Crazy Math

My friend, Julie Masson, passed on a great blog post to me last week called CRAZY MATH. I wasn't able to post it directly to my blog so you have to go to the link to read it. But, please do it read it! It is short and such an awesome explanation of how it is that ordinary people with not a lot of money - like us and most of the people I know who are adopting - are able to end up paying for an adoption. It very much explains how we are able to pay for our adoption - all $60,000+ of it!

The Privilege of Saying Yes

This is a great article that summarizes a topic that is talked about at length in "The Connected Child." It is written in the context of parenting children from hard places.

From: empoweredtoconnect.org
By: Amy Monroe

One thing I’ve learned in my journey as a mom is the need for me to raise the level of nurture I bring to parenting in order to help my children build trust. My children need to trust that I will consistently meet their needs in ways that help them understand that they are precious and that their voice matters. Telling them I will meet their needs helps them to “know it;” showing them (over and over and over again) helps them experience it and learn to trust.

A great way to accomplish this is to give my children as many “yes’s” as I can. It is through my “yes’s” that I can best give my kids this gift of trust. In order to improve in this area, during a recent Saturday at home with my kids I committed to giving them as many “yes’s” as possible. Trust me, this wasn’t easy, but I need the practice and they need this gift. Throughout the course of that day I was intentional about catching myself before each and every “no” I was about to give. As I stopped to think every time I considered saying “no,” I asked myself a simple question: Can I give my child a joyful “yes” instead?

What I learned in the course of this day was truly insightful. I realized that I am often tempted to say “no” out of mere convenience or for selfishness reasons. In fact, in many situations giving a “no” had become my default response. But I discovered something even more amazing – the more “yes’s” I gave the better my kids responded to me and the more our connection was strengthened.

I know what you may be thinking about now – that as a mom we can’t always give “yes’s.” This is certainly true. But I am discovering that the more “yes’s” I give the easier it is for my kids to accept the “no’s” that are an undeniable part of learning and growing. In fact, as I am mindful and creative about giving “yes’s,” I have found that I can often give a “yes” to go along with many of my “no’s.” For example, when I found my six-year-old daughter Kate in the pantry looking for a snack just 15 minutes before lunch, I had to say “no.” But, I was also able to give her a “yes” by telling her that she could put her snack in a special place and have it after lunch. That “yes” represented a win for both of us, and allowed me to meet her need and put another, albeit small, deposit in our trust account.

Each day is full of countless opportunities for me as a mom to give both “yes’s” and “no’s.” My kids certainly need me to say “no” at times in order to help them grow, but they also need many joyful “yes’s” to help them build trust. I am learning that God has given me the responsibility to say “no” when needed, and the privilege to say “yes” as often as I can.

Amy Monroe writes a weekly column – A Mother’s Heart – on the Tapestry blog.

Something More To Consider:

Giving your child “yes’s” isn’t just about saying “yes” to his requests. You can also say “yes” to your child by learning to share appropriate levels of power him. Watch as Dr. Purvis explains this concept and its benefits for our children in terms of helping them grow and heal.

Resources for Adopting Kids from Hard Places

I’ve been working on a list of resources for adopting kids from hard places (internationally or from foster care). It is not exhaustive, but it is made up of the top resources I have found in the past several months. Here are the statistics (from Dr. Karen Purvis) about kids from hard places transitioning into families: 1/3 of children adopted from hard places make a seamless transition into their new home, 1/3 of children have significant issues and the last 1/3 of children have intense issues transitioning to their new home.

Here is the reality: At the very least, any child being adopted from overseas has:

1) experienced a lack of food/starvation

2) had parents either leave them or they have had to leave their parents to be adopted

3) left everything they have ever known to be familiar to them (even if they were ‘bad’ circumstances from our perspective, they were still familiar)

These events happen to nearly EVERY child adopted internationally, no matter what their age (except for newborn infants who have care from birth and are then adopted). These events are traumatic. There is a lot of loss and grief these kids will experience. In addition, every child is going to have to deal with the issue of attachment to varying degrees; they also have to adjust to new parents and learn to function in a new family – or maybe the first family they've ever been a part of. Add to all this the possibility of having bonded with a foster parent and leaving them, having a parent leave them in the street to fend for themselves, witnessing fighting, abuse, murder, experiencing physical and/or sexual abuse and you can begin to see why kids who are adopted from hard places will have significant trauma that their parents will have to help them through.

