People always have advice, but sometimes they need to just be quietly supportive. The only thing worse than being heartbroken is being told not to be. Being told I have to ‘not let it get to me so much.’ Simply put, if you haven’t lost a child through unjust adoption, you’ll never fully understand it, and that’s okay. You’re lucky to have avoided such a mess in your life.

I’ve been to hell and back, and back around again with this bloody adoption, so if I’m feeling overwhelmed, it’s really okay. If I’m having trouble trusting anyone since this happened, it’s understandable. If I can’t help but cry myself to sleep because of my niece’s absence, please let me just get it out. It doesn’t mean I’m weak, it means I live and love with passion, a rare combination these days. I don’t want to sweep my feelings under the rug, I want them out, and if people don’t want to hear it, then they should’ve never overstepped their bounds by intruding in our family affairs. You don’t take a child by despicable means and expect nothing bad to happen. God may take a while to punish those responsible, but I know that no one escapes judgment.

Console me without telling me it will get better because how do you know it will?  Be there for me by letting me know I’m not alone and it’s okay to not always be the strong one. It’s okay to cry when you’ve been hurt so deeply. It’s excusable that I shut down and secure the perimeter because I’m so skeptical of ‘good intentions’ and smiling faces. I’m always after ‘the motive’ and always on high-alert.

I’m so tapped-out by this adoption, it doesn’t go away no matter what I do, and I positively hate that it is one of the major things that defines me. Thrust into a whirlwind of emotions, I pray incessantly that evil will not triumph over good. I pray that all these extra people will get out of our family and our family business because none of them should have meddled where they didn’t belong in the first place. To this day, their sheer nerve baffles me. It was no one’s place to barge into our family and make decisions who stayed or went. That was for us to decide. Not a conniving neighbor, not a desperately childless couple, not a judge sitting on his pretend throne.

An ugly adoption, there’s no way to sugar coat it to make it look nice. Something very wrong happened here, and I blatantly refuse to stop asking questions and demanding answers. This is my baby sister and my first niece we’re speaking of, it’s my job to stand up for them and protect them. I have the right to know why and how this happened. Paperwork signed by Buddha himself still wouldn’t make my niece not be my niece. And though this couple keeps waving their ‘exhibits’ in our faces, very soon it won’t mean anything.

If anything is going to come out of this, it’s going to be me getting closer to God, reevaluation of my life and the people I keep close to me, and being as loving and kind as I can be. I’ll keep the faith that my niece will come home one day and no one can stop her. I’m holding on to the love I feel for her, I’ll cherish the memories I have of her. I’ll pray with unwavering faith and I know it won’t always be like this.

Having said all that, I’m defending my right to be angry, my right to be sad, and my right to wait in joy and not sorrow. I will allow myself to be happy again because God is always working on this. I don’t have to ‘prove’ how much this is all hurting me, He knows. Just because I’m not crying every single moment doesn’t mean I don’t want to. Just because I wear a lot of makeup and 4-inch heals doesn’t mean I’m suffering any less.

So for those that have had to personally get me through this ‘tragic’ mess, thank you. And for those demanding me to ‘get better’ or ‘get over it’ , I want you to go out, lose a child then come back and talk to me. For those that have put me down for fighting so hard, I feel sorry for your relatives because you would fold like a lawn chair if push came to shove. It’s weird how much people are jealous of my strength and courage.

I just want the freedom of being able to feel whatever it is I want to feel without judgment. If I want to lounge all day and take a mental break, that should be alright. Let me grieve the only ways I know how, be patient and let me get through each day in whatever way is best for me. Just be empathetic, and don’t put rules and restrictions on my feelings. Let me hurt because it hurts, let me hope because I’m still allowed to dream. They’re my feelings, I’m entitled to them, good or bad.

The loss of a child means all bets are of …. logic, well there is none.