You are wanted.

I watched you today as your daddy held you close to his chest. I made note of how tiny you still looked in his grip. Certainly you have grown since your arrival just 5 months ago, entering this world just over 6 pounds, but you still look small. fragile, yet strong. 

Your eyes drifted my way and your gaze caught mine for a moment.  I saw through those dark eyes into your sweet spirit in a way that only a mama is capable of doing. Your eyes widened and your body stiffened with joy...you saw me too. you know me. and I know you. 

I heard you tonight. you laughed out loud at my hilarious version of peekaboo as I strapped you into your car seat. okay. it wasn't really all that funny, but your belly jiggling laugh was a kind gesture. If I close my eyes, I can still see your toothless grin and squinted eyes and hear your grow-like chuckle. just like a mama knows, I could pick your laugh out form 10 rooms away. Your lips have met mine thousands of times and even the way your drool drips from them and dribbles over to mine makes my heart pitter pat. Now that's love. real love.   

But there are moments coming in the near future. moments that I have dreaded since that hot day in July when my phone rang with our case worker asking if we would take a 3-day old baby boy. I think back to my other 4 children. I remember where I was the very moment I found out about their existence. I remember the feelings that enveloped me as the 2 pink lines crept up the white paper.  joy. fear. elation. unknown. excitement. tears. hope. anticipation. I felt so many of those the moment I heard you were coming too.

But with you, it was different. I knew our time together would be short. fleeting. hard and full of heartache. And I still said YES! We said YES TO YOU! You, my dear boy, are wanted.

Any day now, my phone will ring and it will be our case worker. She will tell me it's time for you to go. I will pack your bags for your journey ahead. I will wash your clothes for the last time and fold your little pajamas neatly into your suitcase. I will mix up one last bottle and I will think back to those early nights. You were so tiny and eating every 90 minutes. I was so exhausted but I would sit up in the dark and hold you in one hand so I could balance the tiny bottle in the other while I kept my pinky on your chin to help you hold your suck just right on that nipple. It took you 20 minutes to eat 15 ml and it was hard work. love is hard work.

and after go you, I know the memories we have shared will only be mine. you will never really remember me. someone may tell you about me and you may see me in pictures, but soon, very soon, this world you and I share will be shattered. it will be forever changed. I won't wake up to your cries at 4 am, or pat your back for that big burp I know always comes after a minute or so. I won't see your first tooth push through. I won't be there to watch you get up on all fours as you prepare to crawl. I will miss that first step and the first word. someone will see and hear, but it won't be me. 

but don't think for a second that my mama heart has forgotten you. don't you know I will be wondering about you and praying over you long after you have left my arms? I will lie awake at night and think about what your day was like, who is holding you when you get sick and if your sweet baby heart hurts like mine. don't ever doubt that you are desired with a fierce, passionate and crazy love. 

you, my precious, precious son, are wanted.

you, friend, are not alone

I have a dear friend. 

her heart is incredible and she is walking a journey of listening, discerning obedience and heart change. i received an email from her last week that sounded so desperate and exhausted. 

foster care and adoption bring beauty and pain. 

I thought some other mamas out there could use a moment of affirmation as you read my response to her below:

I am now home, reading your email again and responding.  I almost dialed your number but for some reason I feel led to type out my words of encouragement and affirmation right now. maybe so you can read them again and again (I don't even know what I am going to type, so that's awfully humble of me to speak so highly of my words!)

I love you. when I read your words about being battle weary, my soul sank to my moments over the past few months when I felt the same way. my heart empathized with each word and emotion about your unbelief. I know what it feels like to think God must have chosen the wrong mom. that I heard his calling incorrectly. that there is no way I can follow where he is leading. that i will NEVER feel that deep JOY or belief or drive again. i was completely broken but it felt so so so lonely. i could barely muster up the words to share at times because it just all felt so hopeless and dead. my tears that flooded daily felt refreshing, but only for a few moments until the reality of my situation hit me again like the weight of the world. how could God be so good while I felt so crappy?

the tunnel was dark. it was quiet. deafening at times. it was lonely. friends that offered encouragement felt so far away even when they held me in their embrace as i sobbed through the pain. they didn't really understand and their words dropped short of my need for connection.

the darkness seemed too dark at times. i didn't just want to give up, i did. 

but then there was hope. small rays of light shined through the darkness. because the dark cannot overtake the light. psalm 112:4 says, "When darkness overtakes the godly, light will come BURSTING IN!" 

