Seven years ago I was a normal mom.
I had one kid.
My husband and I took him to do normal kid things.
I loved that kid a ridiculous amount.
I still love that kid a ridiculous amount.
I got married the summer after I graduated from high school.
14 years later I am still married.
One first child is now 13 years old.
He has been an older foster brother to 12 kids.
Now he is the oldest of 8 children.
As anyone can imagine, adopting 6 kids can flip anyone's life upside down.
I would be lying if I said I never missed the 'easy' days, the ones spent with just this kid.
I wouldn't trade my current life for anything.
But I would pay a lot of money to go back in time for just one day and be 'normal' again.
4 comments:
It is interesting that you talk about this, because it is this very thing that has held me up over the years from becoming an "official" foster parent. I am now pursuing it because I strongly believe that this is what God wants me to do AND I do WANT to be a foster/adopt mom again. But having raised five children (only one was biological the others were "kinship fostering") it has been such a heartrending experience in raising these kids that has made me gun-shy of taking on more. Still, I feel this is my calling in life and with the grace of God, His Strength and Mercy, I will continue. My last PRIDE class is tomorrow night and I just have to say I have learned a hundred times more through reading my list of foster parenting bloggers than I ever did in the classes. In fact, your post reminds me to cherish these moments now as I continue forward in hopes of someday having more children in my home. Blessings to you and thank you for your words!
Pam, I so understand! I LOVE our life, but that doesn't mean it is easy. It actually is just not easy at all. But, God didn't call us to a life of leisure. He called us to a life of service. I am happily at His service. I imagine someday we will get to rest...in heaven ;)
So I don't have as many children, but I have big kids who were already self-sufficient....and then we brought in a five month old. The bigs are now 11.5 and 10....easier days are gone when you now have a 22 month old. Thankful for how my big kids have handled adding this little person to our lives...there are definitely sacrifices on their end.
There are for sure. It has been hard at times for my oldest. He didn't really want us to take our youngest. It was hard for me to try to 'convince' him, not because he was hard to convince, but because I didn't want to try to push my thoughts on him. He was totally entitled to not want another baby...another thing to take my time away from him. We do our best to let him live his life as if he doesn't have so many young siblings, but obviously it is impossible to shield him from all of that. Even just the noise in the house sometimes drives him nuts. In other ways he has done wonderfully. He tends to like the babies more than the rest of them. Overall I am thrilled with how he has handled everything. I hope he is learning something good from all of this!
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