all sisters and brothers, they do have their moments where they can't stand one another, much to our chagrin. They're just being typical kids, we can guide them through the difficult moments, teach them right from wrong, and teach them that fighting or arguing is never going to solve things, just cause more problems down the road.
Well, I will be writing more in here as time goes on. I have to get the van packed; we're taking the kids fishing, as it is a beautiful day here in the Pacific Northwest: sunny, bright, temperatures forecast to be in the sixties. Really perfect weather; for once it isn't raining! Take care and God bless!
~Harry G. Phillips (Olympia, Washington, father to fifteen, eight adopted, seven "home-grown"). :)
Sounds like another family I know. But just so the general public knows, it's incredibly difficult to adopt more than a few children-- especially if your family large to begin with. There are actually laws against it.
However, that having been said, this sounds like a fun bunch of kids. I'd love to go fishing off the Sound... But like the author says-- it's rare when it's not rainy-- unless, of course, you live a bit further north, like in Oak Harbor, where the air currents go around that big protruding bulge of land... --Charlie
One family? You bet! And all are loved and appreciated for whom they are. Well done! "Normal" families could take lessons from these stories of adoption.
When two men hit the reset button and decide to go out looking for the good in the world, they not only find it but also a lot more.
P.S. The title is listed on Amazon under Look for Something Good by Robert Drews (not by Robert H. Drews)
