You guys, reunification is hard. It takes commitment. Constantly checking our own baggage at the door. And a willingness to stand in the gap, even when it’s sticky and uncomfortable.

“Hope is now an older teen. She’s matured some; she’s developed some more coping skills. She has unpacked some of her trauma and her emotions around the need to be adopted by a non-family member. She’s really doing great even as she has a long way to go.

She’s happy to be in contact with her extended family, but she still hasn’t unpacked a lot of her feelings about all that happened or figure out what kind of consistent contact, if any, she wants or how to manage the increasing expectations of family that she be more participatory in big family events.

There’s a gap. I reside in the translational gap.”

The Gap: Adoptive Black Mom