Distant Cries

Life has gotten in to a pretty predicable and steady groove. Jude’s doing fantastic. He’s gaining physical strength and abilities, he is growing, he’s (very slowly) beginning to learn how to say a couple of words (mama and dada are his main objectives right now), and he’s become quite trusting and comfortable with all of us. We’ve been with him for about 10 weeks now, which is hard to believe!

Jude feels like a child to us now. Well– he’s always felt like our child, since we held his first picture. But it feels like he feels like our child now.  That’s a very comfortable and cozy place to be with him; we are very blessed and of course, very in love.

The other 3 Rowe kiddos have leveled out and gotten used to having another sibling. The girls, who struggled so much to relinquish their “baby” title, have fallen so head-over-heals in love with him that I actually have to protect him from their over the top affection!

We are still waiting on his 2 (minor) surgeries to be scheduled. There will be about a 2 week recovery, but both procedures are out-patient and pretty routine.

He had an eye exam at Vanderbilt’s Lion’s Eye Institute and everything looked good! They will reexamine his vision in 6 months and determine at that point if he needs glasses, but there’s no optic damage of any kind.

Next week his hearing evaluation will take place, and then we’ll be able to schedule his speech evaluation. This is the one area we really do feel like he needs some help.

In January he’ll have a Genetics appointment, a feeding evaluation, and his regular 2 year check up. Hopefully after these we will be DONE with all these appointments! But I’m so so thankful for an incredible hospital in our city and an incredible international adoption pediatrician.

Thank you all for your continued care. Our whole family feels so loved and taken care of by you guys!

This morning, as Jude was smothering my face with snotty, milk-covered, cheerio-crummy kisses, it occurred to me that it may be time to update the blog.

Yesterday at church, someone asked me, after watching Jude toddle around the lobby squealing and babbling, “Is he pathologically this happy or is he just in a good mood this morning?” I’m happy to report that our boy is “Pathologically Happy” (at least when he isn’t teething and doesn’t have an ear infection).

I’m also happy to report that it would appear as it he has completely fallen for me.

Yes, I believe it’s true. He’s officially in love with me.

He’s been all ours for 7 weeks. In 7 weeks he’s changed countries, bonded with new “caregivers”, learned to sleep in a bed (instead of rolling around on the floor all night),  and learned to sleep in a room without us and with Big Brother.

He’s learned to play with toys instead of throwing them meaninglessly behind him. He’s learned to look at a book (at a short book, quickly, but nonetheless, a book). He’s gone from walking around unsteadily to running around the house with his siblings, giving no thought to the changes underfoot.

He’s learned to say Mama.

yep.

But most importantly, he’s learned that Josh and I are here to provide for him, and when we are around a lot of people, he will survey each face until he sees one of ours, and then make his way to us. When he needs comforting, he will come with a scrunched up face, eyes squeezed shut,  and lift up his arms to be held. And when I’m holding him, his little body will fold in to mine now, like a child snuggles up to his mamma, instead of keeping an unsure stiffness about him.

He’s comfortable enough to fuss when he wants, demand what he wants, and refuse what he doesn’t want.

So I’m feeling like things are going well. Real well. We are all 6 settling in to a pretty predictable and routine daily life.

He’s still hit-or-miss with eating, and it bothers me on days when I feel like he’s losing weight instead of gaining, and days when I feel like I’ve given him every thing I can think of that he likes and he’s refused to touch any of it.

And he is still not showing much interest in attempting to talk. But he will have a hearing evaluation in December, and following that will be a speech evaluation, so I’m not going to worry about it in the meantime. He seems to be continually understanding more and more English and has no trouble letting us know what he wants!

I know this might be a naive thing to say out loud, but this baby is so sweet, so good natured, so low key. He’s happy, he’s loving, he’s snuggly, and he’s affectionate, and  I just think that the rockiest moments of the attacement process are behind us.

In some ways, now that things have calmed down and I’m starting to feel pretty sure that this isn’t all just a dream, I’m really starting to realize how good the Lord has been to us. How every prayer has been answered, how every promise has been kept. We are indeed very blessed by His intimate care and faithfulness.

Thank you to everyone who has been so kind to us. We’ve had so many people ask how we are doing and tell us they have been thinking of us and praying for us. So many of you have expressed concern for us and for our children, and it means so much to us.

We’ve now been with our Jude for 3 weeks. The words “bonding” and “attachment” are words that never crossed my mind with our other three children, and how amazing it is to look back and think of how intimately I bonded with our biological 3 before they were even born. The process with Jude is much different, although no less intimate. My heart deeply and irreversibly attached to Jude at the sight of his picture, at the words of an email saying he’s ours. A bond that came in a different way but with the same fierceness, was formed to this far away baby in an instant.

