Adoption, Roller Coasters and Risky Love

We took our kids to an amusement park over the summer. We had three kids that were tall enough to ride whatever they wanted and three that were only tall enough to ride the little kid rides. This works out well for our family because I do not like roller coasters. My husband took the big kids and did all the terrifying things that make you want to throw-up. I did the the carousel and flying elephant-type rides.

But I’ve done the scary rides at this amusement park before. Back when we were houseparents at a group home, we took our boys here at least twice a year and there were no little kids who needed me to ride the flying elephants with them. There were only big kids who didn’t think it made sense that I was always telling them to face their fears and do hard things and then I refused to get on a perfectly safe roller coaster. So I rode the things I hated riding. And it turns out, sometimes I liked riding them. A little.

As we walked around the park, I told my older kids that one particular ride had been my favorite of the scary rides. They thought it looked a little too terrifying, but I had been brave enough to ride it before, so they could ride it too. They went with their dad and loved it. And then insisted I should go on it.

I stalled.

We rode everything else and the park was just about to close. My oldest kept begging and begging me to go on it with him (literally saying, “I beg you!”), but I told him I was just too exhausted to do one more thing. Especially one more TERRIFYING thing. I saw the disappointment in his eyes, but he and his younger brother ran off for one last ride before the park closed.

I watched them run off. I groaned. I imagined the regret of not doing this with them. I imagined their joy if I went. I imagined dying from a roller coaster mishap. And then I ran off to catch up with them. I was totally out of breath by the time I found them in line and we had just enough time to jump on the roller coaster for its last trip. I seriously thought I might die. My heart was racing and I spent the whole time with my eyes closed, making unintelligible noises of panic. Not my finest hour.

But as we were literally hanging upside down, my son said, “Thank you so much for doing this with me, Mom.”

This is what it means to be his mother. And I couldn’t be more thankful.

Yesterday we celebrated the anniversary of the day we first met him. I relived it all in my mind as we talked through the details over hamburgers and shakes (his choice for a special meal). I became a mother in a hot, dimly lit office building 12 years ago on the other side of the world when this adorable baby was placed in my arms. He was silent. I wept. We took him home knowing next to nothing about who he was and who he would become. It was an act of faith. And it was terrifying.

I stepped on that roller coaster of adoption, breathless and panicked, but knowing that I wanted more than anything to be a mother. Whatever was going to happen, it felt worth the risk. I did all the reading, talked to everybody, was as prepared as I knew how to be, but there was nothing that could truly prepare me for the reality of that moment. The pure joy of knowing I was someone’s mother. The pure terror of being responsible for another human’s life. In the abstract, it sounds entirely overwhelming.

But a child doesn’t stay abstract very long. It’s hard to be nervous about if this child will consider you his “real” mother during his teenage years when you’re absolutely consumed with figuring out how to feed him and keep him alive. In that moment, in that particular second when he was placed in my arms, the entire focus of my life shifted. Whatever I was the day before, the hours before, the minute before, now I was a mother. I was HIS mother. And I would walk through fire for him.

While the idea of adoption was overwhelming in so many ways, actually being this child’s mother has been a simple joy. He makes me braver than I ever thought I could be. He has made me the kind of mom he needed, even if it wasn’t the kind of mom I pictured myself being. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but now I ride scary roller coasters. For him. Because he’s the kind of kid who wants me to. Because life is more fun when we do it together.

Adoption is scary. My child is not. The process is hard. My child is not. I know that’s not everybody’s story, but it is mine. I envisioned all the worst outcomes and what I got was a son who makes me thankful every day that I get to be his mother. I asked him yesterday what he imagined he was thinking as a baby when he first met us. With no hesitation he said, “These are my people.” I’m forever thankful for that.

I don’t know how our family story ends. I hold it with an open hand. I just know I can only do what I can do. I can love my kids. I can be the mom they need me to be. I can support them when they struggle and I don’t have to take it personally. Maybe we have a lifetime of family bliss ahead of us, but if we don’t, I have learned that these kids are worth the risk. Love is worth the risk.