Life is Good...

Life is Good... my daughter's teacher says this all the time.  I look to her with admiration... because this woman went thru great loss just over a year ago... she lost her adult daughter to cancer.  Life is precious... there is no promise of forever, so Life is Good... no matter good days or bad.  Sometimes when things are looking like there is a storm overhead and thunderclouds ahead there is a break in the sky and light shines down... and you realize Life is Good.

Today... Life is Good.

Psych...

Done... now wait for the report and hope it is completed quickly!  I had to giggle today when she stopped by the room where I was completing the psychological testing and quizzically looked at my reading material.  See she expected me to still be working on the test because it has about 600 questions.  Her jaw dropped when i told her I had been done with it for 10 minutes but didn't want to interrupt her (she was working with a child during my testing).  She said she rarely sees anyone finish it in under an hour and a half.  I began the test at 10:05 and finished at 10:50.  She had to look for herself because she thought I was kidding, seriously her jaw dropped.  Giggle...

She seemed pretty pleased with my plan of action for the boys and I left feeling pretty good.

Hopefully, everything will come together  and the stars will align and this registration will be out of my hands next week

In the meantime...

...what do you talk about when there is nothing to tell everyone about?  Except that tomorrow is the psych evaluation and then next week I will have the Homestudy and it will be sent off to do the bouncing back and forth to ensure it has everything that the country needs.  So, I am waiting... there are many times in this process that I will be waiting and i think that is why I was a very bad blogger during Elle's adoption...   there was SO much waiting, it took a year of homestudy delay that lead to the summer break delay, then re-writing the laws delay...  the homestudy being delayed caused  at least an additional 4 months of waiting to bring Elina home ... I just didn't have news.  So, we are going to do some posts about what we are doing in the meantime, because we are hoping there are not big delays and can bring the boys home quickly.

In the meantime.... I have put extra efforts into counseling to ensure that my children at home are in a good place psychologically to add children to our family.  With having a bio and an adoptive child I often wonder how things affect them psychologically.  Yes I am one of THOSE...  if I raise my voice or am harsh, I wonder if I have scarred them for life... I know I know... The counselor assured me that both are good with the addition, but  that she felt the negativity from a few people are really making them angry and frustrated.  I wouldn't have believed it until that I saw it... I sensed their attitude change but was trying to keep the negativity away from them.  THe kids displayed anger and then it was replaced by joy... my little guy has been building up anger and was able to hurdle that anger and told the counselor that he really wants to be a big brother... amazing!  Now, my complex little puzzle of a girl... she wants to please everyone and she fears people leaving her life.  She has already suffered so much rejection in her short life... She overheard a conversation, saw the pain in my eyes, heck she walked in as I got off the phone and I was crying in my own hurt and frustrations... she knows there is turmoil... and she realizes there could be rejection.  She just wants to make everyone happy.  If I could only share all the moments when she looked at me with contentment (before the news broke) and told me how happy she was that I decided to save these boys just like I saved her. She had some hero worship going on...  I am hoping and praying that everybody will rejoice when the boys come home and that their coming home does not make people choose to not be part of our family or friends. So in the meantime we are doing alot of praying for everyone's acceptance!

In the meantime... we are dealing with too many colds and even a round of the flu... in September Elina was sick for a day, then she gave it to Connor... was only a few days after that in October and I had a horrible case of the flu.  The kids were touched by it a bit... it took an entire month for me to stop coughing.  Connor was nabbed by by the bug again in December and now again today.... he is coughing up a storm, he hasn't had anything terribly bad yet, a fever in December but this time there is only a cough.  Poor little guy just coughs and coughs. I have tried a couple of options and waiting to see if the Kids Mucinex works.  I hope it passes quickly...

It hasn't all been downers... we have been having a great times too!!  We had a wonderful Christmas and New Years and have been coloring, playing checkers, doing puzzles, Elina is learning to play the piano, playing Wii and we are just enjoying being together... this past weekend we even went for a long bike ride  and played at the park because the weather was so nice.

