proverbs 31 – This Eternal Journey

what if?

#whatif

What if mama’s stomachs were never supposed to be flat and hard…what if our softness was simply a continual visual wonder for the life that quietly grew within?

What if God designed us to be soft, because our arms and stomachs and laps so often cradle a little one for sleep, for comfort, for teaching….

What if the strength of our arms comes not from push ups and lifting weights, but from lifting littles high, catching them when they fall, carrying them through the rough places of life….

What if our hands aren’t meant to be soft and photo-finish smooth, but worn and calloused….each mark representing a dish washed, a child cleaned, a household fed, a tear wiped, a garden planted…

What if our faces were never meant to be flawless, but every worry and laugh line was a reflection of shared compassion, shouldered burdens, unexpected laughter….

What if we were never meant to be mannequins, endless slaves to the ever changing, demanding whims of fashion…but we are seen for the love we hold in our hearts…. the ideas and passions that change this world for the better.

What if our hair was never meant to be continuously coiffed but as silver streaks our temples, we welcome this gradual crowning of wisdom that only time can gift.

What if our feet were never meant to be tortured in shoes designed to draw the stares of men to our legs, but instead, they were shod with shoes that only helped us run faster to the weary, the waiting, the downtrodden…

What if we have it all wrong and we strive for things that will never bring us closer to God?

What if how we, as women, mothers, daughters, sisters, wives….what if how we are made is simply the best thing as we are……untouched, un-refined…that we don’t need the wearisome race of the unnatural……and we can joyfully rest in the undeniable gift of being a woman.

What if?

of toddler and teens…

Who’d have thought I’d be the lucky mom of a simultaneous toddler stage AND teen stage? I’ve definitely hit the occasional insanity jackpot, not that I was aiming for it, but it somehow seems to find me no matter how carefully I hide. (was that a mixed metaphor? Jackpots searching for me…oh well)

I know that ya’ll just look at our happy pictures and think, “oooohhh, Cady has it all together!”, but let me just fill you in on what a sometimes typical day looks like in the always strange and exciting opposing spectrums that encircle the lives of toddlers and teens.

It’s a typical day. I’m chasing Lian around, redoing the things he’s undoing, picking up the things he’s pulling out, cleaning, laundry….you know the game. It’s like one giant, happy game of “let’s see how insane mom can get”.

“Mom”, says Chloe as I’m laying on the floor fishing the balls out from under the TV cabinet….again. Lian is laying on the floor with me, pointing and directing where mom should put the aforesaid balls so that he can pick them up and roll them under the cabinet again. It’s a fun game, you see. Fun.

“Mom!” louder now, “MOM! I applied to the Royal Ballet School and I can’t get the application to go through.”

“Ok,” I grunt as I heft my aching body off of the hard wood floor. I sit down at the table, scratching my head. Is my hair thinning? Yes. Yes, it is.

CRASH! Lian dumps all of the tupperware out of the cabinet. I sigh, but leave it. It’ll keep him occupied while I figure this out.

“Mom! I need the computer!” my youngest demands. “There’s no ink in the printer and I HAVE to print this!”

I glance over.

“Lian, please don’t put that toy in the dog water!” I say in my best I’m-trying-to-build-attachment, cheerful mom voice…dragging him away and distracting him with a cracker.

“TT, I’ll get dad to order ink, don’t worry” I make a mental note to text Chris. (I forget, as usual)

I shoot an email off to the Royal Ballet Academy stating our issue. The dog starts insanely barking and Lian demands to be picked up.

“Jake turn that thing down, please!” My phone rings. Lian on one hip, Tirzah hovering worriedly over my shoulder with a look on her face says that her entire future will be ruined unless she can print this paper out for class. NOW.

“Good Day! May I please speak with a Mrs. Driver? This is the Royal Ballet School calling”….a very proper British lady is speaking. I suddenly get the urge for a cup of tea and I stand up straighter. British accents have this affect on me.

“Yes!” I pant in what I hope is a proper voice, as I balance the phone on my neck and start kicking the growling dog out the backdoor. Let her eat the mailman, I don’t care.

I’m wildly gesticulating at who knows what, but I feel that more proper behavior is in order from my children and various stinky pets when someone from England is on the phone.

“It’s the Royal Ballet Academy”. I mouth to Chloe. Chloe’s eye widen as if the Queen of England herself is gracing us with a visit.”It’s the Royal Ballet School!” She corrects me. I attempt to roll my eyes at her but I’m afraid it’ll throw me off balance and I’ll drop the baby.

Lian happily reaches over, stuffing the rest of his cracker down my shirt. I set him down and wildly gesture to Jacob to turn that game down or so help me, all of his descendants will feel my wrath. A cat slithers past my leg and yowls at the door I just shut from letting the dog out. Why, again, do we have pets????

