Brain tumor doesn’t stop Wisconsin couple’s wish to adopt a boy

Caleb David Duda was just 2 when he was placed in the foster home of Dave and Amanda Duda of Milwaukee. He’d been abused and neglected and even at 2, had multiple placements in foster homes. His birthparents’ terminated their rights. That was April 2014.

“I haven’t felt the need to physically birth a child. There are just so many kids. God calls us to help the orphans,” Amanda tells the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Jim Stingl.

Dave had been having some medical woes through 2016 — blurred vision and loss of taste, included. So he went to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester . He had a brain tumor, which was removed on Valentine’s Day. He’s 42.

He’s in the hospital now at Aurora St. Luke’s Medical Center in Milwaukee, which was a particular problem the other day because the Dudas had a court date to make it official; they were adopting Caleb.

So they arrange for him to “attend” the adoption proceedings in court by Skype. And after Amanda finished her testimony before Milwaukee County Children’s Judge Laura Gramling Perez, it was Dave’s turn.

“I love that little guy with all my heart,” he said.

That little guy has a brother and a sister — both adopted. One is 10, the other just turned 1.