Local family adopts three children from Asia

When Lori and Kyle Fleming eat a family dinner, their dinner table looks like a meeting of the United Nations.

Aidan, 4, is adopted from Kazakhstan. Keagan, 3, is from China, and Miriam, 23 months, was brought back from India on May 3.

“Each time we decided we wanted another child, we just looked at the country with the greatest need,” Lori Fleming said. “First, with Aidan, Kazakhstan was a new country, things were going pretty fast. With Keagan, most adoptions from China are for girls. The agency said they had a boy available. And for India, Kyle had always wanted to go to India, and we’d heard people talking about how kids had to be euthanized in some situations.”

Keagan and Miriam both were born with cleft lip and palate. Keagan has finished his surgeries and Miriam has two repair surgeries remaining.

While there are many children in America waiting for adoption, the Flemings said they
did not hesitate to look for children from foreign countries.

“I used to be a juvenile prosecutor,” Lori said. “There’s a problem with some states that for parental rights to be fully terminated it takes years. You often have to be comfortable with an open adoption and birth parent contact. It seemed like a long list here. Over there, it’s just kids sitting and waiting in orphanages for parents.”

In order to get adopt from the various countries, the Flemings had to jump through legal and political hoops both abroad and at home.

“There are safeguards at the local, state, federal and international level,” Lori said. “We had to get local police clearance, we had to get approval by the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services and the Department of Homeland Security. The courts in India took six months to clear us. It took a while, but child trafficking there is a real bad problem.”

However, the bureaucratic delays in some cases helped acclimate the Flemings to their children.

“When we were in Kazakhstan, the length of the process benefited us. We went to the orphanage three weeks before. In that tim, we got to know him, and he got to know us. When we got to come home with him, it was a lot easier. With the other two, after we cleared the courts, they kind of just handed them to us.”

Even though the children come from India, China and Kazakhstan, the Flemings said their home countries are not a problem. Three kids under the age of 5, however, does cause a problem.

Keagan is potty training and Miriam is still in diapers. The Flemings said Keagan looks up to his older brother Aidan, and Miriam is already learning to join in the commotion.

“Keagan and Aidan can be best friends and bitter enemies,” Lori said. “There hasn’t been that big of a change from two to three [children]. Miriam just tags along with those two. Keagan and Aidan get along most of the time, so it’s not like two kids with polar opposite personalities.”

The Flemings said they are lucky, since both sets of grandparents are near enough they can pick up a sick child or take the kids for a night while Mom and Dad rest.

“They love to take them for a night,” Kyle said. “That gives us some time. Usually we just go to bed early.”

“Sometimes we go to Home Depot,” Lori added.

Lori works as an attorney at the Spigarelli Law Firm. She also teaches a night class, Legal and Social Environment of Business, at Pittsburg State. That’s in addition to her activities at church and at home.

“She manages to juggle about 30 things at one time,” Kyle said. “She’s also much more patient with the kids than I am. She’s a lot of fun and very nurturing. In some ways, I toughen up. She’s very organized. She’s a great mom.”