Halloween – it just gets better!

Years, before kids, DH and I always had a basket of candy on the entry table.  We usually only gave away 1/2 – 3/4  of it because we were the old curmudgeon of the neighborhood.   I think the kids dared each other to find out who was going to come up to our door to find out what kind of candy we had to see if it was worth walking up our driveway.  In 2002 we had arrived home on the 30th, grabbed a shower and slept a couple of hours.  On Halloween mom and I sent DH and dad out to get candy and some baby supplies and dressed JB in a little ladybug costume that my best friend had given me.  JB loved racing me to door, but then hid behind me when there were people actually there.  We did not go out trick or treating that night.  For the next 4 years we went to the Halloween party at her daycare where she gathered enough candy to get a small school high.  Once we moved into our current home DH took the girls out around the neighborhood while I handed out treats,  Once JB started school, she started seeing children around the neighborhood that she recognized.  This year, with our addition completed and people settled and truly becoming neighbors as well as both girls in school we have at least 2 other children trick or treating with us with the possibility of a 9 extra children wandering around with the men in the families while us moms either gather at my house or stay in their houses to hand out treats.  We sure have come a long way – and it is so exciting.  It is incredible to me that  I, who went for years and did not know who my neighbors were, now welcomes many of the kids in the neighborhood into my home on a routine basis, stocks boxes and boxes of popcorn for quick snacks, who turns around and finds new children in her backyard or ringing the doorbell asking to come play.  I am so proud of my girls for their openness to friends and willingness to welcome people into their home.  God has blessed me with the challenge of stepping outside of my comfort zone and providing some terrific people to pull me out of my shell.  There are times I look in the mirror and wonder who this middle-aged mom is looking back.  While still uncertain in social situations that I can’t control, I have found a new confidence in my own abilities.  I have gained a new sense of self-worth.  I am so glad for this growth because I don’t want my girls to be inhibited by the same insecurities that I have felt for so many years.  So here is to trick or treating with half the neighborhood.  Here is to our open door policy for the neighborhood.  Here is to well-balanced girls who know their own self-worth and can handle themselves with confidence in whatever situation they encounter.

A Long Awaited Reunion

It has been quite awhile since JB and her Godfather have seen each other.   DH and I were friends with FJM before JB was even a dream.  We shared many dinners and lots of laughter together over the years.  As we were struggling with infertility I spent many hours talking things over with him and praying with him as we walked our way through that dark tunnel and came out the other side.  He had been transferred from the parish we had attended before we submitted out dossier to China.   We had long considered him as part of our family – so when we received our referral we asked him to formally become part of our family and be JB’s Godfather.  We have been so blessed to have him in our lives.  

Papers = meremodisty by TaylorMade                                                                      photo treatment – coffeeshop
Word Art – no TOU, was a freebie that I downloaded.
Aged Photo Borders- made by AnVanLaer                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

 

Fall Break

Last week was Fall Break for the girls.  We took off and went for our one and only camping trip of this year.  The weather was very chilly and it rained 1 day.  But we had a really good time.  One day we headed further south and visited JB’s Godfather.  He is a priest assigned to a very small town.  We got to see him and he took us all around his town.  This page is of the girls playing around as we were waiting for something or another.  I just happened to snap these pictures and thought they did a great job of showing off their personalities that day. 

A Loving Template – extremely altered
Wordart and I Love You circle – TaylorMade Indefinitely
Photo treatments – CoffeeShop Classic B&W and Bittersweet Vintage

I Bond, She Bonds, We All Bond Together?

That buzzword in parenting – bonding.   That nebulous instant connection between mother and child.  That magical soul knowledge of each other.  Balderdash!  I have spoken with parents who have parented children they have carried in their womb and some of them had a very tenuous bond with their child for several months after birth.  How could I have possibly answered my pediatrician’s question  2 weeks after meeting JB that we were bonding.  How horribly naive I was. 

JB willingly came to me without tears.  Within 2 days she looked around to find me whenever I got out of her direct line of sight.  She showed joy when I approached her.  In my honeymoon phase I did not realize that she was only showing me what I wanted to see – she was a pleaser who pegged me immediately to get me to meet her needs.  I thought we were bonding.  My heart was definitely already involved.  But even that was not real bonding.  JB was the realization of prayers and dreams and renewed hope.   I loved what she represented, but I did not know her enough to love the person she was.    Several months after we got home JB was doing 2 things – feeling comfortable enough to challenge me, and acting out in a typical (though unrecognized) sensory seeking SPD fashion.  I remember looking at her and wondering who she was.  I looked in her eyes and realized that I really had no idea.  We started to learn about each other.  We started to trust each other.  We started to relax and let our relationship take its own course.  I learned how to meet her needs, those verbalized and those that I anticipated.  I thought we were bonded.

A few months later she started experiencing night terrors.  She would wake screaming.  I had no idea how to take away her fear or comfort her.  I held her after she awoke and soothed her back to sleep.  Not long after that she had tubes placed in her ears.  When she awoke from anesthesia she frantically grabbed hold of me and relaxed more deeply into my arms than she had ever done before (and no, it was not the anesthesia that made her relax)  It seemed that she realized that I was going to be there to comfort her when bad things happened.  I thought we had bonded. 

We moved into our new house.  In the interim between selling our house moving into the new house we lived in a 1 bedroom apartment where we all slept in the same room.  Once we moved into our new house I realized that JB was getting up in the middle of the night and making sure we were still there.  I asked her about it and she told me that she just wanted to make sure we were safe.  Finally we ended up placing a sleeping bag beside the bed for when she needed to be with us and we needed to get a full night’s sleep.  She began confiding thoughts to me that she had never talked about before, though I had tried to introduce topics.  She asked for alone time with me – our mother/daughter dates.  We talked about all sorts of things.   I thought we were bonded.

