Not a Fairy Tale

As many of you know Seth and I took our first Foster Placement on November 30th. It has been a roller coaster that we don't ever want to get off since that day.

C on his first night at our house.

I have said one phrase over and over again these last three months, "Foster Care is not a fairy tale." I think somewhere inside of me, before we got a placement, I thought it might be. I have watched Foster Care happen all around me, in the most loving ways, for as long as I can almost remember. I saw firsthand in their lives, how much of a fairy tale it was not. But somehow in my mind I had forgotten all of this.  And while going through the process of getting licensed I got the fairy tale set back up inmy head. We were going to "save" a little kiddo and they were going to love us and we were going to love them and we were all going to live happily ever after. Even if that happily ever after wasn't forever, I was totally fine with that. Never in a million years, did the fairy tale include a picture of a little boy so scared of us that he didn't know which end was up. I never pictured hours (have mercy) long fits that I had no frame of reference on how to stop. I didn't imagine him coming home from visits so confused that he just didn't even know what to do with himself, so instead he shutdown, and he didn't want me or anyone, or anything else for that matter.

I also didn't imagine how deeply attached to this little boy I (we) was going to get. If you've asked me in the last couple of months, how long C was going to be staying with us, or if he was ever going to go home, I've probably told you all the same thing. Simply, because it's all I know to tell you. "C's momma loves him very much, and I think she's going to do all the things she needs to do to get him back at home with her. We are here to love C for as long as he needs to be loved, if he needs us to love him forever, we would be honored to do that." And that is so true. I truly believed that when I got the call for C to go home to his momma, I was going to be totally fine. Until it became a reality. (Don't hear me saying I have a date and a time frame for when he will get to go home and be with his momma and siblings forever, we still do not.) We go to court for C about once a month and get to hear the progress in his case. His momma is doing so well, and is doing everything she needs to do. And I am so happy for her and C. I am over the moon thrilled, because I believe in the depths of my soul that God wants babies and mommas and daddies to be together. But that means that this little person that has crawled his way deep inside of my heart, isn't going to be with me forever. And while at the beginning, before I had a tiny human that didn't actually belong to me, living in my house, I said that would be no problem. I feel as if my heart is being ripped out of my chest, and it hasn't even happened yet.

The real problem is that my heart doesn't even ache the most for me. C has deep attachment issues, and I worry that going back home might cause him more harm than good, in the long run. Daisy Hope loves C like her very own brother. They look for each other in the morning if one of them is awake before the other. They look out for each other, sneak food to each other when they think momma isn't looking (ahem), hold hands in the back seat of my car (be still my ever loving heart), hold hands when one of them is sad, and go out of their way to make each other laugh. I worry that Daisy Hope will somewhere in her tiny being resent us for "making" her love her brother, and then "taking" him away from her. I worry for our families that have invested so much in his little life, and gladly so, being heartbroken after he comes home. I worry for Seth, being so shattered after C goes home, that we can't ever do Foster Care again.

They love to love each other. 

Then I remember, the future isn't mine to worry about. God already has this whole story figured out. He already knows the exact date and hour that C will go home. I remember that God knew that C and Daisy Hope were going to attach to one another, and he as good already worked out of that. I am reminded that God made our families to love him alongside of us, so that C could feel wanted and loved as long as his story is mingled with ours. I remember that God had C written into our stories before Seth and I ever met one another.  Then I can breathe again, and I can remember that Foster Care isn't about me. It's not even about Daisy Hope, Seth or our families. It's all about C and reflecting God's love to him, for as long as we are allowed to.

I plan to hold on as tightly as I can to those things, and not let go.