Pregnant Women are fighting Contractions. I'm fighting inner demons.

It’s been quite an insightful month. Since the beginning of our Adoption journey, paperwork and fundraising has kept us busy. Deadlines, planning and asking for help so that we can do our home study all led up to the days this November, where we finally could sit around our family table and talk about what our future will be like with our little one. We have met with our social worker two times in our home. Here’s how it laid out.

Visit 1

Check that we are decent human beings, check our motives for adopting our child and check that our home is a safe environment.

Visit 2

Jeff and I started off sitting down and filled out a 4 page packet with silence filling the air. She told us we could not talk during our participation in completing this form.  Of course, I had a question about one, so I slowly raised my hand. With a reply she said we would talk about it later when Jeff wasn’t around. Flash back of high school exam day popped in my head! I almost started to sweat about this paperwork that wasn’t even a pass or fail. The questions were like a background check, except it dug deeper.  Once we were finished, Jeff left the house. Nope, not just the room, but the entire house for an hour while the social worker and I talked about my answers. Some questions asked about alcohol abuse in the family while others asked if I felt safe around my husband. She asked me if I’ve accepted my infertility, and if I blamed myself for my parent’s divorce. Others were about personal struggles I’ve dealt with as early as the age of 16. Deep Stuff, right?

If I blinked would I be sitting in a cold room on a metal chair with a single light hanging between me and my social worker? Personal was too soft of a term to describe these questions that were asked.  

This Home Visit turned course. Today wasn’t about my child, but the battles I’ve had to overcome and the person I’ve had to become to be on this journey. This was a day where I was judged to be the mother to my future child. It almost was a counseling session that allowed me to let go of my fears and acknowledge them. As scary as this sounds it was very relaxing. I cautiously had to remind myself that my social worker wasn’t a friend, and I would stop mid-sentence wondering if I was being too honest. Oddly enough, I was finally being honest with emotions I’ve hid away for a long time and she was accepting of it all.

A light went off in my head and I had to try not to cry. The interview opened my eyes to everything I have defeated.

How often do you think about that? Personally, for me I feel every day comes with new battles and so I often forget the amazing things I’ve done in the past. I’m not trying to talk big about myself, but think about it.

Do you ever give yourself credit for the inner demons you’ve faced?

The weary mountains you have climbed to reach your goals?

 Most days I wake up thinking about things I must accomplish. I allow my fear of the future to conceal the triumphs I’ve achieved.

When she made me unlock my past, I felt I was sinking into a hole with the words of objects floating around me that use to hold me down.

Infertility. Weakness. Failures.

 Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.

I had no way of knowing what my life would be like, while I was in the years these words haunted me. I fought with God and asked why he placed in my heart the longing to be a mother when I kept failing repeatedly. He pushed harder and the desire to have a child grew stronger. With all my doubts, I asked for answers. Months went by as I searched for freedom from my disappointments.  I finally gave my life to Him and l I took a step back from my distracting criticisms and forgot all disapproving statements I placed in my head. I was finally able to listen.

I had to shut out the worlds expectations, my own expectations and shout,

“Ok God, I’m ready for your plan.”

John 14:27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

He seeks out the lost, gives mercy to the sinners, He Loves all his children and reaches for those who are weak. He stands for you, fights for you and continues to guide you to the person you are meant to be. We cannot see our future but He can,

Let Him Lead.

Those words will always be a part of my story. They held me down for years and I can’t expect them to disappear. I do have a choice to use those terms as a reminder that I didn’t surrender, I fought and I decided I wasn’t going to give up on something I knew I could never live without.

Mark 11:23 Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.

Don’t you ever think you cannot do something because of something that happened in your life. It did not happened to YOU unless you allow it to. Those words you hear in your head, those failures you THINK describe you, Don’t. You are here today at this very spot living in a world that is against you, surviving because you didn’t give up. I’m thankful for each mistake, bump in the road or wall I will come across because without pain, I wouldn’t learn how strong I am.  I wouldn’t know how to walk forward when I feel a weight of negativity holding me back. Not if the life I was given was easy.

When my hour was up she smiled, and thanked me for my honesty. Jeff arrived for his turn and I left the house. Gosh this kid is teaching and giving me such a life already and they aren’t even here yet. This adoption journey isn’t the shortest but it’s worth every step. What I realized today was that the interview was nothing compared to what I’ve already put myself through. That picture I painted for your earlier. The one where I’m in a room with a single swinging light hanging over a table dividing me from the other person. Well, that other person was me not that long ago. We are our own worst enemy and we can say the most hurtful things to ourselves. It's time you walk out of that room and never look back.

It's time you believe in yourself.