This is not going to be a super light post. It most likely won’t make you laugh. It might make you cry. It might make you want to adopt, but friends,
it might make you not want to adopt. I pray that it will open your eyes to children who desperately do need families, but that it will also open your eyes to the realities that adoption is HARD.
On November 3rd 2009 (yes that is exactly 4 years
ago) Brandon and I mailed in our application to begin our Ethiopia adoption
journey. The night of November 2nd
I actually slept with the manila envelopes (2 because we had a home study
agency and an International agency). I
told Brandon that it felt like we were conceiving this adoption so I needed to
at least put the applications under my pillow.
Before we sent them off we prayed over them and they were off to
agencies.
If this was the end of the story it would be sort of cool. We started our paper chase 4 years ago and now
we can celebrate that on Orphan Sunday… well there is more to the story.
You see, November 3rd just happens to be the day
that M came into orphanage care. I want
to tell you a little bit of M’s story.
His Story is his to share and we will be sharing it with him along the
way as he grows. This is not his Story
with an “S” but a bit of his story that I am pretty sure I have not shared on
here.
On November 3rd 2009 M came into care in
Ethiopia. He was in a government run
orphanage. He was about 3 months
old. Here is a photo of him at that
time, chubby cheeks and overall happy personality.
Poor little man had no idea that he was now an orphan
waiting for a family. Harder still he
had no clue that this orphanage was severely underfunded and that food
(formula) would be hard to come by. M in
the next 6 months would not gain a single pound! He didn’t grow in any way. He didn’t meet any developmental
milestones. He lacked one of the
greatest needs an infant has, nourishment.
He most likely would go long periods of time with very watered down
formula or even just water.
We have no idea what it was like for him emotionally during
that time. Because we visited his
orphanage on our embassy trip we know that it appeared to be a very sad and
dreary place. We do have hope that from
time to time volunteer groups came and brought love and joy and food and
prayers into our son’s life.
When he was rescued from this orphanage and taken to the
care facility associated with our agency he was barely hanging on to life. A social worker from our agency was visiting
the orphanage and saw him and said that he was coming back to the care facility
with her. This is not protocol, but by
God’s great grace the orphanage let her telling her they didn’t want to deal
with a dead baby. She feared he would
not make it back to the orphanage. The
Doctors who saw him early on said he was within days of dying of malnutrition,
Global failure to thrive. This means
every part of him was struggling to live.
Here is what he looked like at 9 months of age. This is a 3 month onesie. It is falling off of him.
I do not pretend to know ever reader to my little blog. I do not pretend to know what your growing up
was like or the needs you have had that have been unmet. While I can’t speak for any of you, I can
speak for me. I am 32 years old and I
have never endured anything close to the trauma that my son had endured by age
9 months.
The next months of his life were filled with food and care
at our agencies facility and slowly be began to gain weight and very slowly he
began to meet milestones. He sat alone
for the first time at 14.5 months of age.
He was WAY behind, but he was alive. Thanks be to God!
So, in short November 2009 was a HARD month for our little
man.
November 2010 was not a walk in the park either. On November 11th 2010 my life
changed forever. For the first time I
held MY SON! I kissed him and loved him
and watched his chest move up and down as he slept. I held him, rocked him, fed him, and sang to
him. I got to pretend it was the real
deal for about a week. You can read about our Court trip to Ethiopia HERE. Then, because Ethiopia is a two trip country,
I had to get on a plane WITHOUT my son.
Once again he was abandoned in November.
This time he was at a better care facility for sure, but he was very ill
with pneumonia when we left him. Over
that week we began to bond with him and I shudder to think what his heart must
have been feeling when we no longer came for visits.
 |
| One of the last times I held him before we left. He fell asleep in my arms that night. |
It is now November 2013.
Years have passed since those hard Novembers, but each year at this time
M begins to struggle deeply in all areas.
Yes, I am serious. No, I am not
wacky or making things up or justifying behavior. This time of year is very hard for M. He works hard to sabotage everything he
loves. I am not saying that he is typically a
perfect little 4 year old or that he ever has awesome behavior. I am saying that this time of year his
behavior can only be understood when you look at it through the lens of his
past. Friends, it is hard to endure for
all of us right now. Oh how we covet
your prayers!
If you are reading this because M is a part of your life and
you are interacting with him regularly you will notice that all things are a
bit harder for him right now. He works
very hard to ruin things he loves. Why would he do this? His mind thinks, “they will just abandon me”
and “I might as well get it over with.”
I am trying to tell his mind (and I say it out loud too) “I know you are
struggling right now. I forgive
you. I love you. I will never leave you.” After many days of struggling and a lot of
wisdom from adoption connection experts we have told him about his
traumaversary in a way he can understand and we have shown him photos to talk
through this time of year with him. He
can’t verbalize why he does what he does, but we are quite sure this is the
trigger. So in this season parenting is
done differently. You might notice him spending more time in the Ergo carrier. You might notice him acting like a 2 year old
and me parent him like he is 2. I am
working to meet his needs. While it
might look strange, we are OK with it.
Adoption is NOT easy!
Adoption is HARD! The process is
hard for sure. It is taxing in every
way. BUT the hardest part of adoption is
the day in and day out of dealing with the trauma and loss as you graft this
incredible child into your family. What
I wrote above about November is just a part of what adopted kiddos deal
with. The trauma of losing everything
they have ever known to be (what feels like) kidnapped and taken to a place
where everything is upside down is enough to cause deep wounds and
heartache.
M was not the only kiddo in that orphanage. Some of them didn’t make it. Others are in forever families and
struggling. Others are there right
now. They are real. They have needs. My heart breaks for them.
Adoption is beautiful.
Adoption is at the heart of the Gospel… redemption. We who know Christ have been adopted into his family. I am not anti-adoption at all. Anyone who knows me knows that I think
adoption is incredible. Will parenting adopted children bring more issues than you can imagine into your family? Yes! Is it worth it? Yes!
I love my son. His
heart is so worth fighting for. I am so
blessed to be his mom. I ache as he
aches. I hope this season of struggle is
short, but no matter the length I am his mama and I am fighting the battle with
him. Jesus is victorious. Those words can sound so trite at the end of
this post. We don’t know when our little
earthly victories will come, but we know the End and we know that Jesus Is
victorious.
You see God has been in this all along. On that hard day for M 4 years ago his mommy
was sleeping with an envelope (ET is 9 hours ahead of us) and praying for him. He
was an orphan, but God knew he would soon be “one less.” God created him and God sustained his life
all those months in Ethiopia. Today my
son (besides his small stature) has completely caught up with his peers
physically and mentally. Jesus is Victorious!
*I realize this is not your typical Orphan Sunday post and I didn't really mention T at all and I don't have super cute after photos of them today... but today I want the reality of being a orphan to be engrained in your brain!
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