Parents adopting kids from hard places can’t to bring these kids into our homes, give them the love we have to offer, parent them like we parent our children who have been with us since birth and expect that they will be fine. It is not fun to think about, but it is reality. And this reality can be incredibly overwhelming. Trust me, I have cried many tears over this. There were about four Sunday church services in a row last fall that I bawled like a baby, grieving and crying out to God about these things. There is nothing that has made me long for and depend on the power of God like the thought of adopting kids from a very hard place. In addition to the grace and power of God, there are two main things I have learned (from Dr. Karen Purvis at empoweredtoconnect.org) in my preparation that have helped me the most when I begin to feel overwhelmed about the challenge of parenting kids from hard places:

1. Parents who have a realistic perspective about how difficult it can be to parent kids from hard places will experience more success and joy in parenting than parents who have an idealistic view of what it will be like to bring these kids into their home. An idealistic view involves thinking “we have so much love to give a child,” “when they come home it will be wonderful,” “our child will be so happy and thankful we adopted him.” Being as realistic as possible about the difficulties that lie ahead is very important.
2. Dr. Karen Purvis has said if parents use the tools available to help parent kids from hard places, she has never seen a child not progress to their full potential later in life.

With this said, below is a list of books, blogs and more that I have found to be the most helpful. I also put my own commentary after each one to give more description about why it is on the list. Most of them are on this list because they have been recommended by a number of people. Some I have read, some I have not yet read. My goal in compiling this was to have as many of the resources I may need in the future handy and available. I actually have many more on a longer list, but I’m posting what I think are the main important resources. This also includes therapists. I know that may sound scary, but again, I’ve done enough reading to know that it is quite likely that one or more of our kids could need adoption-specific therapy or other treatment. I’m not planning on taking our kids to therapy as soon as they get here, but it makes me feel better to know that I know who I can call if I need to down the road.

BOOKS
The Connected Child (Dr. Karen Purvis, et. al.) If I had only one book to read to help me prepare and to refer to when my kids come home, it would be this one.

Wounded Children Healing Homes (Schooler, et. al.) Not quite as practical as “Connected Child” but my second favorite book in preparing to adopt kids from hard places.

The Boy Who Was Raised As a Dog (Bruce Perry) This book is not about adoption, but rather about how the brain is affected by trauma. It is not a necessary read for most people, but it is probably one of my favorite books I’ve read EVER (I was a psychology and sociology major, what can I say?)! It is incredibly fascinating and lays the foundation for understanding why kids end up acting the way they do after they’ve had traumatic experience(s). Trauma literally changes brain chemistry. The good news is that there are ways to “re-wire” the brain through treatment, therapy and appropriate parenting techniques.

Toddler Adoption: The Weaver’s Craft (Mary Hopkins-Best) I haven’t read this yet, but I am about to start it. This is one of the only toddler-specific resources I have come across.

Attaching in Adoption (Deborah Gray) I started reading this book, but decided it would be better to read after the kids come home and I know the specific attachment issues we are dealing with because it is very in-depth.

Nurturing Adoptions (Deborah Gray) I am planning to read this after the kids come home as well.

Building the Bonds of Attachment: Awakening love in deeply troubled children (Daniel Hughes) I got this book from the library last week, but then found out the author is doing a webinar through Adoption Learning Partners on March 8th (see below), so I signed up for the webinar and took the book back to the library.

Theraplay: Helping Parents and Children Build Better Relationships Through Attachment-Based Play (Jernberg & Booth) I am really looking forward to reading this book. I like the concept of using play as therapy and look forward to learning more about how we can do that.

Parenting with Love and Logic (Cline & Fay) I don’t have much to say about this book, but have seen it recommended by a number of sources.

Inside Transracial Adoption (Steinberg & Hall) “Transracial adoption” refers to adopting a child of a different race than yourself and your spouse.

I’m Chocolate, You’re Vanilla: Raising Healthly Black and Biracial Children in a Race-Conscience World (Wright) Another book about the issue of transracial adoption.

BLOGS
http://www.onethankfulmom.com/ This is my all-time favorite blog for Christ-centered adoption information. It is an adoptive mom who simply shares what she is learning, the issues her adopted kids face, etc. Most of my book recommendations have come from her.

http://gatheredfromafar.com/ This adoptive mom does a great job of sharing what life looks like after adopting three girls (I think they were adopted as toddlers or a little older). It has helped me get a better picture of what life might look like for us. She is also a believer.

