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.