I Hope We Don't Adopt Her (Even though we love her to death!)

"Do you think you'll be able to adopt her?"

Brace yourselves, I have some strong words to say on this subject, so let me preface this. I get this question a lot. Our parents get this question a lot. I realize that many people just haven't had to think through the complexities of this issue or don't really have an understanding of what foster care is. If you have asked me this, I am not upset with you and I do not look down on you, but I do hope that you are willing to humbly learn and consider these things.

** I want to add here in the beginning that we are not opposed to adoption. There has been some confusion after my initial post that this is what I'm saying. I like to believe that it would be hard to know us personally and ever get this impression. As far as adoption is a necessary consequence of our fallen world, we love the idea of adoption in the case where it is already necessary. What I am saying is that I hope it does not become necessary in any particular case. I realize I'm taking an idealistic approach to this topic, and that the reality is that it is necessary in many circumstances, but I want to continue to seek and pray for healing for biological families as long as possible.**

 My husband informed me today that there is a subreddit of foster parents who take infant foster placements, and then actively work against reunification with the bio family in an effort to get a free baby. It makes me ill to think about. It makes me furious. These are someone's children. They probably have parents and families who love them despite the choices and circumstances that may have led their children into care. To actively campaign against your child's biological family for your own selfish desires is despicable. Yes, there are instances when parents do not have their children's best interests at heart. There are times when the parents will not become a safe place for their children to go home to, and in those cases, terminating rights and adopting are good and right things to do in a desperately sad and broken situation. Adoption is always plan C or D. Never plan A.  This kind of foster parent is rare, but it highlights an issue with our attitude towards the God-given goodness of biological family. The family unit is a beautiful and wonderful gift from God that has, like all of his good creation, been warped by the fall. Our desire as foster parents should be to see it restored, not permanently dismantled for our own gain. My heart breaks for bio parents whose children are placed with the foster families who are gaming the system in this way, my heart breaks for children whose foster parents care more for their own selfish desires than for maintaining, respecting, and building up their connections with their biological families.

When we became foster parents, we made a commitment to more than just the children placed in our home, we made a commitment to honor, respect, and pray and hope the best for their families too. I doubt there is a single decent foster parent alive who hasn't at some point selfishly wished their foster child would stay forever. I admit I have. But I recognize that thought for what it is: selfish and prideful. Historical atrocities have been committed by governments and organizations that took children away from parents whom they deemed "less suitable" and gave them to be raised by people of a "more desirable" race, religion, or political affiliation. The goal of foster care is not for the child to end up with whomever will be the "best parent", the goal is for the child to be with their true family, even if we disagree with their way of parenting or their religion, or if their culture is different from our own and we lack an understanding of it. To permanently dismantle a biological family is an extremely serious thing that is not to be taken lightly, and never to be hoped for. It may be tragically necessary, but it is NEVER to be hoped for.

I have said this before, but let me say it again: WE DO NOT DO FOSTER CARE BECAUSE WE HAVEN'T BEEN ABLE TO HAVE OUR OWN KIDS. WE DO NOT DO FOSTER CARE IN THE HOPES OF ADOPTING A CHILD. Yes, in some way our infertility is related to our foster-care, I've gone into that in detail in previous posts. But we do not do foster care in an effort to replace the hole in our lives left by infertility and miscarriage. We do it because there are children who need to be safe and loved while their families put in the work to reunite their families, and we have a safe place and love to give. It may be that some families don't succeed in reunification for one reason or another, but I could not in good conscience support terminating a parent's rights if they were not given every opportunity and help we have to offer them.

You see, the thing is that you and I are fully capable of making the same decisions that parents of children who are in foster care have. It is only by the restraining grace of God at work in our lives that we too have not fallen into whatever it is that has led to these parents being separated from their children. We don't want to believe this is true, but Scripture is clear on this point. Our hearts are deceitful above all else, we are lured and enticed by our own desires,  we are slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness without God's intervention in our lives. We contributed nothing to our own privileged birth or moral development, and certainly not to our salvation. And when you stop and realize that it could have just as easily been you in that situation, you realize what a tragedy it is not to give this parent everything you can in an effort to see them and their children together again, because I hope someone would do the same if it was me or my family member in this situation, and because we should strive to uphold the God-given gift of the biological family. 