OTHER RESOURCES
http://empoweredtoconnect.org/ (Dr. Karen Purvis) I’ve shared this website on my blog before. It is PACKED with incredible resources. I have looked at many of them, but decided to wait to use this as a resource once our kids get here (instead of reading everything on it now).

7 Gifts & 7 Insights Video Series (by Empowered to Connect) If there was just one resource on this entire post that I recommend the highest it is this. It is a series of 17 short videos by Dr. Karen Purvis. We were required to watch this video series by our agency and I am so glad we did. There is also a study guide that can be downloaded to go along with it. This video series is the nuts and bolts of what every family must know about adopting kids from hard places.

Healthy Touch (Texas Christian Institute of Child Development) This is a DVD that I have about the importance of using touch/massage with children to help bond with them. Touch is a powerful tool that parents can use to help their kids bond and attach.

Adoption Learning Partners This site offers an extensive variety of online courses to help prepare for adoption. We watched “Food for Thought,” which helped us learn about how to help our kids catch up from being malnourished. I am also going to watch "Connecting Your Family, Inside and Out" by Daniel Hughes in a couple weeks. Most courses cost around $15.

Adoptive Families Magazine This is a great magazine and is available at the Ames Public Library (or you can buy a subscription). Each issue covers a number of important adoption topics. I used to get it shortly after Abram came home, but found it not as helpful for a domestic newborn adoption (there aren't as many post-adoption issues to deal with in an infant, domestic adoption). I need to start looking at it again because I know it will be very helpful now that we are adopting three kids from Africa.

NUTRITION These are the best two websites I've found to help parents know how to help kids nutritionally who have been malnourished.

http://www.adoptmed.org/

http://adoptionnutrition.org/ (The Spoon Foundation)

THERAPISTS (Notes by Anne Hrbek, a mother at Cornerstone to two biological girls and two girls adopted from foster care who have had significant behavioral issues.)

Karen Combs (fantastic attachment therapist -- plenty of experience). Wonderful lady. Adoptive parent of a child with significant mental health problems. She will travel and does in-home therapy.
Karencombs@netins.net
641-487-7832
66684 110th Street
McCallsburg, IA 50154-8014

Tracie Engstrom
tlengstrom@gmail.com
Play therapist
Good with children/teens with attachment and trauma problems. Does family therapy as well.
232-0411
Located in downtown Ames (across from Wheatsfield in Pyle office building)

Carol Leland (Youth and Shelter Services)
cleland@iowatelecom.net
Therapist -- experienced adoptive parent with internationally adoptive children with significant mental health issues.
233-3141
YSS office is on South 5th street (across from Panera).

Denise Best, therapist
Denisebest@mchsi.com
Adoption & Attachment Treatment Center of Iowa (Iowa City)
Fantastic attachment therapist. Difficult to get appointments with since she has gotten very well known.
319-338-2722. Last I heard doesn't take T-XIX insurance.

If anyone has any other resources to add to this list please let me know! And feel free to pass this onto others.

Acquiring English

I'm thankful for how God has equipped his church with people who have many different gifts and talents and are willing to share them with those of us adopting. There are several people at our church who teach ESL (English as a Second Language) and one of them passed on several great resources for me. Perhaps the most helpful was this article with many great tips on how to help older kids who are adopted acquire English during the first few months and years. Even if you are adopting younger kids, I think many of the tips could be helpful.

P.S. Our kids will only know French when they arrive!

English Acquisition for Internationally Adopted Children

Apr 12, 2001 - © Susan Ward

When adopting an older child internationally, some of the main questions revolve around language. How will we communicate? How quickly will she learn English? Below are tips and notes based on my experience with Hannah. Hannah had just turned six when she got home from Russia.

Hannah was a bit of a wonder child in that she was completely fluent with almost no accent after 9 months. Part of the reason is that she is very, very bright; she has an excellent memory; and most importantly, she had excellent Russian language skills which provided the foundation for her to learn her second language. She was also very eager to learn English.

Hannah's mastery of English was very quick. After three years home, she reads above grade level, writes poetry, and understands very subtle nuances of the language. Her language abilities quite remarkable and are probably not typical.

General language tips: -learn as much Russian (Chinese, Vietnamese, etc.) as you can and use it for the basics i.e."It's time for bed." "Do you need to go to the toilet?" "Come here" "Would you like an apple?" "I love you" "You're my daughter."

-When speaking Russian doesn't work, draw pictures and pantomime.

-When you're not communicating in Russian, speak English to your child constantly even when they don't understand it. For example, when you're going for a walk, just chat in English about what you see.

