The Days After

Now that we have moved past Kylie’s first year in our arms, I thought it might be time for me to post something that has been floating around in my head and heart for a while. 

The past week I have spent quite a bit of time going back and re-reading my blog from this time last year.  Re-reading and re-living our time in China has made me quite nostalgic.  Adoption is quite a lot like childbirth.  Depending on how traumatic your experience is, the love you end up feeling for your child eventually makes you forget the trauma and makes you want to do it again.  And so many of the China adoption blogs I read, I found because they were in the process about the same time as I was and so all of their blogs are now also celebrating one year home milestones.  It’s hard not to find yourself thinking on these things.

For quite a while, having Kylie was rough.  It was rough in China not having Steve there.  It was rough having such a little child and feeling like, due to bonding, you couldn’t accept help from anyone (a myth, by the way).  The first few weeks home were brutally hard and filled with many a sleepless night (and day) asking myself “What have I done to my family!??!?” and wondering whether I was really cut out for this.

Then a few month ago, things started to REALLY calm down and fall into place.  We were finding our rhythm.  And I started thinking about possibly going back for another.  Steve had made a passing comment about a son and I started watching Gotcha Day videos on YouTube about Gotcha Day and looking at pictures online of boys waiting in China. 

And I was confused.  Did I REALLY want to do this again?  I thought our family was complete.  What was God telling me?  I had jokingly said if God wanted us to adopt again, then He’d have to tell Steve FIRST this time and drop the money from heaven because I just wasn’t fundraising again.   And for a time, I flirted with God…basically daring him to do it.

But after a while, I went back to feeling like our family was complete.  But my heart is still with the orphan.  Not just Chinese orphans, but ALL of them.  And so I ask myself frequently, “What do I do with that?”  I wish I could say I knew, but I don’t.  Honestly, I don’t think God is calling us to adopt again.  Will He?  I don’t know.  Who DOES know the future other than God?  But at this point, that’s not what it feels like to me.  And until I DO know what God is asking me to do with this desire, this passion, I continue to struggle onward…to seek out what I can do.

And as we approach the Easter season, I’d challenge you to ask yourself what you are supposed to be doing. 

Once I figure out what I’m to do with my passion, I’ll let you know.