Mindful Monday

I thought I'd sit down to write a Mindful Monday post, since it had been so long since the last one. The problem is I have no idea what to write about. I'm flying by the seat of my pants. I'm doing a lot of that lately. My plan is to just see what comes...

If my children are my best mindfulness teachers, (and let's face it, nothing brings you face to face with all your Stuff and forces you to hang out with it like children do) then Yonas is my Professor. I have to stay open and aware of the ever changing tide of emotions this boy brings. Sometimes I can hardly bear it. Most of the time I see exactly what he needs from me and most of the time all I want to do is give it to him. And sometimes I really don't want to give at all, but I do it anyway. And then sometimes, I watch myself watch him, knowing what he needs, knowing what I'm feeling, aware of everything, mindful, and yet. And yet, it feels torturous and tedious and I struggle to not head out the door and walk the few blocks to sit under the highway bridge by the railroad tracks and take up a new life. And then sometimes mindfulness is nowhere to be found and all I want is chocolate or tequila.

That's how it is, this parenting gig. Or at least, that's how it is for me. That's how it has been from the beginning, when Ava was an infant, or Eden a toddler, Safa right now. But because they've been with us from the beginning, the stakes aren't as high if I check out from time to time. If I don't respond in the most open-hearted, mindful way, we have a history of learned love and attachment and trust to carry us to the next moment. They know I will listen, come, comfort, tend, and care. They know in the deepest parts of who they are that we are a we.

Yonas has no baseline knowledge of this we-ness. So those moments when I can't seem to open my heart enough to engage the way I know I should, those carry far more weight with him than they do with the girls. Those pitiful moments like the one we had today where even though he could have absolutely gotten up from his seated position on his own, for some reason he needed me to help him. And for some reason in that moment this admittedly pull-yourself-up-by-the-boot-straps kind of mama just couldn't do it. So we sat in some kind of ridiculous stalemate, his needs bumping up against mine, the oldest of human dances. And he cried. And I sat by him. I said, "You can do it." (Which I should have probably just been saying to myself.) I offered him a hand to reach for. But he wouldn't take it. So I pointed out a roly-poly instead. And I broke a stick. I looked at his fat belly, the swollen mosquito bites on the back of his neck. We watched the roly-poly together. The wind blew. I noticed the yellow dusting of pollen over my arms. I heard the girls playing. I saw how I wanted to be somewhere, anywhere else. I noticed how I wanted a glass of wine. How I still wasn't just helping this kid up. He said roly-poly. We laughed about it, this crazy gray bug that becomes a ball.

And then it happened. At the same moment he began to stand, I reached for him. And I picked him up and we went inside, a mama and her boy, both doing the best we can.

Six Weeks Out

(last week)

(in Ethiopia)

We've been home with Yonas six weeks today. In that time, we've had lice, pneumonia, fierce tantrums, food issues, screaming, crying, fights, lost sleep, homework, laundry, and colds.

We've also had a birthday, dancing, laughter, joy, sunshine, silliness, flowers, singing, long walks, and love.

When I think about how far we've come as individuals and as a family in this short six weeks, I'm astounded. The six of us have worked hard.

Yonas is becoming himself. The person he is outside of institutional life. A boy with a family. He's beginning to lose his orphanage persona. He is sleeping. He has outgrown many of the clothes that fit him when we first got home. The shoes we brought to Ethiopia that were too big for him are now too small. His hair is softer, longer. He looks healthier, more vibrant.

The food issues are abating. He is no longer eating so much he vomits. Many meals come and go with no problems at all. And although he still eats much more than he needs, we are seeing the beginnings of self-regulation. Some milk leftover in his cup. Not asking for thirds. Getting down from the table while the girls are still eating. We have begun introducing the notion of "all gone".

We are communicating through a nice mix of Amharic, English, and some signs. He's learning several new words a day. When he first came home he constantly babbled in a loud, sing-song voice the same syllables repeatedly. This is called "Excessive Chattering" and some post-institutionalized kids do it to block out fear and grief. He doesn't do it at all anymore.

