gotcha day, 2 years later

On May 29, 2011 a hurricane hit our home. Well, it felt like a hurricane. His name was Wang Longshan, but you can call him Judder. On that day a dude weighing less than 20 pounds turned our world upside down. What just hit us? What do we do now? Were we ready for this? Let’s just say, these thoughts have hit our minds almost daily since that day.

Now don’t get me wrong. Judd is a lot of fun. We love him. His brothers love him. He is one of us, and the DNA of our family has been forever altered by his Genghis blood. He is full of life, laughter, curiosity, and a disproportional amount of noise. Two years ago this unstoppable force collided into our little family, and the dust is still settling.

We were unprepared for Judd, which ironically all the adoption training said to be prepared to feel. There is no webinar or book that can prepare any family for a new family member, let alone one from a past as traumatic and varied as an abandoned kid from an orphanage. We have no idea what Judd had been through. All we saw was a happy, cute kid whose only earthly possession was a squeaky Mickey Mouse toy, but Judd brought much more than that with him into our family. And we’re still realizing what those things are.

There are dozens of books on attachment and parenting in adoption, and I am thankful for Karyn Purvis and others who have helped us greatly. But the sheer stack of books on the subject tells you something: attachment and parenting an adoptive child is hard for everyone involved. It’s just hard. We’ve learned about orphanage behavior, sensory problems, learned helplessness, mommy shopping, mixed maturity and other categories we never had before (here’s a great article if you are into such things). When Judd throws a tantrum we try to figure out if he’s scared, confused, controlling, defiant, or just a normal 3 year old. It’s impossible to know sometimes. And everyone had different advice ranging from hugging his poor neck to spanking his defiant rear. Parenting an adoptive child can feel like a complicated mess.

However, I still believe that the right things are usually the hard things. I still believe that adoption was right for our family, even though we feel like a hot mess half the time. If I’ve learned anything in these past two years it was that Judd was meant to be in our family. God sovereignly chose a nameless boy left under the flags at a shopping mall in Hohhot, China to be in our unimportant family in Knoxville, TN. That fact still staggers me, and it has been driven home over the past two years.

It’s easy to understand that Judd needed us, but even more so, we needed Judd. Our family wasn’t complete without him, and God knew that. We are different people than we were two years ago, and I believe that in the coming years, we will better understand God’s grace, our adoption in Christ, and unselfish love in ways that we never could have without Judd.

So, here’s to two years of little Genghis Graves.

Judder, you are funny, loud, full of life, naughty, determined, active, smart, and exactly what we needed. We are glad you are home.