Do You Not Know?

Whoever said adoption was like a roller coaster should be shot.  Okay, that's a little extreme, even for a joke, how about they be water boarded?  Sorry, I can't resist :)  My point is saying adoption is like a roller coaster is possibly the greatest over simplification.  Ever. ! First, a roller coaster is fun.  Second, it is over in seconds.  And the further we get into this process the more I realize it is like a marathon, grueling, painful, draining, and to complicate the matter-you don't know what's around the next bend or when it will end.  It's a waiting game, one that you must be able to see little glimmers of hope in or you will lose.

renew your strength. . .

We're so early into this experience, we have so much ahead of us, but I feel grateful to already have learned so much.  As I mentioned before, surprisingly, everything with the paperwork has gone well, definitely work (it's interesting to take two small children and a crying cat to the vet to get a rabies vaccine since all animals under your roof must have proof of rabies vaccinations) but it's coming along well.  We're ready to schedule our social worker's visit and we're just about done with all the (for now) required paperwork.  It's regular life that has been the marathon.  I shared some about the additional pressures we've been dealing with, and thankfully Cecilia's health is doing better, but this week was still a knock down drag out fight in other areas and by Wednesday I overwhelmed-physically, spiritually, and emotionally.  Interestingly, it was big picture problems getting me down, not the little details.  Which is odd, because I am not one to get stressed over the big picture, but I can be absolutely frantic over the details.

you will soar on wings like eagles. . .

A Kazakh Eagle Hunt.

An old Kazakh proverb states, "There are three things a real man should have, a fast horse, a hound, and a golden eagle." Just a bit of a cowboy culture going on there :)  Hunting with eagles is considered an art, one that has been in practice for hundreds of years and is a valuable part of their culture. The Golden Eagle can reach up to three feet in height and a speed of 120 mph as it soars from above to capture its prey.  Maybe it's because I'm American, maybe it's because they are just spectacular, but eagles seem to embody the very essence of freedom.  I was thinking this week that sometimes our freedom is imposed on by others, but sometimes we place our own obstacles in the way of experiencing freedom.  When I'm teaching my elementary kiddos, we call this a "Baditude" :)  At the start of the week, I was presented with a ton of beautiful little details about the adoption-exactly the way I feel love!  My items from Kazakhstan came in the mail (you may remember that the director of our agency actually bought me souvenirs while she was in country working on the adoption program!)  Sweet little vests and hats for all three children, and a toy horse for Baby Boy's room.  I was so excited! Alongside that fun, I've been able to connect with three women who are adopting (or considering adopting) from Kazakhstan-and one of them just got their referral for a 15 month old boy!! (Sound familiar?!)  So excited for you and your family!  As many of you know, a big love language for me is communication and connection.  Just making these connections, having someone to talk to about all the craziness that's in my head, it means the world to me-helps me cope with the fact that my little son is on the other side of the world.  I feel Love through details, through connections, and that is exactly how I was shown Love.  But if I choose to focus on the big hot mess (I know I said I was too old for that phrase, but it's just so fun!) then I am held captive by my own attitude.  I enjoy no freedom, just slavery.  Only when I open my eyes to all that is happening (ironically, looking at the big picture!) can I soar, on Love, free, above anything that tries to entangle me in depression.

Baby's vest and horse.

you will run and not grow weary. . .

This is a marathon.  And the times that are the hardest, the times that I have to run-to something or from something-are the times when I most need to focus on what's at the end of the marathon.  I might not know when or how this race will end, I might not know the twists or turns, but I know who is running the race with me, and I know who is waiting for me at the end.  And that is all I need to know.  I mentioned in my last post (or one of them, I write a lot, who can keep track?) that I wanted Kazakhstan items for Valentine's Day.  After all, a piece of my heart is there, somewhere in Central Asia.  Bard knew that I wanted a book and music about Kazakhstan but he went above and beyond so much that he gets bonus points for a long time!  He ordered a t shirt for me that has the Kazakh coat of arms on it and a locket that has a picture of the same coat of arms in it-and a place to put a picture of my Baby Kaz.  And yes, the book and music too :)  I'm so thankful to be going through this race with a man like him.  In all that we've been through lately there is one word that comes to mind repeatedly when I think of him.  Integrity.  That is a man I want by my side and that is a man who is a great father, and who will be a great father, to a little boy who needs him so much.  And when I think of that blessing, and know that it is part of my Hope, and Future, then I can keep running.

My locket and girls' vests.

you will walk and not be faint. . .

