Today is my daughter’s sixth birthday. Six-years-old! It is hard to believe. She is growing up so fast, but she still embodies the innocence of a little girl. She is sweet, imaginative, affectionate, and emotional. She also has a sharp tongue at times, and definitely stands up for herself.
The other day I was watching another little girl while my daughter was engulfed in her swimming class. This little one, petite in stature with blonde curly hair, was prancing around her mommy and obeying her every word. She looked just like Tinkerbell.
I thought about the innocence of little girls. Perhaps my own life experience came into play when dwelling on this, perhaps not. I just know that girls have always had a difficult road to walk in life, and in many ways, I’m not so sure that it is getting better for them.
And then, I turned to my daughter in the pool, and I was profoundly moved by the thought that she was meant to be my daughter. The little girl flopping around in the water, half listening to her coach, and giggling with her friends, is just the kind of daughter that I was destined to raise.
She is fierce. She is unique. She is tough. She doesn’t take no for an answer easily, but she knows how to say no (which is exactly what I want in a daughter). She is sweet, temperamental, knows what she wants, and a little bit of an old soul in a little body.
Tonight as I was tucking her into bed, as usual, she asked me to sing her a song.
“Mommy, I don’t want a birthday song. I want you to sing Amazing Grace, and I want the whole song, not just a little bit of it.”
Before I could sing out the first words of the song, I got choked up a bit. This song declared itself to me following a call last week from a birth mother of one of my children. Tonight, it declared itself again by the request of my daughter. I sang as much as I could remember:
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found;
was blind, but now I see.
‘Twas Grace that taught my heart to fear,
and Grace my fear relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear,
the hour I first believed.
Through many dangers, toils, and snares,
I have already come.
‘Tis Grace that brought me safe thus far;
and Grace will lead me home.
After I finished singing, I leaned over, kissed her goodnight, and said, “Happy Birthday, Sweetie. Love You.”
The truth is that Grace led us both home…
to a life filled with ups and downs…
to moments of tears and moments of cheers…
to each other…
to love…
and, to the knowledge that we are incredibly loved by an incredible Savior.
Happy Sixth Birthday, Sweetie.
“Our children are not ours because they share our genes… they are ours because we have had the audacity to envision them. That, at the end of the day…or long sleepless night, is how love really works.” ~ Unknown
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
Here is the second post regarding “What Adoption Means to Me” written by a foster parent:
“Adoption – a word I never dreamed would be a part of my personal journey – but God had other plans!
And I am so glad He did!
He brought a little red-headed boy into our home that opened our horizons to a world we didn’t know existed!
He has and continues to teach us that choosing to make a difference in a child’s life will definitely change yours!
Adoption changed us forever – our family, and most importantly our hearts! “
This family sought out to make a difference in a child’s life, but not necessarily with the intention of adding to their family through adoption. When the case goal changed for the child in their home, they prayed, discussed, and prayed some more about the next step in all of their lives.
They knew that the Lord brought not just any child into their lives, but the boy who would become their son.
Adoption changes lives. Adoption changes hearts.
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
You shook me up a bit today, birth mother. Your call at the last half hour of the work day broke up the busyness of paperwork. The moment I heard your voice say my name, I knew it was you. It was good hearing from you. It is something that I do not mind at all.
I never know when you are going to call, but every time you do, I cannot help but be affected by it. Life has been a little hectic lately. In the madness of it all, I have found myself barely stopping to inhale, or even exhale. There have been moments in the past few months where I have felt overwhelmed by parenting; overwhelmed by the challenge of striving to raise kind, happy, faithful, and disciplined children.
There have been moments where my sole focus has been on what the child we share does not do, versus, what he does do. Yet, when I told you of his recent accomplishments, his strengths, his talents, and his quirks, you gasped, laughed with joy, and thanked me for giving him opportunities in life. That…birth mother…that shook me up a bit.
The space between our words was filled with just a bit of silence. That was okay, though. The gravity of why we are connected carries much weight. We are connected by a precious little soul. We are connected by love.
You shook me up a bit today, birth mother. Your words speared me right into the heart. While my heart has been worrying about his day-to-day life, your heart has been carrying emptiness to which I do not know. You told me about all of the pictures I have sent you through the years, and how they are dispersed throughout your living room, and how you surround yourself with pictures of him. In some sense, it sounded like you have a shrine devoted to the precious boy we share. This shook me up.
As our conversation ended, your words began to take a more sincere turn. You spoke of your eternal love for him. You spoke of your sadness that is carried around on a daily basis. You told me about how you felt you had to lose him. In some ways, you believed it was your choice; yet in other ways, it was a choice you had to make. You hope for a day that it will not hurt so bad; that the loss of him won’t feel as heavy as it does.
