*For Sue, and all the mamas who have lost a child through failed adoption.
She is a dark-haired little girl with chocolate eyes and a sweet smile.
She is the little girl my friend held in her mind when she thought about what her family would look like, one day. She saw two sandy-haired boys and a little girl with those deep, brown pools of chocolate eyes.
The blond-headed boys came along the natural way, but God never gave her a girl. Time passed the way time does, and the family of four settled into the years. Still, this mama-heart felt that her family was not complete, not yet.
Then God made a way. Out of nowhere, like snow on a sky-blue day, a little girl came into their lives. She had never had a home with a mother and a father. She had never had a place where she was safe and loved, where people hugged instead of hit.
The best part of all was that this little girl already had a place in their lives! They knew her, and she knew them. When she came to their home, it was like the missing piece of the puzzle had been found.
With joyful expectation, we rallied around this family, praying for God to work through the adoption process. It was easy to pray when it seemed so obvious what God was going to do. It was the only thing God could do, because I’d already figured out that it was the very best way He could redeem this situation.
Didn’t it all make sense?
But just yesterday, I opened my computer and saw the message: the adoption failed.
I stared at my screen in disbelief. We all knew something like this could happen, but none of us expected it. We expected God to overcome the obstacles and make the paths straight because that is what God does.
He just didn’t do it this time, at least, not in a way that my eyes can see.
All I could think about was my friend, sitting in her home just a few streets away, grieving the loss of the little girl she had already began to love like a daughter.
I did not know what to say. How do you comfort someone who has lost a child through a failed adoption? No one talks about it like a loss. It’s just an unfortunate set of circumstances that didn’t work out like you’d hoped.
But it is a loss, and it stings like death. A woman like that can’t keep her heart from loving a child that might be hers, even if that child is born through a different body. She can’t help but make a place in her heart, and to grow in love in the waiting the way a woman grows in love for a baby growing in her womb.
The truth of it is, my friend had already started to become that little girl’s mother. That part of the adoption had not failed.
What do you say to a mother like that? What do you say to the woman who has cuddled the child she thinks will be hers, who has begun to dream dreams for that daughter and has spent secret hours shopping for bedroom furniture in white and pink? What do you say to the woman who has prayed for that child and held her breath, hardly daring to breathe in case it does not happen, and who now, in the absence of a child to hold, finds herself grieving alone because the rest of us just don’t get it?
It’s hard to know what to say. “How are you doing?” I blurted out yesterday when I called, even though I knew perfectly well how she was doing and I knew better than to ask something so trite. But we say things just to fill the void because we want to help, and we find that we can’t.
“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”
“You can always try again.”
“Maybe God is opening your home for another child.”
They hurt, those words, even the parts that are true, even the parts that are spoken out of genuine love and concern, because they don’t recognize that this child had already started to become her child, and this child has been lost.
And there is a mama who is crushed because of it.
I do not know, but I imagine that she tries hard to convince herself that it will be okay, that this little girl will be safe and cared for wherever she goes. But how can she be any more wanted? How can she be any more loved? How can this be God’s best for this child?
The hardest part of grief is always the questions it brings. They are the questions none of us can answer and most of us have trouble asking because they seem so devoid of faith. I think part of faith is trusting that God can love us even when we’re hurting and can’t find the right words, or even when we tell Him we don’t understand His ways.
He already knows it.
It seems silly to try to put a band-aid on the pain with words, whether they’re words to God or words to one another. Sometimes, there is nothing to say.
There is only grieving together.
Virginia Spence says
I am a mother who lost a child from our first adoption. My husband and I have journeyed through infertility for 12 years. When we first found out we were chosen to raise little Savannah, out hearts soared. I got to watch her be born. We got to hold her not long after birth. Then we had to leave the hospital. Savannah went to interim care to wait for the 10 day revocation period to pass. On day 7, the birth family changed their minds. We were devasted. Our pink and purple nursery with little butterflies was a painful reminder of our Almost Girl. My husband and I did not go through this alone. God held us through it all. I could feel his arms around me keeping me from tipping into the abyss of despair. Trusting in the character of God – his goodness – took sheer willpower. On June 7, I hit rock bottom. It was the darkest day of my life. I did not know that on June 8 our son would be born. We got to bring him home July 3. Weeping endures for a night but joy comes in the morning. The darkest hour is just before the dawn. Thank you for writing this article.
Kristen Glover says
Oh my goodness, I just wept as a I read this. I’m so sorry for your loss, but I’m so thankful that God has given you a son. Thank you for opening your home to a chosen child. May God bless you richly as you raise him for God’s glory.
Amy Glover says
Thank you for this, Kristen. I’ve never been able to articulate this loss we experienced several years ago but you just did beautifully.
Elizabeth says
You are so very right. Sometimes there truly is NOTHING to say. Don’t underestimate yourself, Kristen. You say NOTHING very well. You have walked with me through some intense grief and you are one I would always turn to. You know how to give the gift of weeping silently with one who has known profound grief that words cannot speak to. You know how to do what Job’s friends did in Job 2:11-13 (I think I’ve quoted this to you before, but it bears repeating).
“Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place, … They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him. And when they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him. And they raised their voices and WEPT, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads toward heaven. And THEY SAT WITH HIM on the ground seven days and seven nights, and NO ONE SPOKE A WORD TO HIM, for they saw that his suffering was very great.”
gail says
Oh this is so painful. I pray that God intervenes and this is all a mistake.
Amanda Tirado says
We saw a lot of failed adoptions in the military simply because the families were military and were not considered stable because of frequently needing to move. That was hard to see. So many good, Christian families on the brink of actually getting out of the military, yet were denied parenthood because they were still in, even if only for a few more months or years.
We also saw military families readily being accepted as foster parents, which didn’t seem like a fair set of scales.
Kristen Glover says
I thought about you when I wrote this. Your story has given me so much insight into the many aspects of child loss, some of which I might not have thought about without your willingness to share.
Natasha Metzler says
beautiful, friend.