November 3rd

November 3, 2011

I got out the kindergarten-level writing books I have with the girls and they looked at me like, “are you kidding me? This is too easy.” Zahra did it for awhile, but did not seem happy about it at all. I got Zoe on the floor and started whipping through flashcards, saying the names of the objects and having her repeat and she really liked it (Zoe is way more hands-on, active, verbal, visual). But, all that lasted about 15 minutes or so and I was feeling discouraged about the school issue. They need to learn English, but starting with very simple ABC’s feels too baby for them I think. Zoe did LOVE the Leap Frog letter thing and she almost knows the alphabet now.

I called my friend Karen again (adopted two older girls from Africa) and she gave me some more INCREDIBLE wisdom. She said that the girls will have no framework at all to understand the concept of homeschool. If they were 5 and had not been to school yet, then we could maybe get by with it, but because they are older and used to going to school Karen said homeschooling (at this point) will make them feel ripped off. Oh man, when she said that a major light bulb went off because that described exactly how I perceive they feel right now. So, we are looking into possibly enrolling them into some ELL classes so they have a sense of going to school and so they can learn English faster. Since they are so much older (than we thought) and speak to each other all the time, if we don’t get them around other kids their age regularly it is going to take forever to learn English.

Karen also said an incredibly profound thing regarding the girls and education. She said people often ask her (about her girls), “how long do you think it will take them to catch up?” (which is totally the way I have thought about it). She said – adamantly – “catch up” is the wrong mental approach with our girls. Because of their background, they will never “catch up” so that cannot be the goal. The goal is to allow them to learn and grow and integrate this new learning into what they have gone through.

And the sooner we can communicate better, oh my word, the better for all of us. Today was very rough. Four of us were in tears at some point during the day. It is getting harder by the minute for the girls not being able to communicate with us and therefore staying connected to them is getting harder. It is easy for them to just retreat to their room by themselves (which I totally understand since I’ve lived in another culture and had to learn the language – it is exhausting and frustrating and you just want to get away).

And there are no books or research (that I have found) for this adoption + older children + no language. We have a lot of adoption/connection tools but with the girls being so much older (than we thought), the language is much more of an issue that we ever expected and it greatly limits the tools we are able to use.

During the afternoon, the girls both wanted me to help them ride their bikes. But Zoe had to go to the bathroom, so she took my arm (which she has never done) and had me come with her. I knew her game . . .she didn’t want me to help Zahra first. I went with her but when we went back outside, I helped Zahra first. And that was the end of it for Zoe. She walked away very mad and then I found her in tears. DISCONNECTED. I tried to approach her a number of times, but she did not want me near her. It was a no-win situation for me. Had I helped Zoe, Zahra prob would have been upset. I tried helping Zoe with her bike, but she refused. I was disconnected from Zoe and had NO IDEA who to regain the connection. A little later we came inside and it was time to start dinner. Jason let the kids watch PBS (we were basically all D.O.N.E for the day), but Zoe was still in the kitchen and started helping me, which, praise the Lord, allowed us to regain connection. Whew!

But, after the TV show was done, Zahra came in the kitchen and when she saw Zoe making dinner, she became disconnected (sulking/downcast). Oh boy! Fortunately, God came through with some great insight from my friend Karen earlier that day that I needed JUST at this moment. Karen told me that we will need to be very intentional about helping Zahra maintain her oldest child role that she is used to. Karen said we need to find ways to give her extra responsibilities and privileges. So, as soon as I saw the look on Zahra’s face I knew that she was feeling her oldest child role taken out from under her. Praise God that He allowed me to talk to Karen just in time to need this info. Because I knew this was most likely the reason she was upset, I tried to give her some responsibilities to do to help with dinner. She was slightly reluctant at first but then came right back into connection with Zoe and I. Whew!

This is life right now . . . trying to keep everyone’s basic needs met while staying connected. More and more disconnections are occurring, so it is more like keeping everyone’s needs met while figuring out how to reconnect throughout the day. But, God is so faithful to help us hour-by-hour.

While I feel like one of our biggest struggles is that the girls are older than we expected and we are not prepared with activities to do to meet their higher level needs, in other ways, they show evidence of some younger needs. For example, we took all the kids to the park and you should have seen the girls on the swings. They have been on our swing in the back yard, but they don’t go very high. They loved the swings at the park, but screamed like they were on a roller coaster! It was so cute.