Day 131: Impossibly, horribly true

Tonight, I am not sure what happened. My TV seemed to choose a channel all by itself. After watching some DVRed sit coms, I was watching Oprah. I don't usually watch Oprah because she is sometimes overly congratulatory of how great she is. She has done a lot of wonderful things, but I think she has allowed her head to get a bit swollen and I have a hard time watching her salute to "I'm awesome!" If she were really as awesome as she seems to believe, she would do her good deeds in quiet, where God instructs our generosity to be so as to be of pure motivation. It is a tough call to answer, but just saying.

Anyways, enough of my anti-Oprah tirade. For all her pride, she has done some pretty powerful shows. The show that happened to be airing tonight, seemed to be from earlier today. I was immediately moved to tears by the story of a young man, Clayton Grad, who had been horribly abused by his father and step-mother when he was six. The details of the abuse were sickening. He was kept in a closet, dog fencing surrounding his body so he could not sit or move, much less escape the tiny 2x2 closet. He was not fed nor allowed to use the restroom. He was punished with urine and feces when he could no longer control his bodily functions. He was kept in the closet for most of his life during a long enough time period that he cannot recall when it started. Luckily he was rescued by a police officer who God made sure listened to his "gut" and was later raised by a loving aunt who did much to give him the life any child deserves.

The audio recordings of the timorous six year old recounting the horrible abuse turned my stomach and made my heart ache. I just can't understand how these people can have children, but I can't. I can't understand how they could look at this sweet little boy and torture him. Pausing the TV, I held my daughter so tightly and chased her around the living room, tickling her and kissing her. I must have told her "Mommy loves you" a hundred times tonight.

Being Friday night, I didn't rush to get her to bed early, but she's had a rough week with teething: fever, crabbiness, loss of appetite, sleepiness, temper tantrums. She started acting "done" around 9:30. She had crossed a threshold and nothing made her happy. I took her in to change into her jammies, but she was hurting and tired and just started crying. It broke my heart. I just held her and rocked her. I gave her toys and got her to laughing, but instead of putting her down to bed alone, I couldn't bring myself to let her go.

I wanted to be a mom from the time I was 16. I had a dream that I was pregnant and it was so powerful. I wasn't in any rush, but I wanted to be a youngish mom. I wanted to have several children, maybe adopt and foster. Then life got in the way and I was not able to conceive or not in a relationship in which I wanted to. By the time I met the man with whom I wanted to have children, I was no longer able to even hope for a biological child. We started looking into adoption. When we realized how costly it was, I began to realize that I might never be a mom. I was devastated, but trying desperately to accept that as my lot. If God meant for me not to be a mom, maybe He had a reason I shouldn't be a parent.

When things started falling into place, and we finally knew that we would be parents, I was over the moon. But it didn't seem real until I held her tiny finger in my hand. My friends said they could see my joy in the picture of me by her cribside in the NICU. I still can't believe how lucky I am to get to be her mom. Until you have a child, you can't imagine the type of love you have for this itty bitty person. It is gut wrenching. Loving her is so intense sometimes it almost hurts.

After she fell asleep, I held her in my arms. I wanted to squeeze her so tightly as if I could hug my love into her so she would always be able to carry it around in her heart. I watched the rest of the show I had paused and cradled my sleeping angel, trying not to wake her with soft kisses as I tried to understand how anyone could take the precious gift they'd been given and do such things. I talked to her as I carried her to bed. "I love you so much," I said. "You deserve a perfect mommy, but all you got is me. I am gonna do my best to love you enough to make up for my mistakes." I know she couldn't hear me, but I needed to tell her one more time how much she was wanted. I was meant to be her mom. God planned it from the start even if I didn't know it and she was always wanted by me. But I did wonder what life she might have had if her birth mother chose not to give her up. It would have been filled with poverty, transcience, drugs, cigarettes, jail and dysfunction, maybe neglect and potentially abuse. I am brought almost to tears imagining that life for my precious Lil Bit. It shouldn't happen to any child.

But it happens everyday. 5-6 children died today from abuse. Every ten seconds a case of abuse is reported. That number is more staggering when you think about the fact that most abuse is never reported. Much of what we would consider abusive behavior isn't even recognized at the time by the child as wrong and if reported, would not result in the child being removed from the home due to an overworked, underfunded system.

The day I met my daughter was the happiest day of my life. I am far from perfect and have my days when I could be more patient or more energetic or know what to do. Being a mom is an impossible job. I am going to screw it up, I am going to leave her with memories of me being angry or impatient. It is literally impossible to parent perfectly or even close, but no one should have a childhood like Clayton. And yet, it is impossibly, unbelievably, disgustingly true for one out of every 110 (or so) children.

I see what happens to some of those children when they get to me in high school. While they believe they are adults, I can see the little broken children inside. It hurts me. I have reported a few cases of abuse. One family moved away immediately after the investigation started. Another was found unsubstantiated. One girl I sent home with bags of food and got her in touch with counselors, but she is still in the home full of neglect. I am not allowed to take them home. Heck, I can't even give them a ride home legally. But that doesn't stop me from wanting to.

I know God is the master and has a plan, but I can't find in myself an answer as to how such suffering of children is allowed to happen. Especially when there are literally hundreds of thousands of couples just like us waiting for a child whom they will love and nurture. I just can't grasp how these parents are allowed to exist by God or man, but they do . . . and there are no words for the grief I feel for them tonight.