And then, you told me that you love me and my husband. I wanted so badly to say that I love you, too, but the words just would not come. That…birth mother…that shook me up a bit and caused my heart to wrench.
Your final words to me are ones that stuck to me as I hung up the phone and drove to get the child that has stirred both of our hearts.
“I love him more than words can ever tell.”
These words from you resonated deep down.
As I stared at the pink sunset declaring itself to me as I drove, the thought hit me that you were probably staring at the very same sunset. You were probably recalling our conversation, my every word, your every word, and details of the incredible child to which we share.
I teared up a bit. I tuned into a station on Pandora. As I stared into the sunset, thinking about you, and thinking about our child, I sang every word to the song that was playing:
“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see. ‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved; How precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed.”
That…birth mother…that shook me up a bit.
As I tucked our son into bed tonight, I held on to him just a little bit longer. I told him that I loved him over and over again. I stared into his soft brown eyes, examined his face, and kissed him. I thought of you.
The truth is that I love your son…my son…our son…more than words can ever tell.
All of my children have come to me through the sacrifice of someone else; through the sacrifice of another Mamma who carried them into the world. The significance of this is something I do not ever want to take for granted.
You shook me up a bit today, birth mother, and I’m so glad you did.
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
In recognition of National Adoption Month here in the United States, I’ve asked other people whose lives have been touched by adoption to share thoughts with the theme of “What Adoption Means to Me”.
What Adoption Means to Me
-Thoughts from a Birth Mother
“Adoption means despite the poor choices I made, there was a solution. Adoption means I was able to give my precious baby girl to a couple who was praying to God for a miracle.
Adoption means my precious baby girl could have a wonderful, loving childhood without being deprived of necessities. Adoption means I was able to grow up and finish my education without the challenges of being an unmarried teenage mother.
Adoption means I cherish my own children even more, now that I am married and better prepared to be a mother.
Adoption means I now have a new friend, whom I gave life to. She is amazing. I love her kind heart and compassion. She has a beautiful family, loving parents and siblings and I’m thoroughly enjoying getting to know her.
I am so thankful for her parents, who raised her in such a way that she has no bitter feelings, no anger toward me and were supportive of her finding me when the time was right.
For that precious baby girl, adoption has made her who she is today and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
Adoption means an opportunity for God to turn the unexpected into something beautiful.“
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
“Mom, are you my real Mom?” My son asked as I started his bath water. “I’m sorry, Honey. What did you say?” I knew his question, but I wanted to hear it again so that I could listen for the slight change in his voice when he said the word “real’.
“Are you my real Mom?”
I stared at him for a minute, poured the body wash into the running water so that bubbles would emerge, and said, “Why do you ask?” He went on to explain that a boy on his gymnastics team kept saying to him that I was not his real mom.
“Well, I wonder if he meant biological mom. If he did, then no, I am not your biological mother, but I am your real mother. I love you and take care of you, and that is what makes me your real mother.”
“But he said that because I was not with you at birth, then you are not my real mom”, my son said. “Was I with you at birth?”
“No, you were not, but you came to live with us when you were just a tiny baby, and I am your real mother.”
And just like that, he went on to talking about what happened at school. Just like that, the conversation was over.
My children know they are adopted. We have discussed what makes us different that biological families. We have spoken the words of adoption, birth mommy, birth daddy, two moms, two dads, adoptive mommy and adoptive daddy to them since before they could barely speak. My husband and I have always felt that our duty as adoptive parents is to only speak truth to our children.
They deserve to know that they are adopted. They deserve to know that they were weaved in other women’s wombs, and that they have biological parents.
It has not been easy, you know. I suspect that a lot of adoptive families have experienced random conversations about birth parents and adoption at the most unsuspecting of times. I chuckle a little bit when I hear that adoptive parents are waiting for the “right time” to answer children’s questions about adoption.
The truth is that there will never be a right time. The right time is when you are driving to school one day and your child suddenly pops you with a question. The right time is when you stumble across a movie about an adopted child, and your child compares himself or herself to that character. The right time just might be when your child is settling into a warm bubble bath.
As my son’s mind lingered off to the antics of bath time, my mind kept swirling around the word, REAL. Why is it that we focus on that word (real) when we live in a time of a lot of artificial things? There is artificial sweetener, artificial limbs and organs, and artificial insemination; yet still, when it comes to parenting, we use the word real.
Real or Not Real…? I guess that is the question.
I do not know why we automatically jump to the terms of “real mom and real dad”, but this is what I do know:
If one is not real, then one is imaginary. My husband, myself, and my children are not an imaginary family. We are a very REAL family.
