If I Could Start Over With Adoption

-
https://authory.com/ChristinaGochnauer/If-I-Could-Start-Over-With-Adoption-af0551a6aefe04cc68b9966db511c6141

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Surviving

-
Image
  Lately when someone asks how I'm doing I snort and say something to the effect of "surviving" and move on to less uncomfortable topics of conversation as quickly as I can. I used to overshare. Sometimes I might still if I'm close to the person asking. But mostly the question makes me feel uncomfortable and inadequate. Which is kind of absurd, truthfully. I just can't seem to find the balance between oversharing about how hard my life is some days and undersharing so much that people around me think I'm just standoffish. I'm working on it. The real answer isn't much fun. I'm exhausted. I know I'll miss them being little but right now? I just need them to sleep, not hurt each other, stop tantruming over the same thing every day. They are beautiful, sweet, compassionate, loving children. I'm just weary of all the big feelings all of the time. There is rarely a day there are not tantrums and things getting ruined. We are trying hard to
Read more

Why Happily Ever Aftermath?

-
Image
I get it. It's a weird, kind of long name, and also apparently the name of an episode of a TV show I don't watch. Regardless,  it fits. The aftermath is the part after the storm.  Where you survey the damage and assess what to do next. You are joyful to have survived and frightened about what you may find.  In 2008 Tim and I spent a few months in Mississippi doing post-hurricane Katrina clean up. I remember hearing a story about a house that got absolutely destroyed by the storm surge and hurricane winds. When people were cleaning up they found one perfect China teacup that looked like it had been gently picked up and deposited on  a pile of rubbish. They continued to find odd things. Pictures undamaged in one place but utterly ruined in another. It was all the same storm but it affected every home and every person in different ways.  Adoption is a lot like that. A family had to be broken for my children to be mine.  Their lives were turmoil and pain intersp
Read more

How to explain adoption to a 4 year old part 1 (of 100000, give or take)

-
Image
The other day my littlest asked about her first mommy. Every time this happens I am gutted. It doesn't get easier for me but I'm glad she is comfortable talking about it. Hopefully opening the door to communication now will make it easier later down the road. It has never been a secret. We have pictures of adoption days hung up in the house. We have books about adoption on our shelves. Our oldest sons were 10 and 11 when they were adopted so they very much remember life before adoption. My girl is sunny, silly, and in many ways more mature than her four years on earth should allow her to be. To be sure she is every bit of a silly little girl but she sometimes asks me questions that I know if I blow off will just come back to me later, probably in public when changing the subject becomes more of a song and dance routine. So we have a policy of just trying to, in age appropriate language answer the question. When she asks me to tell her about why she couldn't live with her &
Read more