My little man is 5!!

No it is not possible!  Where has the time gone? It seems like yesterday I was in that hot hospital room begging his daddy to open the window! He is my sunshine... I cannot explain the joy he has brought to my life.  He made me a mommy and continues to make me want to be a mommy...  Thank you Connor for the inspiration!

Mommy made his card this year! 

Presents from "Sister"

 Hot Wheels from Mommy

"This is the one mommy!! This is what I wanted"

Doesn't he look so proud???

Happy 5th birthday baby!!  Today I told him he was a big boy and wasn't a baby anymore, and he reponded, "But I am still your baby and can snuggle you because I am your Connor."  Yes baby, mommy will always snuggle you.  The joy he brings to me is amazing!!

The Short List

Ok, this list will be fluid for a while yet, but this is my short list of names.

Carter
Hayden
Landon
Reed
Dawson
Cooper
Derrick
Cole
Christopher
Holden
Owen
Parker
Grayson
Ryan

My kids' suggestions:
Mason
Jacob
Matthew

The Name Game

.

Ok, so I would like input... I am thinking about the boys' names.  First let me explain the parameters and then I would love if you all would make suggestions...

1. It has to be a name that is fitting for a little kid.
2. It has to sound strong for an adult.
3. It has to be a name that does not have obvious nicknames... there are a few exceptions, but I am just not a nickname girl.  As you can see by Connor and Elina. :)
4. The initials can not spell anything. (Remember last name is Villemure)
5. I don't want the boys' names to rhyme, but they can start with the same letter.
6. Make sure it is not a name that they can get made fun of...

I love that I made this post... so many great ideas coming in!  What I was meaning my nick names is for instance Robert-Bob, Bobby, Rob, Robbie etc. Though I do love the name Robert just not all the nicknames. Christopher is on my list... because it would be a name derived from my sisters.  Andrew is my brother in law so I think they have dibs on that name.

My 4 year old came home from school one day with a family tree with with names on the leaves... Mommy, Sister (because he calls her sister and not by her name), Connor, Matthew and Jacob.  When I asked him who Matthew and Jacob were (this was before I saw my boys and at that point would have not seen us adopting 2 nor had I really socialized it with my kids)... Duh mom, they are my brothers.  Crack me up!  I think he chose names of two of his buddies... because we do know a Matthew and a Jacob even if Connor doesn't see them much.

The Truth Pandemic

What you need to know:

• `HIV is considered a chronic but manageable disease with proper treatment.
  `Children who receive treatment are expected to live a normal lifespan.
• `HIV has never been transmitted in normal family living conditions.
• `You NEVER have to fear contracting HIV through casual contact with an HIV+ person.
• `HIV is spread in three main ways: sexual contact, IV drug use through the sharing of dirty needles,
   mother to infant (pregnancy, birth or breast feeding.)
• `All around the world orphans are overlooked for adoption because of their HIV+ status.
• `Medications called ARVs can mean the difference between life and death.
• `The combination of three or more ARVs is called HAART. (Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Therapy)
• `With medications HIV can be effectively managed to the point that the virus is undetectable in laboratory tests.
• `There is a term for the miraculous transformation HIV+ people undergo when they begin receiving the medications they need.
   The Lazarus Effect is a term commonly used to describe people who were once on the brink of death who have been restored again to health through medication.

http://www.projecthopeful.org/

"How to Be The Village" by Jen Hatmaker

I find myself reading this blog post and agreeing with most things Jennifer says... I wish others could see and understand the journey.  I wish I could put into words what I feel when I think about bringing the boys home.  I wish that everyone could understand why I want to adopt these two boys and that Connor and Elina will not end up suffering for my choices.  Sure it will not be easy but they will have so much more by having these brothers. 

