Saturday, March 1, 2014

6 of 7: On family size and openness

There was an article making the rounds on facebook this week about the bittersweet emotions of watching your last child go through firsts and milestones, knowing you'll never be in that place again. There was something that just rubbed me the wrong way about that article.

It was the first sentence.

"On the day that your last child is born, you'll find yourself filled with a jumble of emotions."

Whoa, wait a minute. Wait. A. Minute. How do you know it is the last child?

Our culture assumes that we need to make these decisions. We say, "Oh, we are going to have X number of children. Period." That makes me sad. Where do we leave room for being open to God's plan for our family?

My husband and I got married later than some. I was in my late 20s and he was in his mid 30s. We figured we'd shoot for maybe 4 kids and see what happened. I always assumed that our family would be larger than the standard "one boy, one girl" American ideal.

It is not. Here we are. One boy. One girl. No prospects for family growth on the horizon.

But here's the thing. We are open to more children. Our adoption resources are spent. Fertility, at this point, would probably require some sort of miraculous divine intervention. Our kids are currently requiring every ounce of energy we have to give. But we are open. If God placed an opportunity in front of us, we would take it. Not necessarily because we were looking for it or even thought we could handle it. But because He does. And He knows what we can handle and what is best for our family, even more than we do.

I'm participating in Jen's 7 posts in 7 days at Conversion Diary. 










On the day that your last child is born, you’ll find yourself filled with a jumble of emotions. - See more at: http://suburbanturmoil.com/the-last-one-3/2014/02/20/#sthash.jtSeG0lK.dpuf
On the day that your last child is born, you’ll find yourself filled with a jumble of emotions. - See more at: http://suburbanturmoil.com/the-last-one-3/2014/02/20/#sthash.jtSeG0lK.dpuf
On the day that your last child is born, you’ll find yourself filled with a jumble of emotions. - See more at: http://suburbanturmoil.com/the-last-one-3/2014/02/20/#sthash.jtSeG0lK.dpuf

1 comment:

All in His Perfect Timing said...

That is annoying and frustrating that people think / presume that since you have "x" many kids, you're done. Or that there is a "perfect family size." And I totally agree with you ... how do you know you're done? God's pretty awesome!
I'm catching up s.l.o.w.l.y with blogging - I hope to make it more of a priority in life rather than just sitting in front of the tube. I hope you all are enjoying spring-like weather and the outdoors!