I wear a necklace with a cut-out of Taiwan and Christ’s words in John 14:18 – “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you” – promising the Holy Spirit and His second coming.
I believe that earthly adoption serves at a metastory and a shadow of the true Story of God’s redemptive power in adopting me and Lee and Jocelyn. Hopefully, one day when they come to know Him, Robbie and Zoe and future children and grandchildren into His forever family.
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.
John 1:12
For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry,
I can always tell when we are starting, praying about or in the middle of an adoption.
I know because of the paper work that lies about,
the emails that clutter my inbox,
and the anticipation that seems to linger in the air.
But more tangibly, I know because the whole world seems to go awry.
The axis of the earth seems to tilt,
the Super Moon graces us a bit longer
and our house starts to come alive.
Not like the house in Ammityville,
but alive with activity
and none of it is the good kind either.
On our date night last week, The Hero and I discussed our second adoption.
We made some very direct goals and hard decisions.
Almost immediately, our house responded.
The vacuum cleaner sparked and died on Friday.
Behavioral issues abounded with our children.
The washing machine keeled over Saturday morning.
And Monday we awoke to the air conditioning units refusing to pump cold air.
The repairman told us both units would have to be replaced.
(For those of you who have not replaced one in quite some time,
it’s about the same cost as an international adoption).
The Hero met me at the door on Monday, smiling.
I found nothing to smile about.
But as we sat at the dining room table,
we started talking about our last date night.
And I started laughing.
Our house was under attack.
Literally.
Spiritually.
While The Hero called our insurance,
I called our adoption agency.
And sent them some money.
And just for good measure,
I made some small financial gifts to some of our favorite places.
And prayed over our house.
It’s Thursday morning.
The Hero called me from his car.
The a/c repairman just left.
Units are fixed and pumping.
And it’s covered by our insurance.
His only words “give thanks baby. This was all HIM today.”
The Hero found a part for the washing machine.
And fixed it for less than $30.
Behaviors have been identified and specifically prayed over.
The only total loss was the vacuum cleaner.
But considering it was almost 12years old,
it didn’t seem like too big a loss.
Whatever is keeping you from adoption, remember:
THE DEVIL HATES IT
AND WILL TRY ANYTHING TO STOP IT.
Ephesians 6:12 “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rules, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”
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Lindsey Andrews
We are a family of God’s perfect design. With two adopted angels (2, 5) from Ethiopia in 2010 and more on the way soon. The Andrews family are one of three founding families of LoPa Art, buying Ethiopian art fair-trade and proceeds benefiting an Ethiopian non-profit, currently serving 210 orphans in Korah, a trash dump outside Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Lovers of gardening, advocating for Children’s HopeChest, swimming and traveling to Africa, the Andrews continually seek to connect those they know with the things they love. Mommy is a writer, lawyer, speaker and chief laundry distributor. Daddy “The Hero” is a fireman, handyman and human jungle gym. “The Angel’ is now eight and loves reading, drawing and dreaming about buying a bunk bed. “The Dinosaur” is now four and stomping his way through home, hearts and life. The family is loved by Jesus and protected by a french bulldog, Walter. Mommy blogs at www.africaboundandrews.blogspot.com
Today, I was heading to the grocery store, but I had a feeling Max wouldn’t do well. We had already been running errands for a little over an hour, so I decided instead to go to The Salvation Army to see if I could find any treasures. I was going to do a quick walk-through – maybe I would find a cool piece of furniture or some clothes for Max. I found something much more amazing.
This nice lady was helping me figure out the price for a play kitchen set. She looked familiar, but I didn’t really think much about it.
I went on my way to hunt some more.
As I was walking up and down the isles, I heard another worker say the nice lady’s name. It’s a unique, unforgetable name and it’s the name of the first birthmom we met when we were going though our adoption journey. It clicked and I realized why she looked so familiar. I made a bee-line for her.
January 2010 – A birthmom wanted to meet us. We found out that she was from the Gary area, but was in a rehab center in the town we live in.
