It’s Thursday, so don’t forget to pray for Jo, her students, and the people of PNG.
Anyone else?
Psalm 27
1 The Lord is my light and my salvation—
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?
2 When the wicked advance against me
to devour me,
it is my enemies and my foes
who will stumble and fall.
3 Though an army besiege me,
my heart will not fear;
though war break out against me,
even then I will be confident.
4 One thing I ask from the Lord,
this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.
5 For in the day of trouble
he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent
and set me high upon a rock.
6 Then my head will be exalted
above the enemies who surround me;
at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;
I will sing and make music to the Lord.
7 Hear my voice when I call, Lord;
be merciful to me and answer me.
8 My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
Your face, Lord, I will seek.
9 Do not hide your face from me,
do not turn your servant away in anger;
you have been my helper.
Do not reject me or forsake me,
God my Savior.
10 Though my father and mother forsake me,
the Lord will receive me.
11 Teach me your way, Lord;
lead me in a straight path
because of my oppressors.
12 Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes,
for false witnesses rise up against me,
spouting malicious accusations.
13 I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living.
14 Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the Lord.
Wandering Views 
Thanks for prayers for my niece traveling home from Norway. Her last flight was delayed nearly two hours because of a fuel leak with the plane. She ended up on a different plane because of that, otherwise had an uneventful journey back.
Hubby’s important phone call did not go well, but the person he was talking to knows without a doubt now where hubby stands, and it’s not the end of the story yet. Thank you for praying.
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Today is the day eighteen year old is off to meet his bio dad. He will be picking up his twenty year old sister from my dad’s house, then driving to meet their bio maternal grandmother and off to prison to meet with bio dad. This is the Easter visit so they allow three visitors. Prayer for ease of travel and that all would be mindful of their words. Bio dad needs to see eighteen year old for the young man he is, not the five year old he abandoned to the police when he leaped out the window to escape the meeting with them. He has been in regular mail contact for a couple of years now and phone calls for the past year. I wrote to him a while back and cautioned him to treat these children with care as they do want a relationship with him but they are not there to be used. He claims to be a believer and that he is trying, though he admits he does seem to subconsciously sabotage himself. He has now spent over half of his life in prison or jail. But God can and does make people new. May it be so and may this reunion be blessed. He gets out in about thirty days. We thought it best if son met him while he was still in prison and others would be around.
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I am sharing Michelle’s OFFensive prayer with BG’s paternal family to pray. She had a therapy session yesterday and her dad met here there. He said she was in a good mood when she went in but had done a 180 when she came out. He also said the therapist gave him the stink eye. BG went to the boyfriend’s house afterward. She got upset with me because I couldn’t take off yesterday afternoon and go do something with her. I had told her we would do anything she wanted after 5 pm. As it is right now we have plans to spend Saturday together.
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Mumsee, that biological connection is strong. I had not seen my mother in about 10 years when BG was born. Even though my dad, my in-laws, and my Mama Ruth were there to help me and take care of me, what I really wanted was MY mother to take care of me. It was irrational because the mother I knew wouldn’t have been any help at all.
You have raised him well. Hopefully he will go to this meeting with eyes open and heart guarded. Perhaps there really is true change in the heart of the bio-dad. I know a man who truly did find Christ in prison. You can’t be around him more than 15 minutes before he tells you his story and wants to know your relationship with God. Being around him is for lack of a better word—comfortable.
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We have always encouraged the bio connection, but do it as safely as possible. We allowed bio parents to write until they became inconsistent. Now that they are eighteen, we encourage them to contact the bios when they are ready and expect any thing. I have told them they may want to go live with or around the bios and that is fine with us. We will be here if they ever need us.
The Ethiopian was convinced he was going back to Ethiopia where living was good, until he went there and found out a few things he had forgotten. Like plumbing. Now, he and his sis are trying to get their bio mom over for visits, and have, but he has learned he has nothing in common with her as they don’t even speak the same language. He won’t tell her he is in the military. The others may have picked up something from that as they have not pursued a relationship with the bio families yet. I tell them it may happen later, no rush.
