Rhett and Carol Mouchet chose to be parents again at an older age, and they’re loving it

by Elizabeth Garcia
Coastal Family Contributor

Rhett Mouchet and his wife, Carol, were enjoying the freedom of being parents of almost-grown sons. Secure and successful in their careers, Rhett and Carol were surrounded by friends who, like them, had accomplished a great deal professionally and were close enough to retirement to taste the leisure, the freedom, the fun.
Contrary to the norm, Rhett and Carol decided to adopt a little girl from China. And this time around, they’ve found a very different approach to parenting and life.
Gathering and providing all the required paperwork to the international adoption agency was a monumental challenge and they were racing against the clock because Rhett was nearing China’s then cut-off age of 55 for adoptive parents.
But Rhett saw it clearly, and felt it unmistakably. They were supposed to adopt a child. They weighed all the concerns such as financial security, health, taking care of a child for 18 years or so, fairness to the child and the fact that there would be no young, leisurely retirement. After considering the many various factors, they decided they wanted to try.
“When Rhett first suggested it, I was wondering how I would manage raising her,” Carol said. “I had no idea how all of this was going to work out because the whole idea of adopting a child from another country was so overwhelming. This was a step in faith for me to trust God completely, and I became 100 percent committed.”
Rhett has a tendency to want to handle things on his own. But once you’ve worked through the mountains of paperwork (it took over their dining room table for months) and followed all the procedures, you’re left maddeningly helpless. You wait. You hope. Sometimes you despair of not getting what you want.
“The one lesson I’ve had a pretty hard time with in life is thinking I can fix it on my own – sometimes you need a certain amount of just absolute faith,” Rhett said. “I had done some things in life against all odds, achieved a great deal. I still have a hard time putting it into practical application – this is beyond our control, to put your faith in God.”
Through all the drama of trying to adopt, the process brought Rhett and Carol closer together. Rhett is Broker-in-Charge of Melaver Mouchet, a commercial real estate brokerage firm specializing in sustainable commercial brokerage. Carol is a successful commercial real estate appraiser with Johnnie Ganem Appraisal Company. The boys – Tyler, now 20, and Chase, now 22 – settled into the idea that a little sister might be coming into the family.
“A good many of our friends thought we were absolutely crazy,” Rhett said. “Most of them were polite about it. Some said, what’s lacking in your life that you’re doing this? Some thought of it as a terrific philanthropic thing. (But) it went far deeper than that.”
Suddenly, wonderfully, everything came together in November 2006. A little girl, three and a half years old, was available for adoption. Now a member of the Mouchet family and six years old, Caroline is a happy, beautiful child attending Hesse Elementary.
It’s been like taking all of life lessons in three short years, Rhett said.
“Years ago, I wouldn’t be going to a tea party at school. I loved it! I was thinking, I’ve really changed,” he said.
“When the boys were smaller, I was so consumed with business and going to the functions I needed to go to,” Rhett said softly. “I’m really recognizing some of the foolishness of that. … I think it’s more of a lesson for me. For a long time I was all about achievement. It makes all that seem not important.”
“Having a little girl is more fun than I ever imagined,” Carol said. “(And) seeing the world through the eyes of a child who had nothing and who is so full of wonder is a new and exciting experience every day. And yes, some people look at us very strangely trying to compute what in the world we are doing, but they have no idea how much love Caroline gives us every day.”
They don’t feel like they’re missing out when friends their age are going out and going on adventures, child-free.
“I don’t miss it at all,” Rhett said. “We either take her with us or have a great evening at home.”
“The support group that surrounds you in a thing like this is so important,” whether it’s the agonizing process of adoption or the childrearing years, Rhett said. “You have friends, and then you have real friends.”
Although the boys didn’t take much interest in the adoption process at first, now that Caroline is here, she’s become an important part of their lives. Rhett thinks having Caroline in the family made the boys more interested in caring about and reaching out to the community. He and Carol are proud of how the boys have embraced Caroline into the family, and proud of the young men they’ve become.
“It comes down to simple things,” Rhett said.