Just the word can give me the chills. I picture overpriced wrapping paper and pizza kits, going door to door and begging family friends to help me go on my choir trip or get new softball uniforms.
Matt loves to surprise me, but not in a way that I appreciate. He’ll frequently come up to me and say, “Close your eyes and open your mouth,” so he can surprise me with a treat. I can’t stand it when he does this. It’s not that I think he’s going to put something gross in my mouth, it’s that I don’t know what to expect. Sweet? Salty? Spicy? Crunchy? Gooey? Small? Big?
So, instead of readily closing my eyes and opening wide, I close my eyes, then peek, then close my eyes again, then peek, then close. Then I open my mouth as little as possible and cringe as I await the mystery food.
Which leads him to say, “You don’t trust me.” And, I tell him I do. I do trust him. I just hate the unknown…not knowing what to expect…which makes it look like I don’t fully trust him.
In reflecting on our adoption journey to Miss L, I feel like that is a perfect picture of what my faith looked like. Cringing, cautious faith.
Faith that was caught off-guard by a God who clearly answered our prayers to lead us to a third child, if that was His will for our family.
Once we committed to moving forward with Miss L’s adoption…in faith…I still found myself guarding my heart and doubting it would or could all work out. Humanly speaking, there were a lot of reasons to be cautious and to doubt because no US adoption agency works with her country. I would have to figure out how to do an independent international adoption, so I immersed myself in researching immigration laws and adoption requirements and learning the US definition of orphan. I spent months gathering documents from the other side of the world.
Each potential road block I encountered along the way, He leveled. Every question, He answered. Every dark path, He illuminated. Each time I learned of a new requirement or necessary document, He provided it.
When it became clear that hiring a lawyer who specializes in US orphan immigration law would be a wise idea, he provided a the lawyer who had experience with this country. (No small task seeing as only a handful of adoptions from this country have ever even taken place.)
When it came time to get our visas and book our travel, He worked out the details and put us in touch with people who went above and beyond to help us.
When we were told to expect it to take one full week in-country to get her passport, He provided it the same day we applied for it…within hours.
When it seemed as if we’d be stuck in her country for a few extra days waiting for an open departing flight, He provided just enough seats on the plane to get us out ahead of schedule.
When we were waiting to pick up the results of her US-required medical exam, He provided a group of US adoptive parents in the waiting room who gave us important information on dealing with the US Consul@te.
When we arrived 15 minutes after the office closed to apply for her visa at the US Consulate, He provided kind officers who were more than happy to allow us in anyways.
When we expected to have to wait at least a week for her US visa to be approved because hers was such a unique case, He provided it in one day.
When it appeared like we would miss our flight back to the US due to insanely long and slow security lines, He provided an officer who noticed my tears stress and allowed us to move ahead in line to make our flight.
In more ways than I can list, His fingerprints were all over her adoption and our trip. And yet my faith seemed so small. So filled with doubt and uncertainty. Will it work out? What if they won’t issue her visa? What if we run into snags? What if our trip is longer than expected? What if? What if? What if?
Small faith cringing with each new call to trust and watch Him work.
So when people see our family or hear our story and say, I could never do it, my first thought is: Yes, you could. If God calls you to it, you can do it. I am proof that He doesn’t call only those with no fears, no doubts, and no worries. He doesn’t limit his blessings to only those who have unwavering, bold faith.
He calls and equips and blesses even those with weak faith. His grace covers our doubts. His strength enables us to walk through our fears.
I don’t look at either of our adoption journeys as displays of how strong my faith was or is. I look at them as displays of how strong my God is. It was His power that was on display for all to see. His power at work through a weak and worried woman who had just enough faith to take the next step.
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses,
And I’m just not sure how to be the mom she needs me to be.
Because there are moments where it seems so completely overwhelming. And I feel so completely inadequate.
Like this morning, when a simple request is followed by a refusal from her. And thus, a consequence ensues.
Which is followed by a tantrum. But not just any tantrum.
A tantrum that reaches a whole ‘nother level. Different than any tantrum I’ve ever experienced with other kids.
