Partnering

I am so inspired by what I read here… the story of this daughter is somewhat different than the story of our daughter, but similar in many ways too.  Here is a quote that puts our hearts into words…

The Father looks on my daughter not with eyes of hopelessness and fear. He stares into her deep and calls forth Himself, planted in her from before the day she met the streets. What the enemy calls misfit, He reclaims as heiress.

And as her now-mother, my role is to carry this torch over her life. I live advocacy in my flesh and in my spirit. My prayers and my words form the bridge of partnership between His promises and her reality. I partner. She is being made new and it’s my job to speak it loud and to believe it in my quiet.

We see that our trip and arriving home from China with our girl (!!!!!!!) is just the beginning. We have another journey ahead that will begin as soon as we get home.  There are some things about adoptive parenting that are the same as parenting a biological child. There are also quite a few areas that we have learned are different. We have learned that our daughter needs a specific type of environment and parenting when she first comes home in order to feel safe and secure and to learn how to live successfully in our family.  Our child needs to learn that we’re the parents. She needs to feel nurtured and safe. She will not be used to having parents to love and care for her. We’ll be living a very quiet life with limited trips out and no visitors in for a little while to help us make this happen. By keeping our lives very boring at first, we’ll be helping our Sparrow feel safe.

After our airport celebration, we will enter into a season of family time and bonding at home.  Although you will still see some of us out and about, we will not all make it to church for awhile or to all of the wonderful  festivities that will be happening this season.   We believe that this will go a long way to helping Lucy adjust and bond as she joins our family.  Sometimes things are not always what they seem.  If Lucy appears too comfortable with too many people in too large of a circle right from the beginning – this might not actually be a good thing.  As strange as it may seem, adopted children  acting very outgoing and affectionate with “everyone” is not a healthy thing. It is called “indiscriminate affection” and can mean that they haven’t really attached to anyone. We hope by doing life and family quietly and privately for a season, we can help Lucy have a successful transition home.

We cannot wait to get to China… and then get home… and we cannot wait for all of you to be able to get to know our girl too!  Just think, she will be adapting to a lot of new things . . .  parents, family, new home, new foods, new language, new time zone … and on top of all of that, she will be taking all of this on without the foundation of an early childhood in a loving family as God designed it.

We are believing for  healing, adjustment, bonding, and a wonderful future for our Lucy Joy.  Thank you for understanding how we are going about partnering with Him hoping to bring all this to reality for our daughter.

6 thoughts on “Partnering

  1. What a perfect quote and a wonderful explanation you continue to give of how we can partner with you by loving and praying for you from afar for a season as you partner with the Father in bringing Lucy into the loving embrace of your family and His family. Yes! We are excited to meet her – in the proper season.

  2. Well, said, my friend, well said. Cocooning works. Eliza still has an “off” day the day after we have been somewhere with lots of other people. She does well in the moment, but the next day is very hard. It confuses her so much.
    We are praying fervently for you, our dear friends! For every aspect of this trip that we can think of. Praying, praying, praying. What a privilege it is!!!
    Love you guys,
    Steph

  3. We are praying for you and for Lucy and the entire family. We know that you and Jason will be wonderful loving and caring parents to Lucy Joy and the rest of your family too. We look forward to meeting Lucy Joy when the time is right for her. Love and Hugs to all!

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