So, no. I hope we don't adopt. At least not in this way. Someday we plan to adopt children out of foster care who are already waiting to be adopted. The sad reality is that some day we will probably be called upon to adopt a foster child who lives in our own home, but I hope that never happens, because I hope and pray for hearts and lives saved by Christ, and for families made whole again. 

The Weary World Rejoices

"A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new glorious morn." 

It's tempting to write off Christmas when you're grieving. It seems to be a time for holiday cheer, not for grief, and yet, this time of year often serves to magnify our grief and make us even wearier than we may already be. We feel like we don't fit into the Christmas season. 

Advent is a season of waiting, though and before the celebration of Christ's birth, there was a weary world. It had gone 400 years without a word from God. It was groaning and yearning for God to act, to fill in the missing component. The world was waiting for Jesus, whether they knew it or not, and they could feel that emptiness and incompleteness that only he could change. I can relate with that right now a lot quicker than I do to the more positive feelings that surround our idea of Christmas. Maybe it's not so incorrect of us to mourn more deeply this time of year after-all, in fact, maybe it's just as in-line with this advent season as any other emotion. Advent is a season of waiting, and whatever it is in our lives that we may be waiting on, the truth is that we are waiting on the Lord to act; to intervene, to save us from our despair and hopelessness.

More than 2000 years after the birth of Jesus, we approach advent with an utter certainty that soon, Christmas will come. Soon, we will be celebrating the coming of the Lord in the same way that the angels, shepherds, wise-men, and those who recognized the arrival of the messiah did all those years ago. Soon, the weary world will rejoice. This is such a wonderful reminder that as we feel more keenly the brokenness of our lives this time of year, that we can wait with confidence and anticipation of God's action and deliverance in our own lives also. We do not know how long it will last, but we know that the Lord will deliver us from this too because we know that he has already delivered us from much more; we know with that same utter certainty that we can put our hope in him as we wait. We celebrate this child in the manger, because without him, we would have no hope as we face these weary seasons of our lives. We celebrate that in the scope of eternity, our weary souls will soon rejoice as well. As we have a full understanding of what it is to be weary and waiting upon the Lord, we can celebrate  the coming of the Jesus with an even deeper joy as we eagerly anticipate his work in our lives and his second coming when he will fully and finally fill our weary world and weary souls with the completeness that comes only from him. He is the thrill of hope in our weary lives. He brings the new and glorious morn. He brings joy to our suffering and thankfulness to our discontent hearts. He brings salvation, hope, and joy to the world. 

Three Years a Mom

My precious Brighton. My eldest child. The one who made me a momma. The one over whom I've shed the most tears and spent the most days missing. Three years ago, we found out God had placed this little soul into our lives, and left them completely changed. Every day since then has been directly and deeply impacted by the knowledge that this child exists and the love we have for this child that has no place to go. There's a beauty that I can't help but recognize in realizing that this never-ending grief and disappointment, the tears that flow steadily even three years later, all stem from a love that is natural and pure and deep; a mother's love for her child. I have loved this child fiercely, and have defended his or her life and worth time and time again to myself and others in my words and my actions. I am grateful and unashamed to call myself a mom because of this child.

God has made me who I am through Brighton. This child caused me to lose all my confidence and then find it back again in a more loving, compassionate, Christ-centered, focused,  and determined way than ever before. This child is the reason that I am passionate about every child being loved every day, and why we have had the joy of being foster parents. This child is why I started writing, because I felt like this life needed to be known and recognized and I couldn't stand the thought of my beloved child being forgotten and not missed, and I wanted other mommas to know that their children and their motherhood are not forgotten in the absence of their child either; the Lord sees, and so do I.  The knowledge that this child is with Jesus keeps me looking heavenward and gives me a tangible reminder of the marvelous grace of our loving lord who keeps those whom he has called to himself safe and secure in him through all the days of their lives, be they 90 years or 1 month.

