Our Story Hurts

 

On December 27, 2021 - almost 7 months after my husband died - I drove 4 hours to pick up a 12 year old girl who needed a home. 

4 years later I rang in the anniversary of bringing her home by sleeping on the floor of her hospital room. 

Hours before, after a great day together, she dissolved into a tantrum that she couldn’t control and I couldn’t bring her out of. She was hurting herself and threatening me and I had to call the police so she would stop. 

We ended up in the ER for a behavioral health evaluation (not our first rodeo) and it was decided that the best thing for her was to spend a week at an in-patient facility.

4 years ago I drove her home…and today I had to let someone else drive her away. 

This is the part that everyone warned me about 4 years ago. The hardness of this part…the possible hopelessness of this part. The brokenness of this part.

My daughter’s situation isn’t abnormal in the adoption community, or even in the parenting of biological children (RAD, ODD, ADHD etc etc). Sometimes our kids are broken…and we can’t fix them. As much as we deeply, profoundly, wish we could.

I wish this wasn’t her story, I prayed that it wouldn’t be. 

But it is.

And that’s ok.

It’s ok that this part of her story feels ugly and sordid and hopeless.

It’s ok.

Because this isn’t the title of her story…nor is it the ending. It’s just a part. And broken doesn’t mean lost, or worthless, or irredeemable. After all, don’t we serve a God of broken things? A God who redeems those broken things and makes them whole?

I choose to not be ashamed of the ugliness of this part, for her or for me. 

Because choosing her was never been an option. I learned she needed a home and I said “Me!”. God gave me profound peace in that from the literal second I knew about her. Not choosing her wasn’t an option, even knowing that this could be our future.

And I will continue to choose her. Even when she chooses a poor imitation of herself. I will choose the best of her, and love the worst of her. 

My motherhood has been tainted by scars since the very beginning…infertility, loss, failed adoptions, and now a child who doesn’t want me.

What is motherhood without scars? I’m not really sure. But I’m ok with these, they’re mine. Hard fought and hard won. Scars that shape a story worth living, worth telling, even when it hurts.

Happy Anniversary, kid. 

I love you…I choose you…for always.