Serious Sunday

I may start a series. Or I may not. If you're expecting something stable and dependable from this blog, go elsewhere. Absolutely all of that gets used up on Ezra. Every single ounce.

Some church friends of ours came home this week with their daughter. She was born in China and was just adopted into the family God has ordained her to grow in since birth. I just kept tearing up all morning.

You know, with pregnancy, it becomes real (I think) pretty quickly: "morning" sickness/crazy fatigue. Even if you don't have that (lucky!), you still get to hear a heartbeat within weeks of conception. But I won't be carrying our next child.

I suppose I will have to work this out with the Lord, but, if I'm being completely honest, sometimes I felt like I forced His had with Ezra. Not that I can make myself get pregnant by force of will or something, but God allowed my body to be fertile, and, well, we got Ezra. I wanted him so badly we didn't technically wait until we like heard a "Now!" from the Lord or something. Stephen was willing to become a parent, but he also was very comfortable waiting a bit longer.

I divulge all of this merely to say, sometimes I feel like having Ezra was more of a selfish act than I care to admit. I yearned to have him and be his mommy. I longed for it for years (5). I don't really have some sort of clear calling that God wanted us to have him when we did. I don't regret it a bit, not even a little, though that makes me feel a little bad. [whoops, sorry for being so willful, God!]

All of that to say, when we bring our next child home, I don't think I'll be able to feel that way even a little bit. There's nothing biological about adoption. You can't just "whoops!" into it. It's not the natural order of things - it takes many, many deliberate (and often laborious) steps. When I was pregnant with E, there were several times when I was terrified that we had made the wrong decision; that we weren't ready to parent this amazing person; that we'd mess him up terribly. I think that's probably normal.

The thing was though, there was no going back; he was coming, and he came, and he's here. With adoption, at any point, I can say, "no." And it all stops. And at any point, God can say, "no," and we won't get anywhere. I don't think that's going to happen, and I'm sure I'll have several similar freak-out-times as I did when we were expecting E.

But it's just so humbling: God choosing you to parent someone He loves dearly. What a crazy responsibility. I cannot believe He's picked me. Now, if I can only remember that when Ezra bites me tomorrow. [He got me on the underside of my arm today. It really hurt. Really.]