Reposted 

Supporting Families Before the Airport

Your friends are adopting. They’re in the middle of dossiers and home studies, and most of them are somewhere in the middle of Waiting Purgatory. Please let me explain something about WP: It sucks in every way. Oh sure, we try to make it sound better than it feels by using phrases like “We’re trusting in God’s plan” and “God is refining me” and “Sovereignty trumps my feelings” and crazy bidness like that. But we are crying and aching and getting angry and going bonkers when you’re not watching. It’s hard. It hurts. It feels like an eternity even though you can see that it is not. It is harder for us to see that, because many of us have pictures on our refrigerators of these beautiful darlings stuck in an orphanage somewhere while we’re bogged down in bureaucracy and delays. 

How can you help? By not saying or doing these things:

1. “God’s timing is perfect!” (Could also insert: “This is all God’s plan!” “God is in charge!”) As exactly true as this may be, when you say it to a waiting parent, we want to scratch your eyebrows off and make you eat them with a spoon. Any trite answer that minimizes the struggle is as welcomed as a sack of dirty diapers. You are voicing something we probably already believe while not acknowledging that we are hurting and that somewhere a child is going to bed without a mother again. Please never say this again. Thank you.

2. “Are you going to have your own kids?” (Also in this category: “You’ll probably get pregnant the minute your adoption clears!” “Since this is so hard, why don’t you just try to have your own kids?” “Well, at least you have your own kids.”) The subtle message here is: You can always have legitimate biological kids if this thing tanks. It places adoption in the Back-up Plan Category, where it does not belong for us. When we flew to Ethiopia with our first travel group from our agency, out of 8 couples, we were the only parents with biological kids. The other 7 couples chose adoption first. Several of them were on birth control. Adoption counts as real parenting, and if you believe stuff Jesus said, it might even be closer to the heart of God than regular old procreation. (Not to mention the couples that grieved through infertility already. So when you say, “Are you going to have your own kids?” to a woman who tried for eight years, then don’t be surprised if she pulls your beating heart out like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.)

3. For those of you in Christian community, it is extremely frustrating to hear: “Don’t give up on God!” or “Don’t lose faith!” It implies that we are one nanosecond away from tossing our entire belief system in the compost pile because we are acting sad or discouraged. It’s condescending and misses the crux of our emotions. I can assure you, at no point in our story did we think about kicking Jesus to the curb,but we still get to cry tears and feel our feelings, folks. Jesus did. And I’m pretty sure he went to heaven when he died. 

4. We’re happy to field your questions about becoming a transracial family or adopting a child of another race, but please don’t use this moment to trot out your bigotry. (Cluelessness is a different thing, and we try to shrug that off. Like when someone asked about our Ethiopian kids, “Will they be black?” Aw, sweet little dum-dum.) The most hurtful thing we heard during our wait was from a black pastor who said, “Whatever you do, don’t change their last name to Hatmaker, because they are NOT Hatmakers. They’ll never be Hatmakers. They are African.” What the??? I wonder if he’d launch the same grenade if we adopted white kids from Russia? If you’d like to know what we’re learning about raising children of another race or ask respectful, legitimate questions, by all means, do so. We care about this and take it seriously, and we realize we will traverse racial landmines with our family. You don’t need to point out that we are adopting black kids and we are, in fact, white. We’ve actually already thought of that.

5. Saying nothing is the opposite bad. I realize with blogs like this one, you can get skittish on how to talk to a crazed adopting Mama without getting under her paper-thin skin or inadvertently offending her. I get it. (We try hard not to act so hypersensitive. Just imagine that we are paper-pregnant with similar hormones surging through our bodies making us cry at Subaru commercials just like the 7-month preggo sitting next to us. And look at all this weight we’ve gained.See?) But acting like we’re not adopting or struggling or waiting or hoping or grieving is not helpful either. If I was pregnant with a baby in my belly, and no one ever asked how I was feeling or how much longer or is his nursery ready or can we plan a shower, I would have to audition new friend candidates immediately. 

