1st. Round or 2nd Round ?

Are you a 1st. round draft pick or 2nd round pick?

Not that I am a huge football fan but someone in our family is a huge football fan and has been very interested in the draft picks .  This made me think about how the players that were not chosen first felt . Did they feel any less a part of the team being picked second or third or even last ?

When I was younger I was always a second round ( well actually a tenth round or last pick )  when teams were being chosen for dodge ball or whiffle ball .  I was not the best batter for whiffle ball or the fastest runner in dodge ball  so I was always chosen last .  I remember thinking how unfair that was .  Didn't they know I had so much more to offer the team than how good an athlete I was ?  To them it was more important to win  the game.

On the rare occasion that I was team leader and could pick my team , I always chose the kids that were chosen last or not the best players athletically .  We never won a dodge ball game or whiffle ball game but we played harder and with more determination than the other team .  Sure they won, to them it was easy , but we had more determination    .  We  all knew we were the underdogs but it did not stop us .

This  "second round pick " was something that I always felt was unfair.  When we started our adoption journey I knew we would choose a child that was not a "first round pick. "   We wanted a child that would not be chosen first , one that was waiting longer , one that ...  had something deep inside that was not visible as being perfect .

By all means I do not think that healthy children are not deserving of a family .  ALL children deserve a family of their own .  This is just what works for our family .  There are over 143  million orphans in this world , ALL of them deserve to be loved and have a family !  And ALL of them deserve to be chosen FIRST .

When we were adopting Lucy our adoption agency told us about several children .  They all sounded wonderful .  But then they mentioned a little girl who had been waiting a very long time for her family to find her .  She had been shuffled between adoption agencies  , no one was too interested in her because of her medical condition and how she looked .  I knew before even seeing her picture she was our daughter .   Her photo was of a shy , tiny little crooked girl .  We were in love and could not wait to get her home and kiss her . 


 The same scenario happened with Emilia , she could not walk . No one wanted to make her part of "their team".  Gemma , her diagnosis scared so many, what could she bring to the team ? .  Teresa ,well who wanted to chose a child for their team that may not stay on the team for very long or help them to  " win" .  That's just it , they all had something to bring to the team that wasn't about winning " the game" .   The "win" was in the race and how we all ran the race .  All of our children brought their own special gift with them . They all had something our team was missing .

They all are helping us to   fight  the good fight,  finish the race and keep the faith.