There is no calming her down. There is no reasoning.
There is only escalation, and screams from the depth of her soul. Followed by more escalation. And thrashing, and contortion, and eyes rolling back in her head.
It’s as if for a little while, she’s not even there. She’s somewhere else.
And then exhaustion comes. And she curls herself up into a fetal position.
So vulnerable.
So wounded.
And then, the chanting returns. The chants that consistently rang out when we first brought her home. The self-soothing primal chants that make my heart hurt for the life she led. And the scars that bear witness to that time.
And it’s then, that I realize how much I love her. And how much I want to fix it, and make it all better. How I desperately wish she did not have to endure what she has in her short life. Where she was provided for…but not loved. Fed…but not nourished. Touched…but without affection. Abandoned. Without a soul in the world to call her own.
So I scoop her up, and love on her. And pray.
Which is really all I can do.
Because she needs a lot more than I, alone, can offer.
She’s come so far in the past year and a half. And 99% of the time she looks like a happy, spirited, well-adjusted kid who has learned how to love and play and be silly. And I am thankful.
But that 1% of the time….well, I think that road will be a long one to walk.
Sometimes I forget.
Just because she has a family, doesn’t mean she’s fine. Just because she’s been home for a while, doesn’t mean the issues are all gone.
It’s not magic. It’s not quick in this case.
BUT….adoption is healing. And redemption. And a second chance.
And while some would have me believe that she will never be restored from those hurts from her past, I will choose to believe otherwise.
Because she is CHOSEN. And LOVED.
And SHE. IS. MINE.
And really, that’s all that matters.
And that, I can remember.
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Jennifer Middleton
Jennifer and Rush Middleton have been married for 11 years and have 4 kids, Jonah (8), Reagan (5), Rylie (3) and Jude (2). Rylie came home from China in 2010 and Jude just arrived earlier this year. The Middletons have been through the easy and the hard of bringing a child into their family, yet the awesome gift of adoption has rocked their worlds in more ways than they can count. You can check out their blog about family, life, adoption, cleft lip/palate and other randomness at Apple Pie and Egg Rolls.
The Lord continues to bless me with encouragement when he knows I need it the most. A few months ago I went searching online to see if I could find our little man’s orphanage. I want to know where it is, to look it up on google maps, to see pictures, to imagine him there. But between having little idea about where to start and having to translate all those sites from Russian to English on google translate, I didn’t get very far. I looked through hundreds of orphanage pictures, hoping I recognize something in the background from the photos we have of out little guy… hoping I’d maybe even have some sort of motherly sense to just know which “baby house,” as they say in Russia, was his. But I did not.
Until today.
Through the miracle of the internet and what I’d say is God’s gracious guiding, I found it. A woman I connected with on a private adoption-related forum (hi M!) found my etsy shop. She bought a t-shirt and sent me a link to the website of her son’s orphanage, asking if perhaps our son was there too. I clicked on to the site and saw that it was one I had visited before. I wasn’t sure it would lead to anything, but still- I cut and paste every piece of wording into google translate and kept clicking around, hoping and hoping until…
Until I suddenly saw his sweet face and soft smile looking back at me. I inhaled sharply and tears prickled at my eyes. It was one of the pictures we already have of him, but just to know…. to know where he is… to see the faces of his peers, his playmates, his friends… this is a gift I treasure deeply tonight.
There is only one picture of his orphanage on the website and I’ve memorized it already. The white walls, the gray floor, the pine table and chairs, the colorful toys, the old fashioned play-pen like my parents would have played in. The room it sterile, but bright- filled with sunlight from large windows- and clean. It gives my mother’s heart some peace. A treasure, that picture. A gift for my soul.
On the site, the children in the baby house are “listed” with a picture and short description. The words used to describe our sweet son echo the descriptions his nannies have given us through our agency: quiet, gentle, tender, sweet. Our precious, precious, baby boy. Oh God how I long to cup his face in my hands, to stroke his head and push back his hair, to whisper, “My love. My baby. My son.” Do that for him today, I pray. Warm his heart until it glows with my love, from miles and miles away.