Two of the first three have had contact, the third refuses to have anything to do with them. She is a tad judgemental. The oldest of the three has had the bio dad try to get money from her and been able to refuse. The bio mom also stole money from her so she now keeps her distance. But they continue to try to reach out to them and I think that is a good thing.
God is always there and able to change people to be like Him. It is a process.
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Yesterday’s Doctors appointment was kind of good news. It is Sciatica. It is unpleasant but usually resolves itself in 4 to 6 weeks. No surgery and since it is temporary I can have drugs.
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Did they give you any exercises to do Kbells?
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That is good news, KBells.
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Well, the next therapy session is April 13 and my presence has been requested.
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By daughter or by therapist?
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I am not sure. I was told by the daughter that the next session was for the two of us to discuss her living situation and some other things, but she didn’t want to go into it right now because she doesn’t want to hurt my feelings or cause a fight. She “feels like she is going backwards” because she had to come back here to live.
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Kim, they just told me to do core exercises.
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Mumsee, I know the day will come when the Kid will want to met his bio family. What is a good age? I’m thinking old enough to handle it but young enough that we still have legal control in case they try to take advantage of him.
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KBells, depends on the situation, of course, but I think ideally, it would be while you are still in charge. Our Ethiopian had family connection through his sister so they never lost contact with their bio mom. We encouraged him to go with sister to Ethiopia to see mom when he was about sixteen. That was good for him so he could understand what it was really like and not just his memories from when he left there at nine.
Our first three, we had a number and address for the bio grandma and she kept in contact with them. We encouraged that by taking them to visit her and to their family reunions. Their bio parents were not supposed to have contact until they turned eighteen but we allowed them to write letters that we prescreened. When it became obvious they were not going to be consistent, we started holding the letters until they were sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen. They read them but none of them wanted them so I still keep them. As they got older, they started initiating. Now they want no contact with bio mom but are pursuing contact with bio dad and he is responding consistently. The youngest of that group is now eighteen and he has fairly strong boundaries. The oldest is twenty and she does not. The nineteen year old is waiting to see how things go.
Another group has a twenty one and a nineteen and they younger three. The twenty one year old has spoken to the bio mom on FB but has shown no inclination to go visit. The nineteen year old has not spoken to them or anything. Nor does he want contact with the twenty one year old sister. We would allow written communication with those at home but nothing more.
The other group has a nineteen year old but he has chosen to not contact them. We did try to contact an aunt and uncle early on in the adoption because they have some of the siblings but we were told they wanted no contact with these two for life. Seems a bit harsh but it is their call. I try to encourage all of them to at least contact their bio moms to let them know how thye are doing. I would want to know.
So, I suspect it will a combination of what your son is wanting and how much you know of the bio family that should determine any contact. With the internet, there really is no such thing as a closed adoption anymore. And I figure, the more people involved in their lives the better. As long as they can be protected from bad manipulation.
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Update on Kaitlyn. She awoke earlier this morning and her mom had gone for breakfast. She found she couldn’t breathe at all and hit the panic button. I cannot imagine the fear as she couldn’t even take a breath. She has now been put on a different oxygen supply and because of the machinery can no longer walk to the bathroom and must use a bed pan. Poor girl. Sherri and I started packing up her stuff that is still here at camp as the rooms upstairs where she was living are going to be used by other staff as we move into the busy season. We didn’t get even half packed up, but it was tough knowing that it was unlikely that Kaitlyn would be the one unpacking her stuff. But we’re still praying for a miracle.
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Kbells – I am so relieved for you.
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Kim – I know this is a cliche, but you could tell BG that sometimes you have to take a step backwards before you can go forward. Such as: if you start to walk down the wrong road, you have to go backwards to get to the right road.
My Nightingale is a good example of that.
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Well our Saturday is no longer. Her dad wanted to have her over for burgers on Sunday but she has to work until 6 that day. She wI’ll be going to his house on Saturday. She needs to spend time with him and I understand that. It just hurts a little.
I asked Mr P the other night if we could please go to New Orleans f I r Mother’s Day. Are 18 years of wanting it to be something g special I realize it isn’t. I am going to be selfish and do something for me.
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Kim, my hunch is that on the other side of these hard times you will have the sweet times. This is the tough time, but that doesn’t mean it will always be the tough time and I hope it won’t be.
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