In 1980 I married Caroline, for better or worse. That was easy to say back then, now I have a deeper understanding of this part of the marriage vows. 12 months later Caroline gave birth to our first child, five more followed at regular intervals and the seventh arrived about 13 years ago (you work it out). I don't have the brain space to tell you all of their life stories but in summary this is the state of play at the moment.
One is married with two children, three are single mums with two children each, one is a part time dad to one child and one is a heroin addict and up to just recently the primary carer for one child. Oh yea! one more still at home with us, she's 13 going on 21 with an intelligence level that matches her attitude.
I guess we could that our plans to bring up a regular family were totally blown out of the water. We still now have times of self examination "what on earth did we do wrong?" "Could we have cared for them better?" etc etc. But, like the rest of the journey up to now we have come to see that life's curve balls (if you are American) or googlies (if you are English) have all been part of a loving fathers training programme, preparing us for a life focused on others and following Him.
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