“And I want Mommy to have a baby in her belly,” I overheard her say as I was walking up the stairs this morning. I stopped in the hallway outside her room just long enough to hear “but sometimes it takes a long long time for babies to come. You have to pray and pray and pray. And wait.”
My daughter delivered a five year-old summary of her mommy’s life.
Nate had been talking with them about Zechariah and Elizabeth. And, to Eden, Elizabeth was another one of those women – like Sarah and Mary … or her mommy – whose story reminded her that pregnancy must come at the hands of a miraculous God.
I’d never told her I want to be pregnant.
She wasn’t my “second choice”, and I didn’t trust her young mind to later process my desire alongside of her own story with a healthy perspective. She was too young to catch wind of her Mommy’s pain.
The first time I remember her mentioning it was after a playgroup where all the women, but two of us, were pregnant. Children built towers, played instruments and read books around their mothers who shared life-stories. Naturally the topic of pregnancy came up. And my little one, who has not yet lost the hyper-vigilance that is a survival mechanism for many orphans, absorbed every word.
Later, in her prayers, she asked God to “send a baby to her mommy’s belly.”
It initially hurt my heart.
I’ve been preparing to field questions and observations about how our family is different for years. I just didn’t expect the first of them to be about my personal scarlet letter. I anticipated that she’d one day feel the pang of our skins’ different colors and her unique entrance into our family, but I didn’t suspect she’d have this other difference on her radar.
While the things that make our family different don’t seem to be a struggle for her now, they may one day become more than observations. I could call it maternal instinct that makes me want to protect her from every potential hurt, every pain. But my heavenly Father’s instincts were different.
His protection came not from avoiding that which would cause pain, but for offering His companionship as I walked through it. The valley of the shadow of death is land claimed by the Father. It is a holy place.
For me. And for my daughter.
At five, she has lived years I want to erase, but that God will redeem. And then, as one grafted in to this family, she has inherited new opportunities for pain.
But the ground I’ve taken in my life and heart, as it relates to processing my lack, doesn’t need to be won over, again, by her.
Her inheritance comes (from God) through me. She is my legacy. What I win in my lifetime — in terms of a hopeful perspective on all He has allowed and joy in the midst of “setback” — she gets to live out.
Her words to Nate this morning were not pain-filled. Sure, something in her – I’m not quite sure even why – wants her mommy to be like the other mommy’s with babies in their bellies. She longs, in the way a five year-old has capacity to. But what she has come to know as commonplace Christianity has taken me years to receive:
You don’t always get what you want, but in the face of delay, you pray and pray and pray. And wait. Sometimes for a long, long time.
And in the meantime you worship the One who holds beauty.
My highest aim as a parent is not to try and protect my children from all that might befall them, but to, instead, seek the healing touch of Jesus in every area of my own life, knowing that they will inherit what I leave behind. The “unfinished” will be theirs to finish or to pass along. And those ashes subjected to beauty, will remain their crown.
At five, Eden doesn’t wonder if God will still be who she believes Him to be if, next month, Mommy isn’t pregnant. “God is good, He is so so good to me,” she sings as her bare feet dangle from the potty.
Bracing myself against the hits I fear might come from the Father is a distant memory. After many years of having my soil tilled and turned, the ground is supple to receive the God of Hope.
And because of His great mercy in my life, to save me from my fearfully expectant heart, my daughter receives new land on which to plant.
My freedom won is her inheritance to build upon.
The fullness of God I pray almost daily for in my own life, isn’t just my platform for the next age. It’s hers too.
And her daughter’s.
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Sara is a wife to Nate and a mother of five whose arms stretched wide across the ocean to Africa. After almost a decade of Christian life she was introduced to pain and perplexity and, ultimately, intimacy with Jesus. Her book, Every Bitter Thing is Sweet released October 7, 2014 via Zondervan, is an invitation — back to hope, back to healing, back to a place that God is holding for you—a place where the unseen is more real than what the eye can perceive. A place where even the most bitter things become sweet. She writes regularly at EveryBitterThingIsSweet.com.
Within the past few years it seems there has been a big emphasis placed on examining the terminology we use in talking about adoption.
Birth mother, first mother, expectant mom.
Kids of our own, biological kids.
Given up for adoption, placed for adoption.
But, does terminology matter? I believe it does. It’s also apparent that the adoptive community believes it does. Many adult adoptees will tell you that terminology matters to them as well. Thinking about, understanding and using various adoption terms in thoughtful and sensitive ways is greatly valued in the world of adoption. So, it only seems to follow that terms used in talking about adoptions that aren’t completed, fail, or are ended are understood and used in a thoughtful and sensitive way as well.
What is it called when a family does not complete an adoption they had begun?
What is it called when a family welcomes a child into their home intending on adopting him or her but end up not completing the adoption?
What is it called when an adoption is ended after the child has been placed in a home and the adoption process has been legalized?
As special needs adoptions have increased, the instances of failed or unsuccessful adoptions have also increased. Adoption is beautiful, but it is also complicated. Families, social workers, agencies, and governments all work to give children homes. But, medical files aren’t always accurate, governments aren’t always honest, special needs aren’t always clear, and the process is far from perfect.
Enter the home study. Hours of interviews and stacks of documents converge to outline what parameters a referred child must fall within. Agencies are not quick to allow families to diverge from what they are approved for in their home study. After all, many factors were taken into consideration to determine those parameters: income, family make up, ages of children already in the home, health insurance, proximity to health care professionals and specialists, etc.
