The Good, The Bad, and the Unexpected

*warning, I had a lot I wanted to write and little amount of time so ignore all typos!*

June 8, 2012 - We have been home for 5 full days now and I am just catching my breath. Laundry is.....well, as caught up as one can be with 4 kids during the summer. I think I finished unpacking the last suitcase yesterday and the jet lag is pretty much gone. We are adjusting to our new reality of having 4 kids at home all day long.

Mostly our family has had to adjust to a little girl that is bonding with everyone but me, that is until today, but I will get to that later. First, let me tell you about our plane ride home. It went very well. We had a 3 hour flight from Beijing to Tokyo first. We bought a lap seat for Lucy, which in retrospect, we will never do again for any almost 2 year old with whom we will be traveling. She needed her own seat. Anyway, praise the Lord, it all worked out for the first flight. Before take off the flight attendant said she had 3 open seats in the front of the section. Do you know how much extra room is at the front of those sections.!!!! It was awesome. Lucy had her own seat and room to walk around during the flight. So that went well. We had a little lay over in Tokyo and then we hopped on the plane that we would not exit for 11 hours. Again, Lucy had a lap seat! When I came to our seat a young man was sitting in the window seat next to ours. I looked at him and said, "well, are you ready for this?" He glanced over at Lucy and just smiled. Thankfully, he was the nicestest man from Hong Kong (but born and raised in Australia so I enjoyed listening to his accent.) He was positive from the start and said Lucy looks like she will do great. Well, she did do great. The only thing that made me super sad was she woudl not let me hold her the entire flight. So Jason was stuck holding Lucy for 11 hours. She slept for nearly 7 hours of the flight and was pretty content the rest of the time as long as we kept the snacks handy. : ) Have I told you how much this child likes to eat!?  Anyway, by the end of the flight I was exhausted and I sure Jason was even more so. What really made me tear up was when a flight attendant came up to ask about Lucy and then said, "it looks like she really likes her Daddy. I saw you holding her and she cried and held out her arms for him." Uh, yeah, thanks for rubbing it in. No, I know she did not mean anything by it, I was just at a very sensitive spot at that point. Was this how Lucy was going to treat me once we came home? Well, the nice Aussie sitting next to us started up a conversation about Lucy's lip and palate and then we talked about the bonding issues she was having and then at the end of the flight he said she was in fact a very good traveler, for which we were thankful. We drove home after a stop at Chipotle!!!! We missed Chipotle so much we had to stop there for our first meal back in the States. : ) When we arrived home I had several suprises from sweet, sweet friends!!! Groceries in the fridge, freezer meals, muffins for breakfast, cards and flowers. Oh what a sweet welcome home!

Such a cute vase! Thank you E, K, and A!!!

Flowers on my front porch when I came home!

 Each one of these potted plants were planted while we were in China meeting Lucy for the first time. My wonderful friends from our MUMS (Moms Uplifting Moms) group planted these for me with wonderful signs planted alongside the flowers. Thank you MUMS girls! I love them and Lucy has already helped water them. : )

