Day 5 - The Hardest Day



Momma brought me "salty sticks" (what Americani call pretzels)!



I didn't get to visit with A.J. very long on Friday morning, only about an hour and a half. It was not nearly long enough. He seemed much more subdued that during our other visits, but I don't know if that was because he was picking up on my mood or if he really understood when they told him that this would be the last time that I came to visit for a while. :-(

We got to play and snuggle a little and enjoy each other's company for one last time before I had to meet with the Director to give her our answer to the question "Do you want to adopt this child?" Our answer was 'Yes. We can't wait until he is part of our family, laughing and playing with his brothers and sisters."

I found out that he weights 12 kilograms (26 1/2 pounds) and is 33 inches tall. His size would be about 50th percentile for a 2 year old, and isn't even on the growth charts for a 4 year old. I guess his small size didn't completely hit me until I got home and realized how much bigger his sister (who is 6 months older than him) and his brother (who is 6 months younger than him) are. Eve is 11 inches taller than him and weighs 12 pounds more and Zac is 7 inches taller than him and weighs 10 pounds more. I almost fell over the first time I tried to pick Zac up after I got home! :-) I forgot how heavy he is. It made me so sad to think about our tiny little man...

I also found out a little more about his medical history. He weighed only 4 lbs 6 oz when he was born, his heritage is Romani (we suspected this, but his records confirmed it), he has no chromosomal abnormalities, they tested him for cystic fibrosis but could not get a result "because of technical problems with the laboratory", and he has been hospitalized for pneumonia or bronchiolitis a total of 12 times in 4 years. Because of his reversed organs and lung problems, we strongly suspect that he has Karatgener's Syndrome rather than CF but testing for this disorder is not available in Bulgaria and the physicians may not even be aware of a diagnosis as rare as Kartagener's. We are blessed to be just a few miles from an amazing children's hospital in Austin (Dell Children's Center) that "just happens" to have an International Adoption Clinic. Once A.J. is home he will have a 3-4 hour appointment at that clinic where they will do complete developmental testing, assess him for sensory processing / integration issues, a nutritional consultation, any immunizations that he needs, a thorough physical exam, any diagnostic tests such as lab work or x-rays that they feel he needs immediately, and give us referrals to any of the specialists that he needs to see. It could take us months to accomplish all of this if we had to schedule everything with individual offices! We are anticipating that we will get referrals (at the very least) to the CF clinic at Dell (because Kartagener's is treated in much the same way as CF), occupational and physical therapy, GI clinic, and the surgical clinic. I am anxious to get this done as soon as we can after he gets home because I really think he will thrive best after his physical needs are taken care of. But I am not looking forward to walking into a hospital with him for the first time. I know he will not be a happy camper, but I am hoping that having Momma there with him will ease his anxiety.

It just occurred to me that some of you might not know that the Romani people are commonly called "gypsy" or "gipsy". We choose not to use that term because in Europe is is very derogatory (similar to a white person using the "n word" to describe a person of African-American descent here). We have been doing a little research on this group of people so we will be ready to share his heritage with him when he is ready to understand, and I will share some of that with y'all in another post. I am also going to share a little more about the culture in Bulgaria, an opportunity to help A.J.'s orphanage, and a few other things.

I am sorry it took me so long to get this post up. After blogging twice a day all week, I know some of you thought something was wrong when I didn't blog for three days! School starts tomorrow for us, although I arrange our school weeks from Thursday to Thursday to correspond with our Classical Conversations campus teaching so we won't really get into things until Thursday. I will keep you all updated on how things are progressing with our final paperwork. The I800, local police checks, and medical exams are the only things we have left to do!

Day 4, Part 2

This is what I was afraid his visa photograph would look like. :-)



This is what the photographer was finally able to capture. Not too bad...

We had a wonderful afternoon visit today. I was waiting in the entry area and when A.J. came around the corner and saw me he started running toward me! That moment is one that I will remember forever and was such a blessing to my heart. Then, he took my hand and started pulling me down the hallway toward the play room.

I have discovered that this kid LOVES the chicken dance. It is on the CD that they play for the kids every day, and one of the staff does the dance for them. He can do the first part, and would do it and then point at me to ask me to do the rest with him. Then he brought me a stuffed bear and wanted me to make the bear do the dance. We are going to have to get that song on iTunes and teach the rest of the kids that silly dance before he gets home.