As an adoptive community, we need to continue to encourage education and preparation for all potential adoptive parents. But, we would also do well to understand that even with all the education and preparation possible, adoptions may still end before placement, after placement but before finalization, or after finalization. How are we as an adoptive community going to respond? It goes without saying that our hearts are and will be broken for those children. Absolutely. But does that sympathy and empathy have to come at the expense of the adoptive parents?
I don’t understand how a family could end an adoption.
I don’t understand how a family could not bring home a child they intended on adopting.
You are right. You won’t be able to understand because you aren’t intimately involved in that situation. But, we don’t need to understand in order to minister to each other. We don’t have to agree in order to offer support and encouragement. We don’t have to like it in order to continue to enfold those parents within the adoption community.
If you’ll allow the analogy of preparing for marriage, an engaged couple is wise to do all they can to fully understand the commitment that marital vows require. However, even in Christian circles, we have all witnessed marriages that have fallen apart. Education and preparation aren’t always enough. But, when engagements or marriages fail, do we take to social media to dissect a situation we know very little about? Do we callously say, “How could they…?” “I can’t believe they…” “I would never…” On the contrary. We have come to realize that our world is broken. Our standard and our desire continues to be for every married couple to be beautifully united and eternally committed. But, we realize that when that doesn’t happen, the reasons are complex and complicated; the people involved are still God’s children and are hurting and in need of support. We realize that God’s love and work of redemption is not hindered by broken people or broken situations or broken promises. He is not a God who gets stopped at dead ends or unmet standards. His redemption story continues to unfold even in the midst of brokenness.
Years ago, we did not complete the international adoption of a child we intended to bring home. I felt like we carried the label of “the family who disrupted” as a scarlet letter. However, our experience of not completing an adoption of a child before the child was in our home is very different than a family who has enveloped a child into the fabric of their family only to have them taken out of their home or deciding that adoption is not the best choice for all involved. We can’t pretend the experiences and situations and resulting hurt are the same. And yet, so many do. We refer to every situation of an adoption stopping or ending as a “disruption.” Simply lumping all situations under the umbrella term of “disruption” is not helpful to the parents in that situation, the community called on to support, or the potential adoptive parents who are trying to learn all they can about what sometimes goes wrong. We need to consider more accurate terms.
Here’s a list to help: (Source: https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/s_disrup.pdf)
An uncompleted adoption – An uncompleted adoption is an adoption in which the family decides not to adopt a child before the child is in their home and before the adoption is finalized.
A disrupted adoption – A disrupted adoption is an adoption that ends after the child is placed in the home but before the adoption is finalized.
A dissolved adoption – A dissolved adoption is an adoption that ends after the child is placed in the home and after the adoption is finalized.
Being sensitive to using correct terminology can go a long way in discerning what type of support those families may need. Offering caring support to these hurting families will go a long way in ending the shame and isolation they often feel.
So, does terminology matter in talking about adoptions that either don’t happen or don’t work out for the long term? Absolutely. Understanding and using the correct terms for each situation shows a general understanding of what the family went through which will directly impact the kind of pain they may be feeling and support they may be needing.
Terminology matters. We’ve known for quite some time that it matters to adoptive families and adoptees. It’s time to understand that it matters in these situations as well.
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18 years in the classroom as a teacher was easy compared to parenting three little ones at home full-time. Through their three daughters, God has revealed Himself most clearly to Stephanie and her husband Matthew. He not only worked a miracle in giving them their biological daughter, He continued to show Himself in mighty ways throughout adoption journeys in China and Bhutan that were anything but normal. Nowadays she enjoys encouraging and connecting with other adoptive families through speaking and her work on the leadership team of “We Are Grafted In” and on the Board of The Sparrow Fund.
“Whatever you do, don’t adopt from foster care. That’s scary stuff.”
Ten years ago, when adoption became more than a hypothetical thought for us, a good friend tried to warn me. She’d been a social work major, and she’d come away scared. I believed her.
Two years later, we adopted a healthy, white newborn through an agency and brought him home from the hospital.
When I felt like we’d adopt again several years ago, and we were not ready to start over with an infant, I talked to another friend about the possibilities we’d considered. Foster care, special needs, HIV-positive. All words that concerned her.
“Why would you put yourself in that position? Why would you ask for that?”
Two years later, we adopted a four-and-a-half-year-old little girl with trauma history who had spent years in foster care.
Thinking back, her concerns were legitimate.
Why would we put ourselves in a position to care for a child with HIV or other special needs? Why would we volunteer to parent a child whose history could mean difficult behaviors and emotional baggage that might last for a lifetime? Why would we get on the adoption roller coaster again?
I have two answers that may seem simplistic at first glance.
First, because kids are worth it. All of them. They’re worth the fears and inconvenience and changes to their new families. They’re worth changing your parenting style to address their needs. They’re worth therapy appointments and grocery bills. They’re worth your tears on the bathroom floor as you question what in the world you’ve done and if it will ever get better. They are worth it.
Second, obedience is worth it. James 1:27 says, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” I don’t take that verse to mean everyone is called to foster or adopt. But for us, that’s exactly what it meant. Through His Word, circumstances, prayer, and other people, God made it clear to us over the course of years that this was His plan for our family. To do anything differently would have been disobedience. I know this is different for non-believers, but for us, knowing that we were being obedient was what kept us going on the hardest days. And it was enough.