The tantrums are lessening in both intensity and length. When I had pneumonia, Erik wisely implemented a plan where every time Yonas began to tantrum, he picked him up. No matter what. Even if he had to chase him down because he didn't want anything to do with him. It worked. So that's what we do. We pick him up. This has not always been easy for me. This has taken real work on my part and I struggled with it. Sometimes the last thing I want to do is pick him up. But I do it anyway. Most of Yonas' tantrums are born out of being told "no" in some form. There's this idea that adoptees have experienced the "Primal No". Their birth families said, "no", the orphanage said, "no". For many adopted children being told "no" feels like rejection. It feels like, "You are unlovable. You are not good enough. You are unworthy." As we work to earn his trust, he softens. He begins to accept a "no" for what it is.

He is funny, affectionate, loud, daring, short-tempered, and generally at his core, I think, happy. He loves his sisters and they love him. He has begun to understand when Erik leaves for work in the morning it won't be the last time he sees him. In the first weeks we went to the school to pick up Ava and Eden, he was friends with everyone. Indiscriminate with his interactions and play. Now he's more wary. He checks in with me, asks for help, comes back to the safety of my lap when he needs a break.

It has not been easy. I still have moments of dread and fear and sadness. I wake up some mornings, think of the day that lies ahead, how much emotional and physical energy I need to usher us all through the day, and I take a deep breath and think shit, here we go again.

But we are getting there. We are doing it together. And when Yonas says, "Nah, Mama. Nah." (come, Mama), I know I want to follow.

Falling in Like

I've been absent from the cyber-world because I got pneumonia. Coughing-so-hard-you-throw-up, in-bed-for-days, just-take-me-out-back-and-shoot-me, pneumonia. I was able to avoid the hospital by visits to the Austin Infusion Center for breathing treatments and IV fluids and antibiotics. I'm now doing much better and taking the oral version at home. This antibiotic is one commonly used for pneumonia and bronchitis. Oh, and exposure to anthrax. I take it and about 45 minutes later feel like I need a simultaneous nap and quick vomit. And it makes me itchy and cranky, and I'm pretty sure it makes me hover on the verge of a heart attack for at least two hours after taking it. But I'm immensely thankful for the kind nurses and comfy chairs of the infusion center that allowed me to sleep in my own bed and hack in privacy.

While in the thick of it, I hardly saw my children. As you might suspect this was hard for the girls since we'd only recently returned from Ethiopia, really hard on Yonas when we were just beginning our journey of attachment, and excruciating for Erik who became a single parent of four overnight. We continued to receive meals and offers of play dates which helped a lot, but Erik was left to care for Yonas on his own. And frankly, this is still a boy one needs to have regular breaks from. (I'd like now to offer up all kinds of respect and awe to the single parents out there---Cindy, Shannon, etc; I bow down before you.)

So while laying in bed I had some time to think. Here's what I thought about: Injustice. How many people throughout history have died of pneumonia. I thought about pioneer women. How many mothers would have had to keep on keepin' on until they couldn't any longer and then eventually died. How I got to rest in bed and watch movies on a laptop. I thought about how many people with AIDS have died of pneumonia and how ashamed the United States should be for its startling lack of monetary contribution to the global HIV/AIDS pandemic. I thought about how many people all over the world right now are dying of pneumonia because they don't have access to medication. I thought about Ethiopia and her people. Of Yonas and his orphangemates. Of their respective birth families and what would happen if they contracted pneumonia. I thought, I'm so thankful.

When I remember we have only been home for three weeks, I am astounded by the progress we have made as individuals and as a family. Yonas has settled in a bit. He is a sweet, funny, affectionate boy that has the same capacity for delightfulness that Eden has. Except when he's not. His tantrums are lessening in frequency and length, but they are still a daily matter. Erik brought him so far in the time I was the sickest. But Yonas and I have work to do together. The work he has done with Erik doesn't transfer automatically to me. So yesterday, when I offered him a bite of soup he found disagreeable, he tantrumed. He went to the pantry and found the Swiffer. He slammed it on the ground in a threatening way for my benefit. When I turned my back to ignore the ugly, he hit me over the head with it. He is that boy.

He is also the boy that puts his chubby hands on both of my cheeks and pulls my mouth to his. The one that lifts my shirt so he can rest his head on my bare belly while he sucks his thumb. The one that belly laughs for his Papa and hugs Ava. The one that loves his car seat and being outside, the one that freely pours water over his head in the bath and has learned the words bubble, toot, mama, donkey and the sign for more since being home. He is that boy too.

