Foster Care is My Haiti

I read this blog back in November and it so resonated with me. I think back to the girl I was, waiting by the window in August of 2009 for my first placement. I think if she had known where it was all gonna lead, she would have locked the door and lowered the blinds. I think if she had known just how tied her heart would become to a system that would pulverize it over and over again, she would have run. If she had known that she would learn more than she ever wanted to know about despair and brokenness, both her own and that of humanity, she would have made up an excuse or been too busy to answer the phone that day. If she had known how much sleep she would lose or how many breaths she would hold, she would have never agreed.

My plan was never to be a trauma-mama, or a mother-of-many. My plan was to adopt, preferably a baby or two -- I couldn't for the life of me figure out why God said foster care and not Uganda, or Haiti, or the Philippines. But it was loud and it was clear, and honestly, once we started down the road, we didn't look back, question, or consider much else. If that girl had known, she would have never agreed. 

I am so glad she didn't know. See, she was OK with the idea of laying down her life when she didn't know what it meant. She prayed: "Your will, not mine" without really counting the cost.

I hate foster care and I say that with deep affection for it. 

The grief and loss I carry from it is so heavy, but I wouldn't trade it. You see, the only way to trade it is to have never known or parented those six children who came through our home. To trade it is to not have my boys. The other night I was praying and talking to God about the waiting. I said: "God, I feel like I have been in transition for three-and-a-half years. Waiting. Waiting to hear about a placement, a permanency plan, a selection staffing, a hearing, a trial, an appeal. I have been waiting three-and-a-half years to move on with my life." 

Very clearly, I heard: "Beloved, this is your life."

Limbo

See that post down there? Man that was great. Like a big exhale. For the first time in years I didn't have to worry about who was coming and going and when. No bio visits, no drama, no looming court dates, no permanency hearings,  no time lines... well just one. National Adoption Day (NAD). We were going for the second year in a row. We were going to adopt our son. I had a plan. Finalize on NAD take off til June then start looking for my daughter. But three weeks ago I got a call that put all that to a screeching halt..Emmanuels biological father was trying to fight the termination. We were taken off the NAD list, we would just have to wait and see. First he had to go before a judge and see if he was even allowed to appeal. The judge ruled in his favor so here we go to appellate court and from what we know that is a minimum six month (most likely more) process. The ironic thing is the morning I got that call I had a moment while I was watching my two boys run around in the front yard that Emman's "mine-ness" clicked into place. Don't get me wrong I loved him from the day I learned about him. But there is this thing with the kids that come to my home (foster or adoptive) where at some point something clicks in my heart and they become mine (though I don't always experience this). So that morning mine-ness click, afternoon nightmare phone call. I was angry, upset, shocked, and so on. I was supposed to be on sabbatical, and I was right back in that place. Court dates, uncertainty, anxiety, fear, anger, crying in the shower, nightmare, and general heaviness.....I was praying and telling God how I was just so angry because I wanted a break from feeling afraid, a break from worrying, and waiting. I felt he said "That's up to you if you go back there. You could stand on my word instead. Hope in the unseen...but it's totally up to you" So here I am trying to stand on these words. Trying so lift my hands when everything is out of them, Trying to trust when my heart is laid bare, trying to sing praise when I don't know the ending.

Deuteronomy 31:6
Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”

Isaiah40:28-31
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.²⁹ He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
³⁰ Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
³¹ but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

<sup>Hebrews 4:16
 Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Phillipians 4:6-7
 Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life


Pray for us. Pray for us to trust the Lord with laughter and singing. That we would rest in His promises. That we would turn to God in our times of weakness and fear. That we would allow Christ to displace worry and the center of our lives. I heard a song lyric that said "We lift high His glory ,Shown throughout our stories" Let it be Jesus, Amen.</sup>

Sabbatical

For the first time in three years we are closed, inactive, off THE list. No adoption submissions, no emergency placements, no calls, no new kiddos. No Transitions. I know who will be here when The Fair comes, when the leaves fall, when it's time to carve pumpkins, to eat turkey, to celebrate Jesus's birthday.
The cast of characters will stay the same through these next seasons. This fact makes me feel rested, tired, peaceful, and anxious all at the same time. It is right. It is ordained. It is what I need. It is what they need. It is what we need.
But it felt foreign and wrong at first. When my caseworker called me and said we would have to go inactive before we had planned on going inactive, I struggled a little bit. During the last three years, these eight kids have been so hard and so, so good. And while I know it is just for a bit, mostly it feels kind of like a death.
Last week, we went to Galveston as a family. The first night we were there, we took the boys down to the beach to see it. We were running in the water and playing and laughing. Watching my boys with their Dadda, I was so thankful. That I was here and I had not missed this.
And right then and there in the Gulf I gave it a proper burial. I ate all the mistakes and grief and joy and washed it down with salt water and a little bit of hope. And finally, after three years of waiting and praying and searching and bracing, I stopped and breathed.
I let us just be a family. I allowed myself to stop being a crusader and just be a mom. I relished the fact that for the first time in three years everyone was where they should be and I knew what my family would look like at least for a little while...and it felt like coming home even though we weren't.