Today, for this gift, I am thankful. For a peek into his world. For a gaze into the eyes of the children with whom he spends every day. For a connection with another mama whose son waits with mine.
Until I carry him in my arms, I treasure these gifts in my heart. I carry him in my heart, today.
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Jillian Burden
Jillian Burden is an expectant mama; she and her husband are expecting their first child by way of a Russian adoption. While her belly might not be expanding, her heart and her faith sure are growing! You can read about this soul stretching journey to parenthood on her blog.
Over the last couple of months, I’ve spent some time with a few psychologists doing basic routine assessments for a few of my kids.
One meeting included me having a serious discussion on the developmental aspects of my Chinese adoptee with only one loopy dangley earring. The other ear: naked. Call me a crazy homeschooling mother of many.
The other psychologist? She was not impressed with our less than “typical” lifestyle with under the breath comments like, “That’s a passel of kids. You certainly have your hands full” and “So, your child doesn’t have any friends because you never socialize with other kids” after I relayed the multitude of activities we participate in on a weekly basis. Swallow hard, carry on.
When your kids come to you at 8 years, or 5 years, or 5 weeks old for that matter, a lot has happened in their lives. More than we will ever know, and it is advantageous to gather as much information in every possible way.
Being informed helps us.
understand the past,
deal with the present,
plan for the future.
As I was talking to the psychologist about my child, she had the nerve to suggest that during a particularly prickly stage with my child, the bonding and attachment was compromised. Not the child’s. Mine. Ouch. I took that nugget home to think about with my tail between my legs.
Yes, she actually said I have attachment issues.
Time for [Insert deep announcer’s voice]…confessions of an adoptive mom:
I love my children. I really do.
Yet, sometimes, there is one that is very hard to like.
All that history that I wasn’t part of?
It gets in the way.
Of my understanding. It disrupts my compassion.
And the truth of it all?
God has given me a vehicle for growth.
A way to learn more about how Jesus loved the unlovable.
And, He did exactly that in the best possible way.
_______________________________________
Jennifer Peterson
Jennifer Peterson is wife to one faithful man and mom of 9. After the first three came along, they became foster parents and adopted 5 kids including 2 sets of siblings. Jennifer and her husband Bob are currently in China to adopt an 8-year-old boy with a heart condition who has been waiting a long time for his forever family. Join the journey here as they ponder how and where God will stretch them next.
“I believe that this could very well be looked back on as the sin of our generation. I look at my parents and ask, where were they during the civil rights movement? I look at my grandparents and ask, what were they doing when the holocaust in Europe was occurring with regard to the Jews, and why didn’t they speak up? And when we think of our great, great, great-grandparents, we think how could they have sat by and allowed slavery to exist? And I believe that our children and their children, 40 or 50 years from now, are going to ask me, what did you do while 40 million children became orphans in Africa?”
Every now and again, I feel compelled to talk to the Dads out there. The new Dads, the old Dads, the soon to be Dads, and even the ‘WhoooMyGoshHowDidThisHappenToMe’ Dad. And, since it’s Father’s Day, I’ve got an invitation to do that.
We sometimes, bless our little souls, feel inadequate to be a father. Kind of lost in the parental landscape dominated by Moms.
Yes sir, right from the 1st time we got pregnant, my wife had books like What to Expect When You Are Expecting… and it was a thick book! It talked about about the baby stages of development, the zygote stage, the embryonic stage, the platypus stage. It talked about changes in the mothers body, mood swings, things to look forward too, and stories of joy and happiness.
I got a similar book, except it was really just a handwritten note by a fellow father which simply read “Crazy. Expect Crazy.”
With adoption, all the books are about attachment and disorders and getting in touch with one’s feelings and emotional connections to your child and bonding…stuff. These types of things fall distinctly in the realm of the womanly way of dealing with things. If these books were written by men, for men, they would be the same as that handwritten note from my fellow father all those years ago…“Crazy. Expect Crazy.”
