The longer we hang out together …

… the more likely it’ll be that you disagree with me about something.

I can totally handle it.

My roles in life have included mom, teacher, writer, and pastor’s wife—so I’m well-versed in disagreement.

Fun fact: 15 years ago, I was thrust into a teaching position I didn’t ask for (fun story for another day), when the mother of one of my students sent me an 1,185-word e-mail in which she carefully and thoroughly dissected everything wrong with me. I still have the e-mail just for posterity.

She was probably right about a bunch of it.
And actually, now that I’m thinking about it, she probably missed some things.

But the beautiful thing about her e-mail is that no single e-mail since that time has ever really hurt. I’m okay if we disagree about most things (though I’d prefer we do so charitably).

But there is one thing that I believe deep in my bones we have to agree on. Or at least you have to understand that this is a foundational truth for me on this site about which I will not be shaken:

Can we agree that healing is possible?

I’m talking specifically about the unhealed parts of your foster or adoption story.

Maybe healing won’t happen today, or in a month, or even in a year. Maybe it’ll take a professional counselor or a dedicated friend.

But can we agree it’s … possible?

I want nothing more than for the foster and adoption community to thrive.

Over the years, I’ve attended countless support groups for both adoptive parents and adoptees in which we’ve sat in a circle and talked about our shared pain, and then we’ve slurped a coffee and gone home.

On one hand, I see the incredible value of talking about the adoption journey. I have zero desire—either in person or on this site—to sanitize your loss or skip the parts of your story that bring you the most pain. I want to talk about those things. (And we will.)

Further, I acknowledge that the adoption journey can be ripe with unresolved wounds.

And just for the record, if you say you’ve had a hard journey, I believe you.

But at some point on this path, we have to ask ourselves if we believe healing can happen.
Maybe more to the point: do we want it to happen?

The answers to these questions require great risk. But they also (I believe) offer incredible reward.

Important clarification: I do not subscribe to the power of positive thinking. I wholeheartedly reject the idea that every story can be healed with shiny affirmations and positive self-talk. You won’t find that on this site. Toxic positivity is fundamentally unhelpful and rarely leads to any true or lasting change.

But healing is a totally different beast.

I believe in the possibility of healing with the same confidence I believe the sun will rise tomorrow.

So here’s my challenge to you

Take 5 minutes today to imagine what your life and story would look like if you could experience true and lasting healing from what’s hurt you.

Don’t get stuck in the weeds of working theories for how to make it happen. Just imagine how your life might change if you could embrace your foster or adoption story as part of a greater story God is writing with your life.

You can’t even imagine how much I want you (us!) to be healthy and whole.

But first, let’s talk about what healing is not.