My children are mine, no doubt about it. Legally, emotionally, forever and always, through late-night fears and throw-up on the floor, first toddling steps, fingerprints on the walls, bright scrawled drawings on my refrigerator.
They grin at me and yell “Mommy!” when the tooth comes out.
They look to me and whine, “Mommy…………” when life is unfair.
They cling to me and whisper, “Mommy” when the doctor comes at them with a needle.
I am Mommy. But you are too.
There is a part of them that is yours, and always will be. I look for you sometimes, in their faces, in their movements, in their reactions. I wonder if you have the same shoulder dimples, if you have the same almond-shaped eyes, if you have that slight frame.
One of you gave your life bearing my child. Tragedy. Sorrow. So unnecessary, because if you had given birth in another country, you would never have died.
I think about that day, when my child was taking her first breath, and hours later, you were taking your last. Did you get to hold her? Did her fingers curl around yours? Did you get to comprehend, at least for a few minutes, the beautiful miracle you brought into the world? Or did fear and pain overwhelm it all?
And the other two, you who held my child for nine months. You felt her kick against you. You watched your belly grow large with him. A miracle, a life, a breathing, feeling, child in the image of God, growing inside you, yet you felt only
despair.
What caused your hopelessness? Was it the lack of love in your life? Were you afraid of losing your only chance at an education? Was it rejection by your own mother, your empty purse, a broken heart?
I wish I had known you. I wish I could have come alongside of you and given you hope, and helped you realize that there could be another way, that this child who was knit inside of you for nine months could have always been yours.
If I met you today, I would collapse at your feet and thank you. The child you bore made me a Mommy. The child you bore has overflowed my cup. The child you bore is beautiful and intelligent and loving and full of hope.
I wish you could see her. I wish you could see him. I wish you could see me. I wish we could help you fill the holes in your heart. I wish for hope for you. And Redemption.
Your sorrow meant my joy. Your loss was my gain. I am sad that you will never know.
Dear Birthmother, you have given me an indescribable gift. I am forever indebted to you.
My kids were relating to me the adoption story of one of their friends. Well, adoption always starts with something sad, I reminded them.
Sometimes I have to remind myself too, because I tend to forget. We are a happy family. Josiah loves hiding behind doors and scaring people. Grace is enthusiastic about everything. Lily loves to be chased and has an infectious giggle. We eat dinner together every night. We love playing games. We dance a lot. There’s a lot of tickling.
Of course, we have grumpiness and meanness and sometimes they drive me batty. He’s not helping! She hit me! I’m telling! But it’s all normal. I forget, often, that my kids are adopted. I forget that they have pasts that didn’t involve me.
This school year, one of our children has been having some “incidents” of bad behavior in class. It started out somewhat mild, but continued to escalate until January, when we knew we needed to really take action. This child would be set off by certain triggers, which would turn into loud, long, and uncontrollable outbursts.
I was a teacher for 7 years before I became a mom. All I could think was, Oh no, my kid is that kid.
So Gil and I did what we had always done with our children’s sinful behavior, and what has always worked. We set out very clear and significant rewards and consequences, and we followed through on them. We made a behavior chart. We had long, solemn talks with this child. As a family, we role played school-day scenarios, which always ended with everyone laughing in heaps on the floor.
Unfortunately, at school there was no laughing. Our plan did not work. In fact, it got worse. A lot worse. During one terrible week, I broke down and cried. I wasn’t just concerned for my child. I was scared. We had been trying everything we could think of. What else could we do?
In desperation, I wrote to Elaine, a friend of mine who is an adoption specialist. I described my child’s behavior. Could this be an adoption issue? I asked.
She wrote back almost immediately. Absolutely, she said. No doubt. She answered my questions and sent me all sorts of articles and links to read.
Suddenly it all became very clear. Of course! I thought about my child’s past. I thought about how the school environment could trigger things from the past. It made sense! My child wasn’t acting out of defiance; my child was acting out of fear.
My friend reminded me that all adopted children have experienced trauma. Even if they were adopted as infants, there is still trauma. A baby bonds with his or her mother while in the womb. God’s original plan is for children to stay with their birth mothers. When that doesn’t happen, there’s trauma. All of my children came from incredibly competent and loving orphanages, but they were still orphanages. Children are not meant to be in orphanages. Period.
Gil and I, along with our child’s wonderful teacher, started looking at our child’s behavior from an entirely different angle. We made a different plan. We are doing less fighting against the behavior and more addressing the underlying issue. For parents like us, who tend to be no-nonsense and generally expect obedience from our children, this feels permissive. It goes against some of our instincts. But it’s working!
