Unachieved Goals and Life's Greater Gains

September 3, 2018 Michelle Cuthrell

We had big plans for this summer.

As a Type A, list-making, laminating-obsessed goal setter, I’d asked each superhero to set at least one personal goal for the season, and then I’d printed out our family’s list, laminated it and posted it to the fridge, where each day, we could remember just what we wanted to complete before the summer of 2018 ended.

I love hard goals. They give me direction when this easily-distracted girl wants to pursue 50 things at all times. And I love that they give our boys something to work toward. Something to focus on.

Other than Lego ships and light saber fights.

I’d learned through many summers of failure to set just a few big goals for myself instead of 5,431 smaller ones I would never complete and would cry in the corner about not crossing off my list by Labor Day. And this summer, I thought, was the summer I would actually tackle those things that had been on my list for years.

To run daily.

To complete four summer reading books. (And not the kind with pictures of Mickey Mouse and dinosaurs on the front.)

To cherish and make the most of family time.

Simple, fun, easy goals.

And although my body and book-lover’s mind could use a bit more TLC, for the first time, I have no regrets about abandoning them for the most important thing I got to enjoy this summer.

This team. <3

The Gotcha Day Post I Wanted to Write

August 15, 2018 Michelle Cuthrell

Although I’ve been on a bit of a blog hiatus this summer to be more present for our superheroes, I really had intended to write a full Gotcha/Family Day post.

Yesterday, we celebrated the one-year anniversary of the day we met the crazy and charismatic boy we now just call “Superhero 4,” and today, we celebrate one full year since that day when that boy we now can’t picture our lives without became legally, officially, forever and ever ours!

We’re all about making special days special in this celebration-loving home, and besides celebrating our one-year mark as a family of six with ridiculous matching shirts and Chinese take-out and a day full of fun and family, I was planning to post a million words and five bajillion pictures showcasing the progress that this spicy-as-he-is-sweet superhero has made just one year inside our [terribly, extremely, Jesus-take-the-wheel-because-we’ve-got-us-nothing] imperfect home.

I was going to brag up and down (because bragging is a whole lot more socially acceptable when you clearly didn’t contribute any genes to the subject of your boast) about this boy’s drive — both the literal and figurative kind. About how the once 3-year-old boy who came to us as “immobile” — the one who we were told “might never walk” — now races through grocery store aisles and even, without his walker, once stood and crossed an entire room.

The Handicap That Wasn't

August 7, 2018 Michelle Cuthrell

We never thought of it as a “handicap.”

When we said yes to the file of the preschool-aged boy with mobility issues who stole our hearts and just needed a home and a family to love, we didn’t think of his condition as a “handicap.”

A diagnosis.

A medical condition.

A label, maybe.

But it never crossed our minds that cerebral palsy was a “handicap.”

So when I opened my mail eight months after returning home with the angel who could laugh and sing and communicate and talk — who could count and joke and fill an entire room with his big personality — who could do more than we ever asked or imagined in only eight short months at home but who was still fighting to learn how to walk — my heart sank for a moment.

It was a new tag. For a new walker-holding van. With a picture of a wheelchair and the initials “HD.”

A handicap tag.

Superman's Seven Years

July 26, 2018 Michelle Cuthrell

I look back at pictures and can’t believe he looks so little.

Those beautiful black-brown eyes. The chubby cheeks that have since thinned out. The contagious smile that, even from age 2, could light an entire city with one little flash.

All in one tiny, perfect package our family waited one what-felt-like never-ending year to meet.

Our prayed for, longed for, perfectly and wonderfully made Superman.

Today, turning 7.

My Brothers are Just My Brothers

April 11, 2018 Michelle Cuthrell

Last week, Superhero 1 turned 12. I asked him if, as a right of passage, he’d like to contribute a guest post to this blog. I told him his perspective as a sibling in an adoptive family was incredibly valuable and that he could write about any topic he wanted. Even though writing is not this introvert’s jam (nor is speaking, using more than two words to describe his mood or producing more than a paragraph on any given topic), this passionate superhero jumped at the opportunity to address the question he receives most often: What is it like to have two adopted brothers? This is the uncensored, unedited view of a boy who has had brothers from other mothers for four of the last 12 years.

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