Evangeline Joy's Family

We (Ty and Andrea) and our four children Jonathan, Tyler, Charlotte, and Rosie started our adoption journey in 2021 after suffering several late term pregnancy losses. We had known for many years that God was leading us toward a special needs / medically complex adoption someday, we just didn’t know when that would be. But because of everything we had gone through, we felt the time was right. We got home study approved and then placed ourselves on several special needs adoption registries including the National Down Syndrome Adoption Network.

On September 11, 2023 at 11:11 in the morning we got the phone call that changed our life forever in the best way. That a baby girl named Evangeline who had been in a NICU across the country for two months was now our daughter. We got on a plane flying cross country by that afternoon. The next morning, we met her and saw her beautiful face for the first time. We added the middle name “Joy” to her name Evangeline which means “Good News” because she will always be our good news of great joy.

Evangeline was born with many health challenges and hurdles to get through, and we have been right by her side through it all. She was born with a diagnosis of Trisomy 21 (Down syndrome), a severe heart defect called an AV Canal, hypoplastic lungs, and many other issues. We were only home for 3 weeks before Evangeline needed to be air flighted to a Children’s Hospital 2 ½ hours from home for heart failure. She had open heart surgery on October 31st and also went on to require a tracheostomy to breathe out of and a 24/7 ventilator. She has also been completely dependent on a feeding tube for all her nutrition since birth. All of this resulted in Evangeline being hospitalized for 109 days. She is now home and still dependent on a home ventilator 24/7, tube feeding, and many around the clock medications and cares.

Throughout the entire journey, Evangeline has been a complete joy and delight to our family. She has a gorgeous smile that melts our hearts and the sweetest personality no matter what she’s going through. Every day we thank God that he allowed us to be her parents, and we can’t wait to see what life has in store for our family with our precious Evangeline as our special addition. We feel like the luckiest family in the world.