When it comes to parenting, why does “real” even matter? Would you ask a parent if the discipline bestowed upon his or her children was real? What about the sleepless nights with newborns…are they real? And how about those cupcakes you baked for your child’s birthday? Are they real? See? It seems silly to question if discipline, sleepless nights, and cupcakes are real. Why then…Why do we choose the word “real” when it comes to motherhood and fatherhood?
The day-to-day tasks of parenting are all very real. My husband and I are not faking it. We get up each day, remind our children to brush their teeth (multiple times), get them to school on time, hold them while they are getting shots, comfort them while they are sick, encourage them when they are down, admonish them when they are acting in ways that will not help them, cheer for them when they are trying their hardest, discipline them when they need corrected, cry for them when they are struggling to make sense of their worlds, stand up for them when it seems the world is not, feed them, dress them, love them, and accept them. This is REAL parenting.
If your children have friends who are adopted, then this is what you might want to teach your children about adoption:
Adoptive families tend to stray away from the word “real”. Instead, we use biological or birth parents. Adoptive families are just like other families. We were just put together a little differently. We live the same. We cry the same. We love the same.
If you are wondering how adoptive parenting might be different from parenting biological children, or if you have friends who have adopted, remember this….
We are all fighting the same battles. We have a separate history to consider, but for the most part, we are dealing with the same frustrations that biological families are dealing with. We are all struggling with how to be better parents.
We are all yearning to raise children who feel they are the center of our worlds, but not the center of the world.
We are all working to keep our children healthy. We are all considering the future, and what that will look like.
We are all pouring our entire beings into the little souls we have been given to raise. We are just like other families.
We are all praying for our children, asking for protection upon their lives, and carrying a bit of them each day in our hearts.
We are all very REAL parents.
I suppose my son (and my other two children) may face questions and even ridicule in the future about being adopted. This breaks my heart to consider, but also challenges me even more to be an intentional parent…to love with intention, live with intention, discipline with intention, and educate others with intention.
Real or Not Real…?
Seems like a silly question. After all….
We are all very REAL families.
our very real family
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
I do not understand the ways of God, but I understand this:
He continues to create, orchestrate, and demonstrate His faithfulness in the lives of His children.
My children are not of my own flesh and blood. I do not have any stories to tell about their growth in my womb, the experience of labor, and the subsequent delivery. I do not have much to say about any of that, but boy, I have a lot to say about their “births” into my life.
And this, you see, THIS is why I fully embrace and recognize the incredible scripting of God’s story in my life, and in yours.
I cannot fathom a life without the children that God has given me. I would not trade it for anything in this world.
I would not even trade it for the gift of pregnancy.
And this, you see, THIS is why I fully embrace and recognize the incredible scripting of God’s story in my life, and in yours.
The next time you wonder where God is in your life, I urge you to take a look around.
He is in the midst of the people He has chosen for your lives.
He is in the middle of your heartbreak, your successes, and your declarations of freedom.
He is in the valleys, on the mountaintops, and somewhere in between.
He is backwards, forwards, and in the present.
He is right where you are.
My children…my ornery, spirited, challenging, yet beautiful children are exactly what and who they are meant to be in my life. Praise God for that!
And this, you see, THIS is why I fully embrace and recognize the incredible scripting of God’s story in my life, and in yours.
I do not understand the ways of God, but I understand this:
He continues to create, orchestrate, and demonstrate His faithfulness in the lives of His children.
He is backwards, forwards, and in the present.
He is right where you are.
Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! -Romans 11:33
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
While studying the story of Hannah for a project I’m working on, I became a little emotional thinking of her. In some respects, I found myself yearning to be sitting next to her while she cried out to the Lord in her anguish over being barren.
I wanted to put my arm around her, comfort her, and tell her that everything was going to be okay. Although it may sound odd, I felt a kindred connection to her. Tears flowed from my eyes in reading of her and picturing her during her time of need.
Hannah, a broken jar of clay, sought out the Lord in her greatest need.
She didn’t stray from it.
She didn’t make excuses for it.
She declared it.
I felt an overwhelming sense of joy for Hannah, and the gift of a son, Samuel, that she was given. Her story, her life, and her prayers, are so relevant in this world.
I had the realization that Hannah’s story has been told and read through generations and generations of women throughout the world. The power of one woman and her desperation to be a mother has given hope to so many….countless upon countless women….including me….another broken jar of clay.
This one woman, full of anguish over her barrenness, sought the Lord, trusted Him, and never gave up. Hannah lived many, many years ago; yet, her life and her story continue to resonate in this very time.
Hannah, a broken jar of clay, sought out the Lord in her greatest need.
She didn’t stray from it.
She didn’t make excuses for it.
She declared it.
Are you full of anguish? Are you in need of answered prayer, a glimmer of hope, and life beyond the sadness to which you dwell? Are you a broken jar of clay?