The past 3 years have been amazingly hard; God has done amazing things through deep joy and unimaginable grief. God has done incredible good through our love for this little soul. I am grateful to have been granted the heart of a momma that rests in Jesus Christ as her children come and go from this life and this home; gone but never forgotten, never not missed, and never not loved from now until eternity when we meet in the presence of Jesus Christ; our savior, our hope, our comfort and joy, our greatest love, the one who glorifies himself in even the darkest of days and gives purpose to our sorrows. To know that he has been glorified through the life of my beloved Brighton, and loves this child for all eternity is the fulfillment of the most aching prayer of a christian parent for her child. I am deeply grateful in the midst of deep grief for this mercy from the Lord, and I am grateful for Brighton, the little soul that has forever changed our lives for the better.

Diagnosis

I lost Brighton one day after seeing a healthy heartbeat on an ultrasound. I remember sobbing in the shower with the distinct impression that my body was killing my perfectly healthy baby. They tell you that's not the case. They tell it's "chromosomal". They tell you there's nothing you could do. It turns out I was probably right though. My own broken body, my own blood, is what's been killing our babies. In all likelihood, they could have been perfectly healthy, happy babies, had it not been for this thing called "antiphospholipid syndrome." And it turns out, it could have killed me too.

Doctors call it "sticky blood". In short, it means my blood clots very easily; too easily in some cases. And if it's not treated during pregnancy, they believe that tiny blood clots cut off blood flow to the baby causing miscarriage. If this doesn't happen, then, as pregnancy progresses, it increases the risk of blood clots forming in arteries and risks stroke and pre-eclampsia, and pre-mature birth.

It's scary, and it's sad, and it's comforting to find this out. We always look for reason in our suffering. We want to know why God has allowed things to happen in the ways that he has. To be able to see that he was protecting me from great harm gives some meaning to the tragedy of it all, though I would of course have risked my life for any of my 3 kids in a heartbeat. But that wasn't his plan. Now we know though. We can take precautions, we can treat it, we can take away most of the danger for me and our future babies, but it won't be easy. Every time that we want to get pregnant from now on will have to be well planned and well prepared for. It will involve 3 different doctors, and 5 medications administered 3 different ways, two of which are contraindicated, and one of which is a daily injection for the entire pregnancy, and a 6th medication if I'm as sick the next time as I was with Keelan. As much as I desperately long to be pregnant again, I'm also dreading it. The joy and excitement will be there, I know they will, but my first reaction will have to be to take a deep breath, thank God for the next precious life, and pray for the strength to face my fears. On top of concern for my next baby's well-being, it feels like it's all riding on these treatments, because it's everything we know to do, and if it doesn't work, I'm afraid nothing ever will, and not only will we not have that baby, we may never have a biological child at all until we meet our children at the throne of Jesus Christ.

But that's exactly where I find my peace in all of the medical jargon, and odds and percentages, and the depths of googling: the throne of Christ. Brighton and Keelan and Addison remind me to keep my mind turned heavenward, towards my true hope for them and for me and for all our future children.Though I am extremely grateful for them, my hope is not ultimately in medical treatments but in the unfailing savior, Jesus Christ. This truth is the difference between crippling anxiety and unnatural peace. No matter what happens, I will have joy and peace in both the happiest and most desperately trying of times, because, as always, everything is in the hands of our God who reigns sovereign over all of his creation; over my life, over their lives, over bodies and blood clots, over placentas and hormone levels, over thyroids and umbilical cords, and every cell in our bodies, and even over death itself.  We are thankful to him for this diagnosis, the treatments that are available for it, and the ability to move forward with genuine hope, regardless of the outcome. To him be the glory, great things he has done, and great things he will continue to do. Amen.

A Prayer for the "Goodbye Parents"

I've seen posts from a number of foster parents in the last week who have had to say their goodbyes to their foster-loves. This is my prayer for these "goodbye parents":

First, I pray for your kids. They may not be in your home, but they will always be in your heart, and you will always consider them "your kids" in a way.

I pray that they are safe and loved, because you signed up for this heartbreak so that they could know those things.