"I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." -John 14:8

So that is some of the good of this post. Now for the bad. The first night went o.k. Lucy woke up screaming and I went in to comfort her. Long story short......she ended up falling asleep on our couch and slept in until about 8:30, yes, even amidst all the morning chaos of the other 3 kids. The first day with the kids seemed to go well. She loved being around them. However, she showed me that she could bond to them faster than she can bond to me which kind of hurt. When she fell down and hurt herself (for the first time we actually saw her get hurt) I went to pick her up and she held out her hands to Aiden. She didn't want anything to do with me, again. Ouch! That really hurts! Well, this has been going on the past few days. She still preferred Jason to hold her. She would even grab for Isabelle's hand to walk over my hand. Needless to say, I was getting a bit depressed, angry, frustrated, bitter. I never knew I could have such feelings toward an almost 2 year old. Jason and I decided that I should be the one to do EVERYTHING for her and Jason made himself scarce throughout the day so that maybe she would bond to me a little better. She did start to make some progress and then something would happen and I would be reminded that she didn't really want me or need me. No one prepares you for this type of response in adoptions. I was stressing myself out by working and working at getting this child to want me or need me, I was absolutely no fun to be around. I have had my fair share of crying fits over the past 5 days. We are talking uncontrollable crying. Why!!??? Why God, did you ask me to take this child in and give me such a love for her only to have her reject me and everything I am doing for her? Why!? My kids have asked several times, Mom, why are you crying? Mom, are you happy? It has been some of the hardest days I have gone through. The only thing I can compare it to is bringing Ian home and him not wanting to nurse and wondering why people want more than one of these kids. Ha! Anyway, Jason suggested that I go for a walk yesterday just to get out of the house and to think. My man knows what I need. The first mile was more crying. (Thankfully, we live in the country so no one could see me.) The second mile was self talk that I was not going to stress about this anymore. This way I have been acting is hurting our family. What good is it for me to work so hard and stress out about forcing this bond to happen? I cannot MAKE this happen any faster by forcing it. So, I decided I was going to contact CCAI's post adoption department and ask my questions about bonding. The response I recieved was so reassuring that we are doing things right with Lucy, but to stop stressing so much. They also recommended a book to read which I immediately put on the Kindle. : ) I also talked to a couple other international adoptive moms and they too had encouraging words to share from their own experiences.

Basically, I have backed off. Today I went about my usual routine, laundry, dishes, dealing with the needs of the kids, playing with the kids, etc. Plus Jason has given me a few mornings of one on one time with Lucy while he takes Ian, Aiden, and Izzy on his errands. I even went for a run today. My time alone running usually allows me to meet with the Lord. Today He told me, "I am here." I asked, "what are you teaching me through this? Why am I having to go through this?" He reminded me that He too has been rejected by people over and over even after the ultimate sacrifice of love that He displayed on the cross. He understands my hurt and He just kept reassuring me, "I am here." Those words have been my breath today. 

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ........ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us." -Romans 8:35, 37

Today, for the first time Lucy whimpered and acted a little upset when I left her with Jason. She allowed me to hold her while we looked at a book. She reached out her arms for me to hold her. She is showing me signs of progress. She actually looks like she enjoys being with me. I do not know the reason why she has been treating me this way. A few theories have been 1. I was the one that initially took her away from everything that she knew and was comfortable with when the orphanage director placed her in my arms. She is upset I did this. 2. She was treated badly by one of her nannies in the orphanage and I remind her of that nanny, or 3. (my favorite) She actually had a really good relationship with her nannies and I remind her of those people she is missing. She is grieving that loss. We will never know for sure why, but we just keep working on our relationship. We have our good days and we may still have some bad days, but we will just keep working on it. It was recommended to us before we left for China that once we came home we needed to have a 1 month of lock down. Not many people coming over and certainly limiting our outings with Lucy so that the bonding can occur. At first Jason and I wondered if this was really necessary. Now, we understand why this is necessary. Each child is different. Some children may not need this month of "lock down", but in our case this is what we will have to do. One adoptive mom told Jason that she had a similar situation occur after they came home from India with their son, but she had totally forgotten about it until she read this blog. I guess it is kind of like birth pains. You eventually forget about these trials over time.

I also want to add that so many people have been praying for us for a long time and those prayers are also what is carrying us through this unexpected response Lucy is having toward me. Thank you! I am sorry it has taken me so long to update the blog.

Lucy does make us laugh at times with all her different faces she makes. She is a sweet girl and I see some of her personality coming out. She is a fun little one!  

Lucy coloring

Sisters picking their coloring pages

mei mei and jie jie (little sister and big sister)

matchy matchy

The girl likes shoes just as much as Izzy

more dress up shoes

We have to have a home visit by our social worker after one month of having Lucy. Included in this report we must have pictures including one family picture. So, a dear sweet friend brought us supper the other night -- (thank you Andria!) and I asked her to take a few shots of our family. I like the way our whole family looks together! : )

The Penner Family - 2012





Soli Deo Gloria!