Fearless

"I wish the adoption wasn't going through."

I had finally said the words aloud, and with them a torrent of tears that felt like tiny weights being lifted off my weary body.

I had been carrying with me so much guilt, so much heartache, so much sadness for my children. I have wished for a different outcome, one where my boys wouldn't be separated from their mother forever. I had prayed, questioning God why this happened. Why were my kids getting adopted, but some of their siblings going home? How cruel. How unfair. How utterly devastating for my babies.

I've held my children as they've cried for their mother, for missing her and for hating her. I've looked into their eyes as they've questioned why they weren't enough to make her better. I've listened to them brag in denial that someday they would go home. When they're a teenager. Or a grown-up. I've had to tell them hard truths, truths like "You're right, it isn't fair," and "No, you will never get to go home. You will never get to live with mommy again."

The weight of it all, stored up in every mommy fiber of my body, has been enough for me to beg the Creator to let the adoption fall through. Let them go home. Let them not have to live with this brokenness for the rest of their lives. Let me not have to look into those brown pools of sadness for as long as I live. Let us not have to worry, and fret, and question every decision we make for them.

Will this make them hate us?

Will this make them hate God?

Is this good for them?

Did we do the right thing?

Is it all worth it?

The answers allude me.

All I know is that I love them so much that I wish I could let them go. I wish I could rewind the clock and tell the judge, no, we don't want to adopt them. A lie, absolutely. But maybe they could have a chance to go home? To what life, I don't know. I don't even know if going home would be an option. But the constant heartache I feel for them, for their mom, for every stupid, unfair thing they have experienced, is enough to break me. And some days it does.

And then I gather myself, take a look around at my family, and resolve to keep going, never knowing the answer to why. Never knowing, not yet, if they can overcome this. If we can overcome this. It doesn't seem possible. It feels dark and endless. And I am forced to face my fears. And my only option is to look at the light. To look at the Son. And just keep going.