“I breathe in my courage and out my fear”.

One thing no one told us about adoption was the fear that we would encounter. 

We learn fear at a very young age.  Fear of being away from our mother, fear of the dark, fear of snakes, etc.  As we age, our personalities take root and our fears change.  As I grew up, I was always afraid of separation.  I was terrified of being away from my mom.  Who knew what could happen in the hours we were apart?  I loved the fact that we were always in the same school until I reached 6^th grade.  I always knew exactly where my mom was and kept track of her closely.  

All the same, I was afraid of anything less than perfect.  In 5^th grade I threw up after getting a B on a science test.  I would make myself sick studying and obsessing over obtaining perfection.  Thankfully, I hit those magically middle school years and I stopped trying so hard to reach perfection with grades and instead turned to boys.  Now it was all about sports and looks.  How did our parents ever survive these years?  The years slipped by and my fears seemed to subside.   As high school passed into college, I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to find a man to spend forever with.  That fear quickly was engulfed as I met Jake.  Fear turned into bliss as we married and settled into life together.  How happy we were and how blessed we were!

New fears arose.  What if we weren’t able to get pregnant?   What if the fertility treatments didn’t work?  What if, what if, what if?  We learned to turn our fears into prayers and our prayers into actions.  We began to search (or I began to search, and reported daily all my findings to Jake).  You can’t just hand your lives over to the wrong agency, social worker, or attorney.  That is the one thing that I still have a hard time explaining.  The people who control how/when our family would grow hold our lives in the palm of their hands.  Our attorneys, our social worker, the birth parents, all controlled every aspect.  It was new to me.  I was not able to control this like I was the paper work, our portfolio, and our decisions of what outlet to use to grow our family.

I never knew fear like this existed.  A fear that caused heat to flood from my feet up to my heart to my eyes and face…fear that would stop me in my tracks.  Fear that caused my heart to pound so loudly that I swore someone standing next to me would be able to hear it.  Fear that made my stomach roll, and bodily fluids run rampant.  Fear that paralyzed my body and my eyes to leak without even realizing it. 

Adoption is not something we think lightly of.  It isn’t a second choice or a second option because we weren’t able to get pregnant.  Our family was destined to grow, just not in the exact way that nature explains.  Everything we have ever wanted is on the other side of fear.  In order to gain what we so desire, we have to wade through our fears. 

Fear cripples me even today when I think of our future.  We so badly want our family to grow even more in the future, but those fears crawl up my legs and into my heart.  I’m constantly praying to push those fears away and let God take over. 

Nothing worth having comes easily.  I pray that you, my friends, don’t let fear cripple you.  We have two little girls that wouldn't be here if we would have let our fear cloud our vision.  

“I breathe in my courage and out my fear”.