Adoption loss

Today has been another hard day.  I've covered it up pretty well but the emotions are still there.  I picked up Casssie early from school because she had been crying so hard she felt like she was going to throw up.  I finally got out of her what was wrong this evening.   She was upset because she misses her sister Alyssa and nephew Owen so much.  I really don't know when we are seeing either of them again, and I don't want to make promises I can't keep.  We do talk to Alyssa alot on the phone and text all the time.  Alyssa is so sweet that she called Kenny on his birthday even though she was dealing with the grief of Owen turning 1 month old.  Cassie said she just wants to be with both of them and hates that they are in the stupid state of Utah.  She hates that our family will never really be complete.  We will probably never have a holiday where we don't have 1 or 2 people missing.  Even if the words aren't expressed we always know someone is missing in our family, at every vacation, every birthday, every Christmas.

Even though my kids have grown up with adoption, it is still a very raw emotion to deal with.  We didn't get the good part of adoption where a baby joins our family.  We have had our family ripped apart by adoption to the very core.  How do you explain to your kids that there is nothing wrong with them, that at the time for some stupid reason you thought it was best that strangers raise your child than that child stay with you? How do you explain to these children that you didn't know how horribly adoption would would affect them?  Not just the kids you kept but the child you placed too.  How do you ever fully get the trust of all your children when you feel like you have made the ultimate betrayal? 

I feel like I have no answers and only constant questions.  I hate how much the one decision I made to place my daughter has affected all of my children.