He continues to amaze me with how fast he learns new things when he is given the opportunity. This afternoon he started saying 'brav' for 'bravo', and 'choka' (horse). And it took him about 30 seconds to learn the sign for more when he realized that it would get him more pretzels. :-) Food is going to be the way into this kiddo's heart! Surprisingly, he also picked up on the sign for 'finished' pretty quickly when we were done with snack.

I have noticed a few institutional behaviors, but nothing too severe. He does not react appropriately to being hurt. This afternoon he ran full speed into a table and it knocked him to the ground. He reacted by jumping up and laughing. With time, he will learn that there is someone who will comfort him and it is OK to feel the pain. He also has some self-comforting/stimulating behaviors such as thumb sucking and mild head banging in situations where another child would seek out comfort or interaction. And he is not very comfortable with close physical contact. He will let me hold him on my lap or carry him on my hip, but if I try to snuggle him or give him kisses he becomes upset. Interestingly, he will let me give him kisses if I am not holding him. It may be that the combination of being held and kissed at the same time is too much stimulation for him. This is all very common in children who have grown up in orphanages and will change as he has more time in a family. I am mentioning a lot of this here so that in a year or so I can go back and read these entries and see how far he has progressed!

I cannot believe that I will only get to play with him and love on him one more time before I have to leave. If you happen to be awake at around 3am tomorrow morning (11am here) please say a prayer for me to have strength as I say goodbye. Sigh...

Day 4

A.J. was not a happy camper when I arrived to visit him this morning. I really think that he was upset with me for leaving yesterday afternoon. He completely snubbed me for the first 20 minutes or so, and if I tried to engage him he would grab toys and try to throw them at me. Eventually he settled down and we had a fun visit. He is now saying 'vata', 'ne', and 'mama' and he was shaking his finger at me and grinning ear to ear. He is going to be something else! :-) He walked over to the window where we saw the cats yesterday and was looking quizzical and saying 'maw, maw?' We never did see the kitties though.

Toward the end of the morning visit we took him to get his pictures done for the visa. He did NOT want to leave the orphanage and threw a fit as we went out the gate. Dore (his favorite staff member) explained that the only time he has ever left the orphanage before was to go to the hospital and spend a week to ten days hooked up to IV antibiotics and steroids, so is it any wonder the kid didn't want to leave? Once he finally realized we were not headed for the hospital he started to relax. Taking him for all of the medical tests and exams he is going to need when we get home is going to be interesting. He is going to need testing for his PCD, evaluation of his foot, ENT for the 'goo' that is coming out of his left ear, and GI consult for reflux (he is constantly spitting up like you would expect an infant to do). It will be an adventure for sure. But I think getting all of his medical issues sorted out so he is feeling well is going to really help his overall development.

I was amazed at how calm he was in the car. Here they just buckle kids into the back seat with the regular seat belt and he rode along looking out the window and playing with a stuffed bear I brought him. He did not like having his picture taken, and I am afraid his visa will forever immortalize him with his mouth open in a scream and tears running down his face. :-( But once we left the photo place he walked along the shopping square happily checking out all of the sights. It is going to be a lot of fun to start to show him new things once we have had some time to settle in at home.

Momma is going to help me get this fixed when I get home. It hurts me when I walk!

More to come later (if Momma is not too exhausted)! :-)

Day 3, Part 2

Yesterday I asked this question in my emotion laden post - “Will he ever catch up developmentally? Or has the four years this orphanage has stolen from him changed his future forever?” When I was finally able to talk to my wonderful hubby last night he had a perfect answer to that question - "Honey, what will change his future forever is being part of a family! And that is what we are going to give him." See, I told you this guy was amazing!

I was able to visit with A.J. for about 2 hours this morning and an hour this afternoon. This morning they allowed me to visit him without my driver/interpreter or any of the orphanage staff in the room and it made a world of difference in his behavior and interaction. I think that with many people in the room he did not know who to go to and was not sure what the rules would be so he was exhibiting a lot of testing behavior (like throwing things, hitting himself, and banging toys on the windows). But when it was just the two of us I was able to set boundaries with him and he very quickly realized what he would and would not be allowed to do. By the end of the morning he was actually looking at me to check in and see if what he was planning to do was going to be acceptable or not. For example, he would raise a toy up to hit the window and then look over his sholder at me to see what I would do. All I had to do was say "Ne, ne" and shake my finger at him like the staff does and he would move on. That was very encouraging to me.