I pray that even if they were too little to remember, that the love you gave them will never leave them and will make a difference for the rest of their lives.

I pray for their salvation; that even if you never see them again in this life, that you'll see them again in the next.

I pray that wherever they may be, God will also place someone who will teach them about Jesus' saving love for them.

Second, I pray for this child's family, because loving our fosters means loving the people who they love and who love them.

I pray thanks to God for restoring their broken family to each other.

I pray God will rescue them from their sin and the situations that led their kids into foster-care, that they may never have to be apart again.

I pray they will be wise, loving, and godly parents.

Third, I pray for you, foster mom or foster dad.

I pray that you would be able to feel confident that this child is loved and safe, wherever they are.

I pray you would have true, deep joy in the restoration of this family, even as you mourn the loss of this child as part of yours.

I pray that when you find that long lost sock in the laundry, or the pacifier under the bed, or when you hear their favorite song, see their favorite toy, or see a child who is their age or who looks like them, that you would have peace and be able to remember your time together with joy.

I pray that when the tears do come, that you will embrace the love that you have for this child.

I pray that you would grieve well.

I pray against bitterness towards the system, the family, and God.

I pray that God will draw you near to him as you walk through each day.

I pray that if you don't have other children in your home, that you would adjust back to this childless stage of life well.

I pray that if you have mixed emotions about this child leaving your home, that you would not feel undue guilt in that.

I pray for your marriage, that you would be able to comfort and encourage each other and talk with each other and point each other towards Christ, that you may be each other's greatest earthly comfort.

I give thanks to God that he has allowed you to live out this calling to love your neighbor as yourself, and pray that he will continue to confirm this calling if it is his will for you to continue fostering.

I pray that if you need a break, that you would have one and take the time that you need without guilt.

I pray for wisdom in your words and actions as you process this grief; that you would not speak or act rashly and in ways you will regret.

Fourth, I pray for your other children.

I pray that they would understand why their foster-sibling is gone.

I pray they would know how to express the feelings they have in healthy ways.

I pray that they would adjust back to life without them well, but that they can remember and continue to love them even in their absence.

Fifth, I pray for your friends, family, and church family.

I pray God places people around you who understand, or, who are willing to listen and learn if they don't.

I pray that when they don't know what to say, that God would give them wisdom so that they would say and do helpful things.

I pray that you would hear even the unhelpful things with an attitude of patience, grace and appreciation, giving them the benefit of the doubt.

Lastly, I pray for the things that I don't know are hard for you today. With my limited experience, I can't even begin to understand how different foster-care situations affect different people, and how your situation is affecting you.

I pray that you would grow in grace, in comfort, in peace, and in love for God and neighbor each day.

Amen.


If you are a foster parent who has said goodbye to a foster-love or who is going to soon, I would love to know more ways that I can pray for you and support you in this goodbye. Obviously this prayer is based on my own experiences, so please, share with me and help me learn how to help you and my other fellow foster-parents better! Thank you for being willing to take on this heartbreak to give these little souls a safe and loving home for whatever time they needed it.

Having Hope

"I will rejoice and be glad in your steadfast love, because you have seen my affliction; you have known the distress of my soul and you have not delivered me into the hand of the enemy; you have set my feet in a broad place. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted from grief; my soul and my body also. For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my iniquity and my bones waste away [...]. But I trust in you, O Lord; I say "You are my God." My times are in your hand." -Psalm 31:7-10, 14-16a

Every once in a while someone will say something to me in this season of life that I know I'll never forget. Often it is something that stings, but occasionally it's something profoundly helpful, and, often, profoundly simple. I went to an endocrinologist last week to sort out my malfunctioning thyroid and as she looked through my records, she spoke with genuine compassion when she said "3 pregnancies and 3 miscarriages, that takes my breath away. I'm so sorry."

