Can you imagine waking up in the middle of the night to the sound of your smoke alarm? Panic, right? Hasten to turn it off, right? Hate the loud, disturbing sound, right?

Adoptees and foster children live with a smoke alarm in their brains everyday, but no one knows it. Therefore, it doesn’t get turned off.

It goes off the moment we are taken away from our birth mothers. Or, for foster kids, multiple alarms go off over a span of time.

No one knows about the smoke alarm, nor do we.

We just live with it and it shows up in learning disorders, anger and rage issues, inability to think logically, sensory issues, stealing, lying, etc, etc.

What a relief it was for me to learn about this…even at the ripe old age of 72. Suddenly, all the stupid, wrong, clumsy, impulsive, idiotic things I have done throughout life washed away.

I felt God’s unconditional love.

I could see myself as a precious baby, a teen that had special needs that weren’t met, and an adult who has worked so hard to appear normal.

What a relief.

(Credit: Shefalie Chandra: Smoke Alarm)