I have children who make me laugh. Children who bring me joy. Children who always seem to have a desire to choose the right no matter how difficult the test. I am thankful for them and for the happiness they bring to my life.

A few of my children, however, have caused me much pain and sadness as I have seen the paths their lives have taken. Most of it is out of their control due to mental illness or other issues that were related to early years of abuse or neglect in their birth countries. When I have spoken with other parents who have equally difficult children, I see the pain in their eyes and I can so relate to what they are feeling. Oh, how I can relate…with one difference. Some of them don’t have hope for a brighter tomorrow, and hence are filled with despair.

I too have known despair as I have wondered if one child will ever be able to live on his own. I have watched another stray from the gospel and shed many tears over the choices she has made that have distanced her from her Father in Heaven. Another is dealing with the pain of sexual abuse that stole the innocence of her childhood. At times I have fallen to my knees in despair and plead to my Father in Heaven that I wasn’t sure if I could handle much more. Each time that I have prayed, however, the comfort has come. Comfort in knowing that this Earth life is not all there is. Comfort in his sustaining love.

I know there will come a day when my children will be healed of their disabilities and infirmities that were no fault of their own. I can look in my sons’ eyes when he is angry and raging due to his mental illness and see an absolutely beautiful, yet currently wounded spirit deep inside yearning to get out. I know in the next life when he is healed of his illness that he will be free of the chains that bind his mental clarity here and now. I know he has a valiant spirit inside, for I have seen it. I have seen the gentleness and meekness he exhibits when he shows his tender feelings towards babies and animals. I have seen the tears he sheds when he watches “The Testaments” and Christ heals the blind man at the end, giving him sight.

Someday Christ will also heal our blindness and we will have the ability to see the whole plan. We will understand better why we had to endure some of the trials that we have during this earth life. Although some of those trials have driven me to my knees, I am thankful for them, because on my knees was where I needed to be. Through trials I have gained a greater relationship with my Father in Heaven. He knows me–and each of us–by name. He loves us, and through his strength, we can not only endure, but be thankful for the refiner’s fire.

Philippians 4:13 says, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” I believe that with all my heart. He and his atonement are bigger than sin, bigger than pain, bigger than mental illness. And because of that, I can have hope, and I can have faith in a brighter tomorrow.

Last week one of my daughters was playing with a girl who–like herself– is of African descent. My sister overheard Michelle tell the other little girl, “When I was adopted…” and the other girl immediately interrupted by saying, “Wait…you’re adopted?” She seemed so startled, which my sister found humorous because I am about as pale as they come and my daughter’s skin is a beautiful, rich, dark brown. Her friend is 9 years old; old enough to recognize racial differences, yet it never occurred to her that I had not given birth to Michelle.

“Yes,” Michelle replied, and proceeded to label her birthmother as her “fake” mother. I was very puzzled by this. We have never once used that term in our home, nor have we even used the term “real” mother. I could understand if we had used the term real mother regularly, how Michelle might have deduced the term fake mother, but I am clueless as to where it came from. Instead, we have always said, “Your Haitian Mama.”

We had a little talk the next day about birth mothers and adoptive mothers. When I questioned Michelle about her use of fake, she said it is because she can’t see nor remember her Haitian mother. After much discussion, we came to the conclusion that I and her Haitian mother are both very real. One gave birth to her and the other is raising her.

I asked Michelle if she believed that Jesus and God are real. She replied that she did. When I asked how she knew, she said it is because she has felt them in her heart. We discussed how just like her Haitian mother, she can’t see or remember her life in heaven with her Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ, but also, just like her Haitian mother, they love her and are very real.

I am grateful for a religion that has taught me where I came from and where I am going after this life. I look forward to the day when I can meet the birthmothers of my adoptive children and thank them for the beautiful gift of life that they gave our children. Even though they couldn’t raise them, they gave them life and then gave me the beautiful gift of raising them.

In foster care, we often speak of “shared parenting”. It is the concept of the foster parents working together with the biological parents, as the bio parents are working their case plan in an attempt to get their children back. I’d like to think that in the next life, my children’s birth parents and I will also have shared parenting. We both played a part in these children’s lives, even though the roles were different.

I have seen studies asking if adoptive parents feel threatened by birth parents. My children’s birthparents are not in their lives, nor do we have the ability to find them. If we could, however, I don’t believe that I would feel threatened by them. Children can only benefit from having more people to love them.

I have been feeling a bit down lately as if I don’t measure up to all that I know I should/could be. Being of the LDS faith, I know that I am literally a daughter of God, and yet Satan works hard to convince us all at times that we’re just not “enough”. Not thin enough, not smart enough, not loving enough, not compassionate enough…the list is endless at times.

I went to church this morning with an aching and heavy heart. So much of what I wanted to accomplish this past week has been derailed by a couple of children’s behaviors. At times I wonder if I am strong enough (there’s that enough word again) to do what my Heavenly Father has asked me to do; to raise children who range from gifted and emotionally healthy (the easy ones) to those with some pretty severe special needs.