Seek out the Lord in your greatest need. Do not stray from it. Do not make excuses for it. Declare it.
Declare the Lord.
Hannah was praying in her heart, and her lips were moving but her voice was not heard. Eli thought she was drunk, and said to her, “How long are you going to stay drunk? Put away your wine.” “Not so, my lord,” Hannah replied, “I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer; I was pouring out my soul to the LORD. Do not take your servant for a wicked woman; I have been praying here out of my great anguish and grief.” -1 Samuel 1:13-15
Thank you, Lord, for blessing Hannah in her greatest need. Thank you for her, for her life, and for her example for all of the “Hannah’s” in the world.
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
I was approached by the writers/filmmakers of the incredible short film, ReMoved, to promote their Kickstarter campaign for their follow-up film, ReMoved, part two. My first thoughts were, “OF COURSE!”
As a professional who has been in child welfare for the past thirteen years, and as a mother through foster care/adoption, I absolutely feel that there is an incredible need to stand up for the cause of foster children.
If you missed it, here is the original film titled “ReMoved”. I urge you to watch it. The first time I watched it, I was greatly moved by it. I thought about the kiddos I have worked with in years gone by. In some respects, I thought about my own children…
“What if they were left to grow up in the midst of chaos?”
“What would have happened to them if we did not choose to adopt them?”
The writers/filmmakers are making a second film that tells more of the story of the girl to whom your tears may have flowed for in the original video. It also explores the relationships with case workers, foster parents, and birth parents.
Here is the link to their Kickstarter campaign. Visit it. Support it. Pray for it. Get involved.
Today is my oldest son’s eighth birthday. Tomorrow, we will celebrate with a gaggle of hyper boys, cake, presents, and fun. Today, though, we spent time as a family.
On each of my children’s birthdays, I always escape back to where I was when they took their first breath of Earthly air.
For two of my kiddos, I had no idea they were even born into the world until those fateful calls from social workers. I did not meet my son until two days after he was born. I met my daughter about seven weeks after her birth. I knew of the birth of my little one, but I was not present for it.
Do you want to know something? While I have had moments when I wished that I was there to hold them the minute they entered this world, I do not regret our experience. It was an arduous path filled with sorrow, and marked with lots of waiting, praying, and clinging on to that space filled with hope, but it is one that I would walk again if I had to.
Being foster and adoptive parents completed us. It made us so incredibly aware of our own faults, our blessings, our trials in life, and just how rich our lives actually are.
I would not trade our experience for anything in the world.
Today is my son’s eighth birthday. Today, I thought of his birth mother. I thought of the moment I first saw him. I thought of years that have come and gone, and I thought of the years ahead.
I love my son. I love him with every single ounce of my existence. I love him despite my own flaws, his quirks, and our faults left somewhere in between.
Happy Eighth Birthday, Baby. You are such a gift to our lives. You have colored our world with more than we could ever ask for. You are an incredible God-given treasure.
We love you forever.
Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him. -Psalm 127:3
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
Do you know someone who has recently became a foster parent, or is going through the adoption process? Do you need some ideas for gifts to give? Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Gift cards to a variety of retail stores (Foster families often take children in a “moment’s notice”, and may need to run out and grab a car seat, clothing, and other essentials for taking care of children.)
Gender neutral items (Even though a family has a preference for gender, sometimes they are selected or called about a child of the opposite gender.)
Gift cards to restaurants, zoo passes, movie tickets, or other entertainment venues. Sometimes, actually often, a two parent home with no children instantly turns into a two parent home with three children. Eating out, going to the movies and other forms of family entertainment can get expensive with a large family.)
Picture frames and scrap-booking materials (Foster families are asked to keep a Lifebook for each child in their care. A Lifebook is essentially a scrapbook of the child’s life before foster care and while in care.)
Children’s hygiene necessities (Often, families are bombarded with clothing, toys, and other nice gifts, but they may not have a supply of pediatric fever reducers, pain medicines, toothbrushes/toothpaste, or other hygiene products.)
Photography Packages (Professional photography can get expensive. Consider going in with other friends/family members and purchasing a photography session. It is a wonderful moment when newly adopted children become part of the family portraits, and is a “rite of passage” of sorts.)
Foster Care and Adoption resource books (Families may need to read and learn about a variety of challenges they might face. Reading is a great way to learn from the experience of others.)
One of my favorite gifts after adopting my oldest son (our first adoption) is pictured below. My co-workers purchased it for me. It meant so much because they prayed for our journey as foster parents. They prayed for our son’s “case”. They prayed for our son. Gifts like this one can mean so much for a family who is starting a family or expanding a family through foster care and adoption.
Do you have any other ideas? If so, please share!
Like this? How about sharing it? After all, sharing is caring!
BARREN TO BLESSED 