So several years ago i fell in love. The kind of mad, crazy love that makes you impulsively consider doing things you never thought you would- that was totally me. You toy with marriage, even if it wouldn't be right. You entertain leaps into the unknown which are definitively at odds with logic, practicality, ethics, and finances. You joke, with just a small part of you being serious, about the illegal activities which might remove the barriers keeping you apart. (Or is this just me?)
Of course such love fades over time with distance- it almost has to. It isn't healthy to maintain that level of fervor for long, especially when the situation just doesn't work out Still a smaller, more subdued version of the emotion lingers, where that person burrowed deeply into your heart.
He's eight (nine?) now. When I left he was two. Right before I left he pushed himself to his knees for the first time, and I took it as my going away present. He had cerebral palsy, and for the year and a half I was over there I worked with him closely assisting the nurse with play therapy at the group home in which he lived.
The love was not unrequited. i smile to remember one day when one of the caregivers came up the stairs to tell me that he was screaming, and would calm down for no one. When he saw me he grinned and the crying ceased as if on cue. This may have been more to get him upstairs than to see me, but i like to fancy i had something to do with it.
Of course at the time he was not adoptable. i was 26, had never held a "real" job, was single, and contrary to popular belief living on support is not as lucrative a proposition as people assume, as missionaries often come home more poor than they were when they left (unless there's a secret to church support no one has told me). Still, i joked about taking him home. The caregivers told me to do it; his grandmother would have encouraged it i believe.
For a time thereafter, i thought about it. Someday, i told myself i might adopt him. Reality set in fairly quickly however. Could i handle a special needs child? What if he became a life-long care case? Where was my income?
i hit re-entry shock pretty hard. i entered graduate school very shortly after returning. i inherited by default a home full deterioration and necessary repairs. i struggled to find a job. i became a caregiver.
i began talking to people i knew about adopting him, figuring they would be better caregivers than i anyway but i could still be a part of his life. i cringed at the slightest hint that he was being adopted by someone else, despite being happy at the thought.
Distance bred emotional distance, and i didn't care quite as much anymore.
Then a friend decided they would prayerfully think of adopting him.
Then they became pregnant and unable to pursue the adoption at this time, if ever. The pregnancy is wonderful news, and the fall through totally God's will.
It's reopened some of those crazy thoughts however.
i'm very nearly 33 now. i'm still completely single. Now, however, i have a full-time job with really good benefits at the most family friendly non-profit i could imagine. i still own a deteriorating house, but we're making progress. i'm still a caregiver.
Sometimes, though, i daydream about caregiving for two. Sometimes i know full well that i couldn't take on any more; sometimes feel woefully unequipped for what i have on my plate. There are other times, though, when i wonder if i could do it, if i could at the very least do medical sponsorship.
Don't worry anyone who reads this though- i do know it's a crazy idea.; What's life though if you can't entertain insanity at least a little bit though, at least in your daydreams.
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