Troubled child adoption is about loving enough to accept not being trusted. I learned that by watching my wife’s example. I’ll give you fair warning… if you need compassion and are left to choose between my wife and me, go with my wife. If I don’t like you and can justify my position, I’ll throw you under the bus. Then I’ll eat my dinner and drink a Coke before sleeping through the night like a toddler. My wife is different. If you screeched obscenities at her before hurling yourself under the runaway death-trap, Amy would crawl beneath it to drag you out.

My adopted daughters don’t understand that, though. From their earliest moments, their developing and pliable minds were taught that they could never trust a mother. As much as I’d like to blame that demonic abuser for the suffering of my daughters, in honesty, it’s probably not her fault. […]