Perspective {just mine}

This has been a hard week.  I've had a pit in my stomach for days over the sheer sadness and pain and fear people are experiencing right now.  I've not really known how to move on from these feelings.

Then I saw a video of the national anthem at the Boston Bruins game.  The entire audience belted that tune out in a moving show of unity and strength and resilience. 

And it clicked for me.

The best, the ONLY, thing we can do is chose hope and reject fear and anger.  Anything less and we've let them win, let something be taken from us. Let our lives be minimized in some way.

This isn't just about the bombing, the plant explosion, the flooding and sink holes for me, because the pain in my heart for those horrors and the people who are living them is still raw.  I have no real words for that. For them.  Just sadness and solidarity.

But this is about my life in general, too.  My outlook on adoption and the adoption communities I follow.  My complacency to let others who can or will only respond with negativity drive MY adoption process, affect MY life and emotions.

I refuse to let them be my voice anymore.

No news?  Long waits? No updates?  Yes, all those things suck.  A lot.  But instead of wallowing about it, fighting about it, refusing to accept it, we should try to help where we can in a positive way, and above all else, join hands and sing. Loud. Proud. Defiant. HOPEFUL.  Because at the end of the day, it's going to be okay.

Our kids will come home.  Older, yes, but don't fall into the hype that the transition will be SO much harder at 3 than it will be at 2.5.  They are not being harmed.  Not in the sense of the word that really counts. Our kids will come home, and we will live our lives filled with joy, watching milestones and taking all the pictures we want.  Many people don't have that chance anymore.

I choose hope. I choose kindness.  I choose faith.

Safe

We've been working really hard with our sons on feeling confident and safe in expressing emotions verbally.  We've also been working on our sons learning to rely on each other a bit more for comfort or support or help, instead of only needing Mom or Dad.

Tonight Little Bug and Little Bro had to share Little Bro's bed, although bed sharing has never been a strong point for either of our sons.  Little Bug's anxiety has been at a high level all week after some lightning storms shook his nighttime confidence.  So throwing in a different bed, in combination with the fact that his bed wasn't even in his room as a fall back, was causing him some apparent angst.

After getting out of bed a couple times, Little Big finally expressed what he was feeling.

Little Bug: "I'm nervous."
Little Bro: "I'll keep you safe, Little Bug."

And with that promise, our notoriously anxious and often inconsolable Little Bug crawled back in bed, spooned his little brother, and together, heads touching, they both fell into a deeper sleep than we have seen all week.

Brotherhood, man.  It blows my mind sometimes.

Two Years Ago

Big Star,

Right about now, 2 years ago, you were chasing your foster mother around the lobby of the Korean adoption agency.  People were milling about and there was a somber, tense feeling in the air, but you were oblivious to it.  You laughed and grinned and teased and chased.

And then, as if the gravity of the moment needed to somehow be pressed upon you, your foster mother, the only mother you had known for the last 2 years of your life, took you over to a large fish tank, bent down, and started whispering into your ear as the two of you watched the fish swim.

I don't know what she said to you, and it wasn't for my ears anyway.  I imagine it was something along the lines of love and sadness and hope.

Then she let you go, to a new life she didn't know if she would ever get to be a part of.

She sent your to the arms of another mother, one who also started whispering words of love, sadness, and hope in broken Korean and hesitant English.  A mother who had the honor of building a new life with you, and the pressure to make it worthy of the sacrifices so many had made for you already.

Today is your Family Day, my sweet Big Star.  Two years ago you became our family and we became yours.  It's a day of joy and sadness, a day to remember both the gift we have been given and the sacrifices others have made.  It is the day that you became not just Korean, but Korean American.  We could call it "Life Altering in Every Way Day," but Family Day rolls off the tongue so much better.

We celebrate with cupcakes and bulgogi and a big family adventure because we want to celebrate what a special part of our family you are, but as many a Family Day for you and your brother pass, I recognize that just as that day 2 years ago way, this anniversary will always be a bittersweet celebration.  I'm grateful to be able to send your sweet foster mother pictures today that will let her know that she is still definitely a part of your life.

And most of all, I am grateful for the last 2 years where I have been your mom.  I love you.

I Know You

To the mom at story time today:

I know you.  I recognized you right away.  I watched you direct your "calmer" child to the circle of children and then situate yourself and your more "active" daughter just outside the circle, allowing for a little room while still being part of the group.

I know your kids.  I know your daughter who was rolling on the ground and making strange noises after a couple minutes.  I know she couldn't help it and she wasn't just being a brat or intentionally disruptive.  I know your other daughter, too.  I immediately recognized the acceptance in her manner when you separated from her and the group to sit with her sister. 

I know the library worker.  The one who sheepishly but assertively whispered to you about 10 minutes into the story time that your daughter was being disruptive and needed to removed.  I saw the set of her jaw, the black or white in her eyes.

I know your story.  I didn't need to clearly hear your plea to let your daughter try to be apart of story time because I already knew what you were saying.  I know your desperation to give your daughter the normal experiences her sister and peers get to have every day.  I know your hope for sympathetic staff and accepting friends and parents.

I know that look.  The one of resignation and disappointment you wore as you and your daughter quietly exited the room.  The passing glance your other daughter threw back as you left, unsurprised and unfazed.  The uncomfortable look on the staffer's face.  The embarrassed or judgmental looks the other mothers leveled as you dragged your quietly moaning daughter out of that room.

I have no idea who you are, but I know you. And it broke my heart today to see you. 

