She has a home...

This morning I am preparing paperwork for my first teen placement.  And of course, the teen is a girl! I have had several people ask me if it has been hard to place a teenage girl in a home given our experience.  As always, let me be real...I thought it would be.  I worried about how I would walk a family through the process with my reality in the back of my mind.  Could I really ask a family to potentially walk the path that we did almost five years ago? But honestly, it has been exciting, and even therapeutic on some levels.  And on other levels, it has been tough!

First, let me say that placing a teenager in an adoptive home will never get old! This young lady is less than two years from entering the world without a family (what we call "aging out").  There is an estimated 20,000 (no, I didn't add too many 0's) youth who age out of foster care every year in our country.  If you look at statistics, you know that means 20,000 who are very likely to be homeless, in jail, have children who grow up in the system or all three! So knowing that God has given a family to one of those 20,000 and not allowed her to become a statistic! Praise Him! Truly, this is what I am called to do!

So if this is my calling, why didn't God let my experience look more like a Hallmark movie and less like it was? It would be so much easier to talk to families sharing how amazing it had been to adopt a teenager and provide an opportunity for a life she would not have otherwise had.  Somehow, I think more families would want to do it if I could share that story.  But my adoptive families got the real story.  They hear the hard truth of what bringing broken children into your home can do.  So why would I ask them to do that? Because God tells us to!

I have families ask me all the time if I would do it again.  My answer is yes..for many reasons! Mostly because just like this young lady who is being placed tomorrow, she has a home! My daughter will always have a family.  She is not an orphan.  And the most obvious reasons, my grand babies who are now my babies.  Had we not adopted our daughter we would not have been in a place legally to do what we did to provide safety for them at that time.

So as I get the paperwork ready to take to the placement of a 16 year old who will no longer be an orphan, I am more excited than I would ever have thought possible!  Of course the fact that by everyone's account who has worked with her she is an amazing young lady and this family is a super family helps ease any fears or apprehensions I might have! And I am excited for another teen story that I believe will have a happy ending.  And the moments of sadness that I have experienced during this placement as I watch another mother and daughter and hope for them what could have been (and hope will still be some day) for me and my daughter, I have replaced with gratefulness that I have the awesome privilege of walking this family through the days and weeks and months ahead! I am truly a blessed woman to have this job and call in my life!

If God brings them to mind, please pray for this young lady and family.  There will be transition as with any placement. And there will be hard days ahead as they all learn to live and love together as well as grieve what was lost in the past.  Its just part of this crazy journey we call adoption! But oh what an amazing journey it is!