At some point, maybe we will just be experiencing regular life while going through an adoption!  But I know that it will probably flip flop-the adoption process will become challenging and emotional, while our regular life goes back to (as much as it ever was) mundane.  And eventually, the two will meld into some new, as yet unknown, kind of normal.  Although we're not there right now, I know from past experience that sometimes just walking through life is the most difficult task of all.  If the regular is still regular but the outside is crushing down upon you, it's so hard to get up, get dressed, tie your shoes, and go about your day. When we have to leave our baby in Kazakhstan, after spending a month with him, how on earth will I get up the next day and continue on like my life wasn't just ripped from me?  Renew my strength.  Soar like eagles.  Run and not be weary. I will walk and not be faint because of Truth I am experiencing right now.  Because I will carry this Love with me, no matter what.  Because I know.  Because I Hope.  This is my race, this is my marathon.

What's In A Name?

Okay, so that is a super cheesy and predictable title for a post about names, but what can you do?!  Several people have asked us if we know what we will name our little boy and since it's always on my mind, I thought I would let you in, to my mind. . .get ready and hold on!

The first answer is nothing because he will already have a name.  In fact, he's probably already been born and his biological mom, or someone, gave him his first name.  Interesting fact about Kazakhstan, names are very important.  It's actually against tradition to give your child a name from the family tree-going back 7 generations.  And, there is an old ceremony for naming a child where you lay the baby in his crib, the female family members gather around and one person goes up to the child, telling him what his name is, three times in a row.  Maybe we'll do that when we bring him home :) Naming a child is a very personal choice-whether you're adopting or having a child biologically-there is a lot to consider.  A lot of thought went into what we named our girls.  The meaning of their names, the sound, if it would fit their personalities, possible nicknames,  and the popularity of our choices were all issues that we discussed before deciding for sure on Evelyn Joy and Cecilia Lynn.  Just as much thought has gone, and will go into our son's name, but it's different.

Evelyn's name, written when I was 6 months pregnant with her.

Some people give their adopted child a totally new American name.  Some people combine the child's birth name, perhaps as a middle name, with a more traditional first name.  Others, keep the birth name and maybe add their own name as a middle name, or a nick name.  Depending on the circumstances, we will likely do one of the latter options.  I can't imagine our child not having a name that represents his culture of origin.  I've fallen in love with Kazakhstan and want him to be proud of his heritage, familiar with it, and know where he came from.  So, that will somehow be a part of his name.  The rest will depend on how old he is and what name he was given.  If he is closer to 2 years old, we will try to keep his name the same, or as similar as possible.  Because, obviously this will be how he has identified himself and since he will already be verbal, I just think it would be extra confusing to him.  Although, again, it's a very personal decision and other people go different routes for different reasons.

What may throw a wrench in that plan is if the name is Kazakh and particularly difficult to translate into our culture.  For example, the President of Kazakhstan is Nursultan Nazabayev.  And (2nd interesting fact about Kazakhstan, I didn't manage to get one in the last blog post so you get two today!) is that I have studied a lot of world leaders, particularly focusing on transitions from communist bloc countries to a more free market and President Nazarbayev is by far the biggest success story I have come across.  The road to democracy is long and winding, but he has led his people with an openness and intelligence that you rarely see in countries attempting to free themselves of the shackles of communism.  In fact, he wrote a book about his experiences and because I am super romantic, I told Bard that is what I wanted for Valentine's Day.  This is a fascinating man.  However, the first part of his name (Nurse) has an obvious  and totally different meaning in English, and it would be odd for a boy's name.  And the second part of his name (Sultan) also has different connotations in our culture and although I could maybe see keeping just the second part as our child's name, if he came to us named Nursultan, we would likely make it his middle name.  And how cool would it be for him to have his president's name as part of who he is?!

Tsar Nicholas II

The other wrench could come from an unusual Russian name.  The odds are also pretty good that our child will have an ethnic Russian name.  And although I like many Russian names, there are a few that have been ruined for me.  Thank you Vladimir Lenin/Putin.  And some I am just not particularly fond of, Boris for some reason, and Gregory just don't quite make the cut.  Here's a strange piece of info about a possible Russian name though, when I was in high school and I (like every girl I know) had picked out my kids' names, the boy's name that I chose and still love, was Nicholas.  A very popular Russian name.  Now, Bard is not a fan of that name, mainly because Nicholas was a very weak tsar whom many hold responsible for allowing Russia to explode into communism because of his apparent inability to lead with any kind of intuition for what his country actually needed to survive and thrive in the new century.  Whatever.  We have joked for years now that it would serve him (Bard, not Tsar Nicholas) right if the child we adopt had already been given the name Nicholas :) I've actually already imagined getting the phone call and email referral, in which our agency tells me we have a child that the Kazakhstan government is referring to us, and his name is Nicholas.  Poor Bard :)

