Melancholy

I wonder if you believe me, or even know what I mean, when I say between Noah and Anna there is no difference to me.

One ours by adoption, one ours by birth - yet there has been no. difference. for us in love, in regard, in thrill, in protectiveness, in affection, in identification, in bonding. None.

Which is why when I marvel at the miracle of having grown Anna - her each and every part and a lot of her nature and manner - within my own body, I ache, I mourn even, that I cannot say the same for Noah. 

It is astounding to me to know that the breath of life, straight from God, came to her via me.  And it smarts a little to know that I was not in the mix when that same breath of life was given to Noah.  

It's a bit weird.  To have a child who is so you, so yours and yet to have to accept that he isn't as much yours as your other child.  It feels a little like being ripped.

I'm not sure what the emotion is I am trying to describe here, but I liken it to a sort of loss ... that I can't make him more mine - my actual flesh and blood.  It just doesn't compute to me that there is that separation between me and him.  It doesn't feel like it's there.  And yet that is the truth of it.  I kind of scorn the fact that it is, which is hard to do given how I treasure our adoption story and I love how we came into each other's lives. 

He is mine relationally and emotionally.  He is mine legally and he is mine daily.  He is mine physically. But I can't make him mine biologically.  And that minor detail stings my heart some, so deep and so fierce is my love for that boy.

It nags at me that I can't make him mine in the same way that Anna is.  Brings on a touch of melancholy.

On another note, I wonder if there is any sort of parallel with us before God as Jews or Gentiles, or as sinners before a holy God.  I'll have to ponder that one ...