I was also amazed at how easily he learned new things without a lot of extra stimulation in the environment. In the few hours I was with him today he actually gained several new skills. On Monday he would bang blocks together or throw them but not stack them. Today after I sat him on my lap and showed him how to build a tower he did it repeatedly on his own and would bring the blocks to me to have me help him. He started to do some pretend play after I put the "bow bow" (dog) in the high chair and pretended to feed him, and he was reaching up to me to have me lift him.

Other highlights of the day:
 - Even though he may be four, he cannot play with play doh. I had a feeling it would be a failure, but I was amazed by how quickly he got it into his mouth! I thought the texture might be interesting to him but as my kids would say "Epic FAIL".

- The afternoon visit was cut short by a giant diaper blowout that required a bath. Since it was close to dinner time anyhow we let his Baba take him to the bath and headed out. We gave the Baba a ride home and she told us that as they were walking down the hall he was looking for me and saying "Ciao?" Awwww...

 - I gave the scrapbook we made to his Baba and she plans to show it to him everyday and tell him about his Mama and Dada. She saw the pictures of our cats and got very excited, telling us that his "groupa's" room has pictures of kittens and he LOVES them. He saw some pittiful kittens outside the window today and was saying "Maw maw", so I had a feeling he would like the cats. I am thrilled that his Baba is going to do this for him so he will have some idea of what is going to happen. She said that another child in his "groupa" was adopted, so he might have some idea of what becoming part of a family will mean. His Baba makes me laugh because she will chatter on at me in Bulgarian and I just nod my head and let her talk. I wonder if she realizes I can only understand about 10 words of Bulgarian? :-)

 - There were two Bulgarian couples there this morning starting the process to adopt children. 3 less orphans in this orphanage!

Only three visits left before we have to head back to Sofia to finish up paperwork before I leave for home on Saturday. It will be so hard to leave him when we are just starting to build a relationship, but I hope that having his Baba share the scrapbook will help him to remember me until we can come back to bring him home. We will take him to get his visa pictures done tomorrow, so that will be an adventure!




Peek a Boo!



Day 3 - Good Morning!

I finally got to visit with A.J. alone. What a difference that made in his behavior! I will post more about the visit later in the evening (mid-afternoon for all of you back home).

In the meantime here are some pics. Yes, I know they are all "soft". He figured out really quickly that he could see himself on the iPhone and from then on he tried to grab it everytime I took it out, so I had to move quick! For some reason I can't get the first two photos to rotate correctly even though they are the correct orientation in the file. Sorry! (Eric - if you know how to fix it, please log in and edit the post. Thanks!)



I wish I could have recorded his giggle for you. He has one of those giggles where you think the poor kid is going to fall over because they laugh so hard. :-) And I didn't realize how bad his haircut is until I saw these pictures. Poor kid! LOL





 Check back later for more!

Day 2 - The Roller Coaster

If you are looking for a rosy, the process of adopting is all rainbows and puffy clouds type of post tonight you might want to stop reading now. J I think too many people make it seem like every single thing in their adoption process was perfect, that they immediately fell in love with their child, took them home without any reservations or second thoughts and they all lived happily ever after.  I KNOW I am not the only one who has doubts, concerns and fears and I think that it should be OK to share that. But, as I said, if you don’t want to read that type of post then just go back to Facebook. J

Today has been an emotional roller coaster for me. I guess the reality of A.J.’s developmental delays is setting in and this is causing me to have a lot of questions and fears that are probably perfectly normal.

Things like: “Can I meet his needs once we are home when my life is already pretty crazy?” When I am thinking clearly the answer I hear in my head is “Yes. You will probably need to change your schedule around and maybe get a mother’s helper a few days a week to lighten the load of housework, but you can do it.” When the spirit of fear fills me the answer is more like “Absolutely not! Are you insane?”

And: “Am I ready to commit to parenting a child that may never be able to live independently and may never be ‘normal’ in the eyes of the world?” The non-emotional answer is “Many people have made the same commitment and received many, many blessings from it. It will strengthen our family in ways we can’t even imagine, and we will gain more than we give in this process.” The fearful side says “Think of everything you would have to give up! You are finally at a place where your house doesn’t need to baby proofed and your kids are independent enough to play on their own. Do you want to go back to having a child who completely relies on you again?”