Why did we volunteer to love and pour our hearts into hurting children? (And yes, children from infant adoption can hurt just as much as older children). Why do our foster parent friends take in filthy, hungry children in the middle of the night? Why do they stay up with screaming babies who were born addicted to meth? Or love teenage foster kids whose behaviors are difficult to say the least, even knowing that love is not enough to heal their hurts?
Because they’re worth it.
And although obedience is costly, it’s worth it too.
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Matt and Becca write about marriage, parenting, and life through the lens of a married couple, parenting team, and pastor and professional counselor. They share hope and restoration by giving a glimpse into their lives- the failures, the successes, and the brokenness and beauty of everyday. You can read more of their writing at WhitsonLife.
I am not a gardener, but if I were my garden would look something like this.
Pretty, right? Everything in its place, ordered, organized, contained and thriving. Beautiful and fruitful. Yep, that is it right there. And that is a pretty good picture of what I was going for with our family. Each child organized, contained within the life-giving boundaries we set up, and thriving, etc. Sounds good doesn’t it? But as our family grew through adoption my neat rows of seasonally appropriate lettuce and tomatoes, and those lovely flowers intentionally planted to catch just the right amount of sun, changed into a whole other garden. Our family metamorphosed overnight into a crazy out of control mess of a garden. A beautiful, willy-nilly kind of place, full of surprising varieties and diversity. It has been a great adventure to discover and appreciate all that our adopted children have introduced into our lives. They brought with them so much that is lovely, fascinating, strong, creative and exciting from their birth families, country, and culture that have made our garden gloriously unique. Like an heirloom tomato imported from a far away place, I haven’t always immediately recognized the special qualities introduced to our family through adoption. But as the years have gone by, 15 now since our first two treasures came home, I have identified so much that I might have at first mistaken as a weed. I have learned to not to try to pull up something because I didn’t plant it, but rather clear a space for it in my heart and in the culture of our family. Let it grow and enjoy its fruit and beauty, and make it my own. And where weeds have come in (to join the ones already there!)–the unwanted and unwelcome residue of rejection, abandonment, trauma and orphanage life–then I have learned to carefully remove them. Not all at once with a hoe of shame, but gently dig them out with the trowel of prayer and love and identity. Some of these weeds continue to sprout up over the years, the lies that threaten to choke out sonship, so I continue to maintain this special plot of land God has given us.
And I have learned that some plants just need some time to grow before they can set themselves apart from the look-alike weeds. So I garden with care and nurture, waiting for the season of flowering and fruit. And I have learned to be at peace with the process of being a care-taker of such a crazy garden. As tempting as it was to take our new transplants and try to force them into my perfect rows, it proved to be destructive to us all whenever I tried it! So instead I focus on enjoying the beauty and surprise of it all, and the honor of being a part of such a family.
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Beth Templeton
Beth has been married to her husband Stephen for 27 years. They have seven children, ages 18-24. Several years after giving birth to three girls God called their family to the adventure and blessing of adoption. In 2000, they brought home a brother and sister, ages 5 and 10, from Russia. Then they returned to the same orphanage 18 months later and brought home two more brothers, ages 7 and 10. Beth’s heart has been deeply and forever changed as she has watched the love of Father God poured out on her whole family through adoption. She leads Hope at Home, a ministry dedicated to help adoptive and foster parents encounter the Father’s heart for their families, partnering with God to transform orphans into sons and daughters. For more parenting insight and encouragement in the Lord, go to Hope at Home.
Nesting. Hibernating. Cocooning. Shrinking your world. Stripping your calendar.
If you’ve been around the adoption community for any length of time, you’ve heard terms like these and likely have some working familiarity with the general gist of what they mean. Even if you are brand new to the adoption world and all these terms seem like a foreign language when applied to parenting techniques, your basic grasp of the English language gives you at least a working definition to go by. But one thing I’ve discovered over and over in my interactions is that many folks don’t really know WHY adoptive parent ought to consider cocooning. To be sure, there are quite a few philosophies out there that sufficiently cover the ranges of how strictly one ought to consider pulling back from their normal routine and pace of life. But in my studying, the WHY of each philosophy has one common thread that runs through them. Adoption comes out of tremendous loss for our children.
It’s a hard truth. A truth that brings me to my figurative knees quite often. A truth that puts the responsibility for bringing the healing and hope of Jesus Christ to that loss squarely on the shoulders of my husband and me. A truth that pushes me to seek resources, support and training that will increase my ability to be used by The Father to see wholeness come to my daughters. That loss is the common thread that drives many families to consider some form of cocooning with their newly adopted child.
In the early days home with both of our girls, I confess that I was far more excited about sharing our beautiful new daughters with the wonderful community that we had built around us. This dyed-in-the-wool extrovert wanted everyone to coo over chubby cheeks and marvel over sweet smiles and sassy personalities with me. “Shrinking our world” felt like serious potential for the kind of cabin-fever about which nightmares are made! But choosing to spend our early days and weeks attending to their adjustment and transition from “orphan” to “daughter,” was my way of honoring the truth of the tremendous losses they were experiencing. In the beautiful but messy process that is adoption, we gained two beautiful daughters. But in that same beautiful messiness, our daughters lost everything familiar to them in their daily lives.
