The Loss of an Unlikely Best Friend

Two days ago our neighbor died suddenly of a heart attack.  He was 67.  He was also one of my children's very best friends.  They would rather go to his house to hang out than to try and play with any of the neighborhood kids.

I have known Jim since I was 6 years old and lived in this house with my grandparents.  His kids were a little older than I was, but their family has always been in my life since then.  As it turns out, my husband has always known their family as well since they were very involved in Boy Scouts.  It has been such a privilege for my kids to get to know them as well.

Looking at Jim you wouldn't guess that small children would want to hang out with him.  He was gruff, always had a cigarette in his mouth, his hands were always worn and filthy from the project he was working on at the time and he was physically a large man.  My kids ADORED him.  Anytime they'd go over to his house on their bikes they would have a million questions about what he was working on.  He always answered their questions, sometimes teaching them how to do it themselves. If the girls needed anything on their bike fixed, they wouldn't even bother telling Mike or I about it, they would just go straight over to Jim's house for him to fix it.  Bikes were one of his many areas of expertise.  My kids went so far as to knock on their door to see if Jim was home if he wasn't outside.  I had to explain to them that they needed to give Jim and Joyce their space and that they could only "play" with them if they were already outside.  Jim has a pool and he and Joyce are always inviting the girls over to swim anytime they want to.

When the twins first came to our family, and had limited English, the neighbor's names were in the first 100 words the girls obtained.  The best part was that they combined their names and called them JimsJoyce.  It was so sweet and now upon reflection, quite appropriate.  What a blessing to have such a beautiful example of a loving couple who, after 44 years of marriage, were still best friends and loved being together.  Jim was also a beautiful lesson for my girls that you cannot judge someone based on what they look like.

As I said before, Jim passed away 2 days ago.  When I told the girls the news, I could tell that they couldn't really process it.  They seemed to kind of sluff it off.  Their reaction was a bit concerning to me.  I knew how much they cared about him.  Charlotte and I went to visit his wife today and for Charlotte, seeing how her heart was so broken really made it more real.  Caroline couldn't bring herself to even go over.

At bedtime tonight the twins took turns coming downstairs telling me they couldn't sleep.  I got annoyed.  I just wanted to sit and spend some time with Mike.  I went upstairs to tuck them each back in and Caroline came clean.  She couldn't sleep because she was sad about Jim and it was reminding her of when Brutus died.  She broke down.  I held her as she cried.  I reminded her of how much Jim loved Brutus, a fact I had forgotten until tonight.  When Brutus was a kitten, Jim would come over just to see him and it was quite a site to see such a big, tough guy holding such a tiny little kitten.  I remember how heartbroken he was when he found out about what happened to Brutus.  I'm sure he is snuggling with that ornery little kitten up in heaven!  I then came downstairs to dig through the dozens of boxes packed for our impending move trying to find the stuffed moose we named Brutus so Caroline could snuggle with him.  Of course Brutus the Moose was in one of the very first boxes we packed and was therefore on the BOTTOM of the pile!  It took me 30 minutes and I was sweating by the time I dug that thing out, but if than dang moose was going to help her sleep, then you better believe I was going to find it.  That's true love people!!

I then went into Charlotte's room to re-tuck her into bed.  By this time it's 10:30pm...they went to bed at 8:45pm.  I asked her if she was ok and she told me she was sad about Jim.  I held her as we both cried for the next 15 minutes.  She misses him.  After we cried I reminded her of his love for Brutus and we were able to smile remembering how funny it looked when he held that tiny kitten and how he would bring Brutus back home after the many times he would make a daring escape out of any open door so he could have an adventure.

None of us want our children to experience pain of any kind, but in real life any relationship has its risks of resulting in pain.  I wouldn't change their relationship with Jim just to spare them of this pain.  Their relationship with this man was such a blessing.  They learned so many life lessons knowing and loving him.  Having a relationship with God helps makes these times more bearable because we know we will all see Jim again one day in heaven.  I know he will be up there watching over my girls in the same way he'll be watching over his own grandchildren.

Adoption-Our Plan A

I once had a fellow adoptive parent make an off hand comment to me that went something along these lines: "We all know that adoption wasn't our first choice."  Ouch.

I thank God quite frequently that Mike and I are in the minority of adoptive parents who have not experienced the loss of infertility.  In fact, I have yet to meet another family who was able to dodge this painful experience.  That's right folks, we never tried to get pregnant.  GASP!

This decision began before we even were married.  Ever since I was 12, when I found out that my 2 aunts (technically my 2nd cousins) were adopted back in the 60s, I remember thinking how interesting that was.  Of course at the age of 12, I was unable to understand the many layers of emotion involved with all parties of adoption, I just thought it was "cool".  So before we were married I told Mike that I had a strong interest in adopting at some point.  We figured that maybe we would have a biological child as well as adopt, however I NEVER felt the desire to ever be pregnant. Like never.  I don't know if it was because of all of my previous health issues, or because I knew the health risk to myself and a baby if I were to be pregnant, but God took any natural desire to procreate right out of me!  I felt like such a weirdo though because I knew in my heart that God's purpose for me on Earth was to be a mom and yet I had no desire to birth one!

