EC family's hope of adoption halted by Ukrainian conflict

EAU CLAIRE — Erika and Jeff Ehrhard were met with a smiling face almost a year ago when they first welcomed the young boy they would one day hope to adopt into their home.

“Hi, Jeff and Erika,” said Vanya, now 13 years old.

The couple had awaited his arrival for around three weeks by that point, nervous about the inevitable language barrier between them. They didn’t speak a word of Russian, and they were told Vanya knew very little English.

But they soon learned that gestures and Google Translate go a long way. Within weeks, the Ehrhards and their Ukrainian foster child spoke a language of their own. And within those same weeks, the Ehrhard Family soon realized they didn’t want Vanya to leave when the six-week foster period was up.

“I began to realize that, gosh, our family’s not going to be complete anymore,” Erika Ehrhard told the Leader-Telegram. “It’s like the piece that was missing that you never knew was missing until it got there.”

Vanya, whose personal background is unknown, was sent to the Ehrhard’s on Dec. 16, 2021, through Legacy Refuge, a faith-based nonprofit dedicated to finding homes for Ukrainian orphans. Through the organization, children in need are able to participate in a summer or winter hosting program, in which they spend over a month with a foster family in the United States.

The program — co-founded by Jeff Ehrhard’s cousin, Alaya Hayslett, and her husband, Justin Hayslett — is designed to give the participating child a break from institutional living, allows them the chance to experience what it’s like living with a family, exposes them to potential adoptive families and exposes them to a new culture.

Jeff Ehrhard said Vanya was originally meant to live with another family. However, Vanya has a medical condition that family was not able to accommodate for — one similar to the condition experienced by Jeff and Erika Ehrhard’s son, Adam.

So, when that foster family fell through, the Haysletts knew exactly who to call. With that hunch, a special connection between the Ehrhards and Vanya was formed, and hopes of adoption began to take shape.

But, the swelling conflict in Ukraine brought all plans of adoption to a screeching halt.

Joining the family

From the moment Vanya arrived at the Ehrhard’s home in Eau Claire, he fit in with the family. Jeff Ehrhard, an athletic trainer with Chippewa Valley Orthopedics, and Erika Ehrhard, a teacher at Generations Academy, said they knew he would from the very beginning when they saw a video of him describing all the things he loved.

Everything he described, they said, aligned perfectly with their sons, Adam, 14, and Ethan, 17.

“Just from the get-go, he melded in with our family,” said Erika Ehrhard, noting there was an especially strong bond between Vanya and Adam, who are close in age and share the same medical condition. “We weren’t sure what that connection would be like at the beginning, you know? When you have somebody new coming in, how are all the dynamics going to play out? And within a couple hours it was just like he was always there.”

Having arrived around Christmastime, the Ehrhards said they were able to immerse Vanya in holiday activities, taking him to Irvine Park to see the lights, baking Christmas cookies and taking him to meet their extended families.

In no time, they said Vanya, Adam and Ethan were bonding over outdoor activities like sledding, Legos and NERF gun battles.

Despite Vanya’s initial language barrier, Jeff Ehrhard said they were amazed by the young boy’s knowledge of cars, as he could name every one he saw in English, and would often question why his foster father didn’t own a Bugatti. The family fell in love with his positive personality, love of jokes and easy-going nature.

“We just did life together,” Erika Ehrhard said. “The more we did life together, the more he just became a natural part of our family.”

After six weeks, though, it was time for Vanya to return to Ukraine.

Returning to a war zone

When the Ehrhards brought Vanya to the airport the day he was to return to Ukraine, they knew they may very well be sending him home to a war zone. By that point they wanted to make Vanya a permanent member of the family, and wasted no time trying to make that happen.

“We actually started working with Legacy Refuge as soon as he left,” Jeff Ehrhard said. “That weekend we started working on trying to figure out how to get him back.”

The Ehrhards went to work trying to obtain a special visa for Vanya, but the war hit in late February. As a result, the Ukrainian government froze all visas and adoptions. The Ehrhards knew they couldn’t bring Vanya back to the United States, so they redirected their efforts toward ensuring his evacuation from Ukraine.

The couple coordinated with Legacy Refuge, World Children Resources and missionaries in Ukraine to help Vanya and the rest of the kids in his orphanage evacuate the country safely.

Erika and Jeff Ehrhard described the terror they felt watching the Russian invasion of Ukraine progress on the news.

“At one point we got a text: ‘Hey, it looks like (Vanya’s) going to be able to leave today,’ which was great because we could see there was a 13-mile long line of tanks approaching his city,” Erika Ehrhard said. “And so, we knew that time was of the essence to get him out, because we didn’t know when those tanks would come. … They said they won’t be able to communicate for 24 hours. They won’t use their phones when they’re en route.

“And we thought, ‘Great. This is it. They’re on their way out.’” she continued. “And a couple hours later we got another text: ‘I’m so sorry. It was too dangerous. They had to shut the city down. They had to turn around and go back.’ And then your hearts just sink again.”

From there, the city went into lockdown for 36 hours. For days, the Ehrhards were unable to communicate with Vanya directly. When the lockdown was lifted, however, they received word that Vanya and all the other kids from his orphanage were on a train heading for the border.

Today, Vanya resides with a guardian in Germany. Erika Ehrhard and her son Adam were able to visit him there this past summer, when they finally informed him of their hope to adopt.

“We had kind of made the conscious decision before he went back that we wanted to pursue an adoption, but we didn’t want to get his hopes up before we could move in that direction,” Jeff Ehrhard explained.

Erika Ehrhard added: “When we had that conversation with him this summer, yeah, he was really excited. And we just explained that we don’t know when that might be able to happen, but we’re going to be working on it as soon as we get the green light again to go ahead on adoptions then we’re going to pursue that.”

The Ehrhards said they talk to Vanya regularly, video calling him at least once a week. While the couple says they’d love to move past the starting line in the adoption process, they understand Ukraine has bigger issues it’s facing right now. At the very least, they said, they’re just grateful they still have contact with him.

Erika and Jeff Ehrhard said they hope their situation brings awareness to the fact the world isn’t all that big. Even a conflict on the opposite side of the globe can have impacts on people right here in the Chippewa Valley, they said.

“There’s 200 families in the U.S. that are in the same boat that we are,” Erika Ehrhard said. “There’s 200 families that were in the process of adopting a boy or a girl from Ukraine, and all 200 of us are stuck right now.”

Jeff Ehrhard added: “And we were at the start line. There are people that were almost at the finish line and are stuck.”

The couple said they’re working with those 200 families to petition the U.S. State Department to find an avenue that would allow them to bring the kids back to the U.S. at least until the war is done. From there, they’d hope to complete the adoption process officially.

The Ehrhards have a long road ahead of them as the conflict in Ukraine rages on. Even after the war concludes, the adoption process generally takes nine to 18 months to complete, Jeff Ehrhard said.

Faith, family and community have been vital over the past year, Erika Ehrhard said.

“I think faith has really been a huge part of our process in this, because there’s so much that was out of our control — especially when we had to say goodbye and he left and went back to Ukraine, and then the war started,” she said. “From the other side of the ocean, there was nothing physically that we could do. We couldn’t go get him. We couldn’t do anything. The only thing we could do was pray.

“We can do what we can do, and then we let God do what only God can do,” Erika Ehrhard added. “We can pray and we can find resources and we can look for avenues on our end, but then we let God do what only God can do, and that’s open doors when they need to be opened and cut through red tape where it needs to be cut through.”

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