The most important thing I thought while I lay in isolated sickness was this: I miss him. I would be lying if I said that I don't have moments of doubt and pessimism and anger. I do. But I missed the weight of his body on mine, his skin, his Yonasness.

And for that, this beginning of falling in like, I am thankful for pneumonia.

Mindful Monday, Four Days Late

Last week, when I was ready to head for Belize or Costa Rica, (somewhere warm with beaches, I hadn't worked out the details), I kept analyzing where I was emotionally and asking myself, "What happened? What went wrong?"

But the very simple answer is this: Nothing went wrong. It just went.

I do know some things that made it harder. We were matched with Yonas on March 31st, 2009. We waited almost a year to bring him home. We spent the majority of the past year filled with longing for our son, waiting for the time that we could hold him in our arms. It's not that we were unprepared for all the challenges; we took classes, read books. It's just that I imagined that the joy and relief of having him home would trump the challenges. But they didn't. That's a gross feeling, but an emotionally honest one.

I will also confess to thinking that I would be immune to the grip of Post-Adoption Depression. I'd read about it on the forum. I'd read Melissa Faye Greene's piece on Post-Adoption Panic. I had no judgment, only empathy. I just never in a million years thought it would touch me. I was wrong.

I also knew about the food issues that many post-institutionalized children face. But I naively thought that because Yonas had been in care for so long, that because he hadn't experienced the kind of hunger many children coming home from Ethiopia had, that those issues would be minor. I was wrong. Really, really wrong.

I underestimated how much grieving I had left to do for our family of five. I have grieved every change our family has undergone. Every incarnation has brought a what-are-we-doing-what-have-we-done? feeling. I just thought I'd worked through most of it. I was wrong.

In essence, I misread some stuff. I romanticized some stuff (who me??). I thought I was more capable than I was. And here is the kicker: I am not the person I thought I was.

I'm not head over heels in love, I'm not full of patience, I don't have the answers for every challenge Yonas lays down at my feet. And that's incredibly painful.

It's also really okay. I don't have to be more than I am (even though I really wish I could be).
I would love to know that every move I made was bringing us all closer to emotional health and peace. I would love to have a crystal ball that would reflect back to me our shiny, happy, healthy future selves.

When I was in my twenties I wrote on my bedroom wall: "Leap, and the net will appear." There is no crystal ball. But I'm doing everything I can to trust the net will appear.

Faking It

How I would love to be able to post a glowing report of our first few days home. I really would. I would love to be able to match the joy our friends have shown, their love and enthusiasm.

But I'm struggling. Erik is having a hard time. The girls want to love this brother they have waited for, but he's not making it easy. He's a tantruming, unpredictable mess. And rightly so. But just because he's earned the feelings doesn't mean they are easy to be around. He has major, MAJOR issues regarding food. Every time food is around he loses his shit. This is what happens when a child has experienced a lot of hunger. Or equates food with love. Or isn't fed when hungry, but on a schedule instead. When a child never sees food being prepared and so never has to wait a bit for it to come their way.

In Ethiopia he tantrumed for 45 minutes because we moved his hand out of the way to close a cabinet door.

He will not nap now, it is too terrifying for him.

In short, he's kind of an asshole. An insanely cute, terrified asshole.

In Ethiopia I cried. I cried for many, many reasons that I will begin to detail in the coming weeks. But in part I cried because I couldn't imagine what fresh hell we'd willingly created for ourselves. I cried to Erik. I said things like, "We only have 16 years left. Maybe he'll run away from home when he's 15. We'll start selling San Francisco. That could cut our time to 13 years." I said it through sobbing laughter and I was only partly kidding.

I am better right now, now while he sleeps. But today I had moments of such deep sorrow I couldn't imagine a time where I could ever think of him as any thing less than the biggest mistake of our lives. Did we seriously trade our sweet, well-oiled lives for this new shitty version?

Let me be perfectly clear that it is only because my adoption community assures me we will all be fine in time and that statistics tell me that 65% of adoptive parents experience some form of Post-Adoption Depression (PAD) that I can write this awfulness here. It does not feel good to write this out. It doesn't feel good to know I will probably have to seek professional help. But maybe it will help someone else be prepared. Because if you know me, you know I am nothing if not honest about my emotional life, especially if I think it might help someone else. And because I have to believe that this is our path and it isn't meant to be our undoing.

