What I Wish I Had Known – Adoption 2 years later

I’ll never tell you it isn’t hard, or that it wasn’t scary. He turns 7 years-old today and I look back at his first months home and I wish I could have known then, what I know now.

I wish I would have known that fear lies to you. Fear tells you things like, “You have ruined your life, this is forever” and “You cannot handle this level of need”. Those first months home I sat in a swampy morass of fear, and it whispered to me from the moment I woke to the minute my head hit the pillow relieved to be finished with the day. Fear told me that I could not do this, and I was alone. And I listened. For many days, I listened and I struggled and I was scared.

I wish I would have known that his level of need, his trauma, and his pain was not something I could fix or cure. That it was never my job to erase his past, or fill the unending bucket of need deep within his heart. So for months I read everything I could find on ‘fixing’ trauma and I set out to fix my son. My attempts at repair were ridiculously inadequate, because my son needed a relationship with his mother, not a quick fix trauma method.

I wish I would have looked beyond the twisted spine and thin flesh and saw the beating heart of a brave warrior. A child who didn’t just survive 4 1/2 years in an orphanage, but came out to be a message to all of us about hope and love.  A boy who has taught us that true sacrifice and love, begins with a leap that feels scary and out of control. And true bravery is not about being fearless, but is actually found in knowing that you might fail and it’s probably going to hurt; but you are going to get up and do it anyway.

This morning Israel looked at me and said, “Mom, you are so kind and I love you”. I smiled back and said, “Israel, I love you and you are so special”.

And then he asked me, “Mom, I’m not going back to Bulgaria right?”

And my heart dropped and I said, “Never, we are your family, and that means you stay here forever.”

Years ago, I was afraid of ‘forever’ with Israel. Today, forever seems pretty short.

Happy Birthday to my brave warrior, Israel.