My Thoughts Exactly

This person puts it better than I could. (Click on the link and you can read her thoughts) It's the internal struggle you have when you adopt. It's a paradox of sorts. You are so happy with this child and feel so blessed. Yet, in the back of your mind there is this ghost or maybe a family of ghosts. People who gave up a piece of themselves. They didn't do it because they were callous or shallow. They didn't do it because they were bad people. They did it so their child would have a chance. A chance to survive....

I'm not trying to be depressing but trying to shed light on this subject that is a huge part of my life. People sometimes have a misconception of what people are like. People have said to me a million times, how lucky Ansley and Turner are to have been adopted by our family. The truth is, the exact opposite it true. They are the ones who gave up everything. They are the ones who lost the lives to which they were born. They are the ones who have to adjust. We are the lucky ones. Randy and I are. We are the ones whose lives are enriched by these beautiful children. Hopefully, in the end, we will have enriched their lives too. We are the ones who got a peak into cultures that we might have only read about. Now we get to live them to an extent. We are the ones who are forever tied and indebted to a community of people half way across the globe. We are the ones who are now tied to a bigger community right in our own backyard. A community that might have gone unnoticed had we not adopted. I have had people who said, "Your children should be very grateful to you for having 'rescued' them". It is we who are grateful. They owe us nothing. We are grateful to a family who made a plan, a plan for their child(ren). We are grateful that those children are now 'our' children. Grateful for our family!