Friday, January 28, 2011

Clearing the Cobwebs

Shew!
We have had a busy few weeks, but I wanted to do a post to catch everyone up on what's been going on. So, this post will be a bit different... trying to, well, you know, clear the cobwebs in my brain. I have had so much on my mind and things to share, I figured I would just do one post and get it all cleared up!
First, last week Mark arrived safely back home from Israel where he spent ten days touring the Holy Land. The trip was such a sweet gift from our church, Chilhowee Hills. We missed him terribly, but we were thrilled at the opportunity for him to be able to see scripture really come to life. Before heading to the airport to pick Mark up last Thursday the little boys and I needed to make one short, IMPORTANT stop. Adoption Agency. Arm full of paperwork. It felt so good to walk in with so many papers completed. It was a huge step for us and we are going to be able to start our homestudy in just a few short weeks. If you would, we would love to have you join us in praying that our homestudy can start at the end of February. This is the earliest it could get started, but we know the One who makes all things possible!
This week was our "go-get-medical-exams-and blood draws-and-check-ups-for-adoption" week! Aren't you glad you asked? Ahem. Anyway. I had a physical on Monday (I love when everything checks out well!), Brycen and Regan had well visits Wednesday, Corbin and Hudson went yesterday (4 immunizations, 2 flu shots, a blood draw, a finger stick, and 2 hours later we left!), and Mark will round us out today by having his physical. Yes, our insurance company loves us. But, again, it feels good to be getting so much done. We are trying to stay on top of what we can get done because so much of this process is out of our hands. There will be enough waiting without dragging it out ourselves. Or at least that's our philosophy!

During all the snow Brycen and Regan had a fun craft project! In December Regan's first grade class made "passports" and then "traveled" to different rooms through the week. Each room represented a different country. While the students visited the different "countries" they learned about Christmas traditions, foods, and crafts from those places. Regan was all smiles after "visiting" Africa. One of the crafts was a bracelet with different colored beads on it. When she was telling us about the bracelet an idea was born for Brycen and Regan to make leather strapped bracelets with a red, a green, and a yellow bead on them (the colors of Ethiopia). These bracelets could be used as reminders for us to pray for our sweet Ethiopian daughter/sister. So, we took advantage of a snow day and cut leather, tied knots, strung beads, and made bracelets. We have different sizes. If any of you are interested in a prayer bracelet, please inbox me on facebook or send me a private message to carriemckeehan@gmail.com All members (except Hudson) of our family are wearing the bracelets. I know some of you have noticed and mentioned it. We are committed to wearing them until our daughter comes into our forever family!
Lastly, God has opened me up to an entirely new part of my adoption in Christ this week. I would love to share with you a bit about what I am reading and how it confirms for me all the more what great love Christ has for us and how amazed I am that He chose to adopt us into His family. In our adoption reading we are having to read (and read by choice!) many books about raising a transracial family, dealing with language and cultural barriers, and helping a child adjust who likely will have attachment issues. Attachment issues. At first thought I couldn't seem to relate. Then, I started sensing God was wanting me to move past my pride and arrogance. Attachment issues arise because we remove a young child from everything familiar to her. We lavish on her love when she has never known (often times) how to successfully attach to anyone. Quite often she has had to learn to fend for herself and not to others for comfort, meeting needs, or security. This can be challenging as parents try to gain trust, offer safe physical contact, and learn to appropriately/effectively discipline. So often in adoption we, in our ignorance, are prone to thoughts about how grateful and "lucky" these children are who are adopted out of oppression into homes and families of provision, love, and opportunity. The truth is, we are removing her from all that is familiar, all she's known, all that makes sense to her. As I was talking with Brycen and Regan about what it would be like if we could no longer be their family, they were adopted by a family living in Ethiopia, had to learn to speak Amharic, eat injera, and learn to live like Ethiopians. With wide-eyes we talked about how different life here will be for their sister. Better, from our perspective, and perhaps from her perspective once she knows and loves us. But at first we can see how scary, hard, and frustrating it must be. No doubt she will be afforded opportunities here that she wouldn't have otherwise, but then it occurred to me: the familiar is so comfortable to us. Even if it doesn't compare to the opportunities of something new. Then, the Holy Spirit intervened, "Carrie, it's just like when you came to me. It's easy to stay with what's familiar, even though abundant life is waiting." Breath. Take it in. In our lives as we journey with Christ things can seem scary, hard, and frustrating. So much so that often we just want to go back to what is familiar and comfortable. Our lives of sin or living with little regard for Jesus and His sacrifice for us was what we knew. Turning our lives over to the unknown, the unfamiliar can be tough even with the promises of provision, love, and opportunity beyond our wildest imaginations. Our adoptions in Christ are so tangible to me right now. He is the One that is constantly pursuing us, forgiving us, and loving us in an effort to ease our transition from the old "us" to the new "us." He is the One facilitating and making a way for us to overcome our attachment issues. When we want to turn and go back to the familiar He is there whispering His promises of abundant life, protection, and steadfastness over us. As you go through your day, I am praying you will begin to see how we, too, have difficulty trusting sometimes, moving on with our "new life" in Christ, and our tendencies to want to escape to what is familiar, even if it isn't what is best for us. Also praying for you as you learn to trust Him with your attachment issues. I am journeying with you on this one... learning to lean into the One who fought for, pursued, and died to make us part of His family in order to that we can fully attach to Him, dependent on His provision, love, and opportunity.
Thanks for journeying with us. And for letting me clear the cobwebs.