“It seems you’re having a problem with the website. You must enter the state code.” She states in her proper British way.

I shake the crumbs from my bra. State code…state code. Lian is babbling. “MA”, he yells at the top of his lungs. State code…..State motto? I think…..ummm….something about fried chicken or pulled pork…a cardinal? I can’t remember what the state motto/code is. Live free or die? No, that’s Patrick Henry. Was he from here? What does the state code mean? I’m failing this quiz from the proper British person. Silly American, not even knowing her own state code! I stammer that question like a slightly distracted idiot.

“What’s the state code?”

“Oh, no”, even her bell-like laugh sounds properly British….”the state code…what is the code for North Carolina? The, what do you call it? Abbreviation?”

Oh, duh, NC. I sigh. Lian is dipping his ball in the dog bowl and licking it. Sydney is outside eating who knows whom…I think I hear the mailman faintly screaming in the background. The mail truck is now honking frantically. I ignore it. He’ll be ok.

“Yes, we shall fix that state code immediately. Thank you so much.” I brightly state as if my side of the phone call is very much in control of the situation.

I hang up, suddenly exhausted and feeling frumpy. I feel that if I possessed a British accent, my world would be calm, orderly, and I would stand up straighter, my clothes would fit better, my upper arms would not dangle and swing when I wave……or something.

Would my house be cleaner if I had that crisp accent?

Lian is now rolling the wet, dog slobber balls back underneath the cabinet. There’s tupperware scattered everywhere and my son is shooting aliens, but more quietly now.

Motherhood? Who knew, right? I’m thankful that Lian’s cracker as at least dry before he decided to stash it in my clothing. Thankful for small blessings.

Please don’t let the mailman sue me for his heart failure from my dog.

“MOM!”

how do I protect him from words?

If someone were coming at my child wielding a knife, I would step in, take the blow, protect….but these words are like knives for my child’s tender heart. How do I take the blow, somehow anticipating what’s coming?

“Oh my word, I could just take you home with me RIGHT NOW!” She bends down and starts talking directly to Lian.

“Oh, you’re just so cute! How old are you, what’s your name?” He’s ignoring her because he’s rolling a roll of tape across the hardware store’s floor.

“I love it when they’re this age and they don’t talk yet, it’s when they get older and start talking that drives me crazy.”

Ouch…I sigh….what I wouldn’t give to hear Lian speak to me, hear what he’s thinking, hear his little boy thoughts. The countless hours I have spent with flashcards, letters, slowly saying words, coaching, bribing, singing…..Progress is painstakingly snail slow.

“He’s not really speaking much yet.” I state, inwardly cringing a bit. I know what’s coming and I mentally brace myself.

“Oh”, she pauses, “does he have autism? Oh, Down Syndrome? You know, you can teach those kids how to talk.” She beams upon me as if, in that one statement, she has rescued me from all my travails, enlightening me with the knowledge that he can be taught.

Those kids. The “us” and “them” thing.

“Well, every child is a bit different in their abilities.” I wrestle a can of spray paint from Lian’s hand.

Stop the madness!

“You know…(why is every uneducated statement always predicated by ‘you know’), I read that in China, these kids are just abandoned just because they have Down Syndrome and it happens all the time. Parents just leave them. Can you believe that?”

Oh dear. God, how do I gently educate this person while keeping my composure? I’m so grateful that Lian doesn’t understand…yet….but does he? I’m not sure what he does or doesn’t comprehend about adoption yet. I want to rush over and cover his little ears. It’s as if she thinks he can’t hear because he’s not talking.

I smile and shake my head. I tell her about the hard choices that some parents have to make with medical care and the cost of some children’s needs. I tell her to not believe everything she reads. I tell her that we love him to pieces and that he is so incredibly valued.

“Well, I could never do a thing like that. I just don’t have the patience for it.” She flatly states.

Okay then…and I tell her to have a nice day and we leave.

Let me pick your brain with the “what if’s” of this conversation.

What if Lian had been old enough to understand? How incredibly damaging it would be to his core self-worth to hear a stranger make a judgment call as to why his biological parents made the decision they did. This is HIS story.

Would he assume that he is somehow flawed, that was HIS fault he became a orphan, that his parents didn’t love him enough to keep him?

How hard the car conversation will be when he IS old enough to comprehend the heartache of his past.

How do I constructively navigate and cut this conversation short? I’m truly at a loss here because this is new to me. If someone were coming at my child wielding a knife, I would step in, take the blow, protect….but these words are like knives for my child’s tender heart. How do I take the blow, somehow anticipating what’s coming?

I felt torn and guilty that I should have known what was coming. I should have circumvented it somehow, I could have cut her off (SUCH a hard thing for me to do, since manners have been drilled into me from a young age.)