Or: “Will he ever catch up developmentally? Or has the four years this orphanage has stolen from him changed his future forever?” The Godly, loving side of me replies “It doesn’t even matter. He is one of God’s children and he SO much deserves a chance at something much better than what he is destined for here. With consistent attention, therapy, and addressing his medical needs so that he is getting enough oxygen and not ill all the time, and making sure that his vision and hearing are OK he will thrive.” And the fear says “He’ll probably never catch up and you will be ‘stuck’ with a child who acts like a 2 year old when he is 18.”

God has used several things to try to set me straight today. The first one was this post from my bloggy friend Adeye. She is adopting two children who are in much worse places than our little man and her post really spoke to my heart. The second one was the song “Voice of Truth” by Casting Crowns. I had never really listened to this song the way I did today.  I am going to try to include the song as part of the blog, but if I cannot figure out how to do it please take the time to listen to it on YouTube or iTunes. If you are a Christian it will bless your heart and make you understand how God is speaking to me through the music. If you are not a Christian it might help you to see how I feel like I am able to overcome huge obstacles because of my God. Or, it might just make you say “Those Christians are whacked in the head.” Either way, it is the honest truth about my life. And finally is Isaiah 40. This is one of my favorite chapters in the bible and one I turn to frequently. As I was reading verses 12-28 I could hear Him speaking to my heart saying “Do you really think that I, the one who measures the waters in his hands and brings forth the stars, am not big enough to overcome all of these problems you are seeing? I created the world. I do not become weary even when you do. I can handle this!” I am in tears right now thinking about it. One of the most amazing things about this journey has been how much closer it has made my relationship with my Creator.

I so much wish that my husband could have made this trip with me so that we could be working through these emotions together, face to face instead of chatting on Skype with an 8 hour time difference. We are in this together and I wish he could have first-hand experiences with A.J. instead of relying on my opinion and descriptions. And I could really, really use the emotional support that he consistently provides to me.

So, where does all this emotionalism leave us? Right where we started as far as I am concerned. Despite my concerns and fears I believe that God has led us on this journey and that he will continue to carry us through it, whatever it might bring. It boils down to this – I may not be able to give all of these children with sad, sad eyes a family; but I can give one a chance and there is NO WAY I am going to leave him here where his future is most likely life in a mental institution.

And now that I have gotten all of that down in words, I am going to bed. It has been an exhausting day. I pray that none of you will think less of me for sharing the deepest things of my heart here today.

Wow!

This has been an amazing day. Very emotional, very tiring, and very exciting all at once.

I don't really know where to start!

We left Sofia this morning to drive to the city that the orphanage is in (about an hour away). When we got to the city there were very few street signs and my driver couldn't find the orphanage. We stopped and asked close to 15 people and finally found one who knew where it was. When we got there the kids were all in a center courtyard playground area and one of the workers took us over to the window to show us A.J. He immediately started blowing kisses to us! My heart melted right then.

We met briefly with the director, who is a doctor and very sweet. She shared the medical information she had for A.J. and then asked me some questions about our family. I showed her the scrapbook I made to give to A.J. and she was amazed that we have cats living in the house with us, and that our kids do karate.
:-)

We finally got to go out into the play area with all of the kids and I mostly watched A.J. play. I tried to engage him a few times, but he quickly went on to another activity. He definitely seems to bounce from one thing to another pretty quickly. The staff at the orphanage obviously adore him and they have some sweet nicknames for him that I will share when I can tell you what his birth name is. I think we will end up using at least one of these pet names, since he responds well to them. They were very excited to hear that he was going to have a family and kept telling me "He just needs love!" The one down side to him being a favorite is that it seems like he doesn't have a lot of boundaries or rules. My interpreter said "I can't think of the word. What do you call it when they let him do whatever he wants?" I said "Spoiled?" and he replied "Yes! He is spoiled!" :-) I guess given the alternatives that he could have experienced being spoiled is not necessarily a bad thing, but we will definitely be working on setting some boundaries once we are home.

