What if...? Introducing Jadence Katherine

"You say what if I hurt you, what if I leave you
What if I find somebody else and I don't need you
What if this goes south, what if I mess you up
You say what if I break your heart in two then what" (What If by Kane Brown)

This has been sitting waiting for the right time to post, and I think today is the day. I heard this on the radio awhile ago, and I thought it was pretty fitting for Jadence's story in a two-fold way. The first is this...

It was December 2017, we had just recently told our foster care licencor that we were still not ready for long term placements after saying goodbye to our foster daughter M that spring, we were still grieving and not ready to take on another possibility of another heartbreak. Plus, Samuel and Isabella were still very young, Bella still wasn't walking. We told her we'd be willing to do respite care which is just short term, typically one or two day stays when other foster parents need someone else to take their kids for a while.
Our phone rang wondering if we would care for a one year old who had been placed with another foster family and was now going to live with a relative. The foster family had a conflict and was unable to keep her an extra night, so could she stay with us just for one night?
Yes.
This is easy, this part of foster care. Opening your home, sharing an extra room, an extra plate, an extra hug. I can do that and it will be a very small sacrifice, and a bring a lot of joy to our family.
She was so fun. So smiley. Came right to me with a smile and hug.  The other kids loved her. I put her to sleep in our spare room whispering prayers for her precious soul, who doesn't even seem bothered to be in the second strangers home of the week. The next day, we play and she is happy and content. I wait for the social worker to call to arrange her pickup by her family member. I realize as I worry about it, that I have already let myself love her a little.

But the family member is ready, and it seems like a good thing for her, so we pack her up, say goodbye, and tell the social worker how fun it was to have her. It really is fun to do respite care, little heartbreak involved.

A little over a month later, the phone rings again. Would we be willing to do respite for that same little girl for the weekend? Sure, that would be fun. And we hate to see foster kids bounced around to so many different homes, if we can offer familiarity, we try to.

We pick her up, this time she cries a lot. A lot.

The weekend ends, the week begins, the social worker wonders if we can keep her a few days longer. Sure, why not? Well, Dan was in the cities for his brothers surgery so I was solo-parenting, but we made it work.

Friday is approaching, I tell Dan, I haven't heard from the social worker, I'm guessing when she calls tomorrow she's going to ask if we can keep Jadence for a longer stay, what is our answer?

We have a lot of reasons to say no. Bella just turned two, she's not yet walking. Samuel is two and a half. After a year of having three one year olds, I was just getting used to being able to go places in public again by myself. Taking on another one year old meant more staying home, three in diapers again, less sleep. All of those are hard but we could do. But that looming last one...the big what if? The emotional heartbreak. "What if our hearts break again when they aren't even healed from last time?"

Dan comes home Thursday night from spending a few days at the children's hospital in the cities and I ask him what his answer is. He says, "We have to. I walked the halls of that hospital and saw room after room after room of children with no parents. I'm sure there are so many different stories and situations, but it was heartbreaking to see them sick and all alone and I know if we can be parents to Jadence even for a while, we should be. Plus, you know we fell in love with her already."

"Yeah, I know. When did you decide that?" I ask.

He smiles as he admits "Probably the first time I held her,"

The next day the social worker calls and I tell her "of course Jadence can stay as long as she needs to, we love her." We have no idea how long it will be, a few weeks, a few months? There are so many "what if's?" and most likely they all end in my heart completely broken, but until then, I'll love her everyday.

When Jadence came she was 17 months old. She couldn't crawl or stand. She wouldn't cry in the morning when she woke up from the crib. I would watch the video monitor and go get her when I saw her start to move around, otherwise she would just sit up, look around and go back to sleep. Babies stop crying when no one ever answers their cries. They learn crying doesn't work, no one ever comes.

Jadence started physical therapy to help catch up her development, she had very low muscle tone, but she quickly learned to crawl, stand, push things around and finally walk. She was so proud of herself each time she accomplished something, it was so fun to see her realize she could do something.

I could write pages and pages of her first year with us and her story and the roller coaster that was her journey to adoption that include multiple times of heartbreak as we were told she was leaving us and then ended up staying. But what I think is the greatest take away from her story is her own "what if's?". Because of her first difficult year of life, Jadence struggles to trust. Brains develop attachment in the first two years of life. We cry because we're hungry and someone feeds us. We cry because we're wet and someone changes us. We cry because we are lonely and someone talks to us, holds us, plays with us. We cry because we're hurt and someone comforts us. We learn someone will take care of us, the world is a good place, we can trust our parents. But often, kids who enter foster care have not had this experience and then their brains have not developed correctly. They cried, and no one came. They were hungry, and no one fed them. They learned other people, especially parents couldn't be trusted. They learned, trusting people only sets you up for getting let down. When they begin to care about someone, their minds instantly wonder the thoughts in the beginning lyrics to that song. And this has been the next years of her life, her wondering "what if?" and pushing us away. Her being scared to trust us, afraid we're going to leave her or not be there for her. Wanting to do everything herself so she doesn't need anybody. She didn't want my hand when she was learning to walk stairs even though she would fall without it. I had stay so close to catch her every time. When she first came, she would not make eye contact with me when I was holding her. She wanted to be held, but not actually develop a connection with the person holding her.