Mamas who have done this a long while, help me! I don’t know how to handle this well, introvert that I am. I need kind suggestions, not mean or snarky ones (although those are fun to contemplate). I don’t want to cut people down, I want to educate, but not at the expense of my son’s hurt.

Any words of wisdom? I could use some. Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Thank you!

the hubby hurdle…

The divide widened, rifting us in an unhealthy way. A not God-honoring way. A way that wives should not be taking and for me, I was completely justified, in my own stubborn mind, for feeling this way.

You might be like me. You might have married a good man, a quieter man, a man who will cover your feet when you’re cold or leap out of bed in the graveyard hours when you hear those heartwarming “harf harf” sounds of the cat commencing her scheduled barfing routine. I think that many of us have married these steady men. Everyone likes them, demands their time, they give unselfishly, cautious spenders (Target is his nemesis), you get the picture!

They work hard, pay the bills, bathe kids, fuss at teens for too much phone time. Overall, they are really, good guys….church guys, who will answer the call to help others with basically, anything.

But adoption….adoption was really a struggle for my steady man to wrap his mind around.

A few years ago, when I broached the subject with him, it was a flat out “no”.

“We have enough kids, we can’t afford it, how can I love another child like my own?”. Those were the main bullet points, and in that order.

Me, I’m all pie-in-the-sky. “We DON’T have enough kids, GOD will provide, we CAN AND WILL love another child just the same as our own”. And so the argument went, and argue, we DID.

For years.

The topic would come up, I would become bitter and frustrated, he would shut down, I would be sarcastic and snarky (which is always such a GREAT and PROVEN way to move your husband forward on the spiritual journey of adoption).

I was so incredibly, undeniably certain that adoption was for us. I had wanted to adopt my whole entire life, ever since I was a child, I just knew….I wanted to have my own kids and I wanted to adopt. There were children that needed a mother and here I am, a mothering type of person and I would mother them.

They would be so mothered that they wouldn’t ever feel the need to be mothered again. I’m here, let’s get this show on the road. Chop chop.

And so, we went round and round, me, weeping sometimes bitter, angry tears, yearning to be involved, yearning to start the big, scary journey and him, rock solid in his bullet point facts of male, square-boxed, time honored practicality.

And our marriage suffered, because of me, because of him, because we weren’t doing this the right way, the Godly way, and we both knew it.

Finally, I got to a point where God was gently (but not audibly) saying, “Let it go”.

But, but….

“Let it go.”

God, I CAN’T let it go, there are children that NEED me, they need homes, they need a MOTHER and look! Here I am! A mother! What a coincidence, so, you know, let’s start this thing.

Let. It. Go.

I’m pretty sure He quite possibly was saying this with gritted teeth because, man, can I be super stubborn.

Yeah.

So, I’m all Holy-Spiriting my husband, which just might be NOT my job and I’ve got the impatience thing firmly down pat from lots of practice and I’m a total, emotional wreck inside. FullSizeRender 33

After much internal struggle, which resembled one of those animal planet shows where two grizzlies have at it over a salmon head, I had to finally, reluctantly let it go.

THEN, because even though I’ve “let it go”, I still had to do SOMETHING, I started a line of artwork to help raise funds for other families, who were obviously more spiritual than ours, and much more blessed to be able to be so annoyingly united in their decision to go adopt.

I feverishly poured myself into fundraising, and fundraised my little heart out for quite a long time, creating a whole line of ink artwork that sold like hotcakes. It was the beginning of the adult coloring insanity and my finger developed a permanent dent in it from all of the drawing I did.

I believe God gave me purpose in the waiting, and there was purpose in this artwork that was yet to be realized. It took me an entire year to complete my line of Exquisite Ink work and in that year, I felt like I had truly let it go. I sadly resigned myself to the fact that adoption wasn’t for us. I’d just do my small part, however measly it felt, in raising funds and supporting families who were going. (Grrrr…)

Cue, God.

We started attending a new church at the time and it just so “happened” that the pastor was preaching a whole entire, wondrously glorious series on trusting God.

Are you really trusting God? Are you stepping forward in faith, even when you are uncertain of the outcome? Do you trust God with your marriage, your money, your family? Well, do you? Huh?

He wasn’t as annoying as that, but you get my drift.

I’d sit in service and I’m telling you, it took all the self-control in my body not to elbow my husband at certain key points. He’d sit really still, I’d glance down and see his foot jiggling. At times, he’d shift uncomfortably like someone was poking his back (It wasn’t me, I swear!). I’d smile an internal smile with my internal jaw, which, later on, you’ll see will be dropping….internally.

After service, in the car, I’d want to talk about the sermon, and he’d say, “I don’t want to talk about it.”…… that’s it….and silence prevailed.

And I left it, because I sensed that something was happening, but I didn’t allow myself to hope…..I’d already spent too many years hoping, weeping, and praying… Hope hurt too much.

