New City...New Chapter
I alluded to this in my previous post (check it out if you didn’t read it )...and my doctor #NotPregnant post :-)
I don’t talk about this part of my life often...I don’t like to dwell on what isn’t...yet I often have grieved being single and not being the mom I expected to get to be (#notpregnant). There haven’t been any of the soccer games, half time game snack responsibilities, kissing booboos or kids who call me Mom and can only be consoled by my presence. (Insert all the things I’m supposed to say and you need to hear about trusting Gods timing, me being an amazing aunt and “like a mom” to many kids and blah blah blah...agreed and I know...and yet...). Most days I’m really grateful for where I am and ALL the sleep and bandwidth that comes with being childless and yet there’s more. This year I decided to pursue something I’ve been dreaming about since I was young…getting to say yes to a child. This year I decided I would stop dreaming and talking about things but start being about those things….I’m finally done waiting for things to happen to me. I still believe in the dream…I also believe in not wasting what is right in front of me. So this year I moved into the city (West Baltimore) I wanted to be a part of, found a bigger place (that I LOVE), got a promotion of sorts at work and began the foster care certification process. I have completed the training and just had my last inspection/review and completed all the paperwork and medical pre-reqs (hence the doctor’s visits excitement) towards getting my place certified. Now just waiting on paperwork approval and last minute information requests.
Tears come easily as I think of having a kid(s) in my home to care for…both out of sheer gratitude of the opportunity and terror of being responsible to help a young human. I wish I knew why God called me to this before I knew really what it meant. There have been many people who have not understood it and men that had cruel things to say about my desire to foster/ adopt over biological kids (yay dating adventures)…Yet here we are and I’m so intensely excited I can’t hardly stand it. When I got the call about starting training the day after I applied, even though I was told it would be weeks/months, I burst into tears. This is what a dream coming true feels like…and I didn’t quite know how to embrace it. Yet here we are one step after the other…embracing it. Preparing my heart, mind and home for the children my heart has been longing to care for over the last few decades. This journey is expected to be difficult and full of ups and downs and heart break…and yet somehow I think that is exactly what the last few years have been preparing me for. Here I am at the edge of something huge and fully trying not to drown in this joyful deepend. I am so grateful for the friends who have walked this journey with me, cheered me on all along the way and poured into the journey tangible and those who are literally walking through it with me...more to come on that (there are only so many tears for one day). Because of them and the path before me I can stand in this room and say....this will be my kid’s room...The many kids I will get to care for, cry with, be frustrated at and create a safe space while working to reunification with their parents.
Ok now I’m in straight tears. And for those of you who want to know... yes I am open to receiving all the things to make my home ready for kids (ages 7+...hygiene items, toiletries, hair stuff, books, clothes, games, luggage, GC and etc.).
Thanks for being on the journey in the joyful deepend with me and now the Foster Care journey lap being loaded. May the delight of your heart be realized in unexpected ways friends!