Then, when the kids get a little older, there are mom and tots play groups, coffee breaks for moms, moms group at church, and so on and so on. All these wonderful ways to build a healthy relationship between mom and child. A very woman dominated society in raising the children.
Men do have something similar…except that we leave the children at home with the moms, and we go play golf.
Yes, society has done a wonderful job of isolating us men AWAY from the process of “children.” There is little encouragement (except for our wives BEGGING us to actually be active participants in the process) for us to get involved with the pregnancy, early years or emotional side of adoption. And when we DO try to get engaged, we feel that we are invading the mother’s turf.
I remember one time that I went to the Neo-Nazi-BreastFeeding-Womans-Group… er, La Leche League, and I think EVERY woman there wanted to kill me for being a man (including my own wife). It’s a wonderful group though, seriously, which helps new moms learn how to breastfeed. Look ladies, if I could lactate, I would have! It’s not my fault I don’t have mammary glands! Us Dads are reduced to spectators in the childrearing process more than we would like!
Well enough of it! So I figured it was about time someone stood up for us DADs, and found us some good role models!!! So what better place to turn than the Bible… Lets look at some Dad role models in the Bible to encourage us DADs in our quest to be better Fathers and Husbands!
Adam
Key to Fame: 1st Dad in the Bible…well, except for God.
Outstanding Parental Achievement: … um, fathered most of mankind.
Results of Parenting: One of his children killed 25% of the worlds population (Cain + Able, Gen. 4)
Okay, maybe NOT the best example…let me find another one…
Abraham (Genesis 22)
Key to Fame: Considered the father of Israel. Still had game into his 90s!
Outstanding Parental Achievement: Had 2 sons. Many descendants, countless as the stars in the sky.
Results of Parenting: Almost sacrificed one of his sons on an alter. Kicked his other son (and his mother) out of the house at the tender age of 4(ish). The descendants of both sons are still at war to this day.
Ummmm… moving on!
Noah (Genesis)
Key to Fame: Built a big boat.
Outstanding Parental Achievement: With his sons and daughter in laws, they repopulated the earth.
Results of Parenting: After getting off the boat, and being stuck for 40 days and 40 nights with his kids, he immediately got drunk and passed out (Genesis 9:20~24).
David (Samuel, wrote many books in the bible as well)
Key to Fame: Killed the giant Goliath. King of Isreal. Was noted as having a “heart after God’s own heart” (bad husband and friend though… seriously, had one of his best friends hand deliver his death sentence to his commanding officer).
Outstanding Parental Achievement: Had some kids.
Results of Parenting: One of his kids tried to kill him. David wound up having his kid killed in a battle over the throne. There might have been something about some woman and adultery and such…
Okay, you know what. Forget it. I’m just gonna skip on over this all and wrap this up before I get into more trouble.
So, WHY point all this out?
Only to remind us DADs, that no matter HOW hard parenting looks…
No matter how SCARED we are about having kids…
… about adoption.
… about pregnancy.
… about making mistakes.
… about being a bad father.
… about feeling inadequate.
… about all those things and SO many more we are unable to articulate except though far off stares, the odd guttural grunting and cooking some meat on the bar-b-q as “protein based therapy”…
… is the simple truth that if THOSE guys up there, Adam, Abraham, Noah, David, YOUR Dad, MY DAD, or any other Man who has stood in the place of a father figure which may have been missing in your life…
IF they can do it. Then by the good graces of God, YOU and I can do it.
So lets stop being sidelined, stand up, and have the courage, strength and “lacking of common sense” that is required to thinking being a Dad is a good idea, and rush headlong into this fatherhood thing with all that is within us!
Even if all you can muster up today, is “You know, maybe we could consider adoption”, I’m sure it would mean the world to your wife… and you just never know where that fatherhood journey might lead you…
… hopefully not to an alter trying to sacrifice one of your children though. That would be bad. Although, when they hit about 2 years old… totally understandable.
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Adrian Berzenji
Adrian and Roberta have been married for over 13 years. They
