I've been thinking of writing this post for a little while now. I don't know how many individuals who were once in our care, or their families, will stumble across this blog, but I thought I'd put it out there just in case someday, someone wants to know more about where their life or their child's life began. We do our best to send our babies home with photos, special objects, books, etc., but I thought I'd like to tell you a few things about our heart for you while you were in our care (and even now - once loved, always loved, even though we knew we had to let you go).
1. From the minute you entered our door, you were loved. We (and you) might not know much about your history before you came to us, but from a very young age and even while you were still waiting, while others higher up than us were deciding what would happen with your case, we loved you very dearly. You were never alone in the world, not while you were with us. We aren't perfect, but we did our best to care for you, protect you, and love you. We knew it was a privilege to be able to care for you.
2. We prayed for you and we still pray for you. For your whole life, you will have people who think of you and pray earnestly for you. We know that God has you in His hand and we are thankful for that. You likely won't remember us, but know that we still petition Him on your behalf.
3. We know God is in control. We have very little control over where our babies go and the decisions the social workers make, and sometimes they make different decisions than we would, if the choice was in our hands. But it isn't in our hands, and ultimately, it isn't in the hands of the social workers or the judges or any of the people legally involved in your life. The same God who turns the heart of the king, knows what He is doing and guides your life as well.
4. We wanted a family for you, not an orphanage. Children aren't meant to grow up in orphanages, and we wholeheartedly believe that. Unfortunately, there are complications. Paperwork takes a long time to go through (or comes to a grinding halt). Someone higher up than us loses a file. Biological parents didn't register for a birth certificate, or were not South African, further complicating things. The social workers struggled to find the perfect match. There were medical issues. We didn't want you to have to spend so many formative months (or years) of your infancy and childhood in a temporary setting, and we did the best we could to hurry the process (as much as we knew we would miss you when you left).
5. We wished that none of you had to experience whatever tragedy that landed you with us in the first place. There are a lot of reasons why children end up in care, and no matter what those reasons are, loss is a sad and hard thing and we hate that it had to happen.
6. We did our best to provide you with consistent caregivers, appropriate developmental activities, nutritious food, etc. We know these things often slip through the cracks in a group setting, but we know how important they are for babies' growth. We read you stories, sang you songs, played with you on the floor. If you were old enough, your face would light up when you saw "your" people, and you knew they loved you.
7. If you were adopted by someone we know, we were THRILLED that we would get to see you grow up. If we never saw you again, we wondered what you looked like, what your personality was, what your life was like, and we were so happy when the social worker showed us pictures. We hoped that someday we would get to see you again, although we knew it would likely never happen, and we definitely didn't push for that, because we knew you had your own life to live. We missed you, though. Your picture might even still be on our wall. We still talk about different babies..."do you remember how this baby used to do X?" "So and so was the sweetest!"
8. We care about protecting your privacy, and we did our best to follow the guidelines about what we couldn't share with the world. We know your story is yours to tell, or keep to yourself, not something to be published by others on social media.
9. We are not perfect. Maybe we didn't give one baby enough tummy time, or left another one in the jumper a bit too long some days, or became impatient, or lost your milestone chart, or didn't realize you had gotten into the baby powder and spread it EVERYWHERE! Things are a bit hectic when you are caring for five babies, but we loved you and tried to care for you well, even if we did make mistakes sometimes.
10. Above all, what we want most for you is that you come to know Christ as your Lord and Savior. That was our prayer then, and it is our prayer now. We pray that God saves you and gives you a new heart, that you know that this matters more than anything else in the world. We pray that you grow up to serve Him faithfully. We long to see you again one day in Heaven, and to worship around the throne of God together! We may have had a short time with you here on earth, but we would love to spend eternity with you!
We love you!
Auntie Abbie