Our home smelled different than their foster homes. We looked different than the ayiis. Our food tasted strange. The language in our home, even our faltering attempts at pre-school level Mandarin, was odd and dissonant to their ears. Every single sense that my daughters have was assaulted with difference for days and weeks on end. Bigger than that, and long before we came and took them into our family, they lost their first family. Certainly, the exuberant love and joy of welcoming them to our home was evident even in our awareness of their losses. Our hearts were filled with great joy and pride in our older kids’ understanding of this process and their abilities to attach to their new sisters. And yes, the attachments my husband and I formed with each daughter had good strong roots already going deep thanks to wonderful isolated travel-time together in China. But the differences they experienced, the loss these girls had suffered in those early days cannot be minimized.
So, in light of this truth, WHY cocoon? One of my favorite adoption experts, Dawn Davenport of Creating A Family puts it very succinctly:
The idea of “nesting” is to simplify life, settle into a routine, and limit the care of the child to the mom and dad. This is especially important when adopting a child past the newborn stage – in other words, when adopting from foster care or internationally. With adoption, the baby/child’s life has been turned topsy-turvy. The idea of cocooning is to allow life to settle down for the child and parents and to firmly cement in the child’s mind who are mom and dad.
The general gist is to hang close to home for a while: [simplify] life, reduce the number of toys and trips away from home, set up a predictable routine. Generally allow time and space to get to know each other, and to allow the child to learn to trust and rely on her parents. It is the first step in establishing attachment.”Taken from Dawn’s blog.
As Christians, the WHY of cocooning felt a bit weightier even than nesting to simplify. We found that the loss our daughters had experienced was also about the loss of the deep care and nurture that The Creator intends for all the precious lives that He crafts. It was also about the loss of the original plan that He made for them when He looked at them in their mothers’ wombs. His redemptive plan to bring them to our home carried great joy for us but also required great responsibility to serve their little hearts. Hearts that He was entrusting to us for healing and restoration of hope.
The weight of this charge pushed me past the natural tendency I would have had to share my joy with the whole world around me. I put myself on a bit of a leash, if you will, and moved toward focusing on and prioritizing their needs for unconditional love, constancy, structure, and learning that Mommy and Daddy are Forever. That their place in our home is permanent – physically, emotionally, and spiritually. That this family is theirs to rely upon and will be the example of Christ’s healing and hope that their little hearts needed.
Our efforts to cocoon with our girls looked different between our two adoption journeys. How could they not? The adoptions were five years apart. A lot of learning and growing occurred in The Gang’s home in those five years. NOT the least of which was our expanded understanding of the trauma that this loss brings to a little heart and mind. While our methods were very different, the intentions were the same. At first, when bringing home our youngest daughter, our cocooning looked and felt so very different than before. This difference was stressing to me. I was out-of-sorts over trying to make this time resemble the cocooning of five years ago. But after praying about it and finding ways to negotiate our expectations better with our older kids, we found our groove again. A new groove! I found that once the older kids better understood (by both example and years of hearing Mom talk about what she was learning!) the “WHY?” behind cocooning, the easier those negotiations became. It was such a remarkable lesson to me about my heart and its intentions: keeping my motivation for cocooning was paramount. The change in how we implemented it was different but still a healthy out-flow of both that motivation AND our family’s season of life.
So whatever you choose to call it, I strongly urge you to consider some kind of cocooning with your newly adopted child. If you’ve been home for a while now and feel like your attachment to your child could use some re-anchoring, give some thought to temporarily stripping down your family calendar and get intentional about relationship-building time. It’s never too late to adjust your course and hone in on some things that need your time and attention. That’s the gift of parenting, isn’t it? The time and care you put into bringing healing and hope to any of your children is never wasted. His grace and mercy offer us daily do-overs! My favorite Scripture in recent days has been Lamentations 3:22-24:
“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”
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Below are some of my favorite resources that I have shared with friends over the years with regards to cocooning. Enjoy exploring the ideas presented!
Tracy, aka The Gang’s Momma, has been married to Todd, aka The Boss, for almost 25 years. Together they parent 6 kids (ages almost 21, 19, 16, 13, almost 8, & almost 4). She is passionate about post-adoptive care and family support. In her downtime, she loves to read, write, cry over weekly episodes of Call The Midwife, and share a good cup of coffee with a friend. A confirmed extrovert, Tracy has met her match in their youngest daughter for both strength of will and love of socializing. Parenting her two youngest who came home through China’s special needs program is definitely the most challenging thing she’s ever done (between attachment issues & some complicated medical needs), but she’s trusting the Lord to use it all to make her a stronger, better mommy. (At least that’s what she tells herself over her 2nd or 3rd giant Tigger mug full of coffee almost every day!) You can find the (very!) occasional musings of the momma at www.whitneygang.blogspot.com.
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We’re building the nest this month!
Head right on over HERE to find out more and learn about the 40+ businesses that support adoption and the work of The Sparrow Fund!
I recently heard William Paul Young, author of The Shack, say something
that so perfectly describes what I have seen in some of our children. He
said, “Shame destroys your ability to distinguish between a value statement and
an observation.”
As soon as I heard this I thought, “That’s it. That perfectly describes
countless parenting moments in our home.”
I would make a statement, completely reasonable and normal, the kind
parents all over the world make as part of the loving raising of a child.
And my child would respond as if I had just asked them to do something
horrible, something no parent would ever require.
There have been times over the years when it felt like my parenting seemed
to always and only affirm their shame.
No matter what I said, or what tone of voice I used, the push back from my
parenting efforts was massive. To the point where many times I would
almost despair of it all.