Earlier this year we went to a live production at our local stadium.  We had upper balcony seats.  JB was very uncomfortable sitting up there – she is not terribly fond of heights when she does not have control of the situation.  She asked me what would happen if she started to fall off the balcony.  I assured her that I would do everything I could to save her, even going over the edge of the balcony myself.  She stopped for a moment and then turned to me with wide, wonderous eyes and said “You would die for me?”  I assured her I would.  She sat a little taller and moved with a little more confidence.  And then I realized we were still bonding. 

Bonding for us is going to be a lifelong process.  She will realize bit by bit that I am not going anywhere.  I am here for her no matter what.  I love her with all that I am.   We share a name, we share a home, we share our lives.  But we are still getting to know one another, and will continue to get to know each other for the rest of our lives.  We are bonded as the people we are at this minute, but tomorrow we will be different people and will learn about each other and rebond again.  Bonding is not a static event; it is the constant evolution of life and relationships and learning and trusting and accepting.  So I relish each day, I cherish each moment, because it will never be this way again.

Anniversary

Today, 7 years ago, a child was placed into my arms and I became a mother for the first time.  I have talked about that day several times on my blog.  Today I want to talk about the moments before that miracle.  

The room was stuffy and hot and slightly musty smelling.  There was a huge conference table in the center and all around the perimeter of the room was a beige vinyl sectional.  One whole wall of the room was lined with windows.  Our group quickly opened the windows so we could get a little air moving around.  Each parent found a spot on the sectional and claimed it with all the paraphernalia that we had lugged, not knowing exactly what we would need.  DH and I had the diaper bag with a bottle all ready to add hot water to.  We had a change of clothes in case the orphanage wanted the clothes that she on back.  We had gift bags containing items to present to the orphanage director and the caregivers.  We had a video camera.  We had a 35mm camera.  We had extra film. 

Before we had traveled we had read personal accounts of the various possibilities of the condition our child could be in – colds, diarrhea from giardia, rashes, lice, scabies, misshapen head from laying too long in a crib, various developmental delays.  We had read personal accounts as well as professional accounts of the emotions that our child may be feeling and how those emotions may play out – rejection of one or both parents, extreme clinginess to one parent, inconsolable crying, refusal to eat, emotional shutdown to the point that it could resemble mental issues.  I had read numerous books and watched endless videos about China.  I had read of the numerous reasons that children were left to be taken care of by the government – the one child policy, the cultural and elder survival need for a boy, poverty, superstitious reasons, decisions being made by the birthfather’s parents, the stigma of single motherhood.  I had read the few interviews of birthmothers that were out there at the time.  I had read sociological analysis of how the Chinese would view giving up a child.  All of it had left me not with a feeling of anger or disdain for my child’s birthmother.  Quite the contrary. It left me with a feeling of emptiness, because I knew I could never put myself in her shoes, even for an instant, because I could never understand where she was coming from. I could never give my child a glimpse into what her birthparents’ thought processes or feelings were because I would never be able to understand them.  There is such a deep cultural difference between east and west that I could never totally comprehend it let alone put it into language that my child would be able to relate to.  I had never lived in the emotional, cultural and social environment in which she had lived her entire life.

So there I stood in that stuffy, hot and slightly musty smelling conference room.   I was about to become a mother – the dream and heartache of so many years.  Others around me were alternating between nervous laughter and tears.  I spent some time looking out the window at the mass of people moving up and down the street.  I wondered if one of the women I was seeing was my child’s birthmother.  I wondered if she wondered how her child was and what was going to happen to her.  It hit me of the total unknown that is my child’s past – that the chances of me being able to provide her with any information was basically nonexistent.  My head had known that all along, but suddenly my heart knew it and I grieved.  I grieved for all that was lost – my child’s birthparents, my child’s history, my child’s extended family. I did not expect those emotions.  I did not expect it to make me so very sad.  I did not expect the overwhelming REALITY of it to hit me at that moment. 

Those emotions were quickly pushed to the side as our name was called and we finally met JB and held her for the first time.  Those thoughts and feelings were easy to push aside during the baby and toddler years when we were so busy just trying to keep up with her.  But now that she is growing older and starting to have some questions, whether she verbalizes them or not, those feelings are becoming more prominent in my heart.  I ponder them during the night when I hold JB close and listen to her breathing.  I know my grief is nothing compared to what she will face throughout her life.  But as a mother, my grief is different and I can only speak to my emotions.  I want to meet this person who gave JB life.  I want to share stories and giggle with her at JB’s antics, and revel together in the person that JB is.  I want to take away all the unknowns in JB’s past so she can face the future without questions.  In short – I want to fix it.  But it is not fixable.  It is, though, something that we can work on together.   By being open with my emotions I can show her it is ok to be open with hers.   By showing her how much I want to know all I can about her birth culture I can empower her to want to know more.  But today my thoughts are not on JB’s emotions, they are not really on my emotions.  My thoughts are about the people half a world away that share the same genes as my little girl.  My thanks go out to them for choosing life for her instead of the very viable option of abortion.  My thanks go out to them for choosing to keep her safe and healthy while she lived with them instead of ignoring her.  My thanks go out to them for placing her in the safe, sheltered place where she was found.

Our first night home in the States

My crazy hair girl! 2009