I miraculously managed to shut my big mouth (no easy feat) and let the Holy Spirit do His thing, because, you know, that’s His job and not mine (I should probably get a tattoo of that somewhere to remind me of that).

Three months. For three months, we didn’t talk about the sermons and for three months, our pastor wielded the sword of the Word of God like an expert surgeon…..and now you’re wondering what kind of surgeon I go to, but ancient surgeons might have used swords back in the olden days, so just hush now. You get the mental picture.

Finally, one Sunday afternoon, he sat me down. He needed to talk to me.

He’s very serious. My heart suddenly hurts. “I’m ready. I’m ready to adopt.”

I sat really still, fearing that any sudden movement might blow away this new feather of faith. My heart leaped and my internal jaw just dropped, but outwardly, I didn’t move a muscle or say anything.

He’s ready.

Really?!?!?!?!

He’s ready.

My internal jaw was grinning so hard that it forced my external one to comply. There are really no words to accurately capture the sky-high joy that swept over me.

We’re ready. All those tears, arguments, years of hurt, hoping, disappointment, bitterness, talking, hinting, hoping some more….We. Are. Ready.

And that, my dear friends, is how we started down the wonderful, lovely, hard, scary, amazing, close-to-God’s-heart path called adoption.

Through all that emotional upheaval, I learned something valuable. Don’t be the Holy Spirit in your husband’s life. Yes, yes, it’s very hard and while there are times we are to hold each other accountable, it wasn’t the right time.

My man likes to lovingly point out that if we had started down the adoption road when I wanted to, Lian wouldn’t have even been born yet and wouldn’t be a part of our family. It’s so incredibly evident that Lian was meant for this family in God’s perfect design.

Think Sarah and Hagar. Just because your intentions are good or that you think you’re following God’s plan for your life, doesn’t mean that you can take matters into your own hands and advance your cause, pre-empting God’s perfect timing.

It has been an incredibly difficult, but necessary lesson for me.

The journey has transformed our spirits, whittled away our self, weeded out the sinful poison ivy in our garden of life.

Adoption has irrevocably changed us.

God’s timing, allowing the Holy Spirit to work, being patient, respecting my husband’s leadership and decisions….ALL things I had to learn the hard way and I’m still learning these things.

Above all things, lifting up your desires in prayer to our Heavenly Father, Who hears us, but just may not answer as quickly as we’d like.

Now, I’m itching to do it again, but I’m proud to say that I’m zipping it.

Moderately. 😉

Was your adoption decision journey easy or hard? Encourage others with your story in the comments. I feel that there are many spouses out there that feel the call, but aren’t united yet in the decision.

How can I lift you up in prayer, my friend? Let me know!

Stay tuned for how Down Syndrome chose us!

this eternal journey…

I’m moderately pleased to be joining the blogosphere. I say “moderately”, because I’m not one to get overly excited about things and I say “pleased” because I am that….simply, mildly, quietly pleased.

It’s early morning. I’m sitting here crunching cough drops and hoping that my Downy Duckling and teen trio will stay asleep just a few more precious minutes so I can, you know, construct an uninterrupted written thought that possesses some semblance of sanity.

This journey called “life”, that we contemplate on and avoid, struggle with and rejoice in, scream at and whisper to…this life is eternal. You are eternal. Your soul is eternal.

I desired to start blogging about adoption, Down Syndrome moments, motherhood, some artsy musings, eternity, healing, forgiveness, along with many more myriads of ideas that idly meander through my head as I scrape banana off my kitchen floor with my finger nails and fish magnetic letters out from under the fridge with my spaghetti server spoon.

After much thought and idea jotting, I was stumped, and I prayed that God would
give me a title for this blog. The Eternal Journey just popped into my head. Amazingly, the name was free and so, it’s this…..This journey called “life”, that we contemplate on and avoid, struggle with and rejoice in, scream at and whisper to…this life is eternal. You are eternal. Your soul is eternal.

Through my musings, I’d like to point us all towards this horizon that we should be fixing our eyes on, traveling towards, running the race for….this horizon called eternity.

You see, I believe that if you and I keep our perspectives fixed on eternity, this journey God calls us to will hone our focus in on Christ, and the hard things that He lovingly asks us to commit to won’t seem too implausible for our ordinary lives.

“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” II Corinthians 4:18

If you’d like to join me, I’d be honored. If not, and you’re thinking “meh, she’s a mediocre writer with a boring life”, I’d have to agreeably nod, and you may continue on your merry internet way with nary a hard feeling from this side of the screen.

But, I pray that you may find some enjoyment, some spiritual encouragement from my journey, accompanied by an occasional giggle or feeling of camaraderie, and if so, I’d be honored beyond belief.

…aaaaand, I hear the humming of my newest family addition commencing!

The sleep fairies must have been in a good mood this morning but I must not test their patience.

Won’t you join me on This Eternal Journey?