I would offer, “Let me help you with your vocabulary so you can be ready
for you test tomorrow.”
What I hear myself saying is, “I am here to help you. I know you can do
this. You are not alone. I am proud of you and want to be a part of your
life!”
What they heard was a harsh value statement, “You are such a loser. You
are not smart and you can’t do anything right. You are a disappointment to
me.”
I would observe, “That outfit is probably not appropriate for this event.
Maybe you could wear that nice outfit we bought last month.”
What they heard was, “You are ugly. You aren’t meeting my standards. I
don’t accept you the way you are.”
It is the voice of shame.
If you think this sounds extreme then that is truly wonderful, because
that probably means that shame is not a big part of your child’s
foundations. For many adopted children however, the facts of their early
years have been masquerading in their minds and emotions as truth. Shame
takes the facts of abandonment, neglect, abuse, relinquishment, orphanage
life, and anything else it can wrap it’s tentacles around, and disguises
it my precious child’s mind as a deep truth about his/her identity.
Shame speaks words like rejected, never enough, alone, unwanted, failure,
weak, too much to handle, unsuccessful….
And when those horrifying words are spoken a child may shut down
completely, totally disengaging.
Frozen.
No eye contact. No verbal replies.
Or there might be yelling. “I hate you. You are a horrible mother. I wish
I were never adopted. My life would be much better without you. Get off my
back and just leave me alone. You make me want to die…..”
We have heard all of these words, and more, in our home.
It is the voice of shame.
Or, you might see your child put even more pressure on him/herself to
please, to do everything just right. But the anxiety and anger levels
build over time and at some point you will experience the inevitable blow
up from so much self-imposed pressure.
I am overwhelmed with the reality that my Father God has allowed me to be
a part of His healing work in my children through adoption. For it is in
the context of family that our children have heard, over and over, that
they are no longer orphans, but true and beloved sons and daughters.
It is so easy to allow shame to bait me into an unloving, shame-based
response. And so unhelpful!
So I decided a long time ago to respond with the Truth–to counteract the
shame with the antidotes of love, belonging, identity, understanding.
Over and over again, in so many varying forms of my maternal love I have
the opportunity to speak truth into the lie.
Speak it in season and out of season.
Speak it when your child embraces their identity as the beloved, and speak
it when your child denies the truth of it, either through their words or
through their actions.
Speak it when they are in front of you listening, and speak it when they
have gone to bed and only you and God can hear.
Speak it when your heart is full of the truth of it, and speak it when the
words seem like a lie even to you.
Speak it–
over and over and over and over,
day after day after day after day,
year after year after year after year.
I am seeing the fruit of this in our family. That inner voice of shame is
being drowned out by truth, unmasked by love without conditions and
limits. And where shame is still successful in its ugly masquerade, I am
even more determined than ever to speak truth, for this is what adoption
is all about, right? It is about radical rooted love, both for me and for
my child.
It unmasks us all and reveals the beautiful truth that we are His beloved
ones.
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Beth Templeton
Beth has been married to her husband Stephen for 27 years. They have seven children, ages 18-24. Several years after giving birth to three girls God called their family to the adventure and blessing of adoption. In 2000, they brought home a brother and sister, ages 5 and 10, from Russia. Then they returned to the same orphanage 18 months later and brought home two more brothers, ages 7 and 10. Beth’s heart has been deeply and forever changed as she has watched the love of Father God poured out on her whole family through adoption. She leads Hope at Home, a ministry dedicated to help adoptive and foster parents encounter the Father’s heart for their families, partnering with God to transform orphans into sons and daughters. For more parenting insight and encouragement in the Lord, go to Hope at Home.
It was just over a year ago that I answered the phone call that changed the trajectory of our lives. It was the call from our adoption agency family coordinator letting me know that she had two referrals for us to consider. As she began to describe the children my heart raced. This was it! This was the moment I had dreamed about and anticipated for so long. Could it be, that I was about to be introduced to my children for the first time?
It had only been the day before that call, that, I had received a text from a close friend, letting me know she had a dream that Kirk and I were walking out of the airport holding hands with Lily and Liam. Both children had excitement and a bit of worry in their eyes—but more excitement. She elaborated and said, “But the look on your hubs face, it was priceless!” She encouraged me that our referral was coming, “But not when you think.”
I woke the morning of January 16, 2014 at 5:30am feeling impressed to get out of bed. I was tired, but felt urged to read my Bible and pray. I’m not even sure how I came to this next verse, but when I did, I felt sure there was a hidden message in it for me. Habakkuk 2:3 says, “For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and not delay.” I wrote it down unsure what it meant. I had no idea that the calling we had been given, to adopt a boy and a girl, was about to be revealed but in the way I expected.
At 10:33 am my cell phone rang.
I saw the (703) area code but it did not register. Ashley (our family coordinator) was calling to let me know she had two referrals for us to consider. I was beside myself when I realized who it was and why she was calling! After she explained the purpose for her call she gave me some preliminary information about the children to allow me the option of reviewing their files or waiting for another match.
She started by saying, “Okay, I have a little girl that is considered special needs. She is almost 8 years old. She has a vision problem, (crossed eyes). Would you like to review her file?
I swallowed hard. “Yes!”
“Okay.” She went on, “There is boy almost 10. He is only three months younger than your youngest child, would that be a problem if your children are in the same grade?”
“No.”
She proceeded, “Would you like to review his file?”
