It is kinda funny, this blog is. I thought that I would be one to look forward to writing every day. Then I went on vacation. I didn't write once.
It doesn't matter though, because no one reads it anyway! So, I took a vacation from myself. The writer and the sole reader!
Something on my ever growing list of potential blog post is the topic of adoption. What I have yet to share is the fact that I am adopted. The experience of being adopted, for me at least, has been no different than being a biological child of my parents. My older sister and I are both adopted and my younger sister is biological. My parents, have never made any differentiation between the two and we have known since as early as I can remember. It was always stressed that family is family, a unit created by God, no matter how you got there. For that, I am forever grateful.
For a long time, I thought that one of the only obvious effects of being adopted was the deep seeded fear of not being able to have kids. Really, in learning and evaluating, all women (or most I talk to) fear not being able to get pregnant. However, I think that being adopted, you hear so much about your adoptive mom not being able to get pregnant (for that is most of the reason people adopt anyway), that you begin to associate yourself with that, forgetting that obviously, your birth mom got pregnant unexpectedly.
However, in a recent conversation with my mom, she brought to light that maybe, just maybe, there are other underlying issues that I have yet to deal with, much less even realize are associated with being adopted. Simply having been raised by the best, most loving and caring, constantly supportive in every way, parents doesn't change the obvious...
I was given up.
Does given up = Not wanted and Not Good Enough?
Does given up = Being Left Out?
Much to the credit of my mom asking some pretty hard questions, I am begining to see that somewhere along the way, I believed that the above are equal. No matter how many times I have heard that "it is a greater love that causes a birth mom to give up her child", I have associated it more so with a "not being good enough to keep" decision. A "not fitting into her life, hence being left out" decision. These beliefs have effected every reaction and decision I have made since I started to believe that lie. I have thought about this before, and even prayed about it to an extent. But for the most part, I think I have felt like I have worked through it in my head and not in my heart. These lies still have an obvious root in my heart and something that I definitely need to look into and pray about more.
I am being confronted with adoption more and more through this struggle that Regan and I find ourselves in. It is something that we have always said we want to play a role in how our family looks. Being adopted has given me a heart for it. However, I now find myself wrestling with the fact that as much as I love and preach adoption, in the depths of my honest heart, I have to admit that adoption isn't the "only" way I want to have a family.
So much is wrapped into this topic for me, both in my own personal life and in this stage of waiting... where the Lord has us right now.
I am sure that this topic will come up more as I continue to wrestle with the lasting effects that adoption has had on my life and my thinking...
Until then...
Prayerfully waiting...
Much Love-
Al
Yes, you may have been "given up" but you (and I) were given up so that we could have a better life than what we might have had. Imagine how different life would have been if I (or you) had been raised by a teenage mother. We would not have been blessed with our parents and we would not have each other. I am grateful everyday that I was given an opportunity to have a blessed beyond belief life with my new family. I love you!
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