Just In Case You Have Ever Been Under The Illusion That We Have It All Together...

Remember that day when the dryer broke and you tried to fix it and got your favorite pair of unmentionables stuck in the dryer, which then broke it even worse? (Not to mention, left the above-mentioned unmentionables in shreds).

And then you were running late to pick up your kid's TUBERCULOSIS medication from the Health Department and you get a call from the school that one of your kids has LICE!

...And you have NO dryer.

...And your kid has consumption!

...And your other kid has lice.

No, Sweet Readers, this is not a Little House on the Prairie re-write; this was my day yesterday.

And all of those things that were going on were punctuated with copious tears.

Today is a new day. A day that I am enjoying the scent of laundry dried outside. A day that ALL the sheets are getting washed.

There is always something to be thankful for. Always.

Itchy Scars

When I was fifteen I was hit by a car. My elbow went through the windshield and I spent the next year and a half being pieced back together.

I have my arm today thanks to a great doctor's humble spirit and knowledge of his limitations.

When it first happened, it shaped my entire world. Everything was demarcated by "before the accident" and "after the accident." I was pulled into a whirlpool of PTSD and a profound sense of loss. At the time, it was a gigantic tragedy.

Through the years, I have dealt with those initial feelings like you would play whack-a-mole. Even today, there are times that I can feel deeply grieved when I think about the accident.

I have been blessed with some wonderful counselors, and some not so wonderful counselors, along the way.

The first guy that I saw, when I was absolutely crippled by panic, told me that I needed to think about the worst case scenario and then picture how I would handle it...and poof! I should feel better because now I know how to handle anything.

Ha. Wrong! What that metastasized into was me frantically running scenarios for every situation: always having an escape route, being hyper-vigilant. It turned into an obsession over the years.

I was blessed with two therapists that were familiar with PTSD and they really finally helped me flush so much of that out.

What I am left with, today, is a weather-telling arm.

My forearm aches when weather systems are coming in. A deep bone ache that no amount of Advil seems to touch or rubbing seems to help. My hand feels weak and I stretch and stretch, trying to release the tension.

That is when the weather changes, so not all the time.

What can happen at any given moment and is not triggered by anything, is the nerve itching.

Ok. This is super weird.

Sometimes my arm itches. But wait, does it? Oh, yes. It does.

Must. Scratch. Itch.

Makes. No. Difference.

I could claw the skin off and the itch would remain. There is literally NO WAY to scratch that itch.

This morning as I was walking the kids to school, God used that itchy scar to show me something.

Here it is:

When we are wounded, we heal. But we have scars.

And those scars? They affect the way things work. I mean, I can feel you touching my arm, but it just doesn't feel right. 

But, HEY! I am not bleeding!

Good as new!?

Sometimes I think so!

Sometimes the scars work just like the skin would have; keeping my blood in and my muscle covered.

It's faded to where you can hardly see it anymore!

And then... it starts itching. And I know that it is healed, but that this is just going to be the way it is all of my life. That, no matter how pale the scar gets, it is still there.

Its very presence testifying to the brokenness that was thrust upon my life.

When I feel frustrated about the ebb and flow that undoubtedly come with parenting a child from hard places, I need to remember my 18-year-old itchy scar.

Yep.

Daniel gets to stay in his class.

I am very happy about that. It has come at a bit of a relational cost, I am afraid, but things have a way of smoothing out and I need to know and embrace the fact that I shouldn't be so worried about what other people think about me, especially in a situation like this one.

Isn't it ironic how we are worried about people thinking badly of us when we aren't thinking the best of them either?

Years ago, something happened at a family event and one of Garth's cousins had some very sage words: "He had the right to do the thing and you have the right to feel angry about it."

Why do we try and control our feelings and the feelings of our children to such a degree that we don't embrace them for what they are?  A natural response to a situation. We get irritated when someone doesn't respond the way that we envision. We lecture our children not to feel a certain way. We cajole our loved ones when they are feeling bad.

We drop bombshells on one another and then get irritated when someone is hurt.

Feelings are natural! They are NOTHING! I cannot control my feelings! I cannot control my children's feelings! I don't think any of us can (or should?!) get rid of that initial rush of emotion that we have at the moment. That is OK.

When we try to staunch feelings or try to dictate how a person should feel in a situation, we are grooming our tribe to be inauthentic. We are rearing them to question themselves over every little thing. We are raising children who will grow up into insecure adults.

Feelings should be validated. Not squashed.

Feelings shouldn't be wallowed in, either.

Well-managed feelings are things that you acknowledge, determine whether or not they are reasonable and then go from there into action.

I think the older I get and the more trials that I go through, the less time I have to worry about everyone else's opinions of me.

I have fought hard for Daniel.

I have traveled with my knees crammed into the seat in front of me, over oceans and continents. I have ridden on Soviet-era trains with the door locked on my compartment to keep out robbers. I have peed in a filthy hole in the floor. I have walked miles over broken sidewalks. I have spent the night wrestling with a feral child much like Jacob wrestled the angel and I, too, have come away changed. I have learned comfort and corrective phrases in a language not my own so that I could whisper those words over and over to calm a panicked child. I have prayed. I have cried. I have paid. I have gone to so many doctors appointments that words that would have scared me before make me chuckle now.

I have carried three children close to my heart and birthed them under bright lights through happy tears, and that experience empowered me to realize what my body was capable of; what my body was designed to do.

The processes of adoption and  of grafting a child into my family have taught me what my heart was capable of; what my heart was designed to do. The process of "birthing" my blue-eyed Daniel into this life that he now lives has made me into someone so much more than I was before. And through these struggles, he becomes more and more of my child.

When he is frustrated, his eyes search mine for the answers.

When he didn't want to change teachers and I told him I would fight for him, he trusted me.

When he opened his yap and said things that gave people the wrong idea, I made no excuses. Think what they will. We are a team.

Occasionally someone will verbalize that they can't imagine loving an adopted child like "their own" child. Tell me, how could I have labored any harder? How could I have spent any more tears?

No. I won't feel bad about Daniel being able to stay in his class.

Goosfraba

Have you ever been in a rage?

I am not talking about anger or seething or grumpiness.

The kind of RAGE where you see red?

I have had that happen maybe three or four times in my whole life.

One of those times was two weeks ago. I promise, if I had had a hatchet in my hands, there would have been a wake of destruction behind me. A pile of grey kindling where a house once stood. (Let me be clear, my situation was in no way related to school stuff).

With most of us, when that happens, we feel bad for a day or two. We try, in our head, to argue better, to come up with the right response that would stop the other person in their tracks. We plot fabulous revenge scenarios. And after a few days pass, we begin to let go. We chalk up the behavior of the other person to craziness or whatever makes us feel better, and we move on. (Although we may have some lingering retribution fantasies). We decide how, or if, we will interact with them in the future.

What if you couldn't let go? What if you were so full of anger and impotence and you had to see the person every day?

This is what Daniel is experiencing right now, so I'll tell you what will happen: the anger will rear its head over every little thing. Every straw will be the straw.

Daniel has a lot of frustration right now due to some situations at school, and it has definitely been a set back for him.

I have to remind myself of the ebb and flow of dealing with the yuck that he has come from. It just kind of stinks that there are still yucky situations happening.

The situation with the boy at the school isn't really improving. The school is wanting to separate the boys. I totally agree. It makes me really sad that the separation, seemingly, will cost Daniel the teacher that he loves.