This Sabbath morning as I awoke, I prayed that I would find the healing that my heart needed. I looked forward to the balm that the sacrament offers each week; to turn to the Lord for healing and for the opportunity to repent and start again. I thank a loving Heavenly Father who in his wisdom offers us that chance to renew our baptismal covenants each week through this ordinance.

After the first speaker who directed his remarks to the Young Men on how to prepare for a mission, I still had a prayer in my heart that something said today would be directed more toward my needs. I bear witness that the Lord hears our pleadings and answers them. The special musical number was titled “For Me Alone” by Sally DeFord and it was sung by a young woman who is a friend of my son’s. She holds a special place in my heart anyway, but the message she sang today was as if it was intended just for me.

The atonement is for all mankind, but as Elder Ballard said, “The irony of the Atonement is that it is infinite and eternal, yet it is applied individually, one person at a time.”

The chorus of the song is what hit me so strongly today, and had I been alone in the congregation I think I would have wept aloud.

If I alone had stumbled, if I alone had strayed,

If I alone had wandered from the straight and narrow way

If I alone bore guilt for which my all could never atone

He would have come for me

For me alone.

What a beautiful message; one that I have always known, but was confirmed in my heart today that if I alone were the one who strayed, Christ would still have gone through with the atonement. It is for all, and yet it is for each of us as individuals. We may feel at times that we don’t measure up, but Christ and his atonement are more than big enough to cover all of our inadequacies.

To hear the song in its entirety, click here for some downloading options.

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Today while doing laundry, I found something in the bottom of the washer. Quite a few “little somethings” as a matter of fact. I had neglected to check all of the pockets in a load of clothes and discovered 7 CTR rings still in their little plastic bags. In case you are not familiar with the LDS church, CTR stands for “Choose the Right” and a CTR ring is supposed to help a child remember to make right and good choices. They give them out in Primary each year which is the children’s meeting that is similar to Sunday School.

I asked my son who has no impulse control if the rings were his. Yes, they were. Where did he get all of them? He stole them from the Primary closet at church. Stole them? These were not the more expensive rings you can buy from Deseret Book or The CTR store. These were the “el-cheapos” that don’t cost much more than a quarter that you can order through the Church Distribution Center. Still, it was the principle of it all.

“Rings to help you choose the right and you stole them?” I was having trouble wrapping this around my brain. “Oh yeah,” he replied. “I am always losing mine, so I thought I would take some more so when I lose one I can still have another one.”

Actually, pretty good thought processes for him and not as impulsive as I initially thought. He doesn’t always compute cause and effect and that his actions will always have consequences, but at least this time he planned ahead for future loss. :-)

Yesterday I was reading an article I happened to stumble into during an unrelated search. The word “adopted” caught my attention, and, of course, I clicked on the link to the article written about Ana Sliva Mattias, the daughter of British TV reporter, Michael Nicholson, adopted after bringing her to England for life saving surgery. She is the second daughter adopted by the Nicholsons, who previously adopted a little girl in Bosnia a few years before meeting Ana in a Brazilian slum.

Throughout the article, we learn about her experiences in the Nicholson family where she vacillated between feeling a part of the family and feeling as the outsider.

Yet family life was not without its complications. Diana, who as a housewife stayed home to look after the children, was clearly closer to Natasha than Ana, having had four years to bond before the Brazilian girl arrived. By the time Ana reached 13, it began to bother her.

‘When Dad was away – which was often – I used to feel left out,’ she says. ‘The only time Diana would talk to me was when she was annoyed with Natasha.’

At the time the author interviewed Ana, she was estranged from the Nicholson family yet eager to be reunited. She had run away when her father suggested she return to Brazil.

Then he said he wanted me to meet a woman he knew who ran an orphanage in Sao Paulo.

‘He said I could earn my way working for her, that he thought that was what I wanted to do. Yes, I had said years earlier that I wanted to go back, but only in a fit of anger. He knew I didn’t mean it.’

Mr Nicholson has made clear he had no intention of sending Ana to Brazil, but, terrified that he might, she ran away that night, staying at a friend’s house.

There are many more scenarios shared by Ana in the article. Each one is from Ana’s point of view and one could assume that her family was indifferent to her, perhaps even with some resentment on all sides, but we need to remember that this is only one point of view. Even Ana herself admits that while she said one thing in a fit of anger, she really meant another.

When he was home I’d snap at him for silly things and ask him why he’d bothered to bring me to Britain,’ she says. ‘I must have sounded ungrateful, but really, I just wanted to discover my past.’

Were the Nicholsons truly indifferent or simply ignorant to what Ana truly needed from them? I would venture a guess that it is the latter. We cannot truly know what kind of education the Nicholsons have obtained about attachment difficulties and post-traumatic stress in adopted children. The article mentions that they tried counseling for Ana, but they did use traditional talk therapy or find an therapist experienced in attachment?

I can easily see how Ana felt insecure regarding her place in the family. That is very common for traumatized children and children affected by adoption. Whether it is real or perceived, their feelings are valid, and it is imperative that we are vigilant and aware that our children’s behavior may carry a message. One they may be unable to put into words.