“Yes!” I squealed.
“Okay, I’ll send you their files. Examine them with your husband and let me know if you’d like to proceed with a full review.”
After the longest ten minutes of my life, I had their information in my inbox.
I was floored with emotion as I opened those files for the first time. This was the moment I had waited so many months for. I can still recall the intense emotions that sunk deep into my chest, as I looked blurry-eyed at their photographs for the first time.
Time stood still.
He was a handsome boy, an older child whose only special need was that he was older and harder to place and she an adorable little girl with what appeared to be a minor vision problem. I called my husband and forwarded the files to him. We were both at work, so we agreed to look them over together later that evening.
During the waiting, I had envisioned what it would be like to receive my children’s referrals. I wondered, how would I know if they were mine? Would I feel a connection immediately, or would that sense of knowing they were mine come gradually over time? The moment of discovery had finally come.
Months earlier we had discussed the list of possible special needs we felt comfortable with. I had done research on the various conditions and reviewed the information with Kirk. Somehow checking the boxes of special needs that we both were comfortable with felt awkward, but this was a required step. Part of the home study is designed to evaluate and approve a family to care for a child with special needs. The family is assessed by the social worker to determine if they are equipped to care for a child with needs noted on the list. Kirk and I had agreed that only special needs that we both were comfortable with would make it on our list. If one was okay with a special need but the other one not, then it was a no. It seemed simple enough.
At first glance the needs of these two children appeared to fit within our list of approved special needs. Yet, as we read through the little girl’s file more closely, we discovered she had significant developmental delays. This was an immediate red flag. We were adopting two children at once and we already have one child whose needs will require life-long support. Neither of us felt comfortable taking a second child whose needs will likely necessitate the same.
Despite the red flag, we both felt paralyzed to make any decision.
We questioned ourselves. Was God calling us to take on more than we had planned or anticipated? Or was our discomfort a signal meant to offer us direction? Either way, we were not ready to decide as we both felt unsure.
We immediately bathed our decision in prayer and then sought additional information to help guide our steps. We started with requesting an update from the orphanage. We sent a list of ten questions, and waited for their reply. Next, we obtained an expert opinion from a physician who specializes in reviewing adoption referral files. Next we reached out to the adoption community, requesting feedback regarding ‘how to know when to say yes’ to a referral.
The orphanage updates were a mix of good and bad news. The boy’s update stated he was on grade level in school and appeared to be healthy in all respects. The little girl’s update indicated that her delays had prevented her from attending school and she was unable to speak full sentences. This news heightened our hesitancy about accepting her referral.
Next, we sought the opinion from a physician who reviewed adoption referrals. She stated very matter-of-factly that in her opinion, the boy was a healthy older child with the exception that he appeared to be very small for his age. She pointed that the little girl had significant delays that would likely prevent her from ever living independently. She held nothing back and gave me the worst-case scenario to think about. At first, I was a bit taken aback by her negativity, but later I realized she had done me a favor by making me see what I did not want to see.
While all of this information weighed heavily on us, we were eased by the encouragement we had received from the adoption community. So many families responded positively regarding how they had come to make hard decisions. Some told us of ‘knowing’ it was their child the moment they saw a picture. Others said they did not know right away but came to their yes more slowly. Others told of stories where they did not accept the first or sometimes even the second and third referral they were given. I was comforted by the fact that there was more than one way to ‘know’ and that not everyone accepted the first referral. It became clear that there was no perfect formula we needed to use, we just had to keep asking, praying and waiting until a clear answer was revealed.
Why was this so hard? The answer I discovered was painful.
In that period of waiting I came to understand that part of my hesitancy to not saying ‘yes’ to adopting this little girl, was the implication that our lack of a ‘yes’ was really a ‘no’.
That was it. I knew that I was struggling with saying, ‘no’ to a child who really needed a family. Despite my gut feeling that this was not our little girl, I was not comfortable sending her file back and saying—no.
I wrestled with this one for several weeks until I found some encouragement from a book I was reading, Kisses from Katie, by Katie Davis, a(single) adoptive mother of fourteen former-orphans in Uganda. As I read her story, I found answers to mine.
After adopting her eleventh child, Katie had decided not to adopt any more children. She felt her family was complete, until the Lord made it ever so clear she was to take another and not just any child. The child presented to her had significant delays. Katie described how she was hesitant to take a child with limited mobility since she already had a large level of responsibility to her other eleven girls as well as to the people she ministered to in the villages. Having a child who could not walk would mean she would have to carry her everywhere. But then one day the Lord made his plan so clear Katie could not deny it, and once more she embraced a new daughter.
I connected with this story, and wondered if this was my answer. Did God want us to take on more than we had planned but not more than He had planned? Though I felt willing to move forward with her, my husband did not. I wondered at this discrepancy. We would have to move on this decision soon. Although the adoption agency had given us a lenient two weeks to decide, the clock was ticking and we would have to give an answer soon.
January 27, 2014 “Not every child that came to Katie was Katie’s child.”
Those were the words I heard the Lord speak that morning as my husband prayed for God to show us his plan for these two little ones. One would become ours and the other one not.
After hearing from he Lord, I recalled the rest of Katie’s story. I realized that many, many, many children came to Katie for help. Sometimes people would bring children to her or ask her to adopt them, but she did not adopt every girl that she ministered to or every girl that needed adoption. Katie adopted only the girls that were her children—the ones that God had chosen for her.
