This past week a horrible incident occurred in a Cincinnati zoo.  A young child wanted to get into an exhibit and was able to do so, seemingly with little struggle.  He fell a distance into a moat, where a 400-pound gorilla greeted him. 

This is the stuff of nightmares.  Not only are little kids fast, I am convinced most have a death wish.  Our sole job as parents is to try to keep them alive to their 10^th birthday.  Now, instead of your child running out of your sight at the park or getting too close to the lit stove, he is trapped…in an exhibit…with a super terrifying animal that could easily crush his skull with one blow. 

As probably all of you are aware, the zookeepers had to make what must have been a heartbreaking decision and kill this rare, beautiful animal.  Zoology experts like Jack Hanna agreed that this was the right decision as this animal was showing signs of aggression.  He was most likely not going to stop without seriously, and potentially fatally injuring the child.  Tragedy all around.

This horrific event reminded me of something so incredibly prevalent in our culture.  People were blasting all over social media about how terribly neglectful these parents were, and that CPS should be investigating them.

Ahh…the trump card…call CPS.  So many people felt that this family should have their children taken away from them for neglect.  While I don’t think this freak accident should warrant that, I think it shows something important lacking in our hearts.  We are quick to point blame and stand in accusation, but when a child ends up in need of a loving home, where are the same outspoken vigilantes of justice?  All too often, the most opinionated are nowhere to be found. 

Abortion is another area where you see a lot of talk, and very little action.  Let me explain:  While I think EVERY life has value and is significant to our Heavenly Father…I feel for the women that have to make this tough decision.  They hear people shouting, “DON’T HAVE AN ABORTION! People would LOVE to adopt your baby!”  And then when it comes down to it, many are unwilling to actually foster or adopt.  (There are of course awesome exceptions to this, but sadly they are rare.)

My heart breaks when I see kids in need of loving homes.  When I look at our kids that we adopted two years ago, I am overwhelmed with so many emotions.  We are blessed to be able to raise them.  They are precious, hilarious, and although not biologically related to us, they are remarkably similar to our family.  We can’t imagine life without those two.

So, to sum up this meandering blog…I implore you please put action and compassion to your thoughts and quit playing the blame game.  Life is tough enough without the whole world picking apart your every decision.  When you see someone doing something that offends/upsets/frustrates you, ask yourself, “What can I do about this to help bring glory to Jesus?”

Earnestly ask God for insight, and then obey.  Maybe God will call you to adopt.  Maybe He will call you to foster.  Maybe He will call you to volunteer.  But, I guarantee you that whatever He calls you to will be challenging and rewarding in a way that you can’t even imagine right now.

Smile for the Camera!

I love Pinterest… and I hate Pinterest at the same time.  Growing up, a birthday party might entail a group trip to Chuck E Cheese if I was lucky, but usually was nothing more than a cake and a sleepover with a few friends.  Somewhere between my childhood and present day, birthdays transformed into a magical, stressful production.  One of my dearest friends always does the most amazing parties for her kids and she loves it all.  She has boundless creativity and birthdays are where she really shines. 

I don’t write this to be critical of birthday productions, but just to show my state of mind surrounding D’s first birthday in our home. 

I love parties and Pinterest, and I wanted his party to be perfect.  We planned for weeks and invited tons of people.  All the details were taken care of, and I was ready to sit back and enjoy the party. 

Everyone was having a good time, and then it was time for presents… and there were tons of them.  I was excited for D to see how much the people around him cared about him.

He opened the first one (an awesome Lego set from a family member), gave a half-smile, then moved on to the next gift.  WHAT!?  I wanted to scream!  Where was the gratitude… the excitement… the emotion?  I nudged him and told him to say thank you, which he did.  Whew! Crisis averted. 

Next gift.  A wrestling figurine.  Same response!  These were two of his favorite types of toys… things that he had been begging us for.  I knew he wanted them, so why was he so dissatisfied?  We kept prompting him to express gratitude after EVERY SINGLE GIFT. 

Nothing in my CPS classes or books that I had read prepared me for this moment.  I replayed the whole scenario and began to get some insight.  I once read a blog by Jen Hatmaker where she talked about how big days were often too much for her little one.  I wasn’t thinking about how important days remind you of family and other special days.  Each birthday and major holiday brought back memories of previous ones… ones with his biological parents.  It reminded him of who was missing this special day.

It was all coming together.  He was being flooded with memories of his bio parents and it was putting a serious damper on the whole party business.  We made it through the party and came up with a new plan for future birthdays.  Big parties were done… at least for now.  We decided that it would be best to go to an event like a concert or sporting event with family and maybe 1 or 2 friends rather than have a party.  This cuts down on the gifts, but is easier for everyone.  And so far, it has worked. 

I get weird looks when I tell people that we aren’t doing a traditional birthday party… but at this point I am pretty used to weird looks.  Celebrating this day is not about my picture of what a perfect birthday should look like.  It is about giving my kid an extra special day, but most importantly reminding them that we are there for them, no matter what.

Name Changes

When my husband and I started planning on adopting, we had always envisioned changing their names.  Then, once we knew we were adopting older children, we figured that the kids would be pretty settled with their names and be opposed to changes.  Boy, were we wrong. 

Our son was 10-years-old at the time of adoption and he was set on creating a new identity for himself.  I think at that age, I would have probably wanted to change my name as well.  It is around that age that most kids think their name is not cool enough.  For whatever reason, he wanted to change his name and we were thankful that he wanted a fresh start.

