We Are a Different Family

It is a rare occasion that I can compare so overtly what our adopt-three-kids-at-one-time family is like now to what it was seven or eight months ago. It has been a slow and often tedious process. But, last Thursday night I got a glimpse of the difference between the earlier months and now.

After dinner we all walked to a park near our house. We haven't been to parks much in this summer due to the heat (and our great back yard). When we got to the park Thursday night with our soccer ball and volleyball and started playing in the open, grassy area, waves of memories flooded over me. I could not help but be transported back to all the times we went to that park as a family in the early months right after the kids came home - when we were all bundled up in winter coats.

PEOPLE! We were an incredibly different family at the park Thursday night than that family we took to the park many months ago in the cold weather. I mean A. REALLY. DIFFERENT. FAMILY.

It felt like we were family - you know, people who actually know each other really well. We laughed a lot, we called the kids by the nicknames we have for them and we were relaxed and just having fun with them -  not on guard every minute wondering what they were going to do, how they would react and needing to be super intentional about every interaction with them. We were an {almost} normal family at the park. We were not two parents with a toddler and three kids we loved deeply, but barely knew. Such a tangible "feeling" of difference in who we are as a family was a sweet blessing to experience last week. THANK YOU, JESUS!

A few people have asked me lately if my African kids feel like my kids now. It is a good question. I can say for sure that my feelings of my kids being my kids has definitely grown TREMENDOUSLY since they first came home. That I know for sure. While I've never parented a biological or adopted-at-birth 9 or 11 year old, I am fairly certain that it is still a little different. Not quite 100% "there" - whatever "there" is.

Claire is the most attached and probably feels most like my daughter at this current moment in time. With Zoe, it honestly depends on the week/day and whether or not RAD behaviors are rising to the surface or not. When RAD is present, it creates this unavoidable distance in our relationship. In order to love and parent the RAD, I have to disconnect emotionally from her (to some degree) to not take things personally and be able to parent her in the way she needs (providing consequences and firm boundaries for crazy/controlling behavior). If I didn't disconnect emotionally, I would react very poorly to her (read: get very angry). Disconnecting allows me to not let her crazy behavior affect me as much. So it is taking longer with her and that is okay. I still love her just as much as I love my other kids (and in some ways in a more special way because I have invested a lot of blood, sweat and tears in her life). Isaiah also still cycles through his disconnected times and in those times I do not feel the same toward him as I do Abram. But, like with Zoe, each time they cycle back around to a more emotionally healthier Isaiah or Zoe, my attachment and "feelings" toward them grow, too. So, yes, they feel like my kids, but it is still different . . . we are getting there and I am confident God will provide all the feelings of them being 100% my kids in His time.

Before the kids came home and I read about attachment and realized my kids might not feel like my kids for a long time, I'm sure it scared me to death. This is an often-asked question/fear when I talk to people who are interested in adopting. And it is a legitimate question, but not something to fear. I think the enemy loves to make us feel like it will be a miserable nightmare if our kids don't "feel" like our kids after we adopt them. It is simply not true. It is a lie from Satan. God's grace is sufficient and He gives us everything we need to joyfully love them - even if we don't have the feelings to go along with it. And it is selfish of us if we say "no" to adoption because we are afraid we can't love them like our other children or if we think they won't feel like "our" kids.

We love because Christ first loved us. (1 John 4:19)

As a relationship with our child(ren) grows over time, so do the feelings. God entrusts us with a life (or two or three) and asks us to lay down our lives and love them, no matter what our feelings toward them. It is not always easy (but neither is loving kids who completely feel like your own kids!), but the blessings of getting to experience the relationship with a newly adopted child grow is amazing. It is like sitting on the sidelines watching God work right in front of your face. I wouldn't trade that gift for anything.