God made his plan for us clear that morning. Our first referral for a girl was a no. She was not ours. My wrestling was over as quickly as it had come. In that moment of prayer, I knew this little one was not my daughter. I realized that even though I was not called to be her mother, she was His child. It wasn’t up to me to save her or any; I only need be obedient to the calling he set before me.
If you are waiting on a referral, here are some tips on how to get ready for your yes:
Pray for your child while you are waiting. (I am in awe at how our Lily’s personality matches the prayers I had prayed over her exactly).
Seek the Lord throughout the process and follow His lead. (Getting behind God instead of running ahead was a hard lesson for me at times).
Seek godly men and women in the adoption community to offer their wisdom when you need help, support, encouragement or direction. (This is vital!)
Seek to understand your spouse’s concerns about the adoption. Move forward only when you both agree.If one spouse is in on board and the other not, take it as either a no and move-on, or a wait-not-yet, but do not push. (There was a lot of waiting I had to do. God will move in a spouse’s heart, you just need to get out of the way and then wait.)
Be prepared that if you do not accept the first referral that comes your way, there may be some people that will not agree with your decision. You may feel rejected and judged, but do not be discouraged. It is only God you need to please.
Do not adopt to try and save anyone. That is God’s job and only He can do it. Adopt out of obedience to your calling then rely on Him to carry you through. (It is hard work but oh so rewarding!)
Realize there is no perfect formula for deciding to accept a referral or what special needs (if any) you’re equipped to handle. “Pray like it depends on God and then work like it depends on you,” (Mark Batterson).
One last note–one of my concerns in writing this is that it would discourage a family from adopting a child with significant delays or offend someone who already has. So before I leave anyone with any negative impression of how we feel about children with severe developmental delays, let me clearly state that we highly value all children, but especially those precious ones with significant needs. They need families too! We are parents to a child with special needs and he is our pride and joy! Our hesitancy to say yes to another child with significant developmental delays was based on what we felt we could manage in the mix of our other responsibilities. We prayerfully considered it and do not want our decision to discourage anyone who has been called to embrace a child with significant developmental delays. Go and do what you are called to do and if you already have, then Amen!
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Tiffany Barber
Tiffany is a wife to Kirk and mother of eight including six biological and two newly adopted from China. With a looming financial crisis at the outset of their recent adoption, God took their family on a journey of faith. Having been home just over ten weeks, they are currently working through the transition phase of their new adoption. Tiffany writes an honest account of challenges of adoption and the redemptive work of her savior Jesus Christ at Extravagant Love. Though her faith and limits have been tested, she points that adoption is paving the way for her to grow and experience God’s presence as never before.
So, Lucy and I have a little game we have been playing where we pretend to call someone on the telephone. Usually I am supposed to place the call… ring, ring, ring… and say hello to the recipient on the other end of the line. Then I pass the phone to her and she says hello and passes it back and then proceeds to tell me what else I should tell them. I think I am learning all kinds of interesting things by being part of these phone calls that I may not otherwise be privy to! Recently, we started out calling Hanna, Spencer, Becca, Baba… then we moved on to calling people in China. We called Baoji Mama and Baba (her foster parents in Baoji) and some other familiar names of her friends. Then things started to get interesting and she started asking me to call other friends from China with names I was not yet familiar with… some of them were younger children, some older, some had been adopted. It is amazing to me how well we can communicate in our combination of Chinese and English after only 3 months and how quickly more and more of the balance of our communication continues to lean toward English. Sometimes we talk around ideas or use a translator app on my phone like Google Translate or Pleco to help us get over a hurdle. On this particular day, as we continued to make calls, I used the English word “adopted” and she stopped and asked what I meant. ”Remember that Baba Mama came to China to find Lucy? Remember that we signed papers together? Remember the blue thumbprints and your hand print that we put on the papers?”
Nods and agreement from Lucy to all of this. ”Lucy, do you understand? Now I am your mama. No more new mamas.” Yes, she nodded and asked to tell me something in Chinese using the translator app. I found it on my phone and we both patiently waited for the little ding that indicates she should start talking. Then I held the phone and waited for the English word to appear…
Back in China, in the world that Lucy knew, all the female caregivers were called “mama” and all the male caregivers “baba.” These caregivers have come and gone in Lucy’s life and have not been “forever and always.” When I caught my breath, I couldn’t help but be amazed and be so blessed. As I type tonight, I am thinking of how easy it is for things to be lost in translation even among speakers of a common language and
of the other game called “telephone” that demonstrates this so well!
I am so grateful that this truth is taking hold in Lucy.
May she truly feel it in the depth of her heart.
She has a family forever and always.
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Kirstin Rothfuss is Mama to 5 wonderful children and wife to Jason. Two of their children came to their family through the blessing of adoption. Their family mission statement is …“to glorify God by working together to help people of all ages all around us reach their full potential through adventure, hospitality, education, and service.” You can read the story of the Rothfuss family’s most recent adoption at http://www.rothfuss.us/.
As a child, I remember the excruciating wait from Christmas Eve to Christmas morning. I would lie awake for what seems like hours wondering how I was ever going to fall asleep and what the morning might hold.
Now as I lie awake at night, gone are the visions of sugar plums dancing in my head. Instead, my heart is on the other side of the world, as I think about my sweet girl who is waiting too. Waiting for a family she can call her own and who will love her forever.
Waiting for an adoption is hard, y’all. When I was young, I thought that one night of waiting for Christmas morning was tough. I had no idea what was to come.