We left when the kids went in for lunch and returned at about 3:30pm. (Did you know that they use military time in Bulgaria? I felt right at home when they told us to come back at 1530!). We got to take A.J. into a therapy room in the back and play with him and his Baba. (Remember a few weeks back when I was so upset that our little guy didn't have a Baba? I shouldn't have worried because God had it covered.) Toward the end of the visit he was starting to bring me toys and let me hold him for a short time. He is NOT a cuddle bug, that much was obvious! We got to help him eat his snack of noodles with butter, cheese and egg. That kid can eat! He will fit in just fine at our house. ;-) He is independant in feeding himself and can drink from a regular cup with just a little help. 

Some general impressions:
He is teeny tiny. I didn't get his measurements today, but I think he is probably about the size of an 18 month old.
We thought that his 4th birthday was April 24, but it turns out it is actually August 24. So guess who will get to spend his birthday with him!
His development is probably in line with a two year old. He says a handful of Bulgarian words that I can recognize after spending a few hours with him, and he does a very good job communicating in gestures like all pre-verbal kids do. He knows his body parts, and plays appropriately with toys (more or less). He can walk and run very well, but he still goes up the stairs using all four limbs. He is definitely developmentally delayed but I think with one on one attention and a family environment he will catch up pretty quickly.

They wouldn't let me take any pictures today, so I will have to wait and share those later. :-( I did post some pictures of the city on my facebook page, so go check those out in the meantime.

Keep the prayers coming! I have a feeling that leaving him on Friday is going to be very, very hard.

Yipeeee!

Yesterday morning I got the best e-mail I have gotten in a very long time. We finally got our official referral and travel dates!! I will be leaving Austin on August 18th and meeting A.J. for the first time on August 20th. I'll get to visit with him a few hours each day from Monday to Friday and then make the trip home on Saturday.

The reality that I will be travelling overseas in less than a week is starting to set in . Oh my. There is so much to do!

If you have travelled for an international adoption I would love to hear your suggestions for packing, and especially what to take along for your child on trip one. Thank you!

We should get an update from A.J.'s orphanage very soon. Our facilitator has the report, but it wouldn't be much use to us in Cyrillic so I guess we will have to wait for it to be translated. :-) I will let you know what we find out!

Prayer requests:
Where do I start? :-)
Safe travel - especially that I will not miss any connections.
Patience and energy for Eric as he tele-works and manages the household while I am gone.
That I will have the energy to get everything done that needs to be done in the next 6 days! 
That I will recover from jet lag faster than I have in the past. Every time I travel internationally I am miserable (and so is everyone around me! LOL).


I'd better go get some lists made....

Thank you for walking alongside us on this journey!

Prayer Request

All of the "Back to School" sales are making me very sad.

Back in the beginning of April when we submitted our dossier I excitedly looked at other people's blogs to see how long the process had taken for them so I could come up with a general timeline for us. I really, truly thought our first visit would be in late May or early June and we would be returning to pick A.J. up around September. I tentatively planned our summer around these dates, and gave some thought to how best to integrate A.J. into our school schedule once he was home.

Now it is "Back to School" time and we still haven't even gotten our written referral that will give us permission to make our first visit. Obviously trying to estimate time lines is not very helpful, but now we are hoping that we will be able to make our first trip sometime in September or early October. That means that he will not be coming home until about February 2013. :-(

When we started this process in December of 2010 I was very hopeful that he would be home for Christmas of 2011. When it became obvious that would not be possible, I began to pray that he might be able to be in our arms for his 4th birthday in April 2012. That didn't happen either.  So then I said to myself "He will definitely be home for Christmas 2012!". But that was not to be. I keep telling myself to give up the time lines, but my heart is pleading with God that he will be able to spend his 5th birthday with his Momma, Daddy and siblings. He has already missed out on so much!

Then I realized that some families adopting from this country have had the opportunity to hire a Baba ("Granny") to spend one on one time with their child as they wait to bring them home. This gives a child living in an institutional environment an invaluable jump on development and attachment. We have not had the opportunity to do this for A.J. My heart has been breaking over this. I have been crying out to God, asking "Why can't we do something for him while he waits? Why am I stuck here unable to do anything to make life better for this little boy that I already love SO much?"

I am really, really, REALLY struggling with the waiting. Please pray that God will give me peace with the uncertainty and that (somehow, someway) A.J. will get what he needs to be healthy and happy while he continues to wait.