The other day someone asked me, "It isn't really four years. Is it... really?" Their head was tilted to the side and their eyebrows raised. My old nature pressed against my heart to answer. Pain wanted to give a snippy reply. But instead I closed my eyes for a split second and sent a S.O.S. up to God for guidance and responded with a gentle yes.
Four years have come and gone this past week. Four years since my husband sat down with the adoption lawyer and started the plans to bring our daughter home. Four years with paperwork gathered, lost, regathered, not good enough, gathered, updated, redone, gathered again. Four years and three lawyers later. Four years of Haiti opening, closing, opening, and changing the adoption process. Four years with an earthquake, floods, and riots. Four years of watching our child grow and change in pictures. Four years of her asking if can she come home yet. Four years of praying, hoping and trusting.
It is so hard sometimes. I struggle. I take that pain, hurt, jealousy, and anger and I lay it down at the cross. I don't want that burden on my heart, but honestly, I never leave it there for good. Whenever the longing comes, whenever I see a new picture of her, whenever I think of the things she should be doing with us, whenever I miss her... its right there again attached to my thoughts of her by an invisible tether.
I am tired. My heart is so tired. I long for the days when we look at pictures and heaps and heaps of memories with our family together together fill my heart, instead of empty silence and hundreds of miles.I look forward to the day that tether is broken. When the pain of the wait and the things that have been missed is only a tiny blip on the radar of my memories.
I can't change the past. I can't change that it has taken four years to get to this point. I waste so much energy sometimes, wishing I could, wishing it was different. Each day I have to start at the present moment and keep trusting God. Because he has painted a picture that is much bigger than the four years worth of snapshots I keep looking at over and over. It's a picture that is in the past, the present, and the future. It's one I should always look to with faith. I can pull that bigger picture to my heart and know that it is good because He is good...always...even when the tears fall and the wait is long.
