Today, I turn the big 2-5.  And truly, it seems right.  I have a home, a job, a fun life.  I feel like I am doing the things a 25-year-old should be doing, and I feel like I’m doing the things that I personally should be doing.  It seems right for me to say, “Hi. I’m Meghan. I’m 25.”  For once, a birthday that I’m ready for.  And I’m lucky to spend it with my friends, and next week with my mom and stepmom, and later this month with my dad.  What a great month!  And roomie Katy even made me a pretty cake 🙂

I realized the other day that I probably haven’t mentioned on the MM that I am adopted.  This adds a really special component to my birthday each year.  In 1985, a 17-year-old gave me up to a better life.  Then she went back and finished her senior year of high school.  At the same time, my amazing parents made me their own.  That it is the greatest gift of love that exists in our world – to put aside what you want first so a child can have a better life, and second so a couple can become a family.  I mean, this may in fact be the only photograph I have ever seen of my dad smiling…

Our family may not be perfect – my parents divorced, my dad remarried.  But how lucky am I to have the people I have?  My mom, dad, stepmom, and even birth mother and birth father have made a huge impact on who I am.  I would not exist if any of them had shied away from the choices they made.

When I think of all this, my heart seriously bursts for all of my parents as I consider the magnitude of love I have been shown so freely and undeservedly over the span of my life.

How does a girl say thank you for that?