PART 7 - MONSTERS IN THE CLOSET

  It was about ten o’clock when I settled in for the night. After a long day, I was relieved that my husband and my mom were doing well and hopeful that this journey would soon be over.  I had not seen my girls all day. My sister-in-law had taken them to the “jumpy place” for the day (Thanks Aunt Da!!).  I was just getting ready to tuck them in and get some sweet little hugs and kisses when the hospital called.  

  It was a nurse from the ICU letting me know that there were some concerns with Ed. Although he was doing well, the kidney was not “producing” anything.  This couldn’t go on very long before they would need to take some action. 

  It was a kick in the gut when I least expected it.

Just when I finally felt like I could breathe again. 

I struggled to hold onto my peace. Father please help us…

  

  I hung up the phone, pushed down the concerns and went in to kiss my girls good night.  The room was dark, but I could see that Claire was already asleep. Ella was not.  I leaned in and noticed a worried look on her face.

  

 Sometimes a struggle with faith has less to do with feeling fears and more to do with the fears you are afraid to feel and deal with.  The ones you can’t even speak out loud.  The ones you keep locked up way down deep only to have them creep up in weak moments.

I had been keeping three locked way down deep. 

     I was afraid of losing my best friend. 

         I was afraid of not being able to support our girls alone.  

                But my biggest one was that our girls would lose their Daddy.

 It is not the first time they have lost a father. 

  Being adopted, they have already experienced this loss once in their young little lives. It is a thought that most people don’t usually consider when they think about adoption, but as an adoptive parent it is never far from my mind.    

  The first time I held Claire was one of the happiest moments of my life, but it was also mixed with the sense of overwhelming loss that she had already been through that had led to her being held in my arms. I remember the day we sat on the plane ready to leave her hometown. She was in a cute little red checked dress that I had bought for her and new red shoes that the orphanage had given her. I looked out the window and tried to blink back the tears realizing that as the plane took off, every tie she had with her birth family, her town, and her country would be gone.  

It is a loss every adoptee faces. 

I couldn’t bear the thought that being adopted into our family might lead them to another loss like that.  And so, I kept this fear pushed way down like a monster locked in a closet.

And that night, as I looked at Ella’s face, somehow I knew she had a monster too. 

“Ella, are you okay?”

“No Mommy, I’m not”  

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m afraid.”

“Of what?”

“My Daddy is sick. I’m afraid he’s gonna die and I won’t have a daddy anymore.”

She had said it.  

What I couldn’t even acknowledge.

That big, scary monster had just jumped out of the closet.

I couldn’t breathe.  Jesus help me…

And then out of the corner of my eye, I saw it.  I had packed it in the suitcase at the last minute. It was a new Bible we had been using with the girls. It had scriptures concerning different issues they might face marked.

Desperately, I grabbed it like it was my only hope at defeating this “monster”…

                 like it was my…

                                       sword.

  Together we read every scripture marked on fear and healing and trusting God. At the end of each verse, her face would light up with remarks like “I’m feeling better already” and “ I believe that’s true!” and “I know God will do that for my Daddy!” getting more and more excited with each verse until by the end she was jumping up and down on the bed.

I sat there in awe of what I was seeing-
                                       this amazing transformation from sadness to joy.

It was a monster-busting joy.

It was childlike faith.

I wanted it. I determined to walk in it.  Forgive me Lord…help my unbelief…

She took my hand to pray as we usually did when we finished reading, but this time she wanted to do it by herself. 

And then I sat and listened to my 6 year-old touch heaven. 
Yielding her sword, she spoke the Word that she had just read over her Daddy, with faith believing, that it was done.   
Then, she kissed me goodnight and went to sleep. 

No more monster.

^"Out of the mouth of babes and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger." Psalm 8:2 (ESV)

  I was awakened the next morning by the phone. It was the nurse calling to inform me that somewhere in the night, an adjustment was made and the kidney was now “producing”.  Producing so much that Ed was well enough to move to a regular room but unable to because it required a full-time ICU nurse just to handle the “production”! 

No more monster.

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PART 6: LESSONS LEARNED IN THE WAITING ROOM

On December 3^rd, I sat in the waiting room at Duke Hospital. The transplant surgery had started early that morning and we were awaiting news of how things were going.  I knew we would hear news about my mom first and then it would be awhile before we knew about Ed. We had been given a vibrating pager, as if we were waiting for a table at a restaurant.  We were told when the pager lit up and vibrated; we were to go to the desk for the medical staff’s update. Until then we were just to sit and wait.

   

Worth the Wait!

Waiting has never been one of my finest abilities.  Some people seem to be really good at it.  My husband is one of them. I remember when we were adopting each of our girls.  The wait was long (fifteen months for Claire and two years for Ella).  Ed was perfectly content to look forward to the day and let things just unfold as they should.

 I was a wreck.

I had an almost constant twitch in my eye and indigestion. I couldn’t sleep or eat. 

The wait was excruciating for me. There were a lot of unknowns but I knew in the end we would have a child no matter how long it took to get there or what it might be like when we did.  The wait was more than worth it.

But this wait was different.

The waiting room was filled with people.  I am an avid people watcher.  As I sat there, I couldn’t help but notice the faces of so many and wonder what there stories were and who they were waiting for.  I remember one lady in particular whose husband was in surgery as well. She had gotten word that things weren’t going well. 

There is nothing like the mixture of grief, worry, fear, hopefulness, and prayers that are found in a hospital waiting room.

It is almost palatable.

People clinging to their pager willing it to vibrate …..

                                                                   but afraid of what they might hear when it does.

It’s in the waiting that faith is really put to the test.     

And as I sat there…

I have never been so thankful for friends and family who sat with us for hours so we wouldn’t wait alone.

I have never been so thankful for the prayers of the saint who were covering us that day.

I have never been so thankful for a peace that passes all understanding and guards my heart and mind in Him.

           

If there is one thing I have learned in the waiting rooms of life, is that waiting is all about what we allow our minds to do. In the waiting, we tend to want to fix our minds on what we are waiting for –good or bad. Most of the time when we do that it only produces things like worry, anxiety, discontentment, fear... But the key is to fix our minds the One who sits right beside us in the waiting room.  He is who keeps us at peace.

 ³ You will keep in perfect peace all who trust in you, all whose thoughts are fixed on you! Isaiah 26:3 (NLT)

Knowing that He is there…

Makes me thankful that I am never waiting alone

Makes me thankful that he has covered this day in His blood

Makes me thankful that as I set my mind on Him and His Words my mind I wait in perfect peace…even as I watch my own pager light up and vibrate.

At the beeper alert, I think my body jumped up and was half way to front desk before my mind had a chance to catch up, my dad following closely behind me.  Mom was out of surgery and doing well. We were able to see her and she was awake and talking – her first words being “How’s Ed?” in her usual unselfish manner.  Aside from some normal swelling she looked well. 

Ed would follow a few hours later.  There were some difficulties finding a place for the new kidney because of his existing kidneys being so large but they eventually found a way and the new kidney (we call her “Agnes”) began to function immediately.  He was placed in ICU which was normal procedure but he was awake and talking coherently …well, as coherently as possible on a morphine drip! 

 The next 24 hours would be crucial for both of their recoveries, so my dad and I were sent home to let them get some rest and get a little rest ourselves…peace had guarded me through that day but holding on to it through that first night would prove to be difficult.

“Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed," says the LORD, who has compassion on you.”

Isaiah 54:10

 “[If you preserve sound judgment & discernment]...You can go to bed without fear; you will lie down and sleep soundly. You need not be afraid of sudden disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the Lord is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap.” Proverbs 3:24 - 26

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