Happy birthday eve

This one is hard to write.

It’s the eve of her birthday. A day that seemed impossibly far away just a few months ago. A day that we had at one time hoped would include a face-to-face celebration at home.

Our family loves birthdays….we often create a multi-phased celebration that can take days or even weeks. One year, I gave myself a birthday month. Yep – a full four weeks of celebrating me. We love birthdays as a communal event. Even when it is “just family”, it’s a crowd. Favorite foods. Lots of presents. Lots of laughter.

One year she had a My Little Pony cake, where the cake was a sheet cake decorated with all the new my little pony sets, that were also part of the gifts. One year it was a French toast buffet – all the different types of French toast and a wide variety of toppings. There was the cupcake cake (a very yummy trend for that year). There was the donut cake – stacks on stacks of donuts. Actually, one of my biggest challenges in putting on my kids birthday parties is figuring out where candles can go, because the cakes are non-traditional or outlandish.

It’s a great joy of a mom – to celebrate your child’s birthday. It’s a day you share with them – the day they joined society. After months of being only yours – now they enter the world. And for all those amazing mom’s who adopt, I’ve heard many similar stories about the “gottcha days” – a shared moment that changes your identity forever – and theirs. Your stories are forever entwined – even when they are hard.

There isn’t a day of her confinement that hasn’t also distinctly marked my life. Her story will always include these months away. So will mine. We are forever interwoven – she is always my daughter and I am always her mother. And so while she mourns tomorrow for so many reasons – I have a myriad of my own.

It has been said “pain is inevitable, suffering is optional” – meaning, we can choose how to meet each circumstance. We can choose how we experience pain. We can choose how much we suffer.

I have been seeing God’s blessings and faithfulness through this all. I have been seeing Bunny used to bring Jesus to dark places. I’ve seen Bunny grow as a young woman – in empathy, in wisdom, in character. I’ve seen Bunny receive opportunities that actually help her to excel in academic, despite the multiple transitions that interrupted her progress.

But tonight…tonight I suffer. Tonight I choose to suffer with her. To join in her tears. To mourn from a distance. To imagine what tomorrow could have been. To feel the depth of loneliness.

Tomorrow we celebrate her from afar. She will have a face time call with her whole family. I will bake her a cake (at her request!) and we will eat it while having her favorite foods for dinner. It will be a party in honor of her – despite her absence.

But tonight…..tonight I will give myself over to the impossibleness of this situation….cause tomorrow is my baby’s birthday…..