Ok, I'm ready to write. The days have been hard and tough and uncertain but the Lord has been so near. And today was a good day. A good, sweet day that started with a message at church that struck my heart, worship that stirred my affection for Jesus and a wonderful friend who knows this journey well who sat and talked with me and prayed over me with understanding and grace.
It's crazy that it's only been less than 3 weeks since K came to us. We feel like we've had her for months. We've had all the hard days that go along with teaching and training a 3 and 5 year old to get along, share, be kind, love and respect each other. Some days are hard for Addison. Her emotions are all over the place. She came to me yesterday and with tears in her eyes told me she was having a rough day (we could tell) and wanted to talk. We slipped off to her room and had a good heart to heart with some prayer. She is learning to seek the Lord in the struggle of all of this. It's not just about Addie getting used to having a sibling - it's a lot more than that and her heart is fragile and hurting yet she knows the Lord is her strength and she desires to draw on that. My heart hurts for her at times but I love what I'm seeing the Lord do in her!
K is a three year old. A three year old that has come from a very hard place and endured some very traumatic things. While overall she is a very good girl with great manners and obeys when told - she's just hard sometimes! As any toddler is! She pushes every boundary. She's still learning what's ok and not ok. Some days every.single.thing feels like a struggle. Oh my stars she wears us out. And if you don't know this - we're not allowed to spank her. (And for those of you that don't spank no offense - we did with Addie but thankful to the Lord we no longer need to). On one hand that's tough but on the other it sure does prevent spanking out of anger (which I thank the Lord for his unending grace in that awesome area of my parenting experience). But we laugh sometimes because for some reason we've forgotten the whole year Addie was 3 and how hard that age was. When K is not pushing us though... man is she adorable. She's SO loving and gives us the best hugs and kisses! When she tells me she loves me my heart. just. melts.
So.... I know the biggest question you have. Her future. Well frankly we don't know. I don't know much more than I did the day we got her (ok, maybe a little). And well, that's just rough. We do know her parents (both mom and dad) are showing CPS that they have a desire to work things out and get K back. Yes, my heart sank when I heard that - but why? My heart will be broken if K leaves us - but my heart will also be broken if her parents can't get their act together and they lose their child and she loses growing up with her own mom and dad. (I read that in a blog so I can't take full credit for that great little truth but it's TRUE!) It's really hard for me to talk about this part - because ya'll we are just waiting and it could be a long wait or it could all be over in a few weeks. We just don't know how this will turn out. We honestly feel like we're taking care of someone else's kid while they get their act together. And frankly that's just what foster care is. And we knew that going into this. So what do we do? What we're doing now. Just take care of her. She's ours right now. We are here to love her, teach her, grow her, show her Jesus and plant seeds in her heart that we pray fervently will grow no matter where she ends up. Yep - we wanted to adopt out of this experience. But the Lord continually shows us that K came to our family for a reason. So when we start to get anxious or doubt that we made the right decision to say yes to her -- I just think about all the Lord has done in us and in HER since she came to us and it's all worth it. For however long we have her, it's all worth it. Isn't it just the same for our own children?
As for plans for K's baby sibling due in a few weeks - no idea on that either. Our case worker tells me one way it could/probably will work out while CPS tells me another. At first CPS said the baby would go straight to foster care (so that could mean several things for us) and then they said they are working to have the baby kept with K's mom. So I have no idea. I know how I'd like for all this to go - but, God is writing this story not me. (I'm just saying that out loud so as to remind myself)
K has weekly visits with her mom and dad. Supervised visits at a CPS office - one hour a week. On her 2nd visit I sent a letter and some pictures with her. On her most recent visit I sent a journal in hopes that her mom would start writing me back and maybe it would be a good way to communicate to each other. Our desire is to build trust with her parents and it's a very good thing to do. Because if it comes down to it and they HAVE to give up their rights things will go A LOT smoother if they have learned over time that we love K and are taking good care of her. Overall, we want to minister to them through loving K. So I started off the journal and her mom wrote me back. It was crazy cool and I'm excited to begin this and see how it goes.
Know that every word, text, phone call and hug you give us means the world. This is a completely huge change for our family. We will never be the same.
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