-Start reading as soon as your child is home and read every day

-Teach a game where they have to use English like "Go Fish" (I taught Hannah this on day 2)

-Resist asking them to repeat things for you in English, they'll do it when they're ready

-When they start to speak English, instead of correcting them, repeat it back correctly. For example if Hannah aid, "Yesterday I eat ice cream," I would say, "You ate ice cream yesterday?"

-Early on, get one of the phonics games. It helps them learn the alphabet as well as sounds

-Make language fun--after Hannah learned her alphabet, we did lots of verbal alphabet games

-As Hannah's English began to take off, my rule was I only corrected one thing per day

-Get a translator/tutor. I had a Russian graduate student who spent a couple hours with Hannah each week for a couple months. They were speaking Russian, but Olga was also teaching Hannah basic English i.e. vocabulary, numbers, a few letters, etc. I also used Olga to translate the "big" issues i.e. safety topics, upcoming Christmas, the aunt she was about to meet who was pregnant, etc.

Watching an older child begin to comprehend then to speak English is one of the many miracles of older child international adoption!

The copyright of the article English Acquisition for Internationally Adopted Childrenin Adoptive Parenting is owned by Susan Ward. Permission to republish English Acquisition for Internationally Adopted Children in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

Adopting Older Kids

Jason and I made it back from an 8-day trip to super-sunny, 75-degree-California this past Sunday. Half of the trip was business for Jason, but the whole trip was vacation for me. And it was wonderful! We celebrated our 5-year anniversary (back in September!) and enjoyed time together before our lives get turned upside down soon. If I have time, I will try to post a few pictures from our trip.

Until then, I want to post the first of what I hope will be many posts on some of the things I've been reading to prepare for adopting kids internationally. There are so many GREAT resources out there (especially a few select blogs) that have helped us get a clearer picture of what our life is going to look like when we bring three orphans into our lives.

I know my family (ahem, my mom and sister!) think that I am over-preparing for this whole thing. :) But, what I read on the front page of the the Older Child Adoption website makes me stand firm in my resolve to keep on reading and preparing. And this excerpt just begins to scratch the surface of some of the issues our children may face. Here is the excerpt from www.olderchildadoption.com:

Older child adoption is a complex melding of joys an d challenges. In fact, the issues surrounding older child adoption might be called “the ugly, the bad, and the good.” Every parent considering older child adoption needs to read, talk with other parents, and read some more. And, one of the most important pre-adoption projects is to convince yourself that, “Yes, it WILL happen to me.”

Some older child adoptive parents may deal with developmental delays and challenges. Children may act younger than their chronological age. And, they may not be consistent i.e. they may speak at age level, be two years behind socially, and be physically three years behind. For children coming from orphanages, the rule of thumb is one month of delay for each three months spent in the orphanage. Parents will need to work on these child development gaps with at-home activities, or possibly with the help of physical, occupational, or other therapists and specialists

Some older adopted children slide into their new lives with little difficulty. These children joyously participate in their new family’s activities. They quickly learn the rules. They bond strongly, showing positive interactions with other family members. However, many older, special needs children, due to a combination of biological, emotional, and neurological issues, present challenges to their parents.

Older child adoptive parents should prepare for the worst, and hope for the best. Every prospective older child adoptive parent must acknowledge that they may be challenged in ways they cannot fully anticipate. They will deal with grief and loss in children. They will learn about the impact of trauma on children in their early years, about attachment and bonding, and possibly a new language if it’s an international adoption. The challenges may seem overwhelming at times, however, the rewards will be great!

Tools, Resources & Goals for Foster & Adoptive Families

Below is the fourth post in the series I mentioned in my last post about being a foster parent. I thought his insights and resources are just as relevant to adoptive families (adopting children from hard places) as foster families.

By the way, here is a tip if you are a family wanting to gather resources to prepare to adopt a child(ren) from hard places. I know how overwhelming it can be to see a resource mentioned but not know what to do with it because you are not ready to read it right now. Anytime I come across something I think will be helpful I put it in my "Read for C-country" email folder. Even if I come across something that is not in an email, I copy and paste it into an email (like the title of a book) and still file it in the same place. That way when I get ready to start reading, I can go to the one place and choose what to read next. Just a little tip from the organizer part of my brain!

