Bits of the journey...

 Written pre-placement....

Whiplash---

This is the word that comes to mind as I think of our interaction with the foster care system in the past year. Imagine a young girl being swung to and fro by her pony tail (like that scene from Matilda where the blonde is thrown about by her pigtails)— that’s how this feels. From day one, the day I inquired about the boys I am certain are to be my sons, I began to feel that I must check and double check everything reported to me. "I don’t have any information about those boys," she said. Meanwhile, their adoption worker sat two offices down. It would be two months later when I sat down with their adoption worker and her supervisor and told them of the already long journey I had been on in my own heart. I’d been loving these boys for about six months already, with the dream and the seed in my heart that they might be it. My best friend’s first foster placement was the boys’ little sister.

For months I’d wrestled with God about why I couldn’t get these two boys out of my head. “Am I obsessing, God? Am I idolizing them? Help me to be open and to let this go if I need to.” And then, he brings them front and center by bringing that little girl into our lives. Now, I had even more access to the boys' case and their progress. Every step of the way to get approved for adoption, it just felt slow. We bent backwards to get all our training done, sometimes traveling 2 hours to accommodate our schedules. The message was continual— just keep waiting. From the first meeting with the adoption worker we were told their current placement would not likely be their long term fit. Yet, moving the boys before their TPR would be unlikely. We wanted them home by the new school year.  For MONTHS I was told to be patient and wait, all the while no one could tell me what was going on. I was denied information because we weren’t approved. My boys stayed in the system because of a severe lack of urgency while people were lined up to parent them. Finally, I got them to agree to have a committee meet early, before TPR. Two days before it is scheduled they postpone it. The other family did not have paperwork ready. When would it be? Who knows. Three weeks later the boys are removed from the home. Are they brought to us? No. Because despite being told we were foster approved, we were not. Paperwork expired and paperwork sent to the wrong people. “These things take time” and I want to scream. Instead I cry until my eyes feel dry and my head hurts from the sobbing.

Written 12 days in.... 

 Twelve days---

That's all it's been........it feels like ions. In both good, and challenging, ways. I'm already keenly aware that I am not as strong as I thought I would be. Nothing about our boys' behavior has surprised me. Nothing has been unexpected based on what they have been through. Yet, what I could not predict was my own reaction.

My impossible self-standards have struck again. I want my knowledge of trauma and attachment and all that therapeutic blah blah blah to make it easier for me to swallow when I feel rejected or helpless to soothe a child I am just starting to parent. I want my head knowledge to force my stomach not to hurt when they don't want to talk to me or refuse to do what I say. I also apparently want twelve days to smooth over all the emotional ups and downs our boys have had in their short lives. This post is therapy for me to tell myself to R E L A X. It's not on my shoulders. It's okay that I often feel that I have no clue what I am doing. It's okay that they don't like 50 percent of the food I make.

I have more emotions than words to express them. I am usually pretty emotionally-level, but not so in the past twelve days. I have had some of the happiest moments and in the same day experienced more anxiety and nerves than ever. I am joyful to have them home and burdened that foster care/adoption even exists. I am unwavering in my conviction that God called us to this and also I wonder if He's sure I can handle it.

Written 3 months in...

It’s 3 months later and our boys have been home for seven weeks. And now, I cry for different reasons. I cry because I wonder if I am doing enough and at the same time knowing I am not their answer. I cry for the hurt I can see on their faces when they defy us and push us away and just don’t know how to express what’s really going on in their souls. I cry because it’s hard to endure the process of parenting and discipline and building trust. And I cry because I’ve never loved more deeply than I love right now. I didn’t birth these two boys, and I cry for that too. I cry for the yearning they have for their mother and I hurt that I missed so many years of their growing and shaping.

Written now...11 months in 

Resilience---

[noun]: the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.

 I'm proud to say every day we are closer to living out this definition. The battles still come. My stomach still rumbles. But, my appetite is back again and 9/10 times I know it's going to be okay and I'm not left wondering. The outbursts are shorter and we get to the heart of them faster. We are growing together. I am learning how to stand up for myself without stepping on them. When I read back on these little excerpts from the past year, it's crazy to see how much has changed and how much is still the same. Time, trust, trial-and-error, getting to know you, failing, recovering, tears, laughs, cuddles, discipline--- all of these things are healing. They have overcome so much. We have had so many hard conversations; conversations where I wondered if the remedy would come. And, by the grace of God, it has. 

Yet at the same time, the trail of brokenness and loss still remains and lingers heavily on the hearts of my boys. It surfaces when they avoid new situations because they are sure they will fail. It rears its head when they wonder if they can allow themselves to be happy, as they worry about how their parents are doing. It shows up when an innocent act of "play" triggers the memory of abuse from people who should have protected them. It's demonstrated when I see them grasping for every bit of perceived control they can get. I know we have created safety and security to just B E. The next phase is emboldening our boys to look their mess in the face and take an ACTIVE, responsible role in recreating their futures as victors and not as victims. This is not something I can do for them, though I ache to. I speak this vision for their lives when I pray for them every night. I watch my husband model what it looks like to conquer fear and to process disappointment. But the biggest challenge of all of this, and probably parenting in general, is accepting that for all I can do to create an ideal environment for this ownership to happen, ultimately, it is not up to me. It is up to them. It is to this end that I pray for them as I look ahead to finalizing their adoption and crossing into year 2. I pray for this shift in their hearts to come as they fight for their own health and wellness and wholeness and as they accept the life the Lord wants to bestow out of his overflow of love for them.

Thanks for journeying with us.