Waiting. Yep, it stinks!

Friends in Eastern Europe have compiled their dossier to adopt two older boys from an orphanage there.  These are kids no one from their own country wanted.  Their hopeful parents are Americans, living in country, serving orphans and people seen by the majority there as societal outcasts.  My friends are good people.  They were “there” for me when I was stuck in the muck for weeks in that place, waiting for a corrupt government to move so I could bring my children home.  My friends have jumped through hoops.  They’ve done all the important things, as well as all the ridiculous things they’ve been told to do, in order to compile the necessary paperwork needed to make these boys legally their own.  Now, officials at that country’s national adoption authority are telling them that they will not be seen through the rest of the year.  They were told to come back in February.  It’s ridiculous.  It’s about the convenience of the workers.  It’s about politics, and constant changes in adoption procedures.  It’s about changes in authority – something that seems to be in constant flux in that country.  And yes, I’ll say it:  it’s about corruption and extortion, even if it’s veiled extortion.  I can bet you that a nice sum of cash would get them an appointment pronto.  My friends don’t work like that even if corrupt officials do. 

My friends are hoping for an appointment anyway.  They are moving forward in faith believing God called them to become the parents of these two boys.  They are moving forward, knowing childhood does not wait.  (For every year spent in an orphanage, a child will lose 4-6 months or more in physical, emotional and psycho-social development.)  My friends are waiting on people who do not really care about these boys, and who certainly do not care about them.  Yep, it stinks.

I have other beloved friends whose dossier is sitting on the desk of some national adoption official in South America.  The government is different there than in former Soviet states, but there is still red tape, just as there is red tape anywhere.  They can’t get any definitive answers.  There must be some big meeting that takes place.  That meeting hasn’t happened.  The child they’re waiting to adopt is also an older boy with special needs.  He, too, is waiting in an orphanage.  While he is in an orphanage run by people who do care, he is still in an orphanage.  The statistics for kids waiting in an orphanage do not improve from country to country.  My friends would be good parents for this child.  He would have a sibling, already home, from his own orphanage, as well as other brothers and sisters.  But they have not yet been officially matched.  Other people from other countries have looked at his file, but he’s still waiting in bureaucratic limbo, while my friends still hold onto the hope that God called them to become his parents.  However, nothing is certain in any country until you walk out of court with a final adoption decree in your hands.  Waiting.  Yep, it stinks.

The process of adoption is filled with paperwork, red tape, and what seems like endless waiting.  It is hard.  Really hard.  A lot of people give up.  Thankfully, many do not.  Childhood doesn’t wait, even if we must.  Once our kids are home, we wait some more.  It’s a different kind of waiting, but it’s still hard.  If our children were adopted internationally, we wait for them to be able to understand us, as we wait to understand them.  We wait for attachment – sometimes for our entire relationship.  We wait for our children to learn to become part of our families.  We wait for them to learn to trust us and to believe we will not leave.  We wait for them to stop lying and stealing.  We wait to see if they will get into trouble, even as we wait for them to grasp they are valuable.  Sometimes, it’s really hard to wait on these things.  Waiting stinks.

Frankly, I don’t know how anyone gets through the process of adoption, nor the process of knitting a child to one’s heart, without faith.  Your faith in God may look a little different than mine, but I don’t know another adoptive parent that’s doing this well, who is doing it alone.  I NEED God, even when I don’t know exactly who He is, or exactly what He looks like.  Even though I don’t fully understand His character, and I won’t fully KNOW HIM this side of Heaven, I need the hope of His unconditional love for me.  Otherwise, I cannot begin to show that unconditional love to my children.  Without God, I cannot begin to wait for the hope I have for their lives, because I know He has waited on me many, many times.  I know that trusting in Him helps me renew my strength (Isaiah 40:31).

I also need others who are walking this road.  I need the wisdom of those who have gone before me, who have “been there/done that," and I need the friendship of those who are where I was three and four years ago, too.  As one of my good friends puts it, “sometimes only another trauma mama can talk you down off the ceiling.”  My heart breaks for those who isolate themselves, or think that prayer alone will solve everything. 

Sometimes God answers prayer by putting people in our paths who know what they’re talking about!  There is a story my former pastor tells to illustrate this point:  There was a flood.  A guy was stuck on top of his roof, and he prayed for God to save him, as the water rose.  Another guy came by in a row boat and offered him a ride.  The man on the roof refused saying, “I’ve prayed for God to save me.”  Another person came by on a raft and offered him a place on the rickety, but still floating vessel.  Yet, he refused saying, “I’ve prayed for God to save me.”  A third person came by, clinging only to a floating log.  The water was up to the waiting man’s neck by then.  He was told to grab hold of the log, but this quickly sinking man replied, “I’ve prayed for God to save me.”  Eventually, the man on the roof drowned.  When he got to Heaven, he asked why God hadn’t saved him.  God replied, “I tried to save you three times!” 

