In October of 2013, 16-year-old Davion Only stood in front of a church in St. Petersburg, Florida with one request— for someone to adopt him.
“My name is Davion and I’ve been in foster care since I was born. I know God hasn’t given up on me. So I’m not giving up either.”
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnU7b577Faw&w=560&h=315]
His request to find a family was picked up by a local news station and more than 10,000 people from around the country responded. Unfortunately, after a brief stint at a home in Ohio with a potential adopter, he went back to Florida and was placed in four different homes over the next year.
But that all changed last July when he called a woman he’d known since he was seven— his case worker, Connie Bell Going.
According to Yahoo! Parenting, Only would ask Going every year to adopt him, but she always believed there was a better family out there for him.
Something in her heart changed, though, when he made the request again last summer. She explained:
“In adoption there is a ‘claiming moment,’ when you know [someone is] your child. When he called me to ask, in that moment, I just knew.”
So after a successful test run with her family — she has two daughters and a son whom she adopted out of foster care — Going started the adoption proceedings for Only.
On April 22, 2015, the adoption proceedings will be finalized and Only will officially have a forever family.
“Today, I am feeling blessed and honored by being chosen to be the parent to all my children,” she said. “I work every day on being the best parent I can to them, to be patient and creative so that I can meet all their needs.”
Only is over the moon about his new family, and always believed Going to be his mom. He told her:
“I guess I always thought of you as my mom. Only now I get to call you that for real, right?”
And Going feels exactly the same way.
“When he asked me, my heart felt this ache and I just knew he was my son,” she said.
After years of moving from place to place — never having anything to call his own — Only is finally home.
article by Amanda Ghessie via ijrreview.com