Here’s what we would love to hear Before the Airport:

1. Just kind, normal words of encouragement. Not the kind that assume we are one breath away from atheism. Not the kind that attempt to minimize the difficulties and tidy it all up with catchphrases. We don’t actually need for you to fix our wait. We just want you to be our friend and acknowledge that the process is hard and you care about us while we’re hurting. That is GOLD. I was once having lunch with my friend Lynde when AWAA called with more bad news about Ben’s case, and I laid my head down on the table in the middle of Galaxy Café and bawled. Having no idea what to do with such a hot mess, she just cried with me. Thank you for being perfect that day, Lynde. 

2. Your questions are welcomed! We don’t mind telling you about the court system in Ethiopia or the in-country requirements in Nicaragua or the rules of the foster system. We’re glad to talk about adoption, and we’re thankful you care. I assure you we didn’t enter adoption lightly, so sharing details of this HUGE PIECE OF OUR LIVES is cathartic. Plus, we want you to know more because we’re all secretly hoping you’ll adopt later. (This is not true.) (Yes it is.)

3. When you say you’re praying for us and our waiting children, and you actually really are, not only does that soothe our troubled souls, but according to Scripture, it activates the heavens. So pray on, dear friends. Pray on. That is always the right thing to say. And please actually do it. We need people to stand in the gap for us when we are too tired and discouraged to keep praying the same words another day. 

4. If you can, please become telepathic to determine which days we want to talk about adoption and which days we’d rather you just show up on our doorstep with fresh figs from the Farmer’s Market (thanks, Katie) or kidnap us away in the middle of the day to go seeBridesmaids. Sometimes we need you to make us laugh and remember what it feels like to be carefree for a few hours. If you’re not sure which day we’re having, just pre-buy movie tickets and show up with the figs, and when we answer the door, hold them all up and ask, “Would you like to talk for an hour uninterrupted about waiting for a court date?” We’ll respond to whichever one fits. 

Supporting Families After the Airport

You went to the airport. The baby came down the escalator to cheers and balloons. The long adoption journey is over and your friends are home with their new baby / toddler / twins / siblings / teenager. Everyone is happy. Maybe Fox News even came out and filmed the big moment and “your friend” babbled like an idiot and didn’t say one constructive word about adoption and also she looked really sweaty during her interview. (Really? That happened to me too. Weird.) 

How can you help? By not saying or doing these things: 

1. I mean this nicely, but don’t come over for awhile. Most of us are going to hole up in our homes with our little tribe and attempt to create a stable routine without a lot of moving parts. This is not because we hate you; it’s because we are trying to establish the concept of “home” with our newbies, and lots of strangers coming and going makes them super nervous and unsure, especially strangers who are talking crazy language to them and trying to touch their hair. 

2. Please do not touch, hug, kiss, or use physical affection with our kids for a few months. We absolutely know your intentions are good, but attachment is super tricky with abandoned kids, and they have had many caregivers, so when multiple adults (including extended family) continue to touch and hold them in their new environment, they become confused about who to bond with. This actually delays healthy attachment egregiously. It also teaches them that any adult or stranger can touch them without their permission, and believe me, many adoptive families are working HARD to undo the damage already done by this position. Thank you so much for respecting these physical boundaries. 

3. For the next few months, do not assume the transition is easy. For 95% of us, it so is not. And this isn’t because our family is dysfunctional or our kids are lemons, but because this phase is so very hard on everyone. I can’t tell you how difficult it was to constantly hear: “You must be so happy!” and “Is life just so awesome now that they’re here??” and “Your family seems just perfect now!” I wanted that to be true so deeply, but I had no idea how to tell you that our home was actually a Trauma Center. (I did this in a passive aggressive way by writing this blog, which was more like “An Open Letter to Everyone Who Knows Us and Keeps Asking Us How Happy We Are.”) Starting with the right posture with your friends – this is hard right now – will totally help you become a safe friend to confide in / break down in front of / draw strength from. 

4. Do not act shocked if we tell you how hard the early stages are. Do not assume adoption was a mistake. Do not worry we have ruined our lives. Do not talk behind our backs about how terribly we’re doing and how you’re worried that we are suicidal. Do not ask thinly veiled questions implying that we are obviously doing something very, very wrong. Do not say things like, “I was so afraid it was going to be like this” or “Our other friends didn’t seem to have these issues at all.” Just let us struggle. Be our friends in the mess of it. We’ll get better. 

