Home one month

That smile just wins people over, every time.

With his younger brother (age two, left) and older sister (age seven, middle).

Alex has started eating on his own this week. Note the cloth pull-over bib --
after asking around for where we could find these, several people just gave
us some. One family even had this type of bib made to order!

It’s been a few days since we updated…largely because our evenings (when we update) have been filled with miniature child-based dramas or boring paperwork and research. I have been trying to figure out the mystery of the missing certificate of citizenship, and we have been researching Gillette Children’s Hospital, which apparently has one of the best cerebral palsy centers in the nation. Parents we know locally rave about it in all-capital letters.

Alex is doing very well. He seems to relax more every day, and he is picking up new words all the time. So far he knows ball, bye-bye, book, done (as in “all done”), stop, yes, no, and poopy. (This last word used anytime he soils or wets his diaper, even a little bit, which is heartening, since it implies bowel awareness—and the possibility that he will be using a toilet sometime in the coming year.) We’ve heard him clearly imitate, but not repeat, a few other words (like napkin). He demonstrates that he understands a lot of the practical things we say to him, answering appropriately to simple questions or directions. Surely he’s picking up on the sense of what we’re saying based in part on context, but it’s a start.

He has had his first few physical therapy sessions, mostly focused on stretching those very tight muscles. At home, he loves to bounce on Rodey, the inflatable bouncy horse that my uncle and aunt sent us for him. He spent several hours on this thing yesterday. We have to support him as he rocks or bounces. It helps him stretch the muscles in his inner thighs (I will learn the names of all these muscles before long), and it helps him develop trunk strength, which is necessary for sitting unsupported, not to mention crawling and walking.

We’ve been keeping things as “boring” and routine as possible, given the number of appointments we’ve had and given that we have four other kids, and that has been paying off in terms of his emotional stability. We’ve seen more calmness, and fewer breakdowns. On the other hand, he will come and find us wherever we are in the house (stopping at the bottom of the steps if we are upstairs) if we aren’t around. He is still very needy, which can be a little exhausting.

Among the many appointments we had this past week (at least one a day!) was one with the special ed coordinator at our school, as well as the head of school. Based on the advice of every expert we’ve met with, but most convincingly the psychologist from the International Adoption Clinic, we’ve decided to keep Alex home from school, probably for the year. It’s possible that he could start going part-time in the spring, depending on where he is at with his physical and emotional development. The good news is that the school is very willing to work closely with us on setting up some sort of services (mainly PT and OT) for Alex, either at home or in the special needs preschool. They will also hold a spot for him, in case we decide to enroll him partway through the year. He will definitely attend school the following year.

That does present a challenge for me as the stay-at-home parent, because our two-year-old is a major handful at the moment. He will be three in October, and he is into everything, wanting to be independent, and constantly in trouble. Translation: I will need to have an eye on him constantly, which makes me wonder how that is going to work when Alex is so very dependent on me physically and emotionally.

For that matter, our toddler is also very dependent on me emotionally. It is increasingly clear just how traumatic this month-long separation was—remember that I have been caring for him night and day, every day, since he was born. He is very, very angry—and also very, very sad, crying at the least little slight and constantly saying, “I need mommy” or “I need daddy” or “I need a hug.” Today his older brother found him in the middle of the street outside our house; he said “I need daddy” and started crying. (I was away at a physical therapy appointment with Alex.) Our other kids have been having their own transition difficulties, especially our youngest daughter (age seven).

Perhaps somewhat recklessly, we have scheduled a very small (two nights) family vacation for the end of next week. We’re going a couple hours down the river to Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. Our youngest girl is thrilled about staying in a hotel with a pool. We shall see how this washes with Alex, but we need some “normalcy” (a family getaway) for the rest of the family, too.

Tomorrow will be a big day: It will be the one-month anniversary of our arrival in the United States with Alex, and he will be getting baptized in the morning at our parish. In the afternoon and evening, we will attempt to attend the twenty-year anniversary of the Winona Catholic Worker community, in which I was a volunteer for several years in the 1990s. (This is a community that runs two houses of hospitality for those in need of friendship, food, and shelter.) In a way, our welcoming Alex into our home and our community is an extension of that work, isn’t it? So it will be an appropriate celebration.

As for us—the parents—we continue to slowly re-assemble our lives, but as I said at the beginning of this post, right now we’re very focused on Alex from the moment we wake up until the moment we go to sleep, and sometimes the hours in between. It is simply stunning the amount of paperwork and bureaucracy you have to deal with just to give a little kid a home. And then there's getting educated on the many medical challenges Alex faces. On Wednesday I met with two local moms who have special needs kids (both with mobility issues). We met for about two hours...I left the restaurant with a notebook full of contact information and a spinning head. Parents of disabled children clearly move in a parallel world, often hidden out of sight from mainstream society. These parents learn to be real fighters, real advocates for their kids--or they get run over.

Finally, we continue to be awed by the generosity of our friends and neighbors. I think we're looking at several hundred people at this point who have done something specific for us. Tomorrow will be the last day of our Meal Train -- several dozen people brought meals for just about two months. Wow! And we've had people dropping off clothes and equipment, too -- we're expecting a donation of a wheel chair, special needs swing, and a bath chair in the next few days. We are very, very blessed, in so many ways!