So, obviously we have thought about boy names.  Even though we knew the gender of both our girls, I really am not the type to sit around for 20 weeks and not think about all possibilities!  If Evelyn had been a boy, my choice would have been Nicholas James.  James for my grandpa who in one of my earliest memories at age 3, shared the love of Jesus with me, and who also was a tank commander In World War II and stormed the beaches on D Day.  Can't get sweeter or more BA than that!  But, Bard was not convinced about Nicholas so it's really rather lucky that Evelyn was a girl, because we never agreed on a boy's first name!

However, things changed a bit with Cici.  I had a miscarriage in between the two girls and felt like if we had a boy, he should be named Thomas.  I clearly remember laying in bed and knowing that even when we doubt, there is an eternal Presence, and nothing can change that Truth.  Had Cecilia been a boy, she likely would have been Thomas Everett, or vice verse, Everett was also my grandpa's name and I actually love the idea of calling a little boy Rhett :) Things changed a bit more last year when Bard's grandpa passed away.  He was an amazing man and I would love to honor him somehow, which is odd for me because despite my wanting our son to reflect my grandpa's name, I'm not particularly big on continuing family names-there must be a bit of Kazakh in me ;) But I have many wonderful memories and associations with Bard's grandparents, who both passed away last year and feel that using Walter's name is a way to extend their legacy. So there's a fairly decent chance our child will have two middle names!  But hey, we're only having one boy, so we have a lot to fit in :)

Cecilia's name, made by a friend of ours.

Especially true because it's a priority for us is giving him a name that reflects his heritage, all of his heritage.  So if he has our grandfather's names somewhere, then even if it doesn't work to continue with his given name, it would likely be a middle name or a nickname.  But just to be more complicated, it would also seem odd to me if he did not have a first name that reflected his ethnicity, whether that be Russian or Kazakh (Russian ethnically but Kazakh nationally.) So what does that mean?  I don't know!  Maybe we would give him a new name, that represents his ethnicity if his birth name does not translate well?  There is a famous Russian artist named Kazimir Malevich.  We could name our baby Kazimir and call him Kaz.  That is too adorable :)

So what is in a name?  People do not take on the identity of their names, it's the other way around.  If you meet someone with what you think is a strange name, as you get to know that person, the name "grows on you" and if you connect with that person then the name becomes as endearing to you, reflecting the person's place in your heart.  Whatever name our baby has, he already has a place in our heart. And, I have to admit, it's a little thrilling that someone is going to call me on the phone and tell me what my baby's name is!  His final name will likely end up being a bit different than the name he starts with, but it will be a beautiful merging of cultures, families, and history.  Just like him.

The First Trimester

Each trimester in pregnancy has its own challenges, but most women would probably agree that the first trimester is the hardest.  You often feel quite sick and exhausted. You're starting to gain weight, but not in a cute pregnant way, only so that you look fat.  You don't get the fun experience of feeling the baby move, and you may not have even shared the news, so no talking about it either.  With my second child I had migraines 2 or 3 times a week, that would last 1 or 2 days.  Do you know what medicine you can take for migraines when you are pregnant?  Tylenol and coffee.  Yeah, you may as well lick a lollipop!