I am praying for the LIGHT of Jesus to come bursting in tonight for you. 

this song will encourage you. he is all you need. keep looking to him, dear friend. you will come out of the tunnel and your journey will finally look like a beautiful thing. I can already see the beauty of your obedience, sacrifice, desire and weakness. I can only imagine the view our King has...watching his beloved daughter walk in surrender. 

my heart is overflowing because of the joy your friendship brings to me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sY0Vz8fvIhE

When the feeling's mutual.

A few weeks ago, my handsome hubby and I had an argument. Don't ask me what it was about. I can't remember. It probably had to do with baseball and coaching. about spending more time at home and less time at work. about life being about me, me, me. its usually about one of those things.

the kids were asleep and we both wanted to be tucked in our bed too. but we couldn't just yet because I wanted "to talk".  I knew I was wrong. I had done something disrespectful. don't ask what because I can't remember, remember?! He probably responded with something unloving. the crazy cycle was starting to spin. 

we chatted for a minute. or maybe we didn't. then I said something that one of us usually says at the end of such types of scenarios, "I think we should pray"  don't paint me as a saint just yet. I said it begrudgingly (and I followed it with, "but I don't want to." 
I was hoping for my man-of-God husband to step up, do the right thing, say he was wrong, turn his tender heart toward mine and take the lead. 

expect he didn't do that at all. 
so his reply felt like a knife to my heart...

"the feeling's mutual"

dang. 
ouch.
grrr...whatever, at least I was the one who said we should pray.

the prayer went something like this:
"God, we're not happy. we've offended each other..."

through rolling eyes, (yes, its a raw talent I posses) I asked God to search my heart. just mine. 

it wasn't a long, glorious prayer, but it was over.

I wanted to be right. I wanted to be heard. I wanted to be in control and in charge. But I know Jesus wants me to be in right relationship. darn. He commands and calls us to go first. LOVE GOES FIRST. even when the feelings aren't felt.
He honors our obedience.
...even when the feeling's mutual. 

Simple Truth: Hard Isn't Easy

In conversation a few weeks ago with some dear friends, I was rambling on about our latest challenges with our foster son, J.  Life had been taxing around our house with 5 kids under 8, little sleep and major behavioral issues with J. We were battling wills and time outs sometimes lasted close to an hour.
Out of my mouth rolled this statement: "Hard is just...it's just not easy." We all chuckled at how elementary that sounded. But there wasn't another word that fit at that moment.

Hard is just, well, it's just hard.

On a weekly basis, I hear from folks that they could never do foster care because ___________. The top phrase that fills in the blank:
I would just never be able to give them back.  It would be too hard.
my response: Yes, you would. You have to give them back or you go to jail. 

I don't normally respond with such sarcasm, but the truth is, YES. IT's HARD! if it were easy, there wouldn't be almost 700 kids in the state of Florida waiting for a mom and dad. We don't often choose hard in this life. We choose comfort, ease and familiarity. But the things worth doing here will most likely carry us away from convenience.

So our family has decided to choose hard.

Hard means we spend less time with our biological children. it means less sleep and more noise. it means a much messier house!!! it means hours disciplining a teaching someone else's child. it means rearranging carseats often. it means lots of laundry and trips to the grocery store. hard is using a WIC check. it means feeling like others don't get it. because they just don't. Hard means being woken up in the middle of the night by a 1 am phone call from a social worker asking you to get out of your warm bed and take in a little girl that's been abandoned. It means less time with friends and more time at home. It means court appearances, psychological evaluations, OT, PT, speech therapy, visitations to birth parents and a complete invasion into your home by social workers and home inspectors. it means saying goodbye. forever.

and here's where it gets beautiful...

Hard also means holding an abandoned toddler who smells like urine at 2 am while you sing praise songs to a faithful God. it means saying good morning to bright eyes that hold such potential for hope. it means watching a neglected baby learn to roll over for the first time at 14-months old. its watching as your kids erupt in applause when your foster daughter with feeding issues eats a bite of broccoli for the first time and uses her fork!!!  hard is seeing a birth mom sob every week when she says goodbye to her baby and watching her light up when she is reunited.

so when you say to me, I could never do what you do...its too hard, I know what you mean. really. I do. But I know what you don't know...and probably never will. Hard isn't easy, but its beautiful.