October 14, 2009, 3:43 p.m., East Hartford, CT~

Dear Louisiana Sandusky in Tennessee~

You don't know me; I don't know you either, so I guess that makes us equal, right?  *grins*  I hope you don't mind my writing; I happened to come across a copy of one of your books about your family; after I started reading it, I felt compelled to write, so here goes.

My name is Agatha Wright-Halloran.  I live in East Hartford,  Connecticut, with my family, which consists of my husband, Wendell, and our ten children who range in age from ten down to a few months.  Like your family, most of our children are adopted.

We adopted our first child nine years ago; he is now ten.  We've since added to the family:  we have adopted a total of seven children and had three.

Our children (the ones we adopted) are from Haiti, Russia, Hong Kong, Korea, and Poland.  They are all considered to be special needs:  older than the age of two years, of different racial backgrounds, or are disabled (as in the case of our son Steven [autism] and our daughters Misha [diabetes], Rachael [asthma], Tabitha [arthritis and epilepsy], and Corisha [spina bifida]).  Yet by the miracle of adoption, they are as much ours as are our three "birth" children (Wellington, Yolanda, and Tiffin).

Then there's the two youngest:  Michaela and Odom, who are one and two.  They are healthy. (They were adopted from Hong Kong.  We adopted them both just six months ago; it's been a huge adjustment for all of us, but we wouldn't trade them for all the world; we've since fallen helplessly in love with them!)

I am a home health care nurse.  I take care of people who have had ostomies, colostomies--you know, that sort of thing.  It's interesting work; I've done this now for ten years.  My husband did work until last year; he was a teacher; he developed fibromyalgia and chronic pain; he's since had to apply for Social Security Disability (we're still waiting; don't know if we will get it or not).

When I am at work, my sister, who lives next door to us, helps with the children.  If not, then Wen takes care of them:  he makes sure they get ready for school and the older children help out with the little ones if they are able to do so.  We try to do everything as a family; that way, nobody gets left behind.

Unlike you, we are not that religious.  Oh, we know something is out there; we just don't really acknowledge God.  We don't have a problem with people telling us about God, just only as long as they don't force it down my throat; people like that turn us off!  We just rely on each other, and so far, things have been smooth sailing.

How is the weather there in Tennessee?  Is it still warm?  Or has it cooled off?  Here it's cooled off considerably:  in fact, they're calling for a freeze by sometime next week, the first one this year.  The leaves are at their peak, extremely beautiful to look at.  We see people driving down our street just so they can look at our trees; we have a ton of them in our yard and lining our street!

I really don't know how you or your husband (Bill) raise over 40 children without going crazy; we only have ten, but they have the energy of fifty at times!  LOL  Sometimes we need to call for reenforcements when they're out of control!  LOL

I've been reading your book, to see how you do it; haven't figured it out yet.  Maybe once I get nearer to the end, I'll find out.  Til then, I just have to wait!  LOL

Well, Stevie is going nuts again, so I'd best try to deal with it before he starts breaking things; he sounds upset about something.  I will be waiting for your letter; I do hope to hear from you!  Take care and thanks for reading my words!

Regards~

Agatha Wright-Halloran in Connecticut.