See, our son was a junior.  Well, technically he was a sixth.  Crazy, right?  But every time that he said or wrote his name, it was a reminder of his bio dad that was not a part of his life.

Thus began the deliberation over his new name.  Despite our desires for him to pick a name based on meaning, he simply wanted one that seemed cool.  So, he contemplated Jaden (after Jaden Smith, of course) and various names of wrestlers.  We vetoed a few and then finally came to a consensus with Daniel. 

Daniel is a nice name with biblical significance.  You see, Daniel was pulled away from his family and forced into a new life.  Daniel could have chosen to be bitter about this upheaval of his life, but rather chose to serve the Lord and be a mighty man of faith.  Daniel knew that God was His true judge, and He needed to live his life accordingly.  He trusted God and saw him do miraculous things in his life. 

This was our prayer for our son.  His story was far from ideal, but it could become extraordinary.  Our son was uprooted from his family, which at first seems horrible.  But, God had plans for our son.  Plans to place him in a family where he is surrounded by people of faith, who pray fervently for him and encourage him.  We fail continuously as parents, but we are thankful for the faith community that surrounds our kids, and even more so, for our gracious heavenly Father.

Am I a bad parent?

We were parents.  We had a son and a daughter.  Now, how in the world do we entertain these kids?  In our pre-parenting days, we were “that couple” that had it all planned out with how our kids would be different from “everyone else’s kids”.  You know, “that couple”.  “When we have kids, they will never…”.  Blah, blah, blah.  Oh to be young and idealistic.  In many ways we were incredibly naïve to the struggles and challenges of parenting.  Here are a few of the things we said we would never do, but at some point or another did.  Sorry, not sorry.

1.    Let TV babysit our kids

Now this was definitely not an all-the-time thing, but it did happen more than I ever thought it would.  We tried our best to restrict TV at our house to one hour a day in the summer, but being in grad school I needed a little peace and quiet. And, unfortunately, educational programs would not always get the job done.   Sometimes, you just need a little Alvin and the Chipmunks to so you can power through a discussion post. 

2.    Yell at our children

I came from a family of yellers.  We were passionate folks, but I always envisioned a peaceful home where kids were disciplined and calm mannered.  Think Full House. I wanted to sit my children down and explain to them rationally why what they were doing was wrong, but sometimes kids need to know that their parents can lose it a bit.  Something about hearing a generally mild-mannered parent lose it every now and then can act like a reset button for an unruly child.  

3.    Use sweets to bribe my kids

Don’t judge me.  We really are pretty restrictive about sweets in our house.  Sometimes you need to get things done in your household, and you don’t have the energy to negotiate with a pint-sized tyrant. The promise of dessert can motivate in ways that my words will never be able to.

Hopefully, this makes you feel better.  We are all just trying our best, but no one is perfect.  There were, however, a few things I feel that we did well, and I want to share those too.  Adoption, and parenting for that matter, is tough work, so we should celebrate the small victories.

1.    Hung out with our friends with kids

We began this very early on, and I think it made the transition much easier. There is something about throwing kids on some floats as you soak in a pool that makes all well in the world.  Our kids had left behind all the friends they had known, but now they were learning that they had many new friends who were thrilled to get to know them.

2.    Found things the kids loved and embraced them

My kids love animals.  The zoo became our best friend.  I think that first summer we went there about 5 times.  A membership was one of the best gifts we have ever received.

3.    Got our kids involved with service activities

We brought our kids along when our church did service activities, and I am so glad they went.  They were able to hang out and do a work project alongside at-risk teen boys and serve meals to the homeless.  The kids loved it and we loved watching them show love to others.  So sweet.

Those first few months were a blur of excitement, chaos, and pop-in visits from caseworkers.  We were trying to figure this whole family thing out, and thankfully we have a gracious heavenly Father who provided us with an amazing support network.

Move In Day

June 13^th was a day that was unlike any other.  In many ways, I felt like a kid at Christmas.  I was unable to sleep the night before.  I am typically not a morning person, but I was up early finishing last minute tidying up around the house.  Looking back, I think it is hilarious how much I cleaned for two kids to move in.  In the words of my son, “A boy’s room is supposed to be messy…that’s just the way life works”. 

Any way, back to our story.  I drove out to pick up the kids from their foster parents one last time.  This was their fifth move in their short lives, so this part was unfortunately familiar to them.  Their foster dad had their stuff loaded in our vehicle in a matter of minutes.  All of their belongings fit into about 4 garbage bags, which is actually much more than most foster kids have. 

I picked them up alone so that my husband and father-in-law could assemble a basketball goal for my son to play with.  As I made the 20 minute drive, reality began to set in for me, but I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through the kids’ minds.  As I mentioned before, moving was familiar territory, but a forever home was something they had never experienced before. 

We began unloading, sorting belongings out and decorating their rooms.  There was tremendous excitement.  All of a sudden, Z began to tear up as she realized how much she missed her foster parents.  It started to sink in.  This was forever.  As exciting as it was, everything was new.  New house rules.  New Parents.  New friends.  New EVERYTHING. 

Reality was setting in for me, too.  I began to see how bittersweet this really was for these beautiful children.  Sure, it was great that they were now in their forever home after years of “being in the system”, but they were with strangers.  It’s memories like this that flood over me every time a well-intentioned friend tells me how “lucky” these kids are to be with us.  “Lucky” would probably be the last word that they would choose to describe this new living situation.

Even with all of these mixed emotions, it was still a pretty amazing day. Our house was a little less quiet and a little bit messier.  Our schedules were fuller and our budget was tighter.  But, our lives were incredibly blessed.