Tools, Resources, & Goals for Foster Families - Part IV

As a follow up to the first 3 blogs about fostering today’s abused, neglected, and abandoned kids, I want to share a few tools and goals that have made this one of the best decisions we have made. As I previously stated, it isn’t easy, but if you understand the greater mission and purpose this opportunity gives us, the rewards are tremendous.

Our greatest support comes from our licensing agency. Choose wisely, ask lots of questions (for instance, do their standards of care exceed the state’s requirements?). We use Christian Family Care.

It's important to understand what these kids have missed and what they need. We take for granted a few simple things about childhood. Imagine the countless hours of face-time healthy babies are given, the innumerable times a baby drops something on the floor only to have it re-appear in his her mother’s hand, the myriad of sounds and expressions exchanged by a baby and a parent. Kids that are abused, neglected, and abandoned miss out on all of that.

It came home for us when our son joined our family at 3 ½ years old (literally). Immediately noticeable was his undeveloped speech. A lot of kids that come from hard places suffer the same delayed-speech. There are many scientific reasons behind this but one of the main reasons is that he simply missed out on the noise making that naturally happens from birth to early childhood. As he settled in his first night, I sat him down on my lap to read him stories and after the second page he got up and walked away. It eventually became evident that he had never had a book read to him before. The book was about farm animals and we were joined by our youngest son who was 15 months old at the time. At 15 months, he could make the sounds of most everyday animals. Our new foster son didn’t know any of them. Other struggles for him were the inability to look people in the eyes and being too clingy and affectionate with everyone (friends and strangers). Most of these issues are diagnosed or explained as Attachment Disorder. Click on the hyperlink to read the in-depth Wikipedia entry. The short explanation is that it happens in the first 3 years of life when a child has a need and that need is not met or inconsistently met. Attachment Disorder effects psyche and brain chemistry.

One of the greatest resources to learn about what every child needs is Tim Kimmel’s Grace Based Parenting. Tim explains that every child needs a secure love, a significant purpose, and a strong hope. These kids have been deprived of all 3 and our goal as foster parents is to purposefully build these needs into each child’s heart. Purposeful means that you can’t trust that taking over the parenting of a child at 3 ½ and treating them like nothing happened in the past will work. My son loves to be held. No, he actually craves to be held. He’s a healthy 8 years old and he still asks for “uppy.” I carry him around, in front, on my back, on my shoulders. It doesn’t matter how much he weighs, he needs to connect with me, attach to me, and have distinct face-to-face time with me. We are building into him a secure love that he will take with him for the rest of his life. That is, he will always know that he is lovable and that someone loved him.

Another great tool is the Kids Flag Page. Based roughly off of the DISC profile, this resource gives you the “heads up” on how your new foster child is hardwired, what makes him special, and why he may be unique in your family dynamic. It will help you learn the best ways to connect and correct your child. For instance, let’s say that you and your spouse are paced a little slower and lean more towards the methodical. You are getting ready to leave for church so you excuse your foster daughter from the breakfast table and tell her to go upstairs, brush her teeth, comb her hair, put on her shoes, get her bible, and get to the car. You get busy getting yourself ready and are soon in the car waiting. Exasperated, you go back inside, head upstairs, and find her sprawled out in the hallway in front of her bible coloring the unfinished handout from last week’s Sunday school. Based upon your profile, this is disobedience and needs to be punished. After all, your own kids were all able to get ready for church. The problem is, your foster daughter is not hard-wired like you or them. She is from “Fun Country”, easily distracted and has a hard time remembering the laundry list of tasks assigned to her. The Kids Flag Page will help you interact with different kids that have different styles.

Finally, Dr. Karyn Purvis and Dr. David Cross are the world’s leading authorities on attachment issues. Their book, The Connected Child, is must read for all foster and adoptive families. You can find out more about Drs. Purvis and Cross at their website: http://www.child.tcu.edu/.

My wife and I have a simple goal as foster parents: that each child in our home, no matter how long they are there, will experience a loving relationship that will stay with them forever. My vision is that when I end up in eternity and am strolling along the streets of gold, a stranger will approach me with a strong embrace and say, “You were my foster dad! You are the reason I’m here!”
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Peter Bartolini is a member of Family Matters’ board of directors and is part of our Speaker Team. He and his wife Julie have been foster parents since 2004. They have 3 children, Natalie- age 9, Morgan- age 8 and Sammy- age 6. They currently have the blessing of an 11 month old foster care placement living in their home and bringing them joy daily. Since they became foster parents, they have had 19 foster kids in their home and look forward to many more! Peter blogs at http://peterbarto.wordpress.com/.