Starting Over (Ethiopia Post #2)

I met my daughter's today. They are beautiful girls with hearts full of love and spirits that will make them great women.

I met our Sara Macie, not even recognizing her at first. Her hair has grown longer and she was SOOOO much smaller than I even imagined. To see her is to love her. To watch the tears as they streamed down her face, was more painful than anything I have ever felt.
The recognition of who I was and what that meant broke her heart all over again and she was smart enough to fight against anyone who she believed might cause her more pain. Reminders from staff that I was her new mommy only brought back memories of a another Mommy already lost to her and HUGE crocodile tears began to form in those big brown eyes.
Her eyes show the life she has lived, the hurt and betrayal she has felt and the love that she so desperately wants to believe in. The sobs and horrifying cries of disbelief only spoke louder of her need for stability and a home.
My heart has NEVER been so broken for another. I have never struggled so much between taking someone in my arms or running from the room at the same time. Both out of protection for this precious heart that has felt more pain in her 3 years of life than I have in my 30.
I was introduced to Ella Birtukan in the midst of this transition with Sara Macie and while she recognized the tears in her sister's eyes and reflected that sadness back to me, she was far easier to console and was more than willing to let me hold her in my arms and rock her to sleep. I must admit, amidst the unbearable heartache of her older sisters rejection, the warmth of a slumbering baby brought comfort.
Only once, when I was faced away from Macie, did Ella's pouty cry break the hold I had over my emotions. She was just whining, not rejecting or distraught, just uncertain and I turned her to see the familiar face of her sister. Her crying subsided a bit and I let myself feel for a moment, what I had tried to keep to hidden from them in the hours before.
I sat there with one baby in my arms and another within arms reach, but unwilling to even look at me. Sara Macie had no reason to smile, no reason to laugh, no reason to play. Staff, other children and myself tried to distract her with the things that she loves, but she knew. Her ability to discern the moment and all that it meant was undeniable. She is unlike any child I have ever met or seen or read about. There is no hatred in her. No mean or angry spirit. There is only brokenness and disbelief. Disbelief that she allowed herself to trust again and now that trust has brought her another great loss. I know that she will begin to hope again and that I will see a smile soon, but the agony of today was a pain that both of us felt and that I would give anything to deliver her from.
My heart aches , not for my own desire to be wanted and needed by my two girls, but it aches with them both for the weighted memories they bear and for all the processing they have ahead of them.
It took the entire 3 hour visit, but in the last 15 minutes Sara Macie let me hold her. She had her eye on her trusted nanny (who is a GODSEND), but she didn't pull away from me. She just let this very new, very white, very foreign new Mommy hold her, knowing that the next week would mean starting over for her and beginning again.
I don't know how I survived today. I can not explain the intensity, the shear agony that I felt for my girls, that I felt WITH them and for them.
I will bring them home. I will give them the family and the stability that they have gone without. I will give my life to give those girls the love that they deserve and I will spend the rest of my days determined to show them how much they mean to me and how worthy they are of all that is good.
They are my daughter's after all, and already the very BEST part of who I am.
Continue to pray. There is still much to come...