Um... Can I just say that adopting is hard? Yes. It is good but it is really really hard! It is even harder when you adopt multiple older children and they all have attachment issues, trauma, and other struggles. Put that together with the challenges of just learning to love each other and be a family, and you've got a recipe for one burned out mama!
Ever wonder how you could help? Lisa Qualls has some great suggestions today! I know from personal experience that our friends and family doing these things had a huge impact on us making it through those really hard few years!Eight Ways to Help a Struggling Family
7 comments:
What a beautiful family! Thank you for your example of love, determination and charity. We have nine kids and are going back to China for number 10 this spring. Our blog is www.abeautifulroad.com Keep up the great work! Jeremy and Christianne Green
Yes, adopting older children isn't easy...and it can take a year for every year the child is old at the time of adoption for them to unlearn the old and learn and adjust and attach to the new. But it is definitely worth the journey!
http://delanasworld.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/heart-tears/
http://nineyearpregnancy.wordpress.com/2012/08/03/year-for-year/
Blessings,
Delana
Hello there,
I came across your blog in my search to find some Christian advice from people who had adopted large sibling groups. I so appreciate your real, yet encouraging sharing of your journey - and your godly perspective on it all.
I so wish I could visit with you some day :)... I have so many questions!! We are considering a similar leap of faith by adopting a sibling group of 4 (we presently have 2 children, ages 2 & 4).
I can only imagine how busy you must be... so part of me feels bad asking, yet I don't know of anyone who has the kind of experience as you in all this. So please forgive me for asking, but is there any chance you'd be willing to connect via email at some point? There is no pressure to say yes to my request. I know you're busy, and I'm just some random stranger.
In the mean-time, thank you for all you've shared on your blog. I will be reading through it here and there as we pray and think through this decision.
Blessings to you and your family,
~Wieska
www.martinandwieska.wordpress.com
(I think if you would comment on there, I could email you from the comment there). Otherwise I can just add my email address as a comment on here.
Thought it might be best to add my email address...
no spaces:
m w overduin at shaw dot ca
(not to add pressure - but I thought maybe this would be easiest for you if you have time)
The better way: tell that family that buying humans is evil and wrong. That adopting kids with rad who wreck their lives is all they deserve!!
Anonymous,
Since you comment anonymously, I can really have no idea who you are or where you are coming from on this comment. If you have been hurt by someone and feel that adoption is the cause, I am truly sorry.
I would like to point out the errors in your argument however and encourage you to think about how adoption can actually be an amazing blessing.
You say that buying humans is evil and wrong. Agreed. Purchasing people for selfish reasons such as slavery or to even to fulfill some unmet need to be a parent (if that is your reason for adopting) IS in fact very wrong and can obviously have terrible consequences.
However, your assumption that ALL adoptions (or even most adoptions) fall into this category is absolutely wrong. Every family I know who has adopted has done so out of a desire to help and love a child. And while there are most definitely cases where the "system" (adoption agencies and/or Child Welfare Services) gets it very wrong, most times the children being adopted are in horrible situations and are much better off after adoption.
Perhaps you would have considered it more loving of me to leave Jo, Mo, and Missy in their orphanage where they were literally starving to death and did not have clean water or the love of a family. Perhaps it would have been WAY better for Smarty, Sweetie, Chatty, Spunky, Happy, and Cutie to spend the rest of their childhood moving from foster home to foster home, never all together as siblings and never with the security of a home and family. Perhaps you truly believe that, but I can assure you that THEY would NOT agree.
"Kids with rad who wreck their lives is all they deserve." Really? Would you like to apply this same logic to all situations? If anyone really DESERVES their life to be wrecked because of a poor choice (I'm not arguing that adoption is a poor choice, but just going with your logic here), then don't all of us deserve our lives to be wrecked because of the poor choices we make?
No, I don't think any of us wants to actually live by that principle.
By the way, "kids with rad" as you call them may "wreck our lives," but not in the way that you imagine. They don't wreck our lives for bad, but for good. Yes, parenting these children who have had HARD starts in life, who have experienced trauma and who don't trust, is HARD and it challenges us and our beliefs in a way that a nice easy life never would have, but there is also joy in the suffering and in seeing healing and redemption come.
I pray that you might someday find the healing and redemption that the Lord promises for all who come to Him!
Can I just say that I LOVE this response? Beautiful, classy, full of grace and mercy. With love from one who adopted two "kids with rad" who have "wrecked our lives" in the most beautiful (and yes, sometimes painful)ways, and who are two of the greatest blessings God has ever entrusted to my care. A decade in, and they are becoming beautiful, caring young people. He has done GREAT THINGS!
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