With starting our home study, and now formally applying to our agency, we are officially in the first trimester of adoption-the paper chase.  It's called the paper chase because all you do is, well, chase paper!  This week alone Bard and I scheduled physicals and we have to take forms for our physicians to fill out regarding our health status.  I also scheduled an appointment our our cat because any animal under our roof must have proof of rabies (in doing so I discovered poor kitty was way behind on vaccines and will be receiving them all next week.  Oops!)  I contacted the girls' pediatrician so he could fill out a form-any child living with us must have healthy medical status on file.  We both applied for our marriage certificates, birth certificates, my divorce certificate, and the girls' birth certificates-these have to be certified copies, not just copied off what we already have in our possession.  We became a member of a credit union and started a loan process through them.  We received our passports (Bard's had to be renewed, so did Evelyn's, and Cici needed a new one) and made copies of them to send off to our home study agency-they already have mine.  We sent requests to Bard's past counselors for them to write a statement declaring his prognosis and ability to parent-we had sent one to mine last week.  We followed up on the five references required, all are in except one.  If you know us, feel free to guess who hasn't turned theirs' in yet . :) We filled out the formal application for our agency-we had already done the preliminary one-with several pages describing our health, jobs, emergency contacts, lists of all our medications (past and present), biological children, special needs, statements of faith, financial liabilities, assets, and net worth.  We started working on a 15 page form that details out what resources we have and what we will do if our child has special needs-questions like, "What are the signs of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome? Please list language/translation resources available in your area for the child you are about to adopt.  Please list local adoption support groups to assist in dealing with adoption issues and maintain your child's culture/heritage.  What if your child cannot learn in a regular classroom setting?  describe local resources for school age children with developmental and behavioral problems."  And that's just the beginning because next we are filling out our 20 page autobiographical that starts with listing all of your immediate family, where they live, occupation, marital status, date of birth, spouse's date of birth and then goes into fun questions like, "Describe your mother's role in the family currently and as a child.  Describe her personality. Describe your parents' marriage and how they display affection for each other. If your parents are divorced, describe why and describe any previous marriages."

Paper. Chase.

And that was just this past week!  It does not include tasks from the week before like writing out our childcare and emergency evacuation forms or finding all our residences from adulthood on or filling out background checks!  The first trimester of adoption is complete when the majority of this paperwork is turned into agencies and governments, along with your sanity.  I have to be honest though, I was pretty aware of what I was getting into.  Having watched many friends go through this process and now that I've read half a dozen blogs of people across the world going into this same scenario, my eyes were wide open.  The problem was that I made the mistake of thinking that I was going to add the intense, emotional, pressured experience of adoption to our regular lives.  What I did not know is that at the almost exact same moment we started pursuing adoption (at the end of last year) we also entered into one of the most stressful and exhausting periods of our marriage!  Some of the trauma has been what you would normally expect out of life-both of our grandparents had some scary health risks, and, it was the holidays so add stress, busyness, and events and then subtract money!  However, we have gone through some ridiculous work stress, which I won't go into because that was not even the main issue.  It's now February 5th.  We have not really been healthy since December 6th.  And of that two months, the majority of health problems were placed on our littlest, Cecilia, who at a whopping 22 pounds is just a pixie and should not be sick for so long.  She has been to the Dr nearly half a dozen times, been tested (twice) for Celiac, food allergies, had an abdominal x ray, been taken off dairy, put back on dairy, given two enemas (due for two more), and had the flu twice.  I could be counting wrong because I am going on a significant lack of sleep, but I believe she has had 4 days in the past two months that she did not vomit or have diarrhea. Night after night we moved her into a pac n play in our room so we could wake up with her right when she got sick.  She has lost weight, developed a whole new vocabulary (nurse, diarrhea, x-ray, soy milk), and spent more time on the couch watching Cinderella than I care to remember.  Poor baby :(  The good news is that we have hopefully gone through (most) of the worst.  We're still waiting on one test result, but it doesn't seem to be anything very serious, just a run (no pun intended!) of really bad luck.

Why?  Why all the additional stress right now? Regular life?  Maybe, but October and November didn't look like this!  I'm now so paranoid about vomiting (in the midst of all Cici's issues, Bard, myself, and Evelyn all came down with the stomach flu as well) that if one of the girls coughs, my heart stops until I'm sure they are just coughing and not starting to throw up.  The last time I got this little sleep for this long of time is when Cici was a newborn.  I had a minor breakdown/epiphany while driving the other day.  I was thinking about how our lives have been so stressful since we started the adoption process-not really because of the adoption process, but because of all the additional elements going wrong. And I thought that I knew it was going to be hard, but that the adoption part of it would be hard, not my regular life taking a tail spin into the surreal.  And all of the sudden I was mad.  Mad that we had been fighting for two months.  Mad that it had only been two months.  Mad that I was feeling defeatist, which I absolutely hate, more than pretty much any emotion.  Mad at the slightest thought that all this stress could keep me down, slow me down, take me out. Mad.  I am a fighter.  You want to throw life at me?  You want this to be a battle for two months or twelve months? You want to hit me where it hurts, think you can distract me, make me forget what I'm fighting for?  Nope.  I am a fighter. Somewhere across the world my baby is fighting too.  And he will keep on fighting until he comes home.  Then he'll learn that I fight for him.  All the stress, all the paperwork, all the sickness. Go ahead.  Bring. It. On.

. . .in all these things we are more than conquerors. . .