As I wait for my children to trust me, to stop lying, to stop shutting down or yelling at me, to relax and know they are loved, I pray.  But I also watch for those God would send along my way.  I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my adoptive parenting journey, especially during that first year or so.  I’ve asked my kids “why” they did something, instead of “what” they were feeling.  I’ve tried to “make” my kids tell me the truth, instead of helping them discover what fear was driving them.  I’ve argued that my kids needed to know how to handle “real life” with “regular people,” not knowing they would never get there without first healing from their trauma.  I’ve used all the good parenting techniques that worked to help me raise four healthy, happy, whole, and functional young adult sons, only to learn these things DO NOT WORK with hurt children, and I had to learn to parent my adopted children in ways that seemed counter intuitive to me.  I’ve allowed some row boats to go by, but I’ll be darned if I’ll let a raft or a log go by now, too.  Waiting stinks, but I’m not going to drown. 

Let’s pray for our waiting friends, but let’s also be there for them.  Let’s also accept God’s answer to our own prayers when He sends by a row boat, a raft, or even a log.  Waiting stinks, but we don’t have to drown.  It’s a lot easier to endure waiting when we are in a boat, with company. 

Puss in Boots - Movie Review

A lot of trauma mamas are cautious about the movies we let our kids see.  We know keeping our kids’ worlds small, and not allowing everything other families might be able to experience without a problem, helps us keep a reign on certain trauma triggers – things that trigger our kids and cause them pain.  There are other blogs out there where trauma mamas can find reviews of movies written specifically for those of us raising hurt kids.  One of my favorites is Gold to Refine.  You’ll find links to Diana’s  movie reviews on the side column of her blog.  Now that I have my own blog, I thought I’d write a movie review from time to time, too.  Our family does not go to movies often, but when we do, I’ll let you know what I think.  For now, let me tell you about Puss in Boots.  (Warning:  if you don’t want any spoilers, read no further.  However, as a trauma mama, you may appreciate a spoiler or two if it helps you help your kids.)

We saw Puss in Boots in 3D this afternoon.  My hubby and I took our two younger kids, as well as one of our older boys (who has a mild form of Asperger Syndrome).  All five of us enjoyed the movie.  It was funny, and there were plenty of mild zingers for the adults in the crowd.  There was no cursing, though there were a few off-color references – much that would go over most kids’ heads.  The movie is filled with plenty of action and its theme is “good overcomes evil.”  All good stuff.

The thing trauma mamas might consider, however, is that Puss and his childhood friend, Humpty Alexander Dumpty, are orphans.  The boys are raised in a Mexican orphanage where they are bullied by the likes of Little Boy Blue.  They have a kind and loving “mama” who runs the orphanage, however.  She grows to love Puss as her son, even calling him, “my boy” a few times in the movie.  Puss and Humpty emotionally wrestle a lot with their past.  Humpty is especially affected by it and makes many poor choices throughout the movie.  In the end, he makes a decision for the greater good, but gives his life to do so.  Humpty dies by falling off a cliff and being cracked open.  Inside, we see he is a golden egg.  Puss comments he always knew Humpty was a “good egg” inside.  This golden egg ends up being taken up into the heavens by the Goose – you know, the one that lays the golden eggs.

All three of my kids did just fine with the movie for the most part.  Remember, they are older.  My daughter is 13 and my youngest son is 16.  I asked them if the boys being orphans and being in an orphanage made them feel funny at all.  My daughter said no, and I believe her.  She’s a positive person and is not a deep thinker about hard things.  My son looked at me like I was crazy (but this is not unusual – he looks at me like I’m crazy as a matter of course) and also said no – with extra emphasis (“NO-ah!), and a deep Eastern European accent – which is especially exaggerated when he is stressed.  So, while he did fine for the most part, I know the orphan theme bothered him.  He said he liked the movie and he thought it was funny.  My Asperger young man (22) was stimulated by the action scenes – he always is.  He tends to chew his hands when this happens.  So if you have an Aspie, be aware that the action scenes cause excitement like most action and adventure movies do for Aspies.

I’m not sure why SO many movies seem to center around characters with tough backgrounds.  I guess it makes the character more interesting.  As your hurt kids get older, it’s hard to keep all the parameters around their worlds that you once did.  You can’t shield them from all the violent movies, or all the movies with themes that make them crazy.  You can teach them (or try to teach them) to be discerning – to consider whether or a not a movie is a good thing for them to watch, or whether the content of a movie is worth their time.  After all, there’s a lot of JUNK out there!  And if you happen to stumble on one that’s not good for you, it is OKAY to teach them it is perfectly fine to walk out of a movie (or turn off the TV).

That said, I don’t think Puss in Boots is junk.  Far from it.  It is fun and it is funny.  But for some kids with orphanage backgrounds and traumatic pasts, it may not be a movie to see.