Today was Mothers Day. For everyone with adopted older kids, you know that this is a weird day. My two Ghanaian children have another mother that is alive thousands of miles from here. We can’t talk to her (she has no phone/no service) and mail takes months to get there. Our daughter misses her and imagines a life with her. I may never be seen as “mom” to her. This is not an easy thing to accept. We have had people/ counselors tell us that she will probably think of me as an aunt at best, and that I should get on board with that. After years of praying for this kid, that had been left in an orphanage for the last 6 years of her life, wanting her to have a family…this is not the future we had hoped for, for her. We woke up to..”oh, I forgot it was Mothers day”..and she wrote happy mothers day to me on an old church offering envelope. She also made every homemade thing at school that was meant for me, her mom, and told me they were not for me. I have been reminded countless times that she already has a mom. I get it. I understand it. But..it still hurts. I can honestly say that even after reading every book/ article/ blog I could find about adoption, I don’t know what I am doing. And if I’m honest, I can say that I probably have no idea what I’m doing with any of these kiddos. Do I love them? Yep. Absolutely. Am I doing a good job? eh. Hard to say. Our kids are 15, 12, 11 and 7. Every night when they are all asleep, I think, “oh wow, we made it. another day and they are all still alive! ” Maybe that’s all we can hope for- for now.
To be fair, we are in the trenches. Our adopted kids have not been here quite two years and it’s been anything but easy. All of our naysayers along the journey are probably thinking “I told you so” about now. Still, we prayed and prayed for years and I know that we did what God wanted us to do. I used to have it a little more together, but this has been a rough year. Today at church this sweet lady (sorry Robin) asked me how I was doing, and I told her! No seriously, I told her. I told her that this has been the (so far) hardest year of my life. I lost two of my dearest friends within 10 days of each other. I went back to college. I’m struggling with bonding with a kid. I can’t walk without pain due to a back issue. I let her have it. I didn’t tell her I was fine and fake smile (seriously sorry!) I just told her how I was. Struggling. Human. In the deep depths of mourning. Questioning everything that I do. Then I teared up, as is a daily ritual now. But she didn’t run away screaming..as if I had deserted the “brave Moms face club.” She just gave me a hug. And it helped make me feel a little less alone in the struggle.
I haven’t kept up my blog, and for those of you that followed me, maybe I’m back. But it’s not pretty. It just is what it is. It’s hard to write about the lows and the struggles, as I don’t want to discourage anyone. Adoption is one of Gods many plans for some of us, and while it is a beautiful thing at times, it can also be pretty scary. If you are our there and going through the trenches with family, adopted or not, I feel ya! And am praying for you.
Trying to keep it real… until next time.