Christmas Expectations...

I am not sure what I had expected for Christmas this year. I had done research, read articles on the best ways to keep Christmas relaxed and not overwhelming for an ASD kid. I had prepared myself for Adi not appearing interested or being indifferent but I was not prepared for the look of betrayal on his face. The confusion and hurt that I saw in his eyes and the anger that emerged. It broke my heart.

Christmas Eve we headed to the Vandy Children’s Hospital to help serve at their Christmas Eve service. Something about being there and coming home to open their Christmas Eve Jammies triggered something painful in my boy. He came after me with a vengeance and clawed, pinched and hit me in the face till Brian could get him pulled off. I had dealt with this before…but this time his face broke my heart. I was the woman that tried to step into the role of mom to him and he was angry, hurt, sad and LOST. Brian pulled him into our room to calm while I lay on the floor of Adi’s room sobbing and asking God how to fix this. As a mom, I just want to be able to fix the pain and make it easier but I cannot save my boy from this grief. He must walk through it and slowly come to terms with the changes in his world. At the same time, we were receiving emails from birth parents, sharing their pictures and memories from this time last year. They were hurting too and I was struggling to comfort everyone that was feeling so raw and exposed.

Christmas morning was just about as hard. The same anger still resided in my little boy and I was stressed because his only source of comfort had to go to church. Daddy was leaving us for a while to go play for the Christmas service. Adi retreated to his room. Laying in his bed and withdrawing into a world of electronics. Anna Beth and I followed his lead and allowed him the space. After an hour, I went to his door and requested to come in and hug him. He agreed but offered little in the way of communication. I left his room with a small amount of hope as he had no anger left in him. A few minutes later Adi emerged from his room and climbed right on top of me, ready to quietly re-enter the family. By the time daddy arrived back home, we were on better footing and ready to face the rest of our day.

This first year will be the hardest. Each event or milestone is a step farther from the past and with that brings greater trust but also grief. We are never sure what the triggers are or what will trigger memories but they cause raw and painful emotions to surface. How do you comfort a 5 year old that has all the feels but no way to process them? How do you explain the logic of what happened to him when he does not process thoughts in a logical way? The answer…you don’t. You pray hard, you comfort when you can, you allow for a safe space to express those emotions and you wait for the day when you can share with him his story. How do you comfort birth parents that made a hard /brave choice but are now grieving a loss you can only attempt to imagine? The answer…you don’t. You offer hope, you open your heart to listen to their grief, you share what you can, and you pray God continues to open the door to share salvation with them.

There are days that I wonder how far God can stretch me before I break. But isn’t that what God wants? He wants to break me so more of HIM can be revealed. He wants our story to reflect HIS redemptive power. This Christmas there was joy too. It was that little flicker of hope for what God was doing. Each moment of raging allows for a deeper trust. It provides opportunities for us to pray over Adi out loud so he can be witness to the realness and comfort of this Jesus we always talk about. It gives us opportunities to pour out grace on people that were once strangers to us but are now forever a part of our hearts. The orchestration of our family could have only happened by the hand of God and there is hope in that. I am not sure what 2017 will hold and the “TYPE A” in me would love to plan it out but 2016 has proven that to go deeper with my Jesus, I must surrender my plans. I must place my trust in God and allow Him to continue to push me farther from my comfort zones. My expectations destroy opportunities for God to work in my heart. I’m setting goals that allow flexibility for God’s plans to take precedence. As hard as this story has been, I would choose it over and over again.