Back in early March, I had been asked to speak at a women's event to share our story. As I prepared for that night, I was freshly amazed by all that God has wrought in our family in the last six years. It is beautiful and painful and astonishing and far more than I could have ever dreamed of for both better and worse.
Sharing with those women brought all the feelings rushing back. The longing, the terror, the unknown, the joy, the happiness, the beauty, the love, the heartache - all of it. All the feels. The words tumbled out of me while I held the tears in, mostly. Some leaked out, because I was on stage, and I tend to get weepy when I talk about all the things God has done and is doing, and
I'm just pretty raw these days.
Sometimes I feel like grabbing the popcorn, pulling up a seat and waiting to see what will unfold. It has been a wild ride - one that I have not been able to predict at all. And we have been gifted so many unexpected joys along the way. Other times, I want to curl up in a ball and cry over the hardness of everything - over the unfairness and the ways I can't control it. (another thing that I can't control - whether or not William in particular will have any desire to be in a picture with all of his bio-sisters - see John's hands affixing him to the couch whilst he desperately struggles to escape 🤣)
This spring, in addition to
celebrating W & V's birthday, we also got to celebrate Lizzie's - such a joyous occasion!
(despite the look on her face in this photo, Violet absolutely adores Lizzie!)
And, another
sweet friend's birthday is the same day as William and Violet's, so we enjoyed her Flamingo party as well. To see the way that God has woven these stories and people and lives together is truly a marvel. It never gets old, though it also never gets easy.
When I was sitting on the red couch in my counselor's office pouring out my heart, she noted how near God is to our family. She was able to cite example after example of ways that he has made himself known to us, even in the last couple of months. Sometimes we need that other voice to point out the obvious ways that God is manifest within the hardness.
Other times, I'm handed pristine reminders at the dinner table. One night, we posed the question, "If you could wake up tomorrow morning and find that the top news headline was about you - what would you want it to be?" Bella was the first to answer,
"I would want it to say that I adopted twins who had brown skin."
My heart grew a hundred times over as I was reminded that God is working in the midst of all this, and there will be ramifications far beyond us. Transracial adoption has so many challenges (as does adoption in general!), but these are the moments worth fighting for, and my gratitude shivers deep in my bones.
And something that I am learning over and again and carving inside my soul is that God is smack dab in the middle of the pain. It's where he camps out and shows up and walks alongside. He is guiding and directing and most of all, comforting. He is taking the questions and the unknowns and holding them up against his love and the certainty of our hope in him.
So, as we walk through the fire, we won't get burned. I may come out a bit singed around the edges, and I may smell like burning hair, but I will be there, because of the goodness and faithfulness of my God, and for that, I am eternally grateful.