Finding the Edges

by Jon Simpson

heavy.  intimidating.  sometimes just... wow. i've only just started the journey with the lives of my two girls, and from what relatively little i've experienced with them and know of them and their history, i'm aware this path will test (is testing) my mettle in ways other stretches of the road haven't.

i'm a "stranger," showing up five years late to "accept" these girls, to tell them they are beautiful (not because of how they look or behave, but because they just are), to show them they are loved, to demonstrate they are valuable beyond any earthly appraisal.  and i'll likely spend the rest of my days living out the proof of it.  my integrity in these areas will play a critical role in those truths having any chance of taking root in them.

if i'm coming off sounding melodramatic, it's not my intention. i sincerely don't believe i'm exaggerating in the least.

one of things about children that i'm often grateful for (and other times not so grateful, when it's popped up to bite me) is that children aren't usually baffled by bull.  in their simplicity of thought and careful observation of conduct, they know that how you behave is who you really are.  the father who talks a good game and then doesn't have the integrity to "walk the walk" is on shaky ground.  yet i think children usually have such capacity for hope and faith in the human race; it certainly surpasses mine.   so while it may take a good while for the ties between a father and a child to stretch thin (as the child tries to somehow rationalize incongruence away), when it finally does break, it breaks hard.

it's a strange dynamic that my girls are dealing with, having no concept of father.  their caregivers at the orphanage have tried to teach the girls not to trust strangers, and yet they've also been told to trust a changing cast of caregivers and teachers.  Now, without any previous life experience of what a family or a mother and/or father are, my girls are thrust out of everything they've known (as imperfect as it may have been) and into a drastically different paradigm.  what a combination.

so they've got to figure it out.  and we've got to help them.  and it's a process...for the girls and for us. we don't know exactly where they're at, what they're getting and how well, and what they're not.  and they don't know where we're at, how things work, what the real differences are between us and the other institutions they've been in...

and, if you know kids, it'll be no surprise that one of the ways the girls are figuring things out is by finding the edges.  discovering where the boundaries are.  and what happens when they get crossed.  by doing this, they're finding out who their father is.  they're finding out WHAT a father is.  and i'm finding out what kind of father i am.

This is the final in a series of four posts by guest blogger Jon Simpson.  Thanks, Jon, for sharing thoughts on the journey.

Check out Jon's website or blog for more on the "thoughts and happenings in the life of a musician, singer, songwriter, traveler, father, husband, brother, son, etc., etc."

of love and trust, part 2

how good am i at enduring mean-spirited mocking from a child?  at dealing with having my buttons intentionally pushed?  (children are good at discovering these quickly.)  

in their ignorance, at times they'll argue vehemently that things are one thing when i say they're another, or they'll fight tooth and nail to try to get us to go one place while we're trying to take them someplace else that we know they'll like even more.  they'll draw a random line in the sand over something insignificant (since the real point is to put me to the test) and refuse to back down.  they'll test me on, "don't do that again." they'll also try to get me to play favorites, buttering me up when the other has been naughty, or throwing one another under the bus by tattling when one of them has done something naughty out of sight.  and when they're hurting in some way (physically or emotionally), they may or may not cry out, but they're watching to see if i care and, if i do, how i will respond. i could go on...

another element in all of this is that i have boundaries in dealing with my girls that are completely different from those i have with my boys.  my options are limited in how i discipline them because of what their lives have been.  responding to my girls in certain ways that would be completely acceptable in fathering my boys would be quite harmful in fathering my girls (and incidentally have nothing to do with the differences between fathering girls and boys).

For example: my wife or i might have given our boys a little swat on the backside to get their attention after an outburst of misbehavior/naughtiness; we would not use this same type of discipline with our girls because of the physical abuse they've seen or experienced. similarly, while we might have given one of our boys a "time out" as a disciplinary measure, my wife and i don't consider this a viable option for our girls.  Put extremely simply, we're working as hard as we can to build healthy ties between our girls and us that are stronger and longer-lasting than anything they've previously known.  Isolating them as a form of discipline would work completely counter to that aim.  Discipline for our girls has to operate, and is informed by, the context of the very different nature of their lives to date versus the nature of our boys' childhood.

in all this they're finding out: can they trust me?  can they entrust themselves to me?

i wake up every morning knowing this is a tall order.

i also recognize that (to be blunt) i'm inheriting someone else's problems.  i'm willfully taking on the troubles (don't misunderstand: i am NOT calling the girls "problems" or "trouble") that have been created by a messed-up world.  and then i'm struck again with the thought that this is what God did. what He does.  we mess up this world and we mess up ourselves, and yet He as the ultimate Father chooses to be in the midst of it all and offer the way to un-mess things. He does that in my life.

the parallels don't stop there.  for example: how often have i - in my own ignorance - fought or argued with God about wanting something one way (or wanting something the way it used to be), when of course He knows much better and has much better things in store?

i'm grateful that beyond my own grandest desires to see my girls completely healthy and whole, the Heavenly Father desires that even more, and is willing and able to help me be the father they need.

of love and trust, part i...

2/4 blog posts by Guest Blogger Jon Simpson

the issue of fatherlessness - whether through physical or emotional absence - has been popping up on my radar over and over again for a long while now.  not just in the context of my family's adoption journey, though it's only reasonable that the intersections there wouldn't be lost on me.

about a month ago i watched the justin hunt film absent, which examines this issue.  One thing that stuck with me is its assertion that boys and girls universally and instinctively look to their father for the answer to a small set of questions.  One set is unique to boys: "am i good enough? do i have what it takes? can i be a man?" The other is unique to girls: "am i beautiful? do you love me? am i valued?"

you can check out the film to get more details (i'd recommend it) but one of the aspects that's so brutal to me is the difficulty (that word may be a gross understatement) with which the fatherless are subsequently able to have decisive, satisfactory answers to those self-defining questions. when our fathers don't provide positive answers to those questions, we're hardwired to continue to seek out the answers...usually over and over again.  Thus:

• adult males still act as children, trying to prove their manhood in one achievement or confrontation after another; 

• women look for affirmation of their worth in multiple, sometimes self-destructive, relationships or other ways... 

and the outcomes of these attempts, even if "successful," are only temporary.  it seems the key setting for a child's best chance to have airtight, positive answers to these questions are from his/her father, in the earliest of formational days.  as absent posits, the father is the very first external human to accept or reject a child.

i can't get away from the role of trust in all of this. it occurs to me that a father gets one "gimme" on trust when it comes to his child.  a baby in her/his helpless state offers herself/himself to a father.  after that, the father’s got to earn it.

humans are imperfect. including fathers (yes, thank you, no applause necessary for that little earth-shattering gem of knowledge).  we screw up. and even after the trust of a child is given to a father, that trust has to be maintained and cared for (and maybe rebuilt to varying degrees) by the father.

so what happens when a child has had absolutely no father during those critically formational years, is still a child, and - whiplash - now is put into a situation with a man who is resolved to be that child's father? what does that mean for the child? what does that mean for that adoptive father?

if you haven't figured it out yet, let me be clear: what does that mean for me? honestly a few expletives come to mind, but i'll do my best to continue with a clear head in my next post...

Jon Simpson: singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist, really cool friend and colleague.  I invite you to explore Jon’s website or blog, for more on the "thoughts and happenings in the life of a musician, singer, songwriter, traveler, father, husband, brother, son, etc., etc."