It’s been almost a month now, and we’ve had a lot less incidents. I’ve noticed a confidence in my child that wasn’t there before. My child is happier and friendlier. Most importantly, I feel so much closer to my child’s heart. I feel like I understand some of the behavior of the last few years…and I have a lot more compassion.
I realize that so far, our kids’ struggles have been pretty mild compared to what some adoptive families go through. But I’m sharing this story because I want to give other adoptive families hope, and because I want to encourage school teachers, Sunday School teachers, and coaches of adopted kids to also be willing to consider other angles as well. Elaine told me to start at this website, and now I’m passing it onto you.
Adoption always starts with something sad. But by the grace of God, that never has to be the end of the story.
On the day you were born, your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you wrapped in cloths. No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised. (Ezekiel 16:4-5)
I find it interesting that so many people are shocked that some African women would dump their newborns into a pit latrine.
My last post quickly shot up into my #1 most-read post, with over 7000 hits. (I realize that’s small potatoes in the blog world, but it’s a lot for my tiny corner of the internet.)
It certainly was not my most inspired piece of writing. So all I can figure is that it was sensational enough to shock people into reading and sharing.
But why?
Why is it so shocking that women in Africa leave their newborns to die?
Is dumping a baby into a toilet more barbaric than jabbing a scalpel into a baby’s neck, suctioning out her brains, and crushing her skull? Or simply vacuuming her life away, piece by piece, as she struggles to get away?
After all, that’s what happened to over a million babies in America last year. Legally.
At least Tanzania has the sense to make child murder illegal.
In Tanzania, there’s not a lot of hope for unwanted babies, when adoption is so culturally unacceptable. But in America, there’s tens of thousands of couples who wait months….years….for the phone call that there’s a baby waiting for them. Yet still, we throw away a million babies a year.
Listen. My heart breaks for these mamas. I can’t imagine the despair, the hopelessness, the fear, that compels a mama to dump her newborn into a toilet pit. Or to pay money for someone to suck out her baby’s brains. I think of the 17-year-old who is terrified she’ll be kicked out of school. Or the prostitute who doesn’t see a way out. Or the desperate mama who just doesn’t know how she’ll feed one more child.
It goes against a woman’s deepest instinct to turn her back on her child. The heartache that leads her to that point must be unfathomable. Yes, Christians, let’s be known for advocating for the babies. But let’s be known for advocating for the mamas too.
But don’t just weep for the African babies who are thrown away. Weep for the American ones too–and those all over the world, for that matter. (Ironically, one of the few (only?) similarities between the United States and North Korea is that they both permit abortions past 20 weeks–two of only seven countries in the entire world that allow them.)
Yet
There is redemption for a baby lifted out of a toilet pit and given life and love.
There is redemption for the adoptive mother when that child fills empty spaces in her heart.
There is redemption for the birth mother who sacrificially gives her child a chance at life. And there’s even redemption available for the one who doesn’t.
Because in that picture, there is the reminder that we all are in the toilet pit, until the Day when we are lifted out and made Sons or Daughters.
Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, “Live!” I made you grow like a plant of the field….I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Sovereign Lord, and you became mine. (Ezekiel 16:6, 8)
“We were not made to make much of blackness. We were not made to make much of whiteness. We were not made to make much of self or humanity in general. We were made to make much of God.”
I grew up pretty much oblivious to race.
My childhood neighborhood in California was multi-ethnic. My best friend was Indian. Then I spent six years in three African countries.
Back in California in high school and college, I spent 8 years doing ministry in multi-ethnic neighborhoods. Camp counselor for two summers for kids who were mostly black and hispanic. Worked four years for a black employer.
As an adult I spent seven years teaching kids from all kinds of ethnicities. Spent nine of the last eleven years in Tanzania.
As I was growing up, white people were kinda boring to me. Travel and cultures, that’s what fascinated me. The fact that Gil is half-hispanic? Dream come true.
So adopting African children was just sort of obvious. I mean, we wanted to adopt, we were living in Tanzania, and there are two million orphans here. So should we adopt from Africa? Duh. The fact that my kids have dark skin was just….beautiful. And though I always loved the idea of raising a family that mirrored what heaven will look like, I never set out to be a billboard for race reconciliation.
But I’ve been thinking.
Grace and I have been making our way through the American Girl books. And Addy is a little girl living during the time of the Civil War. She’s a slave; she escapes to Philadelphia, but continues to live with segregation even in freedom.
I want Grace to know these things. She is African but has an American passport. One day it is likely she will live in the States. She needs to know.
