An Update . . . Really!

I must say it felt a little bit weird to 1) actually open my blog and 2) click on "new post." I haven't been sure I would blog again. I'm not even sure why. Just a new stage of life, I guess. But, I've been thinking about doing an update since the beginning of the year. And a few days ago I received an unbelievable gift worthy of showing off God's power and glory. So, lo and behold, here I am writing a blog post with an update for the first time in three months!

Thanksgiving was very hard for the kids and for me. Turns out I have had expectations of what Thanksgiving would be like when I had a family. And we weren't the happy, close-knit family I envisioned (at least not yet). I had a huge breakdown Thanksgiving night. I remember telling Jason through my sobs, "... and my kids don't even tell me that they love me." This had been the case for the previous year and it never bothered me. But all of a sudden my kids not ever telling me they love me - along with many other adoption-related issues - did bother me. Ahhh! Part of the problem was that Thanksgiving coincided with the transition from "the crazy/hard first year" to "normal life." Although the first year of adding three new kids with traumatic histories to your family at one time is CRAZY and HARD (but absolutely worth it!), the nice part about it is that if your kids haven't brushed their teeth in two days, you can say "well, its the first year!" After we hit the one-year home mark (October 28th), I think I thought life was supposed to be more normal. But, ha! much of it still wasn't "normal."

Christmas was WONDERFUL! I lowered my expectations, focused on Jesus, we limited extended family time (for the sake of normalcy for our kids) and we didn't travel anywhere. Success! Praise the Lord!

New Years Eve was a disaster! Oh boy. We tried to go to an indoor water park/hotel for a couple nights with several good friends. Our RADish still struggles with a great deal of fear and staying in a hotel pushed all kinds of her triggers (I saw in hind sight). I had breakdown #2 of the holidays in the front seat of our van while driving away one night earlier than we planned, leaving all of our friends.

January has been GOOD! It has been filled with more homeschooling than last semester, increased structure in our days and little time away from home. The combination of those three things has been wonderful for all of us! I do school with the girls every Monday-Thursday morning (Fridays we clean - woohoo!). We are focusing on reading well. Zoe is reading very, very well and while Claire is  a ways behind Zoe, she continues to make great, steady progress. Attachment and healing are still our main priority with the three kids (two of them more than one).

Jason started a new job at the beginning of January. This is an amazing answer to an over two-year prayer of mine (and a good friend!), asking God to provide Jason a job in Ames. He had previously been commuting 40 minutes TWICE a day to Johnston. Not only did God give him a job in Ames, but God provided a job that allows Jason to fund raise (his profession) for an organization (LSI) that does a lot of work that we are passionate about - namely adoption and foster care, but LSI also helps refugees, disabled, elderly, etc. Jason travels a little, but most days he is now home shortly after 5:00p. Its GLORIOUS! Perhaps this is why January was so good. Just kidding. But not totally! His working in Ames has been an amazing blessing in many ways in the short month he has been there. God is so good!

This picture (we sent for Christmas) tells the story almost better than my words could:

GOD IS HEALING OUR CHILDREN! 

You can see it in their faces. 

They belong to us and we belong to them.

It is hard into put words to the slow, steady climb of attachment and healing as it continues after the first year. Without fail, every step forward still comes after pushing and testing to make sure we are not going to leave, not going to stop loving them. Although our RADish still has a lot of crazy, controlling and manipulating behavior, I have seen significant growth in attachment over the past few months. Having that attachment in place makes it much easier to endure the crazy (not-yet-fully-attached) behavior. She has recently started giving me hugs for the first time since she has been my daughter, 15 months ago. She asks for Jason and I to hug and kiss her goodnight every night. And just in the past couple days she has started sweetly and genuinely thanking me for normal things I do for her or give her. HELLO healing!! 

Perhaps the most telling evidence of God's power and healing is a note my little RADish wrote me last Friday. She got upset at me for something. Two hours of manipulation ensued. I asked for her forgiveness for my part of the mishap and then pulled her on my lap and rocked her, holding her tight (she now snuggles in and lets me hold her tightly, which never used to happen). We talked about what happened. I told her I can see Jesus healing her heart more and more, that I love her and that I am so happy she is my daughter. A little while later, I got a delivery from the mail man (Isaiah!) with a note that said:

I'm so happy that you so happy to

Thank you for talk to me a good thing

You my best mama

Love you mama

You make me so happy

Thank you for every thing

Oh, the wonders God has done (Psalm 40:5)! Of course tears fell out of my eyes reading her note. Jesus is truly the HEALER of the broken-hearted. He is turning my daughter's heart of stone into a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 11:9). His truth is triumphing the evil and lies that used to hold her captive. There will still be hard days ahead (in fact, she's in a big funk as I type this!). But, I feel like we have made it - BY THE GRACE OF GOD - to the other side of the steep, steep mountain that is loving a child with an attachment disorder. The arduous climb up that mountain has, without question, been WORTH IT! 

Praise be to the Lord God, the God of Israel,

    who alone does marvelous deeds.

¹⁹ 

Praise be to his glorious name forever;

    may the whole earth be filled with his glory.

