On Being Back

It's funny, I don't know how to start this post!

Hello everyone! is what I started to say, but after being gone for just shy of 40 days, it feels like I am walking into an empty room, and announcing my return to still air. Which is of course ironic, me mentally thinking of this blog as having a physical space that could be empty, when the truth of the virtual realm is that it is always, always full of people who you may not even know are there, and bits and bytes zooming around--and now I am again to the mental picture of the quiet room, but now the air is filled with little glowing, moving numbers ala The Matrix. ; )

All this to say it is weird trying to write after being gone for so long.

(Thank you Rosa and Scottish Twins for helping the room feel occupied by smiling faces for a few moments the other day! And Shera and Rebecca stopping by while I was working on this!)

My bad cold and a really bad night of sleep--Smiley is sick too, poor thing--don't help the brain get back into gear any faster this morning either! I have been sick since Easter and so that's why I have not jumped back into the blogging immediately. But being sick and not wanting to move around much were the perfect excuse to jump back into the blog reading immediately, so that is what I have been doing so far this week--catching up on the lives of those in my blogging community!

And there is so much I have been wanting to share with you all this past month + so I hope to get the momentum back by next week. : ) But until I have the mental ability to do some real writing, I think I will try to post snippets--and get out of my head some of the things that have been floating around in there for the past month!

But for today, I want to share some of the things I have been reading the past couple of days from some of my favorite inspirational blogs. They are all families who have chosen to adopt--well, they would clarify here and say that God has called them to adopt--and not just any kids. They have adopted internationally, multi-racially, and/or--most amazing in my eyes--children with clear emotional/physical/mental baggage like Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, Autism, ADHD, Attachment Disorder, etc. Just reading those words makes my heart race--I confess my faith has been so small that I have prayed in the past that God would not give us a child with ADD, which appears in both my and D's family. ADD drives me nuts--it is the lack of cause and effect comprehension that I struggle to have patience with. So to think about purposefully adopting kids who have much, much worse issues. . . and adopting a bunch of them. And then homeschooling them.

Wow. What is so ironic is that I have been struggling this week with yucky behavior in mainly one, but sometimes two of my girls. One of my sweet girls is going through a phase where she fights doing her schoolwork and says things like "NO you can't MAKE me!" and then when she gets a firm hand guiding her to the bedroom for a time out she says "I do NOT give you permission to TOUCH me!" (which is what I have taught the girls to say to anyone who touches them in a way that makes them uncomfortable--ha) And what makes it worse is that Happy is learning this behavior and is starting to copy it and have little rebellious melt downs too.

So here I have three perfectly bright, normal, typically sweet-hearted kids, who sometimes take all my patience and then some. I am finding myself depending on God for strength and perseverence and self-control in my parenting. So that is what makes it even harder to think about doing what these other families are doing--I whine and complain to God about the brief episodes of poor behavior I see around here, while there are parents all over the world who choose to love kids with far, far worse bahavior. It is amazing.

But the most amazing part is that while they struggle, yes, they are families filled with purposeful living, and their hearts are truly in tune with God. And that part I envy. I wish I could say I have gone all out for Jesus. I wish I would have come already to the complete laying down of self that these parents have come to--I am still in the baby stages, still having to make conscious choices to NOT live for myself in any given moment. OK, maybe they do too, but they have chosen a life that makes it almost impossible to indulge their own selfish natures, while my life is full of such opportunities! And I wish I had such joy.

But do I want what it took for them to get to that place of spiritual wisdom? Not at all.

I think I will be entering the beginnings of wisdom when I do want what it takes.

And, would you look at that? Funny how I just meant to post a snippet since I had no words of my own, but then thinking about the things that have inspired me this week inspired my words to start flowing too. ; )

So here are a couple of links to postings by these amazing families that I think you will enjoy, and maybe be inspired/convicted/encouraged/informed by. Please take a moment to read them; not only might you appreciate your family more after reading them, but they also might give you new awareness of the issues some kids face, and more compassion for kids our culture tells us to throw away.

Columbian Brewed writes:

These kids are killing me...

in a dying to self sort of way, that is. You see, they are fleshing out in me an idolatry of self-preservation and self-gratification that comes so naturally to everyone. Loving hurt children who hurt others as a result of their past has been harder than I ever could have imagined. And it has taught me more about my own sin and hurt than I knew existed. (here for more)

Not An Ordinary Life writes:

The discouragement we felt when it was clear that he was not able to comprehend the seriousness of what he did and the reality that he will probably do these types of things over and over again hit us very hard. It is sad to have to face the reality that this boy who is a very gentle and kind young man could try to be cool by acting like he is tough and scary. The law is not going to listen to me when I tell them my son has a disability...the prisons are filled with our FAS kids. (here for more)

Urban Servant writes:

Parenting kids with hidden disabilities is never easy and sometimes I find it's nothing more than a high-stakes guessing game as we try to unravel what can not be easily diagnosed. Last night we had one of those moments when an older child finally found words to describe his world and some of the behaviors that we have seen exhibited for years. (here for more)

These posts highlight some of the tribulations and struggle of adopting kids like these, with needs that may or may not ever be met, issues that may or may not ever be "fixed." But here from another blog, All Are Precious In His Sight, is a glimpse of some of the joys.

My mind, my spirit are stretched when I open my eyes to what God is doing in the lives of such families.

Thanks for coming by, everyone!