In 2009, Mike's dad was diagnosed with Huntington's Disease.  We were told that Mike had a 50% chance of carrying the gene and therefore if we did have biological children, there would be a 50% chance of passing it on to them.  Along with this, Mike's mom and I both have Crohn's Disease.  Since that is on both sides there was also a 30% chance that we would pass that onto our child as well.  This was enough of a sign from God that He did not have biological kids in our plan and we were more than fine with that.  I was honestly relieved.  Now we could begin the journey of growing our family!

I have so many friends whose lives have taken different routes to get to their adoptions, there isn't one cookie cutter story.  Adoptive families all form so very differently.  Yes, some do deal with infertility, some have a mix of bio kids and adopted kids, some do a kinship adoption along with so many other examples.  Please keep this in mind and do me a favor:

DO NOT say to an adoptive mom "Oh, now you will probably get pregnant!".  I had so many well meaning people say this to me and my response was, "Ha!  I sure hope not!"  Yes, this happens to some couples, yes this may be the hopes of some womens' hearts, but do not assume that is the case!

DO NOT assume that adoption was a family's "second choice" or "Plan B".  For some couples this may be the case, but even if it is, that is none of your business.  Please just share in their joy and love on them.

DO NOT get the impression that any adoptive parent is adopting in order to "rescue" or "save" a child.  None of us are trying to save anyone.  We simply want children and this happens to be the path God has chosen for us.  We aren't any better than anyone else, nor do we ever feel like we are.  We are just barely hanging on, just like every other parent!

Don't make assumptions, it's a good general rule of thumb in life really!  It is always safe to say to ANY family, "Wow, God has really blessed you!".  Period.

Eight--the Elusive Milestone Achieved!

We adopted our twins when they were 4 years old.  We were the fourth caregivers they had had in their short lives.  They had been through abuse, neglect, abandonment, hunger, violence and fear that I can't even imagine...I don't even want to.  They were, understandably, a mess.  A HOT MESS.  Those who knew us best back then know that we rarely left the house for that first year.  We were in full on crisis mode all the time.

Every book we read, and every professional we talked to, told us that it would take at least 4 years until we could expect them to have the same issues that their peers have, age appropriate issues.  It would take them as many years as they lived away from us to learn to trust us and to feel secure.  Back then this news left us feeling so overwhelmed.  Another 4 years of THIS.  How in the world would we survive?  How would they survive?  I had a lot of conversations with God about how I think he had made a mistake.  I couldn't DO this.  It was TOO HARD!  There wasn't really a light at the end of the tunnel.

If you have parented a typical four year old, you may be thinking "What are you complaining about?  You don't even have to deal with the terrible twos, or the toddler years!".  Well, guess what?  Our children didn't have the opportunity to be mischievous toddlers.  At that age they were in survival mode.  They didn't have toys, or people to throw tantrums to.  They had no one.  So that meant that, even though they were 4 chronologically, they very distinctively went through the terrible twos/threes during the first 6 months of being with us.  Imagine your toddler, throwing fits, trying to be independent, but having NO WAY to communicate with them.  Yeah, that's where we were!

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all bad.  Despite the language barrier, we had dance parties, we played with each others hair, even Mike's, and we blew bubbles.  These things need no language.  They also picked up English at a warp speed.

But even an English speaking four year old doesn't have the words to express the anger, rage, sadness, grief and fear that these girls were experiencing.  This led to meltdowns that would last an hour sometimes.  Many times they would need to be restrained in order to keep them, and the rest of us, safe.  I never knew a preschooler could be so strong or so angry.  It was scary.

We decided to use this restraint time as an opportunity for bonding.  We were so physically close to them while we were holding them that we used this time to sing to them, express to them that everything was going to be ok, and to reassure them that NO MATTER WHAT they did, we were not going to get rid of them.  It's not that they thought we might give them away, they were certain of it, and they were determined that they were going to be the ones in charge of that.  They were going to be bad enough that we would quit on them.  They picked the wrong family.  We don't quit, we're too stubborn for that.

Another misconception is that if you adopt a four year old, or any older child, you get out of all of those sleepless nights.  WRONG!  Children from hard places tend to have serious issues with sleeping/dark.  One of our girls was terrified of the dark, while the other would have scary night terrors that would wake me from a dead sleep.

We were exhausted and the thought of keeping this up for the next FOUR YEARS was inconceivable!  Luckily for us, God threw us a bone and we were at a point of near normalcy about two and a half years in!  Near normalcy is all we are going to achieve as there are so many lasting effects of the crap they've been through, and well, our family is nowhere near what anyone would consider normal anyhow :)

So we made it, they are eight!  They are alive and we are alive!  Not only that but we were crazy brave enough to try this again.  God has used the last 4 years to draw both Mike and me so much closer to Him.  We saw how much we needed Him.  He revealed His plans for us so clearly that they could not be denied, and we learned to trust and follow Him.  It has been an amazingly wild ride and I can't wait to see where we are in another four years!