Healing

Jan132017

Replenish my love

Father, I don’t want to go downstairs and face my day or boy without having prayed… I don’t want to attempt to do today in my own strength.  I am so tired and feel incapable and so Father, I open my hands so you can fill them.  I pray you will replenish my love for my boy on an ongoing basis today.  Let me not run out.  Give me the right words to say, help me give him the right direction for today as I have taken him out of school for the sole purpose of loving on him.  And Lord, give me the right eyes… when my boy looks me in the eye, help him see nothing but compassionate love.  And Father, I lift up our boy who is in darkness.  Will you open his heart and mind to the love that comes from his momma.  And I pray peace all over him, that he would not feel he needs to do anything with what he’s given, help him to only see and let it be.  Father, let Your will be done in our home today, You will be our faithful God.  Amen!

 

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Nov162016

It’s a glorious day

fullsizerenderWe cannot begin to describe what the past 4 days have been like here in CO. God has done so much and brought amazing gifts. Never could we have thought it would be this emotional, this perfect, this hard and this healing. Through it all we have lived on an amazing high. 

The boys have had amazing reunions with people of their past. Only God could have known and done all these miracles leading up to boy 1’s adoption. 

Our boy is ready, so very ready. Our prayer is that as he slams the ‘hammer’ to make his adoption final, God separates him from the past and bores him into the future. Let it be a Holy Spirit moment for him.

You can watch the ceremony by clicking right HERE as we broadcasted LIVE via Facebook.  

Part One (only 3 minutes)            Part Two (the majority of the hearing)           Reception Speeches

 

I love that you are here and I would certainly love to hear from you.  To leave a comment go HERE  !

Coffee for the Heart is a place where we just see ourselves sitting down for coffee and sharing, accept it is on the internet, never the less it is very real.  Go HERE for more stories.

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Nov122016

Mom, I just don’t know how I am going to feel

I heard some footsteps on the top floor.  “Ah, someone must have woken up” I thought.  I made my way up and I saw boy 1. I guided him back to his room and I kissed him, I stroke his head and wished him good morning. Then I broke the rules, just to show him I love him dearly.  I grabbed his device from the other room and brought it to him.  His smile was so big, he knew I was making an exception, the one where we do not allow devices in the bed room.  Then he said: “Mom, you can stay here if you want….” When a child says that, at least our child, he is not saying, he is asking!  And so I climbed in his bed and we cuddled.  “Mom, I just do not know how I am going to feel on Monday.” And we talked about the big day coming up.

“I have been dreaming about this day for years.  I have wanted this day for years but now I just don’t know how I am going to feel.”

These moments are precious.  So very precious and there really is nothing better in my life then a moment like this where one of our boys just connects in the deepest way.  I feel our hearts attach, I feel welcomed and all walls, all fear, all mistrust is gone.

We are in Colorado for boy 1’s adoption hearing. We are adopting boy 1 on Monday November the 14th.  That day 2 years ago we met him for the very first time.  So we are blessed with our hearing taking  place on that very special date.

A few weeks ago, in preparation for this trip, I asked both boys to make me a list of places they wanted to go, people they wanted to see and things they needed to smell, touch, taste or hear.  I made no promises, I just said I would work hard to get all the things on their list organized.  Thursday would be boy 1’s day, Friday we’d focus on boy 2.  And so it was.

The days have been long and very emotional.  And our boys… they get through it like champs.  One thing they do is amazing… they share how hard it it so see certain people and places.  How it is good but it also brings up painful memories. Especially boy 2 usually processes on his own: he gets quite and plays basketball.  But during this trip he continuously invites us in.  He wants to share.  Both boys are feeling it, they are truly allowing the pain of the past to surface, and we do this trip as a family.  Hurt is carried by us all and the pain in on the move.

I am forever grateful for the people who were willing to go out of their way to give of their time. But this was not a one way affair. We have seen people run towards the boys, we have had past teachers cry at this reunion, we have heard from each and every person how the boys affected them!!!!!  Boys that were rejected, over and over again, are meeting with people who have ALWAYS recognized how unique they are.

I am so proud of these boys and I pray that after these many reunions, they realize it was never about them. They were never rejected because of who they are! I am also proud of them because they were strong. They endured severe pain and I look at them today and see how they fought to stay alive, how they fought to keep hope, trusting that good was in their future.

And here we are… boy 2 is awake now too.  I guide him back to his room, also with his device and soon I carry up lattes and tuck them in. We have a few hours before we start connecting again with the people of their past.

 

 

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Nov022016

Ever so gently

We went to therapy yesterday.  We went to give boy 2 a place to process.  He gets stuck often and we simply do not know how to help him get unstuck, and so naturally we turn to our amazing therapist.

When he is stuck he suffers, and when he suffers the whole family suffers.  We all hate to see him in pain and we hurt when we cannot reach him even though we all try.

Our boy is a mystery.  His depth is unknown to all.  I see him battle, by himself.  I see him go of into that world of loneliness. Even his brother cannot help him, after all they have different stories and with that come different pains.  I can imagine our boy feels utterly alone and unsafe.  And I… understand.

The reality is so different though.  We chose him, we wanted him, and boy 1… he wanted nothing more than have his brother back in his life.  But the past has taught him, that in fact, he IS all alone.  How scary for a child, a child!

And I look at myself and my struggles.  In my core I feel utterly alone.  The rejection in my life that is still current keeps stabbing at the deep wound.  The healing is painfully slow, and also a mystery.