Sometimes I underestimate the toll that saying goodbye to 4 beloved children (including foster love) has taken, and continues to take, especially when 3 of them were in as many months. This grief is a long, slow burn. The longing to fill our home with family is physical; I can feel it in my chest. The brokenness of death and of foster care still captures my thoughts, I still cry, I still lay in bed instead of doing the dishes, and I still wish them back, even though I know they don't belong here. I still have sorrows and I still sigh, and even with how open I try to be about all of it, I still feel shame in that sorrow. I fear making others uncomfortable with my story and the reality of my grief. I fear being a burden to someone. I fear that I sin by my sorrow. But if it takes away the breath of a stranger, of a medical professional who sees hard things all day long, I'm reminded that it's allowed to take my breath away too.

I'm not doing this grief thing perfectly. But I'm so grateful for the license that this Psalm gives me to deeply, painfully, grieve and sigh. And to know that not only does it take my doctor's breath away, not only does it knock me down, but that God has seen the distress of my soul, and he has seen me sin in that distress, and yet he has been steadfast in his love and gracious in his dealings with me, showering me with his his provision and forgiveness. I recently had a few weeks that were very hard for me; I felt like I couldn't get my head above water, and I felt like my soul and body were "wasted in grief." The longer I let it go, the worse it got, and the more upset with myself I became over it. And then, suddenly, God has set my feet on a broad place the past few days. I feel a spring awakening in my soul. I have a rekindled love of God's word and of God himself. He has not handed me over to self-pity and shame and despair, but has rescued me from my own deceitful heart and manipulative attitudes. My grieving doesn't cease, and there are days that I quip that God has been teaching me patience for 3 years, and I can't wait for him to be done with it. But I know that "my times are in his hands" and I can trust in him, his plan and his love: he sees all my grief, he sees the depths of my heart, he grieves the brokenness of this world, and desires to set it right. What a good and gracious God.

Let me say here, that my husband is such an incredible example to me of God's love. I know that I've been a downright miserable person to be around the last month. I have grumped and griped, and blamed, and belittled, and not once was he harsh towards me in return. He faithfully did the dishes, and brought me water, and snacks when I didn't want to get up off the couch, and spoke kindly towards me with more patience than I know I could have mustered in the same situation. When I realized my attitude and mean spirit, I had to seek his forgiveness, which he gave freely and immediately, asking nothing in compensation and he has not spoken of it again. In an even greater way, God has been gracious to me in ways I do not deserve and in more ways than I can count or even know; the greatest of which has been his complete forgiveness freely offered, and the second greatest of which has been giving me a husband after his own heart to walk through each day with.

I hope and pray that these hardest days are coming to an end. The doctor told me something else the other day: "we're going to treat this, and we're going to have hope." We've discovered that I have a thyroid disorder that can prevent pregnancy and cause miscarriage, and it's easily treatable. We've also found that I might have a clotting disorder that causes miscarriage and serious conditions that are life-threatening to both me and an unborn child, that can also be managed with great success. And so, though it's hard for me to really believe after so much loss, we have real hope that we will soon be on our way to welcoming a child into our arms to stay. What a beautiful, beautiful thought.

Whether or not we have children, we will still have hope. We will have a hope that is not difficult to believe, because unlike our experience with pregnancy and parenthood, we have not once been failed by the hope of Jesus Christ. Come what may, I will rejoice and be glad in his steadfast love whether I have joy or sorrow, excitement, or disappointment; for I always have Jesus and his everlasting love for me. I have the hope and knowledge that he will glorify himself in me and my circumstances. He will give grace and strength to not just face another day, but to be content and seek his glory in it, if only I ask. May he make it so.

Addison Jordan

"Whate'er my God ordains is right: here shall my stand be taken; though sorrow, need, or death be mine, yet am I not forsaken. My Father's care is round me there; he holds me that I shall not fall: and so to him I leave it all."

For the third time, I found myself pleading with the Lord for the life of my child. For the third time, that prayer was not answered in the way that I hoped, and our precious Addison Jordan entered the presence of the Lord. For the third time, I remember that "whate'er my God ordains is right." Not just because he is God and he does what he wants, but because he loves and cares those whom he calls his own. Whatever circumstances I find myself in, I find his care and love there with me, and the greater the sorrow, the more powerful and deep I find them to be. The more grief I face, the deeper I find myself needing to be rooted in his word and the truth of who he is. These are his words that I have been dwelling on these past few days:

Philippians:8-9 "Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me-- practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you." 