Monday, January 10, 2011

365 days.




365 days.
So long, yet so short. This time last year our family was battling fevers, illness, and GI bugs. Little did we know that our sweet Hudson would be hospitalized in one week for four days, battling a tough case of RSV. We felt overwhelmed in the midst of it that we were battling the enemy full-force. We had just returned from Passion Twenty-Ten where our lives had been changed as we served the 20,000 college students attending. Our hearts and minds were under attack and as a result, so was our health. It. was. stressful. We had over 25 days of someone having a fever in our home.
So long, yet so short. It doesn't take much to put me back in those days, how I was feeling, what I was thinking, and how I was changing. Yet, it also feels so long ago. So much has changed, so much is new, so much is different. Today we are all healthy and strong, enjoying a fun snow day at home. Mark is off to Israel and the kids and I are in full force... still wearing our PJ's, talking about playing games in a few minutes and making us some hot chocolate. It just feels so, so....different. Not just physically, but WHO we are. The conversations I have with the kids over the hot chocolate are focused on silliness, playing in the snow, and Regan's newly made-up game show she's hosting in the play room. Just as quickly, the focus changes. Brycen is a contestant on Regan's game show, perfectly named "Guess What?". He is, of course, winning and winning big. Regan, as the game show host, asks Brycen what he plans to do with the load of cash ("forty hundred thousand dollars" as I recall) he is about to win. He, in all seriousness replies, "Well, I am using it to pay for my family's adoption." Regan, playing along, asked, "Why are you adopting and from where?" Brycen, "We are adopting me a new sister from Ethiopia. And why? Well, it just seems easy to me, so I don't know why people keep asking. But, we are adopting because we want a new sister and she needs a family. See? It just works."
365 days.
I wish I could magically go back in time and play this game last year to hear his response. Something in me tells me it would be so different. I love how God has begun something big in them. He has continued to put words and simplicity to us amid all the complicated politics through them. As we have been talking about adoption, their sister, challenges that will inevitably arise after she comes home, and our responses to others, I have been reading a lot about how to foster healthy transitions for all of us. In the reading I have come face to face with the reality of adoption loss in a fresh new way. The idea that our joy, our addition, our new life, our new family, our answer to prayer is someone else's great loss, source of deep grieving, product of tragedy or oppression, and worst nightmare. In those conflicting worlds rests a little girl caught in the middle of grief and searing pain as well as new-found love and family. It's a lot to take in. It's a lot to wrestle with and pray through. Yet, I think back over the last year and I am confident in God's sufficiency.... His ability to be right there in the middle where pain and joy meet. His capacity to bring beauty from ashes is overwhelming, though I have seen that process isn't always easy, it IS always beautiful. My heart and mind are preoccupied today with thoughts about the past year for us and what changes it has brought. For some reason, I can't separate that from the last 365 days for our daughter's family. Even if her "family" is an orphanage and caregivers. Somewhere today lives a little girl who has had her own "last 365 day journey" and I don't know how her last year coincides with ours, but I know it does. I know God is crafting her for us and us for her. I know that the next 365 days will somehow merge those worlds... even if only on the basis of identity and putting faces with names. In it all, I am confident that though our family will have it's own unique hurdles and struggles, it, too, will have it's own unique beauty. "See? It just works."