In adoption circles here's what they say: "Fake it 'til you make it." So today I carried my mess of a boy around all day when all I wanted to do was leave him on the front porch. I pretended to be happy to see him. I smiled giant fake smiles through my panicked crying and raspberried his belly through my tears.

In the middle of the night, when he cries in his sleep, I will wrap my arms around him and tell I'm here. That he's safe. That he's not going anywhere. That I love him. And I will pray like hell that someday soon it will be true.

Six

I finished writing this post around 5:30 yesterday and forgot to post it. I'm a little tired. So today I give you countdown days six AND five.


My girls go to an alternative school that doesn't hold classes on Thursdays and Fridays. So my mother-in-law comes on Thursday mornings for a few hours. And when she came this morning, I headed out the door with my many lists in hand, a woman on fire. Obsessed. Possesed? I went to eight different places in 2 hours and 45 minutes. (Thank you Alice!) Including the grocery store. The birthdays are kicking my ass. But I am happy.

The rest of this post isn't going to have anything to do with preparing to leave. The remainder of this post is stories of my girls that are worthy of inclusion here and I'm afraid I will forget to write them down in the new brother frenzy.

Most of the funniest things said in our family come from the mouth of Eden, 5:

"I love honey more than I have fingers."

"Of all the animals, the scorpian is the one I worst want to take care of." (After a date with Erik to the exotic pet store.)

In this aforementioned alternative school, they have engaging teachers and 5 year-olds write poems so beautiful you could weep. The following are by Eden:

Flowers
Pretty, colorful
Growing, blooming, swaying
They make the world beautiful.
Red, white, purple
Spreading, opening
Silence

A Shell

Pink, peach spirally
Came from the sea
It used to be a home
Now it lives with me.

This came on her own yesterday:

Snails slithering beneath the morning sky
They don't let anyone see them,
In their shells they sleep.


Eden and Safa, 3, do this weird thing in their pretend play where they talk as if they are reading from a book written in the third person. I think it comes from watching Thomas the Tank Engine. So they say things like, " 'I can do that!' she said, flipping through the air." So Safa and Eden were playing baby and Mama and I overheard this:

Safa: "Waaaaaaaaa. Mama!"
Eden: " 'What is it?' I said sternly."

The following is a conversation you could only have with a 3 year-old. We were on a walk and Safa was distressed, looking for something.
"What are you looking for?" I said.
"That thing I lost." she said.
"What was it?"
"It was the same thing I had earlier, but different."
Okaaaaay. I've been around the block with toddlers a few times, so I pull out a trick that almost always gets somewhere.
"What color is it?"
"The same color as the thing I had." This was said in a kind of why-do-keep-annoying-me-with-these-incessant-questions-when-I'm-trying-to-find-the-thing-I-lost, sort of way. I gave up.

Haapy Christmas Faces

Old Pyjamas, New Brother: A Toddler's Tale of Woe

Is it just me or is Safa a little.....needy lately? The girl is struggling right now. She is a regressing, clingy, angry, hitting, whiny mess. She's in disequilibrium---she's feeling left out of Ava and Eden's current love affair with each other, she's too little to keep up, understand the jokes, and do the things they do sometimes. She wants to be big. AND she has a sense that Yonas will usurp her position as baby, will read her old books, play with her old toys, and (GASP!), even wear her old pyjamas!! It's just too much. She wants to be big and little. Bigger and Littler. And it's making her miserable. And also some of us who are around her all day.

Experience has shown me time and time again that whenever kids are really going through something, they are about to make some kind of leap. Cognitively, emotionally, etc. It's like they back up to get a running start to leap over whatever is coming next.

We humans are tricky aren't we? It's precisely those times when we are the most unlovable, that we need the most love. I keep trying to remind myself of that. Those times in my life when people have forgiven me my ugliness, or looked past my unlovable behavior to the person they know I am.

So today I held Safa like a baby. I "found" her, wrapped her up in a blanket, called her "Tiny Baby", carried her in a sling for too long, rocked her, and let her be my baby.

And my heart broke even though I was gritting my teeth some of the time. Because I totally understand. I want her to be Bigger and Littler too.

