Alisha and I had a grand time while I was there. The first night I arrived, Alisha gave me a huge Easter basket she had put together for me...and inside of it among the typical chocolate bunnies and jelly beans, were two tickets to the Disney's Beauty and the Beast on Broadway which was showing in Fort Worth that weekend. Although I had seen this show once before in Omaha with my best friend Arielle, I was very excited to see it again with Alisha...not to mention that it is also my favorite Disney story :) Our adventure together consisted of going to Six Flags, a Christian concert, a picnic at the botanical gardens (my very first picnic ever!), visiting the Stockyards and watching a cattle drive, making meals together, trying fried pickles for the first time and of course, a mani/pedi day that every girl should have!
But the best part was, just getting to know Alisha. Who she was, what she was like, hearing stories of her life, and stories of her pregnancy with me. The hardest part, was dealing with my many emotions that built up inside of me during the day. There were times that we would be driving in the car and I would think "Wow, this is what my life could have been like, with Alisha as my mother." My eyes would tear up everytime I thought that...because I wanted it to be true.
I remember, my second night there, after Alisha and I had said goodnight, and I went into my guest room where I was staying, I broke down. I had always had an "easy" life. Two parents, a good family, never wanting of something I needed...but I never really had a good relationship with my mom. But Alisha was someone I knew I could have had a relationship with. Of course, we would have issues like all mother-daughter relationships, but I knew I would have been able to talk with her about anything. I kept thinking "I would have rather had a hard, single-parent, life with Alisha, than an easy life with anyone else".
But then I called my friend Quentin. Quentin and I had done Fire in the Night together and over Christmas break, my parents invited him to come stay with us because he didn't have money to go home, and he had nowhere else to stay. He became one of my best friends during that time. As I talked to him on the phone, convinced that he couldn't understand me because of my blubbering, I told him everything I was feeling...but then he reminded me of something.
"Katie, if you had been with Alisha your whole life, would you still have the heart for adoption that you do right now?"
Gah, he knew me too well.
*sniffle sniffle* ".....No."
"God always knows what He is doing; you are where He wants you to be, even if you can't understand it right now. Besides, now you can begin that friendship with her, without all the mother-daughter drama."
So, I began to feel like I had "traded" a life with my biological mom, for the heart that God had given me for Life, and adoption...even though I had no way of choosing the life that I had been given. It was almost as if I couldn't have both. I told the Lord that I didn't understand, but I knew that He has a purpose...and that I was thankful just for the opportunity He gave me to begin a deeper relationship with Alisha.
