It doesn't have to be this way

Alright, here's a confession: I stalk blogs. That's not the real confession, most of you already knew that, the real confession is that I don't know everyone whose blogs I follow. I know, I'm a creeper, but its really only two families who are crazy about adoption and orphans. I love reading about their experiences and their kids are really cute!!



One of the mothers just returned from Ethiopia where she met her daughter's birth mother and spent some time at the various orphanages there, including the one where her daughter lived. Here is her post about her last day there, if you would please go read it really fast.

I have two reactions reading this.

1. Why don't those children have parents?

It breaks my heart to think of these children so desperate for parental love and affection. Someone to care for them and love them. Why does nobody want them? Is there anyone who would love those siblings and take them in? Or will they wait forever because they will not be separated?


2. Does it have to be like this?

If you haven't read this post that I wrote, please do. (sorry, so many links). The experience that this woman had in Ethiopia is exactly what I was thinking about when I wrote that post. It breaks my heart that these children are so desperate for a family. It breaks my heart that they are waiting. It breaks my heart that for some, like the siblings she met, the waiting will never end.

Why does it have to be like this?

It kills me that these children were competing for her affection and attention. They were competing for a mother.

Also, the boy's response when she told him that he had a beautiful family. He said "I don't have a family, they are gone now" and she blogs, "I just lowered my head wanting to crawl under a rock for using the word "family" with this child." This boy has 3 blood siblings, but doesn't think that he has a family. He has countless children living in the orphanage with him, but he doesn't have a "family". He has adults who work for the orphanage to love and care for him, but they are not his "family". He has a God who loves and cares for him more than any mother and father possibly could.

He has family. It's just not a "family" in our sense of the word. 


So why does he think that his family is gone?

Why is he still waiting for someone to love him?

Does it have to be like this?