A family for Noah | The miracle has happened

Isabelle Gauthier is not a media reader. She is also not a regular on social networks. In fact, she rarely uses her cell phone except to take photos.

On this day in December 2021, she closed the windows left open on her phone's browser. And it is in this mechanical gesture, where we send web pages to die upwards, that the miracle happened.

Call it God, fate, chance. As you wish. I decided to call it a miracle.

Isabelle's eye was caught by a photo. A little boy in a wheelchair. He had a blue coat. He was photographed from behind, but we could feel him smiling, looking at a young woman in a mask – due to the pandemic – who was playing the ukulele.

Isabelle's finger stopped. She read the article. My article. Whose title was: A miracle for Noah.

Read the report published in 2021

I told the story of Noah, a 10-year-old boy, who had lived at the Marie-Enfant Rehabilitation Center for half his life. He had been rescued from a toxic family environment by the Department of Youth Protection (DPJ) when he was just a baby. His mother didn't want him anymore. What exactly did he experience in this family? It will never be clear.

Then he was placed in foster care. After three years, the DPJ realized that the environment was not suitable for Noah. It must be said that the little one was a serious case. We are talking about a multi-handicapped child, who fed by force-feeding, whose growth was starving, afflicted with a hormonal problem, partial blindness and an intellectual deficiency.

He moved to Marie-Enfant. At the time, it was his place. He needed care. There, he met Amélie Tremblay. The educator was assigned almost full time to his case. “She gave this broken child the will to live again. » That's what I wrote in the article.

But after three years of rehabilitation, Noah was ready to leave the hospital. “The hospital environment does not allow him to reach his full potential,” judged the DPJ. This child’s heartbreaking case led to an unprecedented mobilization of social services. For two years, we looked for a family for Noah. In vain.

This was the goal of my report, in 2021: to throw a bottle into the sea to find a family. If adoptive parents were not found, Noah would remain in the hospital until he came of age. Then, he would live in a CHSLD. A perspective of infinite sadness.

And then, the miracle happened. A few weeks later, a window opened on the cell phone of a lady who does not read the newspapers, who does not consult social networks, who hardly uses her cell phone. This window seemed to overlook the web. In reality, it looked into the future. Noah's future.

After reading the article, Isabelle immediately knew that this child would be hers.

Isabelle Gauthier and Pierre Couture perfectly understood Noah's situation. They themselves have a disabled son, Xavier. He is 28 years old. He has suffered from severe cerebral palsy since birth, following a medical error. “If I had had a cesarean section, Xavier would be normal,” summarizes Isabelle. But he was born on December 31, the medical team was not available for a cesarean section.

Isabelle and Pierre therefore had a son who is in a wheelchair, who does not speak, who has to be force-fed, who lives with a stoma. Every night for almost 30 years, they get up to turn him on his side or change his incontinence pants.

Pierre always wanted another child. Isabelle, no. Until this day in December 2021. “Twenty-five years later, I said to him: do you still want another child? He immediately said to me: “Call!” It was Sunday evening. I called. I left a message. »

Around thirty families did the same. “When we realized there were other candidates, we were stressed. We started to be afraid of not having it! », says Pierre. The selection process lasted months. In the end, only Isabelle, Pierre and Xavier remained. “We had found rare gems,” summarizes Josée Lemieux, head of the adoption department at the DPJ of the CIUSSS du Centre-Sud-de-l’Île-de-Montréal.

Then began the long process of taming Noah. A child dominated by anxiety, who was afraid of everything, easily overwhelmed by any emotion. He spoke little. “As soon as we saw it, we fell in love. He was our son,” says Isabelle. The would-be parents and social services took their time: the soon-to-be new family visited Noah two or three times a week for nearly a year.

From the Gauthier-Couture home to the Marie-Enfant Rehabilitation Center, it's a 1 hour 56 minute drive, on a clear day and without traffic jams, says Google Maps. Round trip: almost four hours. Pierre and Isabelle did this two or three times a week. Summer and winter.

Very quickly, they included Xavier in the visits. “That was the trigger,” says Isabelle. Noah immediately connected with Xavier. » Noah saw the young man, in a wheelchair, like him. Quickly, he wanted to do everything with Xavier. “Do you want me to hug you like I give Xavier?” », Pierre asked him during one of these visits. Noah said yes. He took the little one in his arms. He laughed out loud, amazed to see outside through the window. “Everyone was bawling,” says Isabelle.

Last step: Isabelle and Pierre introduced the dog Kira to Noah, since Kira and her daughter Sacha are part of the Gauthier-Couture household. On the hospital grounds, the two got to know each other. Kira ended up resting her big rottweiler head on Noah's little hand.

And then, Noah went to sleep one night in what would become his new home. It went well. One night, two nights, we went there gradually. One evening, Pierre made the big request to her. “Would you like me to be your daddy?” » Noah said yes right away.

In January 2023, he left the hospital for good. And last October, three years after my article appeared, he was legally adopted by the couple. “He flourished” in his new family, summarizes Josée Lemieux. He talks, he moves in his chair, he goes to school alone, on the school bus. He is in secondary school, in a specialized class.

The adoption certificate is posted on the wall of Noah's room, with his (real) name which we cannot reveal because he was under protection of the DPJ. Noah was the assumed first name I gave him in my article. A first name that Isabelle and Pierre, who called him that for months before meeting him, had added to his legal surname. My false first name has therefore entered reality.

Noah remains haunted by the fear of abandonment. Every day, several times a day, he asks Isabelle: “It’s for life, right? » That's why the certificate, with the judge's name, is displayed in his room: it's official proof that all this love is a lifelong contract.

During our visit to Isabelle and Pierre, Noah came back from school. There were a lot of people in his house. He was overcome by emotion. He wasn't able to come see me.

On the camera in his room, which transmitted the image to Isabelle's phone, we saw all three of them, Pierre, lying next to his son in the bed, who was caressing his back. Isabelle, sitting on the edge of the bed, telling him jokes to make him laugh. And Noah, who was laughing through his tears.

What we were watching in black and white on this small screen was a bubble of pure love, of human warmth, of shared happiness. A real family. This is what Noah could never have had in the hospital, despite all the good will of the caregivers.

I left that house telling myself that there is something ugly, something harsh, something sad in the world. There's Ukraine, there's Gaza, there's the mud-throwing of politics, there's the homeless huddled in freezing gantries, there's the fanatics, the narcissists, the crazy shooters and the road ragers.

And then there are houses like this, where two young men in wheelchairs are happy. They splash in the pool in the summer. They are going to feed the deer with Pierre. They are lovingly tucked in every night, and when they wake up at night, there is someone there to comfort them. In the world, there are also Pierres and Isabelles.

In fact, they are the real miracle.