We have a similar wound, that boy and I.  I do understand.  I thought I had no tools, but in fact, I like no other, I know the tool. I cannot fix this boy, I cannot heal him, but I can SEE him, truly see him.  He will know when he is seen, and THAT is healing.

We went to therapy to help him get unstuck, now I see we went to understand him better, to learn how to better care for his heart.  I need to be a lot gentler with him. Oh the gentleness his heart needs.  My voice needs to be softer because the loudness of my voice brings him into a dark place.  And we need to be less direct.  And when he goes of to the furthest corner of the living room, I can sit with him and read my book, I can give him my presence.  And the eye contact, I need to remember to always make the eye contact, a look accompanied with a sweet smile.  When he asks, I need to gently applaud that like nothing else.  It is all about answering his every need, about affirming him in every state, and cheering him on in the simple day to day.  The fast that he is, is amazing and he needs to know that.

I have a new mission: To find his depth, his soul and hold it ever so gently.

So as we came in with the hope he could and would process, I walked away with so much more.  I can’t believe parents send their kids off to therapy as most work IS for the parents.  If parents do right, the child can feel safe to break and heal.  It’s not about changing our boy or working on behavior, we are here to guide the healing!

 

I love that you are here and I would certainly love to hear from you.  To leave a comment go HERE !

Coffee for the Heart is a place where we just see ourselves sitting down for coffee and sharing, accept it is on the internet, never the less it is very real.  Go HERE for more stories.

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Sep072016

He watched us well

The boys were going at it yesterday.  I looked out the window and saw it all unfold.  It was ugly.  It was physical, words back and forth, and at some point the middle finger went up.  Of course I was excluded from the content of it since I was witnessing it all from a distance.

It was clear feelings got hurt because when we were all inside their faces said it all.  They refused to be in one area, and they were not speaking to one another.  It was serious.  And in the midst, I see boy 1 do something amazing.  He served his brother.  In the midst of anger, of: “I am not going to talk to him for a longggg time” he still did good.  He carried his brother’s laundry up from the basement to his brother’s room.

It was an amazing sight because have we not done just that with both boys?  We kept serving them even though we were so hurt, in the midst of anger, and definitely when they did not deserve to be served.  It made me quite proud of that boy.  He watched us well!  This is such an important attribute to life, we serve.  And when we serve those who deserve it the least, we love deeply those who need it most.

 

I love that you are here, and I would certainly love to hear from you.  To leave a comment go HERE !

Coffee for the Heart is a place where we just see ourselves sitting down for coffee and sharing, accept it is on the internet, never the less it is very real.  Go HERE for more stories!

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Aug112016

Lord, I love doing this with you

It was over onions in the food.  I normally cook 2 portions of dinner: one without onions, one with.  But tonight… I just forgot. Blame the exhaustion.  No big deal as the boy is allowed to pick out the onions, which he does when he happens to eat other people’s meals.  Just tonight… it did not go over well.  Anger came at me, a foul mouth, the looks and then finally the laughter indicating this was some sort of mean game and as if going ‘Nahnah nahnahnahhhhh’.  It was bad enough that, after the warnings of course, I took away the one thing most important to him… basketball.  And the light went out. Screaming, yelling, kicking furniture and doors, throwing things around.  And I let him.  I knew whatever was in there had to come out.  He had to sink deep.  And he sunk deep to his broken truth.  Yelling the ugliest words ever.  Accept, I knew they were not for me.  The screams were no longer screams, they now came from the top of his lungs.  Running out the door, coming back in, going around in circles showing whatever he was feeling, it was too much to bear.  The cries were no longer just cries, they now came from the pit of his stomach.

Our other boy was now affected.  How can one handle seeing his brother suffer and not be affected by it?  Well, not our boys. They are ‘too’ connected, they care ‘too’ much.  Though separated at some point, the bond between them never faded.  It probably got stronger because of it.  So now this boy cries the same tears as he begging-ly looks at me: ‘Do something! Please do something!’  But I can’t, not in the way he is hoping for.  So I hold, I just hold.  And I speak the words that come to me.

I go back to our other boy.  It’s time to calm him down and help him out of this war.  I walk towards him, I try to have the gentlest eyes ever, and he runs into my arms, holds me so tightly crying “Mom, mom, mom.”  And he chants: ‘I am so sorry, so sorry, so so sorry.”  I repeat over and over again that he will be ok, that we will be ok.  After a bit I bring the boys together in a room and honestly, I am empty.  What else can I do?  How can I make sure healing takes place?  I hold one boy, or two. We even hold one another.  I pray silently.  And as I pray I hear a song in my head: “Lord, I love doing this with you.  How I love doing this with you!”  And as I praise God with that sentence, I realize healing IS taking place.

This journey is so draining, so painful.  So very difficult.  I even tell the people around us that our life is no fun right now.  It really isn’t.  We wrestle through each week and keep telling ourselves that a year from now, we will be in a better place.  But how amazing, in the midst of ugly truth and lives broken, I see God.  And my prayer is that we will be in a better place around this time next year.  That life will be back to having joy in it.  But more so, I pray for our boy’s futures.  How I long for them to pass on the healing they have received.  How I hope they will not just go after good paying jobs, but instead truly understand the miracle in their lives and live to pass it on praising God saying: ‘Lord, I love doing this with you, I love doing this with you!’

 

I love that you are here and I certainly would love to hear from you.  To leave a comment go HERE !

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