First, we waited for years and years for a biological child who never came, because God had a different plan. Then we waited for our first adoption, our second and now our third.
Waiting may be hard, but so worth it because God’s plan is so much greater and more wonderful than ours. And even though the wait is hard, once it is over, and we see God’s plan fully accomplished, we know why He made us wait on His timing.
This is a truth I cling to right now when I lie awake at night wishing my child were in my arms. I know that His plan and timing is perfect. I’ve seen it realized twice before, but that hasn’t made the wait any easier. However, because I trust Him based on past experiences of seeing Him work, I know that I will look back on this time and again see His hand behind the scenes in our life and her life, preparing us for the exact moment that He has ordained that we should become a family.
How often has God had to wait for us to respond, believe Him, love Him, or follow Him?
How patient He is with us!
He longs for us, searches for us, and seeks us just as I long for, searched for and sought my sweet little one. So I will trust in the Lord who is my God, Father, Savior and friend, remembering that He loves her even more that I do.
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Suzanne Meledeo
After struggling with infertility for 5 years, God led Suzanne and her husband Adam to His Plan A for their lives—adoption! Their daughter, Grace Lihua, came into their lives in 2011 from the Fujian Province, China. Their son, Anthony Jianyou, joined their family in January of 2013 from Shanghai, and their little girl, Eva Hanting, will be joining their family very soon from the Hunan Province. After a career in politics, Suzanne is thankful for God’s provision in their lives that now allows her to work part time as a Pilates instructor while home schooling their children and working as a part of the WAGI leadership team. You can follow their adoption journey and life on their blog, Surpassing Greatness.
Something triggered her fear, and she snapped. I will never call them “fits” because that would imply she could control them. And she cannot.
We’ve learned how to handle her meltdowns over the last year. We restrain her safely, usually while rocking her back and forth and telling her in a quiet voice about how much we love her, no matter what.
This time, I let go at the wrong time, and her knee hit me square in the chin. I saw stars then told her I’d have to come back in a minute. I went to the bathroom and exploded into sobs. It was as if I’d put my carbonated emotions in a bottle and shaken them for months. Physical pain was the only thing that could release the pressure.
I cried on and off for days. I cried about issues I’d been thinking about for months, and I cried about things so ridiculous that I would laugh while wiping my tears. That’s a sure way to let your family know you’ve completely lost it.
It turns out when you wait a long time to let yourself have a breakdown, it takes a while to recover.
On day three of my incessant crying, Matt left to speak at a church in Kansas for four nights. He felt bad for leaving, and I was dreading single parenting in the midst of the rollercoaster. I prayed that my kids would show me mercy for the week. Bedtimes are very difficult right now for a couple of our kids, and they’re even worse when Matt’s gone. The most challenging part of the day comes when I have the least energy and patience left. So I prayed for my own strength as well.
The days went by, and my kids were amazingly well-behaved. I eventually cried all the tears I’d been storing up. Matt came back home, and things eased back into normal.
When I went to a meeting with my counseling supervisor the next week, I described the whole thing to him. He said, “So you’re saying that when you allowed yourself to fall apart, the whole world didn’t fall apart? You mean when you gave your family the chance, they actually rose to the occasion?” I told him to shut up.
But he was right (I have a love/hate relationship with his rightness). When I see my husband struggle, I feel like I have to stay strong. When my kids are dealing with hard things, I put my own challenges aside. And the pressure builds.
When I let myself be weak and fall apart, balance reigns. They rise to the challenge. I get to have bad days and feel sad. I get to cry for lots of reasons or no reason at all. Being the mom doesn’t make my emotions or difficulties mean less. In fact, I dare say that it’s good for our kids to see me feel all kinds of things and deal with those feelings in healthy ways. (Or, less fun to talk about, to deal with my feelings in unhealthy ways and then apologize to them).
Are you putting your own needs on the back-burner while you help everyone else cope with theirs? I’ve learned that my emotions will eventually make themselves undeniable, and not always at the most convenient time.
Emotional health is a discipline. The circumstances in which I most need to practice good self-care are the same situations in which it’s most difficult to do so. Therefore, I must be disciplined in taking care of myself, even when it feels unnatural. Even when it’s inconvenient.
Have you been storing your emotions away while you tend to everyone around you? It might be time to open up that bottle before it explodes.
**Disclaimer: The “meltdowns” are very rare now, and we have not always handled them well. If you’re in the middle of that struggle with your hurting child, you’re not alone. And if you’re not handling it with rocking and a quiet voice of grace, you’re not a horrible parent. It takes time and professional help to learn the best ways to help our kids from hard places. If we can help you find help, please let us know.
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Matt and Becca write about marriage, parenting, and life through the lens of a married couple, parenting team, and pastor and professional counselor. They share hope and restoration by giving a glimpse into their lives- the failures, the successes, and the brokenness and beauty of everyday. You can read more of their writing at WhitsonLife.
Sara is a wife to Nate and a mother of five whose arms stretched wide across the ocean to Africa. After almost a decade of Christian life she was introduced to pain and perplexity and, ultimately, intimacy with Jesus. Her book, Every Bitter Thing is Sweet released October 7, 2014 via Zondervan, is an invitation — back to hope, back to healing, back to a place that God is holding for you—a place where the unseen is more real than what the eye can perceive. A place where even the most bitter things become sweet. She writes regularly at EveryBitterThingIsSweet.com.
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