Happy {& Sad} Birthday Abram!

Perhaps I should have titled this, "What I Want You to Know about Birthdays and Adoption."

While today is a wonderfully happy, joyful day, celebrating the gift of Abram's life, it is also profoundly sad. I cried myself to sleep last night grieving for Abram's birth family in Texas who I know loves him deeply and misses him - especially terribly on his birthday. I cried for the pain and grief his birth mother carries with her regularly. I cried for his Tia Leti, thinking about how I would feel if my sister placed a baby for adoption two years ago. I would miss that little boy SO MUCH on his birthday.

And I cried for Abram. As he gets older, I begin to see adoption through new lenses. Can you imagine having been created by God through two people who you never see? Can you imagine realizing you were formed inside the womb of a woman you never see? For some reason, God allowed me to imagine it and it hurt so badly. It seemed so wrong. It is not how God created life to be (but we live in a fallen world). Even though Abram has a great life and a great family those things do not erase the loss of biological ties for a child who was adopted. Thankfully God - by His grace - has redeemed that brokenness and most days of the year, we can feel great and happy about adoption (or not even really think about it at all). But birthdays are triggers for the losses that are part of every adoption. There is a near 100% chance Abram is going to feel all of this someday . . . and I wept for him having to do that.

I cried again today when I talked to Tia Leti on the phone. She told me she got out the pictures of her holding Abram for the first time right after he was born. Oh, the tears we both cried. We talked about how we both know that our relationship/situation is the best, but it is still hard. Even the best adoption situation still involves loss and pain and grief. Here is Leti's comment on my Facebook status this morning about Abram's birthday today:

"I was going to try not to boo-hoo today but i just can't, thinking about the first time i held him! Happy Birthday lil man! YOUR presence has brought strangers together to be one loving extended family all the way from Texas to Iowa! Love you with all my heart! Tia Leti"

There is no question our lives are filled with greater joy because of Abram and how God brought two families together to create a new extended family. So we of course joyfully celebrate his life today. None of his birthdays, though, will ever be without some sadness of what he has lost and what his birth family is missing. But - again, thanks be to God - the sadness is not in vain. It makes us truly long for heaven when there will be no more pain and all of the wrongs of our fallen world will be made right.

Now, onto the HAPPY! Abram LOVES trains so we planned to take Abram to ride the Boone & Scenic Valley Railroad train. However, it turns out that Ms. Details here missed the part of the website that said, 'These trains will operate from Memorial Day Weekend through October 31.' OOPS! To my defense, though, I did call and ask if they were open on Easter and they said 'yes' so I guess I got some wrong information.

Well, as you can see from the pictures below, Abram still had a blast and didn't even notice that we didn't actually ride a train. (Whew!)

And then to DQ for some birthday ice cream (of course)!

We will definitely be going back to Boone to actually ride the train after Memorial Day. Maybe we can talk Tia Leti into coming to visit to join us!