Today I write as a mom. I’m studying our annual back-to-school photo that I posted on Instragram. All three of us are squinting just a bit because of the powerful sun saying “good morning” from the east. One boy smiles, and the other offers an unsure grin. My oldest will catch me in a just a few more inches. Next year, maybe? They cozy into me and would later hug me in the front yard for the whole world to see. In these unashamed hugs I can still catch glimpses of the children they are, but each day they look more and more like young adults. Older child adoption comes with some tricky side effects, and I’m not even talking about the lasting effects of trauma. (That’s a different post for another day. Teaching kids with histories of trauma is no joke. I realize this as a teacher and as a mother.) The side effect I’m talking about is the Lost Years. When our boys came to us at seven and eight, we kept them home for a few months before starting them in first and second grades in the fall. (They are both a year older than their peers, but that is a decision we do not regret because the language barrier and aforementioned lingering trauma. In doing that we also bought ourselves another year.) But we missed out on so much. Birthdays, holidays, every “first” leading up to riding a bike. Our cakes started with eight and nine candles. We didn’t smash a cupcake in a high chair or tear up over the first “mama” and “dada.” We didn’t capture first steps on a shaky video or fill files with photos of every different baby expression. We never saw them as babies. Were my precious boys born with a full head of hair? Were their limbs long and lanky or short and chubby? What did their tiny hand look like wrapped around a grown-up’s finger? Did someone come when they cried? I do know their baby smiles would have stopped my heart just like they do today. My filing cabinet at work is decorated with our earlier photographs to remind myself that they once were much smaller, that we didn’t miss out on everything. When looking at our first-day-of-school photo from this year, it’s hard to believe that my oldest once came to several inches below my shoulder (even though he was never tiny enough to swaddle and carry around the house.) Last spring I was driving to work and nearly had to pull over with an ugly cry because I realized that more than one-third of our time with our oldest son living in our house had evaporated. Of the 11 years we have with him before he leaves for college or the workforce, four of them were already gone. I realize every parent feels this way. Time is fleeting. Carpe diem. Cherish every moment. Blah, blah, blah. But damn. I want some of those years back. If we had been raising our children from birth, they would now be four and a half. Instead they are 11 and almost 13, both in middle school and carving their own paths of independence. That means testing boundaries and making mistakes and learning more and more about that beautiful thing we call grace. I don’t get those years back that I so desperately wish I had. I won’t ever get a first day of kindergarten photo, so instead I’ll smile reminiscently at the photo firsts I do have. And I’ll try so very hard to listen well and hug them tight and pray for even more protection. These complex feelings come with no owner’s manual.
4 Comments
Leah
8/25/2016 03:46:50 pm
you captured this perfectly - thanks for sharing!!
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Allison Berryhill
8/25/2016 08:52:51 pm
Oh,Kim, thank you so much for writing and sharing. Lovely.
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Erin
8/25/2016 10:13:15 pm
So right on. Feelings I've had about our girls as well. Thanks for writing!
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Greg
8/27/2016 11:41:08 pm
Great! Have a great year.
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