5. If we’ve adopted older kids, please do not ask them if they “love America so much” or are “so happy to live in Texas.” It’s this simple: adoption is born from horrible loss. In an ideal world, there would be no adoption, because our children would be with their birth families, the way God intended. I’ll not win any points here, but I bristle when people say, “Our adopted child was chosen for us by God before the beginning of time.” No he wasn’t. He was destined for his birth family. God did not create these kids to belong to us. He didn’t decide that they should be born into poverty or disease or abandonment or abuse and despair aaaaaaaall so they could finally make it into our homes, where God intended them to be. No. We are a very distant Plan B. Children are meant for their birth families, same as my biological kids were meant for mine. Adoption is one possible answer to a very real tragedy… after it has already happened, not before as the impetus for abandonment. There is genuine grief and sorrow when your biological family is disrupted by death and poverty, and our kids have endured all this and more. So when you ask my 8-year-old if he is thrilled to be in Texas, please understand that he is not. He misses his country, his language, his food, his family. Our kids came to us in the throes of grief, as well they should. Please don’t make them smile and lie to you about how happy they are to be here. 

6. Please do not disappear. If I thought the waiting stage was hard, it does not even hold the barest candle to what comes after the airport.Not. The. Barest. Candle. Never have I felt so isolated and petrified. Never have I been so overwhelmed and exhausted. We need you after the airport way more than we ever needed you before. I know you’re scared of us, what with our dirty hair and wild eyes and mystery children we’re keeping behind closed doors so they don’t freak out more than they already have, but please find ways to stick around. Call. Email. Check in. Post on our Facebook walls. Send us funny cards. Keep this behavior up for longer than six days. 

Here’s what we would love to hear or experience After the Airport:

1. Cook for your friends. Put together a meal calendar and recruit every person who even remotely cares about them. We didn’t cook dinners for one solid month, and folks, that may have single handedly saved my sanity. There simply are not words to describe how exhausting and overwhelming those first few weeks are, not to mention the lovely jetlag everyone came home with. And if your friends adopted domestically right up the street, this is all still true, minus the jetlag. 

2. If we have them, offer to take our biological kids for an adventure or sleepover. Please believe me: their lives just got WHACKED OUT, and they need a break, but their parents can’t give them one because they are 1.) cleaning up pee and poop all day, 2.) holding screaming children, 3.) spending all their time at doctors’ offices, and 4.) falling asleep in their clothes at 8:15pm. Plus, they are in lockdown mode with the recently adopted, trying to shield them from the trauma that is Walmart. 

3. Thank you for getting excited with us over our little victories. I realize it sounds like a very small deal when we tell you our kindergartener is now staying in the same room as the dog, but if you could’ve seen the epic level of freakoutedness this dog caused her for three weeks, you would understand that this is really something. When you encourage us over our incremental progress, it helps. You remind us that we ARE moving forward and these little moments are worth celebrating. If we come to you spazzing out, please remind us where we were a month ago. Force us to acknowledge their gains. Be a cheerleader for the healing process. 

4. Come over one night after our kids are asleep and sit with us on our porch. Let me tell you: we are all lonely in those early weeks. We are home, home, home, home, home. Good-bye, date nights. Good-bye, GNO’s. Good-bye, spontaneous anything. Good-bye, church. Good-bye, big public outings. Good-bye, community group. Good-bye, nightlife. So please bring some community to our doorstep. Bring friendship back into our lives. Bring adult conversation and laughter. And bring an expensive bottle of wine. 