                                      

Abide

I recently went through a very long dry season spiritually. For a lot of reasons. But the other day I was praying and just going on about how dry my spirit was feeling and how desperate I was for fresh water on my parched soul. I felt like the Lord said "Of course you are in a dry season you have not been coming to the well of living water" I am sure this is Christianity/Spirituality 101 for all of you but it is revolutionary for me. So I have been going to the well trying to be consistent in prayer and devotion and the word and worship. I am trying to learn to abide in peace and joy and the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I do ok. Then my toddler locks himself and his brother in my van with my keys and my cell. Or a huge bill accidentally gets paid two times out of our account. Or my other toddler wont nap. Or someone gets sick. Or .... or...or...or.....
How do you abide then? I know God is bigger than my circumstances. I know that toddlers not napping is cake compared to what other people are wrestling with. But I want to know how do you abide in the midst of the chaos that is life? Does it get easier with practice?

Days like this

                                          When I started fostering, it was for days like this:

    

 or this:

    

 or, more recently, this:

But last Friday, I got to drive my most recent foster kids home. They had been in our home since August. Their parents have worked hard. They have turned their lives around. They have earned back the right to parent their children. I have cheered them on every step of the way and I am truly impressed at what they have overcome. I drove up in front of their home, decorated with balloons and was able to witness a very happy reunion. I got to pray with their family and take a family pic of them and drive away. I never thought I would love days like that; days where I hand over the kids I have raised for the last ten months, five months, or a year to their parents. I never thought I would love letting go or that I would realize that if I am really for the kids I parent and love and minister to that I MUST be for their parents too. I never thought that I would relish my loss and their gain. I am suprised; not by their redemption or healing, but by mine.

On Mothers Day

To the woman who mothered me and really taught me what it's all about. Who labored for me for nine months plus thirty six hours plus thirty years and counting. Who sacrificed herself. Who raised me up and launched me. I cannot say enough. Thank you for letting me be who I am. For always supporting me even when you don't understand or agree. For Thai lunchs and pedicures, and laughing, and crying and grieving for being a soft place to fall but not so soft that I don't get up. It takes incredible grace which I am sure I still don't fully understand or appreciate.

For the ones who made me a mother for the first time.

 And for the ones who made me love being a mother

And for the ones who made me a forever mother

And for the ones who gave birth to my babies I honor you. And for the ones who have mothered my babies while I was still looking for them endless thank you's. For the mother's whose babies I have mothered for a season I am honored. For the mothers who I have watched fight to get their babies back...you humble me and make me proud. For all you who walk beside me. For you who mentor me. Thank you thank you thank you.

Alongside

A while back I wrote this post. I cannot express the utter generosity of the community that supports us. Amazing support in the form of meals when we get placements, gift cards, and showers , and parties when they stay, and wine and chicken nuggets when they don't,  prayer, bikes on Christmas, diapers, formula, clothes, car seats, and on and on. We are always floored at how they all show up for us. When we started this journey even though we had a great community, the life we have been called to can be lonely. There is constant adjustment and transition. There is a lot of grief and loss. There is a lot that is hard to explain and understand unless you are in the thick of it. So the first year or so we were lonely and we prayed and prayed for someone to come alongside us. Someone that we could call and not explain what legal risk meant. Someone who would know what it was like to have a child just for a season but love them for a lifetime. People who we could talk to about CASA workers, permanency plans, levels of care, respite, Star Health, bio visits, and all the other intricacies of this life. We prayed for one couple. One couple who would do life like us. Who would do family like us. In the last year we have had four couples come alongside us in foster care. These are couples at the same life stage we are that feel passionately about orphan care also. So about a month ago when we had three couples (plus us) at our house and all of them were somewhere on the road of foster care I couldn't believe it. Then a few weeks ago when we were at our shower for our new addition and those same couples were there (plus another couple who just filled out the preliminary application to our agency) I thought why not this is what God is about...multiplying things. And He is just so good at it.

                                                   Here I am with my fellow foster mama's

Read their stories here, here, and here and be blessed and challenged!