Wednesday, April 15, 2015

TORN

Life is so crazy right now; I can't even put words to the feeling in my heart right now.  If you could hear the sound of my heart's pain it would sound like glass breaking.  I can't even define where we are right now.  All I know is that before last week we thought we were going to be able to move through this process as easily as some other families that I know have adopted and been able to move on with their family life.  But we are not. 

The adoption process is not postponed; it just isn't happening at all.  We are loving a child that is still in the process of living betwixt and between.  Will she be her mother's daughter or will she be mine?  Will Solomon divide the baby or will the true mother stand up?  The issue right now is this: I am not her mother.  I would love to be.  I would love to show her everything in life that she will need to fulfill her destiny and to become the woman of discipline and grace God would have her be.  I would love to be the mother this little girl needs.

But so would her biological mother...or at least I would hope so.  I looked her mother in the eyes this past Monday (long story) and I realized that she has the love for her daughter that no one else in the world can give her...NOT EVEN ME.  A lot of times when children are placed in foster care the stigma and belief is that the parents do not love their children.  I can't say that this is true for all parents that I have worked with as a foster care worker in times past.  And I can't say this is true for her.  She is being given another chance to rectify her situation, even though her daughter was very, very close to beginning the adoption process with us.

So here we are.  Does this hurt to have to back off and let the process run its course, even if it doesn't go in our favor?  Yes.  But do I have the right to stake claim to a child that is not mine?  No.  No one has the right to do that.  I could never live with myself if we pursued this when it is not legally or morally appropriate to do so.

The lesson continues.  This is the lesson that I will teach others that find themselves in our position.  But this is the lesson that no one in our position wants to learn - not even us.  It is hard to love and let go.  It is hard to trust God when things don't go the way you want or the way you plan.  And it is hard to still follow the process when you want to just walk away because it hurts too much to stay.

My husband and I want a family.  We thought we had a daughter waiting for us to open our hearts and home to her.  We don't understand how things moved in this direction but we are learning to love and let go together. You can't force things to happen when they are not meant to; at the same time, you can't give up the faith that things will happen as they are meant to.  What that means for us this time, I really do not know.

All I know right now...today...is that my heart is torn.  The glass is breaking around me.

For me, this is not the first time.  It feels like the millionth time; it feels like raw pain again.  I have loved and watched people walk away.  A child I have loved and raised to be a woman has walked away even after all that I did for her.  And I did not want to feel this again...I wanted to just be a mom to a child birthed not from my body but my heart since I cannot have my own children.

I did not want to feel this way in such a sensitive process as adopting a child.  I thought perhaps this would come later if this child would seek out her mother and father as an adult.  We were supposed to encounter this in 16 years, but the reality is that this mother is getting a second chance now.  I thought this little princess would grow up with us as her parents and would approach this later when she became an adult seeking out her history and her story, her lineage and her people.  I would be able to help her navigate that because I had to do that myself at age 25.

But the Lord has allowed this.  Sometimes He allows our hearts to break to show the areas where we are struggling and to show us that we have to consider the feelings of others.  It hurts me but I have to consider the feelings of a mother that I thought was not able to love her daughter.  And this is not what we bargained for.