In this together

As always, it seems, it has been a while since my last post. I really think I needed time to wrestle with a few things on my mind. And maybe I lost some followers, but oh well. It had to be done. 

Well, I expect that everyone is waiting for an update on our foster care process and I am oh-so willing to do that!! Ann, our licensor, and I are finally meeting in our home next week. I'm actually pretty nervous about this. Don't know how it will go or what will take place. People keep telling me that it will be fine and everything will be great and there's nothing to worry about, but I still worry. And the only way I can think to describe it would be to ask all the moms out there to write out how they parent their children along with a personal family history and relationship history, how you might deal with sexuality in your home, your opinion on alcohol and drugs, and draw up an emergency escape plan. Send those pages to a stranger and ask that stranger to come and look at your home, or rather inspect your home. Then talk about your parenting skills, all the details of your life, including the things you may wish no one to know, and what might be lacking as a parent. Now, ask that stranger to write an evaluation about you, your life, your parenting, and your home. Are you nervous? 

It's kind of daunting. I know that there really is nothing to be worried about. I know this in parts of my brain matter, but in other, larger, more overbearing parts, this logic is nonexistent. Ann is really great and I really like her. It's just the thought that is some form or another she is evaluating me. I just wish that she would say, "It looks great, everything is in order. We are excited to have children placed with you. No problems. We just need to get through this pesky interview and visit." Then I would know, okay, we are good to go! This is going to happen!

So, if you are reading this. Please keep me in mind and in your prayers on Aug. 21. I may be a wreck...

Most of my wrestling over these last couple months have been about the kids' room. It's a silly, simple thing, really. But in my life silly, simple things tend to turn into big things...i.e. making babies. Buh. I was standing in our recently emptied spare bedroom and started to cry. Then I started to sob. And hyperventilate. It was...fascinating. Really. In two measly minutes I went from a content homemaker cleaning to a blubbering, snotty mess on the floor. And the funniest part of all of this was that I had absolutely no idea why I was crying. I stopped crying and figured that it was about being stressed out over bills and paperwork and I wasn't pregnant again. So I let it go. 

A couple days later I was walking in Target and passed by the CUUUUUTEST pink baby dress. ever.  *light bulb* (Of course, this would happen in Target as many of my greatest moments do.) It occurred to me that though I am completely happy, even joyful and content, to be a foster parent and pursue adoption through foster care, this is not how it was "supposed" to happen. This story, this chapter of my life that I am currently living, is a surprise. This was not what I had in mind for my life's book. I imagined a life with happy-faced pregnancy tests, growing bellies, enthusiastic announcements, my husband's ear to my stomach, baby showers; new, little outfits, a nursery created together, shaping a life from the very first moments.

I did not have in mind a twist in our story that involved hundreds of tests thrown angrily in the trash, pointless and depressing visits with doctors, an empty womb, applications, background checks, getting fingerprinted, a home visit from someone who will essentially approve me to be fit as a potential parent,  placement with a child whom I have never met and who has experienced parts of life I would not have chosen for them, visits with biological parents, and a thrown-together room that seems to say, "Yes, here you get hand-me-downs, you are a second-hand child." And that is where I sob all over again.   

I cry for two reasons here. And I will do my best to explain this to you as I do not fully understand it quite yet. I am angry and sad and mad and frustrated and rather upset that this part of my life, this all-so simple part of everyone else's life is so incredibly difficult for me, this part of life that is part of life. But for me, it seems I have every part of life, except that, which is assumed to be the most fundamental part of life. I cry because this is not what I had in mind for myself when we started out, when Jason and I talked about the busload of kids we would have, when I said, "I do." I did not picture this. And even though I am getting better at being okay, being grateful for every perfect and imperfect moment, I have days when the fallenness of this life is all too evident. Days where I see how far from home I am.

how I long for home

I also cry because this was not what these children had in mind for themselves, this is not what God had in mind for either of us. These babes did not plan to have been taken away from home, for whatever reason. These children do not wish to walk into a stranger's home, to sleep and eat and play. This is not a part of their story that they would wish for. They would wish to be with Mom and Dad, in a loving home, full of fun and hugs and laughter and love. 

It sounds utterly ridiculous when I say it or write it, but I am sad that I cannot give these kids new things. I know, I know. Things don't matter in the long run. But I wonder if these children ever had anything new in their whole lives. It's silly, I know. But I do not want them to feel like they always get the second best, the leftovers, the almost. They deserve the best, just like any other child. They deserve to have someone meticulously put together their room, picking the finest things that have been written about in magazines and featured on television. But I cannot do that. They deserve the picture perfect life that they had wished for, and no matter how hard I try I cannot give this to them. 

And it makes me so sad and angry and mad that they cannot have the most simple thing in life either. The most fundamental, basic part of life -- family. In this experience, in this realization of the fallen world, the imperfect world, of a life that is not fair, we are already connected. I cry because I know what maybe others do not know, or have not admitted to knowing. I know what it is to lay awake at night and wish the world be fair, and wish for simple things that others have in abundance, and wish for one prayer to be answered, and wish that my heart would not hurt so much when it is broken.


Then I remember that it is not in the having that we learn about the ways of God and the beauty of this life, but it is in the longing, and in the gratefulness of simple things; important and big simple things. It may even be in the lack of simple things that brings us to Him. We have no choice but to run to him, to cling to him, to put our hope in him -- alone. Because, plain and simple, life is not fair and this life does not always turn out how you would write it, it is written by Someone Else. 

I can't help but wonder, what if life did turn out the way I wanted? What if I did get everything I wanted? Would I be grateful? Would I be here, in this moment, with these people, knowing what I know, loving what I love, doing what I am called to do? Would I hear His voice, if I was never brought to my knees in quiet surrender, face to face with defeat...weakness...brokenness? How would I know my Savior was there, waiting, if I never thought I needed saving in the first place? This thought scares me and I find I am all the more grateful for these sorrowful and even painful moments, maybe more-so for these than the good and perfect. 

Oh, how wonderful! Oh, how marvelous! 
And my song shall ever be!
Oh, how wonderful! Oh, how marvelous!
Is my Savior's love for me!

So here I am. Putting together the best kids' room ever, piece by piece, with love and care, stitched together with gifts from friends and loved ones, treasures found in thrift stores, treasures long since packed away in boxes stored under our parents' stairs with a sad reluctance as we truly believed that they would never be used in our home. Each meticulously hand-picked, with a breath of prayer for each child who will sleep in this bed, cuddle in these blankets, play with these toys, page through these books. Overjoyed we some of our favorite childhood things out, thankful that they may be loved again by tiny hands.

Though I did not picture this chapter for my life, I did not ask for infertility and all that comes with it, I would not change a thing. Okay, maybe I would wish that I handled myself better and surrendered without being so stubborn. (Print that. Keep it on file. Yes, I admit that I have not always been a great example of a suffering saint. And I admitted to being stubborn.) Though this is not what I had planned, I would not change where I am for all the world. We are in this together, these children and I. We are disappointed by life and trying to figure it out. We have wished it to be different. And I hope, and pray with all my being, that for whatever amount of time they are with me, that I can be used by God to draw them to Him. I hope that I can show them the love He has shown me. Oh, may I be used by Him for these precious children.