Adoption Blessings

I had coffee with a new friend awhile back. We both thought it would be great to sit down and get to know one another since we had several things in common with each other. For instance, both of us had suffered years with infertility, our families were created through adoption and we are both Christian women-that's enough for me to start up a great friendship! As we talked and talked about our life experiences, we kept coming back to adoption and how much adoption had touched our lives. We also talked at length about our children's adoption stories, our Faith that got us to that point, but one thing that we talked at length about were people's reaction to the term or reality of "adoption." We were both amazed at the blinders people wear towards adoption. We both carried on and on with funny stories from strangers to in-laws reactions to our adopting, but one story in particular that my new friend told me I carry in my heart. Whether she knows it or not her little story has given me such joy and wonder when it comes to raising my adopted son. I have also come to understand God's love for us more and more through my experiences with adoption.

The story is short but it goes like this. My friend's daughter is a beautiful girl who is very talented in ballet. Her daughter was adopted from overseas, so it is very evident that they are not blood related. My friend talked about how she does not have the body built for ballet and had other interests growing up, but how she just loves watching her daughter dance though she has no dancing background from her childhood. She went on to talk about how she watches and laughs at all the mothers who get so upset and panicked over their daughters ballet and achievements-it is as if "they" are living through their children. These mothers did ballet, so their daughters must do ballet. She said you can see the stress on the mothers and daughters faces over this need to "do" ballet. But, my friend went on to describe how she doesn't have the need to make her daughter "do". She doesn't need to live through her daughter for she knows her daughter is different from her. Her daughter looks different, acts different and therefor has different talents-there are no shoes to fill or shoes to make fit.

Do you see the joy in that? Do you see her freedom in that? She gets to wait and see what wonderful traits and abilities develop in her daughter-not assumptions. She isn't consumed with,"Will Sarah like ballet like me, she must like ballet." or "Little Johnny's going to play football just like his dad." I now watch in wonder and amazement at how great my son is-and how different he is from his mom and dad. "Is this his talent?" "Maybe he would like this sport?" It is like our son is a big Christmas gift and as we unwrap the present (him) we get to see bits and pieces. We get to be excited because we still don't know what it is. I don't see where the excitement is in making our children be little clones of ourselves. I'm amazed at how people have a hard time dealing with that image and the unknown. People are insistent on wanting to know where my son got some of his red hair-I don't know I tell them.

Adoption reminds me of God and how we are adopted into his family. We are made in his image but how many different types of people do you know? How many different colors and nations of people are there, but we all belong to the same God and children in his family. Let's raise our children up as they should go-that is in the gifts God has given them and not our expectations of them. The blessing an adopted child brings is that they will continue blessing and surprising you their entire life!

A great link about adoption and God's family http://disciplethenations.org/article_adoption.html