Safa is Three

(and has been for awhile). Here are Safa's birthday dress pictures. I looked in the archives at her first birthday pics, with her sweet little face and sad torticollis head tilt. I can't believe she is three. My gals are growin' fast...

Nothing Says Birthday Like Eating Your Favorite Train's Face

There was a train to go with the face, but she wanted the face.

The girl has a serious Thomas the Tank Engine fetish. Some might call it "a problem".

SAFA IS TWO

The quality of these pictures is not very good.
On their second birthdays they are inevitably very two. So getting them to sit still for their picture in a giant birthday dress usually doesn't go down so well. I have two pictures of Ava in hers at two. And about three of the side of Eden's head. Safa's surprisingly went the best so far. It was still over in about 6 minutes, but she was sweet for a bit then very ready to move to the next thing.

Sometimes I try to think of who she would be if she were a first or second born. Her sisters are so much a part of what makes her her. They have shaped her in countless ways---she is potty-training much to my chagrin. She has been peeing on the potty since she was 16 months old off and on. This is a direct result of having two sisters. It's just what you do, right? She knows how to run to her room, slam the door, and yell, "No! That's not fair!!". Sometimes, most times, she does it for no reason. She plays in very different ways than most kids her age because of them. She knows pretend play. She knows how to grab a toy dino, and make it say, "Hi. What's your name? Where's my sisters go?" The idea of "sisters"
is so internalized for her. It means someone to laugh with, someone to get mad at, someone who will pick her up when I can't. Someone to watch, follow, emulate. Someone who she can get laughs out of. Earlier today she told me Erik was her sister. I think she just meant she loved him.

Mostly she is funny and very sweet. She has a temper, but usually gets over things pretty quickly. Her tantrums are unpredictable, but short.

Here's one of my favorites:
She toots. Smiling says, "Mama, what's Safa booty say?"
"What does your booty say?
"Booty say, ppppppffffftttt"
Every time.


I just asked Ava what her favorite thing
about Safa is and she said,"She's sweet and funny." Then Ava went to Safa and said,"Safa, what's your favorite thing about Safa?" And Safa replied, "Uummmmmm, yellow"

I cannot imagine life without her.

Eden and Safa Ride the Plane

I was so certain she was too small to ride, she was quite confident she would be fine. So was the attendant. So I let her get on fully expected her to start to scream and need to get off, or try to stand up and promptly be struck in the head by an oncoming plane. This is what happened instead.

So I heard some fussing coming from the laundry room. Upon inspection, I found this...

SAFA AND THE GOAT

OH, THE LOOTING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This was accomplished in about two minutes time...

TODDLERHOOD IS UPON US

Safa, or as I like to call her Tyrant Sister Queen (TSQ for short), has entered toddlerhood. How do I know this? Because within a ten minute period the following two things happened: She laid down a nasty 6 inch scratch on Eden's thigh for absolutely no reason accompanied by some sort of shrieking that scared us all, and as I finished biting off the last fingernail while she struggled to get free (I couldn't find the nailclippers plus I was just in the mood) I said, "Here, have this" and tossed her some unimportant toiletry item, then, "I'm about to give your ass some Benadryl." I didn't. But I might.

Safa

screamer in delight and anger down dog peek-a-boo, tummy patting sing along, clap along, big sister tag along trying to keep up, abandoned cup scavenger, climber cuddles, pointing, and "uh-ooohhh" looter of pens, eater of crayons, opportunistic raider tough, no b.s taking, knows karate and ka-razy joker, animal lover, book fanatic bath splasher, happy riser, sweet baby breath loud, lunchbox lover, dog follower  slow teether, fast walker, sisters' biggest fan

Now that Safa is getting older she's more fun for Eden...she's also more annoying to her

THAT'S ONE SMALL STEP FOR BABIES...ONE GIANT LEAP FOR BABYKIND.

Safa is 1

Every year on their birthdays, I take a picture of each girl in a dress that used to be mine. Ava's is a dress I turned into a skirt and wore often while I was falling in love with Erik. Eden's is a black camisole that my mom and I both used to wear, and a long purple-blue tafetta skirt that I never wore but always wanted to. For Safa, I chose this red, strapless that I wore this Christmas.