But did I ever realize how difficult it would be to read her stories about white oppression of black people? Sitting there on the couch, my arm around her, her Mommy in every way, with nothing but the color of our skin separating us. Teaching her how people who looked like me made people who looked like her into slaves. And then even when that was over, wouldn’t even let them use the same bathroom.
I never knew how hard it would be.
And then I read this book (not to Grace!). And I know it’s controversial and not everyone likes it, but I personally was deeply moved. Because I am white, and my daughter is black. Because I have “help.” Because even though I knew the history, there’s nothing like seeing it through the eyes of someone else through a story.
Since I’ve always thought multi-ethnicities were so cool, I think I unintentionally ignored the pain that so many have experienced (are experiencing) because of their race. Even, often, at the hands of those who call themselves followers of Christ. And since we live in Africa, I never fully, truly contemplated the discrimination my own kids could face in America.
It’s not my favorite Piper book. But as a theological treatise on why Christians should intentionally pursue racial reconciliation? It’s excellent.
“That I am chosen for salvation in spite of my ugly and deadening sinfulness…that my rebellious and resistant heart was conquered by sovereign grace….if these truths do not make me a humble servant of racial diversity and harmony, then I have not seen them or loved them as I ought.”
“When we feel or think or act with disdain or disrespect or avoidance or exclusion or malice toward a person simply because he or she is of another race or another ethnic group, we are, in effect, saying that Jesus acted in a foolish way toward us. You don’t want to say that.”
My favorite section was on inter-racial marriage. Really, really good stuff. Especially because inter-racial adoption is so similar.
“As long as we disapprove of [inter-racial marriage], we will be pushing our children, and therefore ourselves, away from each other. The effect of that is not harmony, not respect and not equality of opportunity. Separation has never produced mutual understanding and respect. It has produced ignorance, suspicion, impersonal stereotyping, demeaning innuendo, and corporate self-exaltation.”
I humbly recognize that, growing up in my privileged, white life, I will never understand the oppression that minority groups have experienced in America. But yet, God has entrusted me with these beautiful children. So it is therefore my job to do everything I can to try to understand.
Somehow, our family must become a picture of racial reconciliation. Somehow, I must teach my kids how to love, forgive, and reach out beyond racial lines. Somehow, I must teach them how to understand the challenges and history and sorrows of their race, even though I haven’t experienced it myself.
I am inadequate for this task. The weight of the burden is heavy. But yet, it is important and necessary. And worth it.
My kids are sitting on the kitchen floor drinking chocolate milk as I write this. I think chocolate and milk make an excellent combination, don’t you?
There was a time in my life when the first thing I did every
morning was take my temperature.
Every month, I hoped. And every month, I cried.
The worst months were the ones when I was a couple of days
late.The waiting was torture, and I let
my imagination get completely out of control. What would my parents’ faces look like when we told them the good
news?Would it be a girl or a boy?What would we name her?
And then, the next day, only to be crushed again.
I went through dozens of pregnancy tests.Dozens. It’s a good thing I could find them at the 99Cent store.
Then Josiah came, and I was getting older, and I remember
asking Gil one day, “Will you have regrets if I never get pregnant and we never
did any procedure to help it along?”And
he thought about it a while and came back with a definitive No.
And I knew by then that No was my answer too.But I knew I needed to ask it of myself,
because we live in a country where “getting help” is not a possibility, yet I
did not want to live with regret.
But I realized that God’s grace had filled me up.And that I didn’t really pay attention to
what happened each month any more.
Then my addiction started. Instead of craving a child from my womb, all I wanted was more brown babies:the ones who were helpless and hopeless and
desperately needed a Mommy.
And after Lily came, and we started to think about James and
then about bringing a baby into our family from another country, I suddenly
realized something.
I was afraid of getting pregnant.
Afraid because I thought it could mess up our plans for
bringing home another orphan.And
suddenly, I was facing every month with relief at not being pregnant, instead of disappointment.
And that, right there, my friends, is the abounding Grace of
God.
That He could take my pain, and my shame that started so
many years ago, and turn it around so completely and entirely and fully—that
can only be the Grace of God.
Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the
desires of your heart.
Or rather, He will change your desires and make them His.
He is the God of redemption.
He makes beauty from ashes.
He brings over-abundant joy from pain.
And I am in awe.
(Just to clarify—I do know it could still happen to me.It’s been 8 years of “not preventing” and I
am now 35, so I’m guessing it won’t—but I know God does crazy things.And if He does, well, of course, we will
rejoice.But that’s really not the
point.)
