By Lexie V. Owen | Echo
Kelly Helton's adopted family was chosen before her birth. In 1991, her parents, Jim and Joy, heard news of a young girl in Florida who wanted to give up her expected baby. The couple connected with the girl through a friend living in the area and expressed their interest in raising the child.
Paperwork for an open adoption was filed and finalized in a matter of months. That December, the couple received a phone call. They drove from their home in Dallas, Texas, to a hospital in St. Petersburg, Fla. to await their new daughter's arrival.
Kelly was forty-five minutes old when she was introduced to the people who would call her their own. Though Jim and Joy were now her parents, they decided not to withhold the truth of her birth circumstances.
Senior Kelly Helton sat on a Euler sofa and discussed what it was like knowing she was adopted.
"My parents told me when I was three," Kelly said. "They told me I was adopted and what it meant. When I was that young it just meant I wasn't born from my mom's tummy. They told me more as I got older."
Though she often heard from her birth mother, Kelly still faced the questions most adopted children ask. Most of them involved wondering what she did wrong. The more she grew, the bigger her questions became. She found herself growing less satisfied with the answers.
"There's just that gut feeling of 'What did I do?'" Kelly said. "Even though you've done nothing, that ache is just there."
Her parents did what they could to heal that ache. They took time with Kelly to help her sort through her thoughts and feelings and were careful to answer her questions.
"They made sure I knew that my biological parents loved me," Kelly said, shifting on the couch, "but they just couldn't take care of me. My birth parents thought I deserved more and they loved me enough to give me that opportunity."
In time, Kelly came to the peace that her birth circumstances were not her fault. She realized her adoption was God's plan. She found strength through her faith.
"I was God's daughter from the beginning." She gestured confidently toward herself. "No matter what happened, I was His. God is my father for those moments when I want my biological father to be there."
Kelly's relationship with her birth father was not always good. Though he was allowed to be involved, he remained largely absent from her life. Resentment developed from what she perceived to be abandonment.
She leaned forward as she said, "Up until a few months ago, I was angry with him. I wasn't able to see it from his side: that it was hard for him too. The way he loved me was by letting my dad be my dad. He didn't want to interfere. I took that as he didn't care."
Kelly still struggles to come to terms with this kind of relationship, but no matter how distant her birth father may seem, her family is always near.
Kelly's adoptive father, Jim, is one the best emotional supporters in her life. Her eyes lit up when she talked about her dad.
"We're super close," she said. "We're a lot alike. We're both bookworms. We're both laid back and chill. We'd rather sit at home and watch football or read a book than go out."
Kelly fits right in with her family. She talks like them, behaves like them, and even looks like them. At holiday reunions, she knows she belongs. No one mentions the fact that she's adopted. To her and her relatives, it was providential.
"God's timing and plan is so much bigger than we can imagine," Kelly said. "Looking back now to when I was younger, it worked out just the way it was supposed to." She gazed out the window and grinned. The definition of adoption has changed drastically since her toddler years.
"Now that I'm older, adopted means it doesn't matter whose genes you have," Kelly said. "I wouldn't trade my family for anything. They're the ones who made me who I am today."
To Kelly, earthly adoption is a reflection of heavenly adoption. Her parents' love for her mirrors God's grace.
She smiled broadly as she said, "It just means I'm adopted twice. There is nothing that could take me away from my parents, nothing that could make them stop loving me. With God, that is magnified a hundredfold. It's a beautiful picture and I'm very blessed to have that grasp on it."
Kelly leaned back and sighed with delight. Her eyes shone with the love she has received from her birth parents, adopted parents, and heavenly parent.