Jude’s bonding with us is different. He hasn’t been waiting for and anticipating and loving us from afar for months and months. He bonded with his biological mom while still in the womb– hearing her voice, listening to her heart beat– and then she was nowhere to be found. So he bonded with his foster mom, who cared for him and loved him. But then she was gone all of a sudden, without warning. He was placed in the care of several women and one in particular oversaw his day to day care. To some degree he bonded over time with them, accepting that they would provide for him, and he depended on them. Then all at once, they are gone, and his home is once again no where to be found.

And now he is with us. More caregivers. You can imagine his reluctance to attach to yet another person who will potentially leave him (how is he to expect otherwise?). I have come to deeply respect his self-protection. He accepts us; he allows us to love him, to care for him, to provide for him. He comes to us for comfort, for hugs. But there is something reserved about him. I get the vague notion that he’s not become fully available to us, that he’s not fallen in love with us, at least me, yet. And I totally get that. I totally respect that. He’s a strong soul; he’s learned to protect himself; he’s independent.

But with each day he gets a little closer. There are distinct moments when I know we’ve crossed a threshold. Even in the past couple of days I have gotten the feeling he’s starting to love me, not just allow me to love him.

Since we have forever as a family, there’s no rush. Watching him unfold, watching his heart gently and slowly open has been incredibly intriguing. Building on our foundation together each day is a challenge that has been enjoyable and rewarding. He’s flourishing already: wanting to accomplish things that last week he had no interest in, showing desire for  activities with the family, learning how to play with toys the correct way, even attempting to communicate our way (e.i. not screaming and yelling), and my favorite: sleeping!

So all that to say, for those who’ve asked how things are going, I think things are going really well. The best things take time to build, but I’d say the foundation is being laid quite nicely.

Jude had his appointment with the Vanderbilt International Adoption Clinic yesterday. It included a general medical evaluation, a developmental evaluation, and lots of blood-work. The boy did great. We were there for about 3 hours, and he held up the whole time. He’s amiable and outgoing, and I think that helped.

The developmental evaluation put him a little farther behind than we’d like, but the therapist didn’t seem worried. She thinks with exposure, stimulation, and a bit of therapy he’ll catch up.

Physically he seemed quite healthy.

His blood work was mostly positive (so far… we are still waiting on more testing results). The bad news is that he shows signs of malnutrition, being deficient in some very key nutrients. It makes my heart hurt to think of him lacking what he needed, but at the same time I’m excited that I know today, at least, he had all the calcium he needed; he had the Poly-vi-sol vitamins in his juice; he had plenty of protein. He’s gained at least a pound since we’ve had him. Hopefully he will continue to put on weight and grow stronger.

We suspected this, actually, because of his obsession with food. He has to have it all the time, from the moment he wakes up till the moment he goes to sleep. If someone goes in to the kitchen, he follows with wide eyes and outstretched hands. In addition to giving him everything he has asked for to eat, I’ve just been leaving crackers or cheerios on his tray all day so he knows he can access food at any point. He needs the calories and nutrients anyway, and it makes him relax about the access to food issue.

He’s pretty behind verbally, even in Korean,  and the poor guy has to start over from scratch with English. But we’re just patiently chipping away at the problem. He’s using a couple of words (it’s a little sickening how well he has “Dada” down) and has already learned a couple of signs, and every day we just practice very simple, one-word objects and verbs, and I know he’s able to understand us a bit already. He’s a smart cookie.

Attachment has been… interesting. Being in an orphanage for the last 7 months or so definitely affected him. He will go up to anyone for food or to be held. He is warm and friendly to Josh and me, which has been wonderful. But he’s also warm and friendly to everyone else. His level of acceptance of us has been the level at which I think he’d accept any general person– any adult human can be a caregiver. But generally he has preferred Josh over me (of course, who wouldn’t? )

But just in the the past couple of days I’ve seen some growth in this area… he cried when I held one of our other kiddos. He actually cried about that (actually, on two different occasions… but who’s counting)! Also, he’s been more needy and demanding at night, and even though that’s frustrating for us, I get the strong feeling that  our presence in his life has confused his night-time desires. He doesn’t know what he wants. He wants us to be with him, to hold him. He wants to lay down and not be bothered. But he wants to snuggle. But he wants to play. But he wants to lay down and it be dark and quiet. But he wants us to be there. It’s a delicate balance– being the presence that will never leave him but also being the presence who says, “it’s time for sleep.”

He’s been a bit clingier during the day too, which, although I get nothing done, I think is a good thing. He sees me as a comfort, as someone he wants to be very close to. So I’ll take it.

Overall I think this sweet boy is doing fabulous. It’s not all fun and games all the time, and there are some hard moments.  But I’m so impressed with the strength of this child who’s learned how to weather the storms of life like a pro before his 2nd birthday, and the tenderness of this child, who’s not grown cynical or hateful to the world which has tossed him back and forth many times in his first years.