5. If the shoe fits, tell adopting families how their story is affecting yours. If God has moved in you over the course of our adoption, whether before the airport or after, if you’ve made a change or a decision, if somewhere deep inside a fire was lit, tell us, because it is spiritual water on dry souls. There is nothing more encouraging than finding out God is using our families for greater kingdom work, beautiful things we would never know or see. We gather the holy moments in our hands every day, praying for eyes to see God’s presence, his purposes realized in our story. When you put more holy moments in our hands to meditate on, we are drawn deeper into the Jesus who led us here. 

Here’s one last thing: As you watch us struggle and celebrate and cry and flail, we also want you to know that adoption is beautiful, and a thousand times we’ve looked at each other and said, “What if we would’ve said no?” God invited us into something monumental and lovely, and we would’ve missed endless moments of glory had we walked away. We need you during these difficult months of waiting and transitioning, but we also hope you see that we serve a faithful God who heals and actually sets the lonely in families, just like He said He would. And even through the tears and tantrums (ours), we look at our children and marvel that God counted us worthy to raise them. We are humbled. We’ve been gifted with a very holy task, and when you help us rise to the occasion, you have an inheritance in their story; your name will be counted in their legacy. 

Because that day you brought us pulled pork tacos was the exact day I needed to skip dinner prep and hold my son on the couch for an hour, talking about Africa and beginning to bind up his emotional wounds. When you kidnapped me for two hours and took me to breakfast, I was at the very, very, absolute end that morning, but I came home renewed, able to greet my children after school with fresh love and patience. When you loved on my big kids and offered them sanctuary for a night, you kept the family rhythm in sync at the end of a hard week. 

Thank you for being the village. You are so important. 

Thank you Jen for taking the time to, once again, be a voice for adoptive families and their children!

How many is enough?

I borrowed this from a friends blog who borrowed it from somewhere else...  it is a poignant candid blog post regarding family size.  Bottom line, please support and love me for the decisions I have made, please don't criticize my family building even if it isn't what you would do, what you want for me nor what you believe is the best for my family.  I plan to be the best family that each of my children could ask for.

http://myshelbybaby.blogspot.com/2011/09/you-have-enough-kids.html

Approved for 2!!!

Our home visit this morning was stellar, and thanks goes to my unbelievable kiddos!  The social worker commented on how well behaved and polite they were.  She even said that her kids would NEVER have been able to handle this long of a meeting without being all over her and being a distraction.

The social worker arrived on time just before 8am, just after I took out the trash (thank goodness) and before I made coffee (darn!)!  She started by talking to Connor and Elina.  The kids and I spoke about the visit earlier that morning.  I told them why the social worker would be visiting and that this visit wasn't "all about Elina" (like all of the Post Placement Report visits from our other social worker) which Connor really liked.  (Go figure!! LOL!! )  Well it was off and rolling, Elina wanted to show off her one piano lesson skills of the keyboard.  Connor took it from there, giving a tour of our house and talking about why he has Disney Pixar's Cars decor in his room.  I left the social worker to talk to the kids and made a cup of coffee to get thru the next 2 hours of Q&A. 

I was not nervous of being a good parent, parenting style or even whether or not I would be approved to adopt again.  My nerves were that I would be able to adopt "Danny" AND "Dante" as a single mom.  I was stunned when at the end of the meeting she began telling me of cases where she did not approve people, or steered them away from International adoption, if she felt they were not prepared to deal with the consequences of residing in an institution/orphanage. (If you have not brought home a child from an institution/orphanage (or severe emotional neglect/abandonment) you CANNOT understand the fear, sadness, grieving, anger, and mixtures of these emotions.  I worried that she would say something like though I think what you are doing is noble, I do not believe  this is the best fit.  Instead she said... she definitely approves me for 2!  She said she sees that I have the energy to take the boys on. But the most profound, she said that she could sense that I am doing exactly what I am meant to do. And believe me that she was difficult in her questioning, though out the questioning I felt that I wasn't going to pass... but I kept telling myself to be confident and not worry and that if it is meant to be it will be.  LOL...  at one point I may have even said that the first year would be H-E-double hockey sticks.

Bottom line is that we will have to complete the contacts but based on her evaluations thus far, we are...

APPROVED FOR 2!!!