It took such a long time to get her to trust us. It's still and probably will always be a hurdle she will have to overcome, to allow herself to trust people. To believe that people are good, and that especially her parents won't hurt her or let her down when in fact we're the ones who love her the most.

This is hard isn't it? This reality that we can be damaged for life so early in life.
But it's also hard, because I think we can all realize, that when we look at our own relationship with God, these same things come into play. We often struggle to trust him. We believe that He has at some point or another let us down when we needed Him. I realized today as I was speaking with a friend that as I have struggled to pray since all of this COVID craziness it's really deep down because I am mad at Him for letting it happen. And because I'm mad, it means I really don't trust that He is doing what's best for me and taking care of me. We push him away when He's the only one who can help us, when He's the one that loves us more than anyone, when He is actually taking good care of us, and is the only one who will. We'd rather do it ourselves, than risk relying on Him and being let down. The saddest part about that, is that He never let us down. We are blaming him for the devil's hurts just like Jadence is angry at me for things that happened to her before she knew me. Its the greatest, and maybe only lie the devil tells: that God can't be trusted. The devil uses all kinds of hurt and sin to make it seem like God has let us down. But I promise you He has not. And you know it, and want to believe it, and it's ok to let yourself believe it today. And if you're still struggling to believe that, look at the cross. Does it make sense that the God who did that for you would ever let you down? 

There are a lot of experts and a lot of books about helping children cope with attachment issues. There are a lot of theories, and every child is so different, and some so severely hurt even professionals don't know how to help. But overwhelmingly, the best thing we can do for Jadence and many of these kids is to love them unconditionally, consistently, intentionally. Love them when they hate us. Love them when they show more affection to a stranger at the mall. Love them when they throw their 15th tantrum for the day. Today, Jadence was sitting a timeout in my lap at the park, thrashing around saying she wanted to get away, but as soon as I let my arms go, she would quickly grab them and wrap them back around herself. So conflicted, wanting my love, and yet being so afraid to let herself love me. So I just held her, the whole time. Everytime she told me to let her go, I did, everytime she wrapped my arms tightly again, I held her close. 

This is what Jesus does for us too. He loves us even when we hate Him. Even when we ignore Him. He is patient with us. He consistently, time, after time, after time loves us and hopes we love Him in return some day.

The difference is, I will fail Jadence. I will lose my temper and yell when I should speak words with love. I will hurry her when I should be patient. I will want to be loved in return. Not everyday, but once in a while I will fail her. But Jesus will not. And that is my prayer. That she (and all of us) will know His love, that never fails. His love is the only thing, that will "fix" us from our disorder. Because we've all wondered those first lines from that song, what if we trust him and He lets us down, what if He breaks our heart in two?

But as the song goes on to reply:

"What if I was made for you and you were made for me
What if this is it, what if it's meant to be"

And we really are, made for Him.

There were so many fears and what-if's when we said that scary "yes" to Jadence almost three years ago, but in Sept 2018 she became Jadence Katherine Full and laid her head on my shoulder and the song refrain and God responded:

"What if one of these days baby I'd go and change your name
What if I loved all these what ifs away"

She is spunky and fun. It takes almost nothing to make her smile or giggle. She thrives on attention and she hangs right with her brothers in a wrestling match or running around the house. She is a complete sandwich of a tom-boy and the girliest girl you've ever met, which she shows off often as she dresses up in princess dresses with super-hero masks and roars around the house. She's a farm girl who'd rather wear boots any day of the week and wants to be on the tractor and with the cows if that's where her dad is, and if she can do it with a pretty dress on that's even better. And her favorite place in the whole entire world is sitting on her dad's lap. And those are my favorite moments, because I get to see her truly happy. Not hurting, not wanting to be happy but unable to trust. When she's sitting on his lap, she is at peace, and there is no more beautiful girl in the whole world than a girl at peace in the arms of her father.

Its been a long three years, but I am so incredibly grateful every day that our "what if" turned out to be "meant to be."

Somedays, she comes over unexpectedly after an outburst or tantrum and gives me a big hug and says so sincerely, "I'm sorry mommy". Her hugs mean so much more, because I know the journey it's been to get to the place where she not only wants to hug me, but trusts me enough to hug me. A small feeling, I'm sure, compared to what God feels after waiting patiently for us to climb into his lap and rest for a while.