Friday, September 25, 2009

One Day Later

I'm still processing, still getting my head around what my heart went through in that 24 hours. My sister-in-law Amy put it best for me in a text, I couldn't talk to anyone, so she wrote,

"When you said yes in your heart you said yes to being her mommy, God asked you to step out in faith. You did. All He asked you to do was step. . . the answer [to all this] will be glorious. I don't understand why this happened. But it's ok to be sad and grieve."

I needed permission to grieve for some reason. How do you understand for yourself, how do you even begin to explain the depth of love you have instantaneously for a child you've just laid eyes on? It wasn't because she was beautiful, or because she was motherless and under nourished. It wasn't because I needed to love another child. It was because I had been asked to be her mommy, she had been offered to me as my daughter. Everything I do I do with passion. I can meet a million adorable babies and toddlers on the street and think they're great but no one has ever said, "Here is this child. Will you love her as your own? Will you be her mother, will you fold her into your heart?" When I said yes I meant it.

Now obviously, true relationship, true intimacy comes from investing yourself. Just as those first few months after my three bio kids were born, it was a time of bonding, and a depth of love developing that is beautiful and built on experiences together, trust from needs being offered and met. I know that I will go through that same period with this adopted child when they come home, I know that the love from intimacy will take time to develop and grow, but I now know that the deep sold out spiritual love, the desire to pray for a child's every breath and especially their salvation, the love that dares to dream about the different ways they will fit in your family, and what things will look like because you now have a face,an age, a sex, to fit into that picture you've been dreaming about for months, that love is instant. I've suffered a miscarriage of my heart, and it's painful.

Yesterday was tough because I was allowing Satan to whisper in my ear. Saying things like, "You've only seen this child for 18 hours, what difference does it make. You don't have a right to be upset. You don't have anything to be sad about. Just forget about it, act like these past 18 hours didn't happen. OH, you have this strong faith huh, you know God has the perfect child for you, and you just deceived yourself into believing this was her, you don't hear Him at all like you think you do, huh? You've been so wrong, you are making up that voice you thought was His. If you think He'll work all this out, then you don't have a right to be upset or sad, you would have already gotten over this if your faith were what you're claiming it to be."

But the truth is, my faith in God never wavered. I never faltered in knowing with full confidence that God is in total control. I don't doubt one moment that this situation is part of our story, that it is necessary, that we were chosen to receive her picture, even if that's all it is, for a higher purpose than our eyes can see. I believe God knows what He's doing and He's redeeming every circumstance for His glory.

So, when my faith in my God did not waiver, the enemy used it as a time to attack my marriage. Jason and I have been through some tough crap, but it was serious for 5 hours last night. In all honesty, it had about 1% to do with our referral being pulled back, and about 99% to do with our misplaced needs and choices, but satan used this circumstance to make me doubt so much of what I believed about my marriage. It was 30 seconds of a hugely stupid insensitivity on Jason's part, and 8 hours of satan manipulating and twisting. I keep going back and adding adjectives to his insensitivity. Guess I'm not done forgiving. .. . but I digress :)

Adoption is so near to God's heart, that I believe it puts a big ole target on our backs for the enemy. After surviving this latest battle, I'm grateful for the opportunity to shore up the cracks a little more. Jason learned some lessons, I learned a lot of lessons, our marriage will be stronger, more impenetrable going forward, and we're more resolved to complete this adoption together as a unified team. Satan's goal was to create doubt in our ability to trust the other in this adoption and to have us give it up, and for a while last night he probably thought he was winning, but like always in our relationship, the Warrior, the Victorious Conqueror was called in to the ring, and the three of us are indefeatable.

The Lord provided me with so much support. My dear friends who understood I couldn't talk, and simply kept emailing and texting me throughout the day, it got me through. Praise God for our adoption yahoo group, other parents who are going through the same thing, many who have received their referral and understand how much they love that child, and how much it must hurt to have them removed. And a small few who have been through what happened to us yesterday. God uses the testimony of survivors to gird us up. Others who say, it's ok to be confused, pissed, sad, to grieve.

For my non-adopting readers, yes, this is extremely rare. There is no reason to withhold complete love and devotion from the instant you see a referral picture. There is no reason to think, "I better guard my heart, this could fall apart." No one sees their referral picture for the first time and thinks, "I'm not going to call this child my daughter until we're on the plane coming home and it's really happening." Any other adoptive mother who had seen her child, and then 18 hours later gotten the call that they weren't, would be as devastated as I am.

Will we receive another referral? Yes. Will we believe and realize at that time that no other child could be as perfect for us and will all the events come into clear focus and be amazing, yes. Does that negate the fact that "B" was an equal fulfillment of all of God's promises, prophecies and dreams for us? No.

God doesn't ask us to hold back, He asks us to step . . .

5 comments:

  1. Wow! What an amazing way to say all of that!! I sure do love you and praying for you during this crazy time. The Lord is being glorified through your testimony! And the child(ren) that he brings to you will be blessed to have you for a mommy! And we'll be blessed to have them!!!!!! Can't wait!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Love you guys! Praying up a storm. Knowing God has an amazing surprise in store!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Will you please send me your address? I want to send you something that has brought great comfort to my life.

    Erica Reed
    etr2002@bellsouth.net

    ReplyDelete
  4. We are just beginning the paper process with AWAA to adopt a baby boy from Ethiopia. My heart aches for you and your post is exactly right, that yes, satan hates that these children are being adopted and he will try anything to keep that from happening.

    You are right that it is ok to grieve, because you may not have seen that face, but for a short time, you have been dreaming about her much much longer. I will pray for you all and cannot wait to continue to follow your blog and am excited to be on this journey as well.

    KLU (Keep Looking up) Psalms 121: 1

    ReplyDelete
  5. Amy said it best - God dropped her into your heart, and the outcome will be "GLORIOUS"!!!! Only HE could have orchestrated her return to you, this time in God's perfect will bringing her little brother with her.

    ReplyDelete