Family Planning

I know they are thinking it.  I can see it in their surprised faces, faltering questions, and uncomfortable congratulations.  Some even make thinly veiled comments passively asserting their opinion.  Not everyone, of course, but a hell of a lot more than I would have ever imagined.

Yes, universe and teacher and doctor and therapist and whoever else, we're adopting a third child.  A boy. Close in age to our other children.  And we're thrilled about it.

What?  What's that you say?  I have a 5 year old with significant special needs that require a high degree of attention, resources, and energy?

You don't say.

As things with Little Moon begin to click into place, and our family begins to reshape our lives in preparation, we've started letting people in our far periphery circles into our plans.  And more times than I can count, it's been apparent that the fact we are bringing another child into our family is shocking to them.  It's seems like they can't imagine why we would make life "harder" or "more stressful" or "busy" when our lives are already so full.

It's been pissing me off lately, and I have started this post a number of times, only to cancel it once I couldn't find words that weren't swear words.  But yesterday the answer rolled off my tongue.  It was in response to the gentle surprise of a trusted member of Team Little Bug.

We've always wanted three kids.  We have the love and resources for a third child.  But ultimately, what matters most is that Little Bug is not a liability to our family.  He's not a reason to stop growing our family if we have the means, which we do.  I realized that is what was pissing me off. Little Bug will benefit from a little brother and Little Moon will be just as lucky to have the unique experience that having a sibling with special needs brings.  We have made the decision to adopt another child because we believe that it will be beneficial for both our children, accounting for our unusual challenges, at home and the new child.  Our family life might be framed differently than most, sure, but our lives go on, expand, get better, and continue to grow.

Do we have room or desire for four children? Five? Six?  No, probably not. But do we have room for Little Moon? Yes, we do.  And once we finish setting up the bunk beds, we'll have even more.

Down the Hill

Last weekend my Little Moon turned 2.5 years old.  Although I've seen pictures of him in the last month, I haven't gotten any sort of update on him since October.  This week we did get video from October, so I am really getting to know the October Little Moon...the 2-year-old Little Moon.

I think that might be why him turning 2.5 struck me as much as it did.  There's such a difference between a newly 2 year old and a child careening downhill to 3.  Just when I started to feel like I "knew" my youngest a bit, I was reminded that he's not that baby anymore. 

And the child that he is now, at 2.5, is a child I will never know either.  And while I made peace with that before I even became his mother, it still hurts a bit to know that 3 will come and go for us and, if the last week is any indication of the type of unpredictability and shiny new slow moving processes we could encounter, 3.5 might as well.

And that is my threshold right there, ladies and gentlemen.  I never imagined we'd celebrate 3 with him, but 3.5, yes, I absolutely expected him to be in a Valentine's day sugar coma with his brothers.

Then again, this is all speculation and me trying to protect my expectations from running wild with hopes of bumps in line and things clicking into place.  Because when I lay in bed at night, my heart flutters with thoughts of a surprise phone call from my agency telling me something is finally going Little Moon's way. 

So we are all careening down the hill now.  Little Moon to age 3 and all the sass and stubbornness that age brings (which will pair perfectly with intense grieving, culture shock, and communication barriers, non?) and us to a reality where things will potentially be harder, longer, and more emotionally complicated than we had expected. 

But I am surprisingly calm about these things.  I'd love to have days to get lost in Seoul, and Little Moon is being loved devotedly in his native country and language, things I hope will help shape him as he gets older.  Instead I choose to check my e-mail incessantly for days until the updated pictures come in of my precious little one posing cheekily for the camera (those can come any time now, thank you very much).  I take sadistic pleasure in cheating the gallon care package rule in any way I can.  And I drop some profanity here and there when discussing process changes with trusted friends who don't mind occasional F bombs.

So, umm...happy half birthday, Little Moon?

Always More Than a Number

There have been few IEP meetings as important as the today.  In preparation for Kindergarten, Little Bug's team (two special education teachers, two speech language pathologists, the occupational therapists, two physical therapists, one social worker, one child psychologist, and one nurse) all spent 3 months testing him daily on all aspects of life.  I was even asked to spend an hour filling out forms and rating scales and numerous other hours in interviews with various team members.

For better or for worse (and there was a lot of "worse" in the last 3 months), we all sat together today and talked all things Little Bug.  There were words like "learning disability," "delays," "failing expectations," and other words that always feel wrong branding your beautiful child with.  Words that feel wrong, but are always nothing to be ashamed of.

There were numbers.

But Little Bug is more than a number.  He is more than labels.

He is a complicated and beautiful puzzle of strengths and weaknesses.  Can he recognize letters or numbers? No.  But he can recall special details about each of his beloved friends.  Can he manipulate a glue bottle lid or pair of scissors?  No.  But he can do rep after rep of grueling physical work on balls and mats and treadmills with a smile and an "I love you, Ms. XOXO."  Can he sit still for a book at circle time? No.  But he he'd share any book from his shelf with anyone who asked, without batting an eye.  Can he speak words that everyone can understand? No.  But he tells a totally awesome "Why did the chicken cross the road" joke.

It's inevitable in life to be labeled and quantified.  Sometimes it is even necessary to help us help each other. It's not even a bad thing unless you let it be.  I will not let these things define my son when there are so many other parts of him to deserve equal attention.  Like all parts of him, I want to him to wear his weaknesses as a badge of pride.  They are things he overcomes daily and they make him a better, stronger person.

I'm proud of my boy.