Peace in the midst of grief and turmoil can seem unattainable, and yet, here are instructions plainly laid out for how to find peace as I face the loss of my third child: fix my thoughts on these things. Each of these things describes the Lord, so I fix my eyes on him. There are people and circumstances, and things that even in a painful and difficult situation fall under these categories, so I thank the Lord for those things as well. It's not that I am barred from also thinking of the grief and the pain, but one of my greatest temptations is to fall too far into my own mind and my own feelings and forget to remember what is true. There is a war for my thoughts that must be fought minute by minute, and when I can think about these true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, and praiseworthy things alongside that grief, that battle is won and there can be peace. Having spent far too much time living in anger and bitterness after my first miscarriage, this peace is such a beautiful and treasured gift from God that is worth fighting the battle for.

Psalm 55:22 "Cast your burden on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never permit the righteous to be moved."

After 2 miscarriages, it's hard not to see another one coming. As soon as I saw the two lines on the test, I knew that this was a very likely outcome. I knew that a third miscarriage would bring a new set of challenges and feelings and disappointment. At this point I not only grieve this child, I begin to grieve my idea of what I thought my family would be like. I grieve that with the excitement of each new life will come the fear (and the expectation) of more loss and grief. We are the one percent of couples who experience three miscarriages in a row, and statistically, it means that unless a cause is found, each future child we conceive will only have a 60% or less chance at living to reach my arms. That future is terrifying to me and letting go of my idea of what I thought my family would be like is a real struggle for me. With all this in mind, I knew this would be a hard one, and I knew that I must stand firm in my faith in the face of it all or I would have nothing left but fear. But the Lord will not permit the righteous to be moved, instead, he will sustain them. Boy do I need some sustaining right about now, and that sounds a lot better to me than living in fear and despair. This will not shake me, I will not be moved, because the Lord will make it so, and he will grant peace in times of deepest sorrow and uncertainty; "here shall my stand be taken."

James 1:17-18 "Every good and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.Of his own will be brought us forth by the word of truth that we might be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures." 

Even though this child's days were short, he or she was a good and perfect gift from above that we thank and praise God for. This is the verse that we have named this child after. Addison means child of Adam; with miscarried children it can be easy to forget their humanity, and yet this child was descended from Adam, the same as you and me, made in the image of God, brought forth by his will, and yet stained by Adam's original sin and in need of salvation. Jordan means flowing down, or descended; this baby is a gift that came down from the father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. On the days when our lives are turned upside-down and inside-out, God is there; unchanged, unsurpised, and unable to be moved. Because he is constant, I am able to wholly depend on him; to count on him with everything I have to be just and gracious and good to me even though I am completely undeserving of such things.

And finally, 

Revelation 21:3-4 "and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.'"

My greatest hope for life after death is not to see my children, though I certainly look forward to it. No, my greatest hope is Jesus Christ. His worth surpasses all and brings more contentment than the most beautiful family in the world would. With each child we pray that above all else, they would know and love Jesus Christ, and that he would be glorified by their lives, and even by their deaths. Today, Brighton, Keelan, and Addison stand in his presence, worshiping him with all their hearts, minds, souls, and strength. Though I wish I could have held them in my arms and taught them his ways, I can't ask for more than this for my children: the salvation that comes from Jesus Christ crucified, and him glorified through them. This is the certain hope that I have in the sorrow and the tears and in the face of an uncertain future; that one day, the sting of death and pain of miscarriage and every sin and result of sin will pass away, and I will be part of God's people in his new creation. Then, I will join my voice with my children's as we praise the God who gives and takes away, the God who is good, the God who gave up his own son for my sake and my children's sake, the God who defeated the power of sin and death, the God who gives peace and hope in even the most terrifying and desperate situations, the God who never changes and never wavers, the God who is worthy of praise. "And so to him I leave it all": the physical pain, the overwhelming grief, and a future that, though it is uncertain to me, has been written by him from before the beginning of the world so that it would be for my good, and his glory. May he make it so, and give me the faith to trust his good plans for me and my children.