Amen and Amen.

Psalm 72:18-19

Halloween

Last year our kids had been home a couple days so we shut the curtains and kept our outside lights off on Halloween. Even though it is not my favorite holiday, I have to say it was really fun this year. It was fun to start a new tradition of carving pumpkins (something none of the kids have done before) and get the kids ready for trick-or-treating as a family who feels like a FAMILY - everyone was speaking English and no one was hiding under the table or having a major meltdown! 

We carved pumpkins the night before Halloween. 

Claire wanted Africa on her pumpkin. I wasn't sure how we were going to pull that off, but thanks to tracing a map with a piece of paper laid on my computer screen, we got it done! I love that she wanted Africa on her pumpkin.

Zoe wanted a girl . . . with a "Z" on the side.

On Halloween night, Zoe was an Indian Princess, Abram an elephant and Isaiah a brown bear. Claire wanted to hand out candy - a perfect job for her, Miss Social/Lover of Kids.

Post-Halloween picture with her lit-up pumpkin.

ONE YEAR!

Last Sunday (October 28th) marked our ONE YEAR mark with our African kids! We were out of town over the weekend for a family wedding so that was part of our celebration. After thinking about the craziest  year of our lives and making it to the one year mark, I decided to celebrate all week long last week!

What an incredibly different family we are one year later!

TO GOD BE THE GLORY FOR ALL HE HAS DONE IN US, FOR US, WITH US, THROUGH US AND IN SPITE OF US.

I'm a little late blogging about the big one year, partly because we were out of town and partly because all last week I was processing all that it means to have made it to the one year mark. At first, I almost didn't want to think back on the year. It was by far the hardest year of my life and in many ways, I didn't want to relive some of it. But, it was also the most WORTH IT year of my life and God did SO MUCH. I'm really glad I blogged a lot when they came home so I can read what happened and remember the details. Otherwise, it would be impossible to remember much of what happened. It is like a decade worth of life happened in just one year. In fact, my friend Jill (who walked very closely with me through this last year) said, "in some ways it seems like they have been home for a year and in other ways, it seems like they have been here for TEN YEARS." She was right on.

Last Monday I decided I would work on a photo album for the kids all week (if I don't do it now, I can't see when it might ever get done!). It has been good to go back and look at all the pictures from when the kids came home and talk to them about it. The girls haven't had too much to say about it. Claire said she was surprised to see all the people at the airport because she thought the escort would bring them all the way to our house. :) Isaiah was such a baby when he came. I feel like he has grown up three years worth (which is probably true, emotionally).

Last week I also decided to read each corresponding day from last year on my blog as I go along in the next weeks (today I read what I blogged on November 5th last year, etc.). Reading things like, "I saw Claire first (at the airport) and her eyes lit up when she saw me. She came right toward me to give me a hug," is something I do not remember, but it so fun to think about now that I really know her. Of course her eyes lit up - that is Claire! I didn't remember that Claire and Abram were buddies so soon at the restaurant and he asked to sit by her. I could go on and on! I'm trying not to cringe too much at the many things I said were good to do that I would not do if I had new kids placed with us now. :) But, hindsight is 20/20, right? All the reading in the world could never prepare you for adding three kids (two being older) to your family when you have only had a two year old. 

I've realized half of the incredible difficulty of the past year was not having a routine of life for older kids that our girls could jump into. Trying to make up our daily routine, figure out expectations, decide how we wanted our kids to act at the table and every other thing that usually becomes part of your family DNA over time - all at once - was a huge challenging factor (having nothing to do with adoption issues). I'm very glad to be over that hump. 

Another thing I have thought about is that "Gotcha" Day is just not the word to use to describe and celebrate the day our kids came into our family. I have no problem with other people using this word (and don't worry if you said it to me!). If you have been reading my blog, you know my kids have each struggled in HUGE ways adjusting to our family. In many ways their coming into our family has not been a happy thing for them. While we are so thankful (beyond words) that Claire, Zoe and Isaiah are part of our family, their coming into our family TO THEM represents a TON of loss, grief and trauma. Some days even now, two of my kids are still trying to figure out if they are happy to have been "gotten" by us and be part of our family. Homecoming Day is a better way to describe it for our family. 

And, I am very much praising God for the family that we are today. Just the fact that we feel like a REAL, TRUE FAMILY is an incredible blessing and evidence of God's work in all of us. He has done so much. My two favorite things about God in this last year: 1) Watching Him move mountains (healing my children), right in front of my face many, many times and 2) Seeing God come through for me EVERY time I needed Him to. 

I'm so glad God has allowed me experience all of the ups and downs of this past year. The highs were HIGH and the lows were LOW. Hard as it was, I wouldn't trade any of it for the world. Watching three former orphans become your children, learn to love and be loved (or at least on their way), develop personalities and talents and abilities and begin to hunger for spiritual things has blessed my life in unbelievable ways. Not only are my kids completely different kids than they were a year ago, I am different person and a much different mom. God has used this last year to allow me to know Jesus more, depend on Him more and live on His Word more than ever before. I don't ever want that to stop!