Three and a half years ago, my husband and I fell in love with an 18-month-old boy from China.
He was precious.
He was perfect.
And he had medical special needs.
Having two biological children of our own at the time, we had no prior experience with caring for children with medical needs. And although my sweet hubby was a physician assistant very eager to love on a child he could provide for in our home, both of us, at times, wondered if we were really equipped to care for a child who would require multiple surgeries and daily assistance of some sort, especially when we had two other superheroes in our home already.
Distant friends told us this would too drastically change our lives. Acquaintances told us our biological children would be ruined. People who heard our story asked why we would choose to disrupt our comfortable life — the life with two children in a comfortable home and no health issues to worry about. Especially when we had no idea what we were doing.
There were seconds, moments, throughout the adopting process when, even as we LONGED to hurry the process and hold the sweet man we had nicknamed Superman in our arms, we wondered if these people were right. If God really knew what He was doing. If we were really the Kents for the job.
It turns out, we didn’t know what we were doing. And God did. And those people with their sweet protective hearts and their very good intentions — their opinions, combined with our fear, could have robbed us of one of the greatest blessings of our lives.
THIS is what adoptive parent Michelle knows now that she wishes paper pregnant Michelle would have known then. Because the world was very good at preparing us for the HARD parts of adopting a child with special needs … and very silent on the topic of the BLESSINGS.
I invite you to join me HERE at Beautiful in His Time to read the rest of the story.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Michelle Cuthrell guest wrote this article very early in her adoption and advocacy journey. Today, two adoptions, two hosting journeys and a season of advocacy later, God has reshaped her perspective and opened her heart and eyes to the truth — that there is no BEAUTY without first deep BROKENNESS. Read her updated blog post on the beauty and the brokenness of this sacred institution called adoption HERE: http://ofcapesandcombatboots.com/blog/2019/11/6/brokenness-redeemed?rq=brokenness.