Open My Eyes

For three days in a row now, I have experienced something that has literally broken my heart. I'll start with Wednesday....while I was sitting in a doctor's office waiting to visit with the doctor, a lady walks in with a baby in an infant carrier. I thought to myself, "I bet that little baby girl is around Landen's age." The lady walks up to the receptionists' window to check-in and I overhear a comment made by the lady with the baby. She said, "I don't know her middle name, do you?" I thought how weird for someone to not know a child's middle name. Whose baby does she have with her? The lady finished checking in and went to sit down. That's when I saw her name tag....a DHS worker. I felt tears welling up in my eyes. I could not imagine my child being in someone else's possession. I asked around at the doctor's office and evidently the girl had just been removed from her home and DHS is required to bring her to a licensed physician within 24 hours for an exam before she is placed in a foster home. I felt my heart break. I love my kiddos so much and to know that something I have done is causing them to not be with me would devastate me. She was a beautiful little girl, very alert, eager for love. She had such a sweet disposition--she was trying her best to get the attention of the DHS lady.

The next day I was again waiting in a doctor's office and a lady in her 50's walks in with an infant carrier. She was a foster mom and the baby girl in her possession was just 2 weeks old and weighed 7.5 lbs. Evidently she had been removed from her mother's possession at birth because the mother already has 2 other children in DHS custody. No offense to the foster mom, but it was so sad to watch her interact with the baby--there was no bond, no love in her actions. The baby cried for several minutes while the lady filled out the paperwork--I wanted so badly to get up and soothe her! I again started crying....this baby girl was smaller than any of my children at birth! I remember the moment each of my kids came into the world--I could not grasp what it would feel like to lose my kids from the moment they arrived. I wanted to just take that baby girl home with me (as Richie is reading this, he has stopped breathing and is in sheer panic I am gonna show up with a kid one day).

Today at another doctor's office, I saw a grandmother who had been granted custody of her 3 grandchildren. The mother, a meth addict had burned down their house. She is now in prison. There were two boys around 2nd grade and kindergarten and another baby around 18 months. The boys were talking but not acting horribly and as I walked by, the grandmother just hauls off and kicks one of them. I was so shocked.

I don't know why I am witnessing these children's struggles with no parents...I am not sure what it means to me. Maybe it's just to ask for one more voice to pray for them. Pray that these kiddos get good homes with good people who really want to love them. Pray for our system--pray that these kids (like the 2 week old) don't have to stay "in the system" but rather are available to adopt by loving parents! Pray for the parents of these children--that they may be able to rehabilitate and learn to love their kids as they are called to do.