JCICS Call to Action- We are the Truth

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard people- strangers and friends alike- tell me “Rinat is so lucky that you adopted him.” And I do agree (we’re pretty darn fantastic) but I never really know what to say in return. “No, we’re the lucky ones” doesn’t really seem to cover it. We were two people yearning for a child to love, who would make us a family, and the Republic of Kazakhstan put their faith in us and allowed us to be parents to Rinat. They trusted that we would take good care of him, raise him as a good and responsible person and, most of all, that we would love him with our whole hearts. And we feel so unbelievably honored that they did. I feel lucky to kiss away his tears when he wakes up crying from a nightmare. I feel lucky to hold his soft little hand in mine as we walk to school in the morning. And I feel lucky that, most of all, he has taught me what it is to be a mother. He is not perfect by any means but every single second of every single day I am so happy that he came into our lives. He is my life and my soul.

As a part of Kazakhstan adoption, we are required to send in yearly reports that tell about Rinat’s life with us. My friends always ask if it makes me mad that I have to jump through all these hoops just to have a child. But the answer, honestly, is no. In truth, I see it as a chance to brag about how well he’s doing. We have this smart, energetic, stubborn, loving, curious little boy in our family because they had faith in us and we owe them some reassurance. It is my chance to tell them, “Yes, you were right to trust us. He has a good life and he is happy.”

Sadly, there is now someone out there who has cast a shadow of doubt in the minds of people the world over. Someone did not take her responsibility as mother seriously and has made governments question whether US adoptive parents are capable. I am here to tell you that she does NOT represent American adoptive parents as a whole. She is not the norm, but rather a very rare aberration. In the US we are lucky. There are many many resources available to us should we have trouble shouldering any burden that we are carrying. All we have to do is ask. This woman did not do this and in my eyes, and the eyes of everyone I know, she is NOT a mother. A mother would never give up. A mother would never give her child away because he was not what she had in mind. She is heartless and no child deserves what she has done no matter how bad his behavior. It is a shame that she didn’t feel up to being a parent. It is a shame for all of those potential parents out there who would give loving and happy homes to a child and most of all it is sad for all those children who may never know a family because of her.

I remember the judge at Rinat’s court hearing asking “Do you think it will be hard to raise this child?” I responded that yes, I think it absolutely will be hard to raise him. But we are so lucky to be able to.

Love to all
-MAREN

Que Sera, Sera

Hi all-  Rinat has a relatively new obsession that I don’t think is shared by most other 3 year olds and it’s slightly bizarre. He is obsessed with dead people- the US presidents in particular. I know, random right? Here’s how it started: we were down at Peter’s brother’s house in Georgetown and Rinat asked who the man was in the painting over the fireplace. I explained that his name was George Washington and he was the president a long time ago like Barack is the president now. Noticing the crack in the paint he asked “He has a crack in his face, does that mean he’s really old?” “Well, he actually died a long time ago and he was a really nice man who did good things so people built a memorial to remember him by and that is the tall pointy building downtown.” This led to much discussion of the next several days about if he had a mommy and a daddy, if he ever used to be a boy, if he liked to play with toys when he was little, if he had a house, if he liked to play soccer, and on and on and on. Usually the questions would come out of nowhere as he was playing with trains, eating lunch, or reading a book. Then one day he was holding some coins to ‘pay’ at the grocery store and he noticed that there was good old George on one of them. “Mommy, dat George Washington on dis money!” Then he noticed that there were other men on the other coins and wanted to know all about them as well. The same questions were answered- Did ‘Hammerhead’ Lincoln have a mommy and a daddy? Is he really old? Did he have a baby brother? Did he ever ride on a train? And what about Roosevelt?- and I answered every one of them. Then I ran out of answers and dug around in my teaching books and found some kid friendly books about the presidents and we read all about them and went on the Internet and found photos of all of them. And then we decided to go downtown and visit the memorials and he wanted to know every little thing about them. I think it was in the process of looking for a bathroom that we went underneath the Lincoln Memorial and saw the exhibit about the Walk on Washington and Martin Luther King. So, books were bought, many more questions were asked- Did he like to go to his school? Why couldn’t he ride at the front of the bus? Why people not like him?- and answered. And as we were reading one of the MLK books, he noticed a photo on the wall in one of the illustrations and asked who it was. “Well, that is a very nice man named Ghandi.” “What did he do nice? Why didn’t he want to eat? Why did he live in India?...” And now we are off again on another famous person. Is it ever going to stop? Oh, and Rinat tells me that when he dies and they bury him, they will be building a memorial on top of him. Who knows? Maybe he’s right. He is most certainly devouring information rapidly. Sometimes I feel like I just can’t do enough. I give him my time, attention, and patience and sometimes I feel like it’s just not quite enough. That someone more patient, more giving could tell him absolutely everything he ever wanted to know. But then I have to remind myself that I am doing the best I can and that he is, after all, only 3 and he has a lifetime of learning ahead of him.  BTW- That Lego masterpiece above is a recreation of MLK giving his 'I have a dream' speech complete with the Lincoln statue, columns in front, microphones, and plenty of audience members.  Yup, he came up with it all on his own. 

And in that vein of complete and utter exhaustion (did I mention that he is also going through what I will call a ‘difficult’ phase?) Peter and I went on a proper vacation. Yup, we made reservations, packed up, dropped Rinat off with the grandparents, and 36 hours after booking it, hopped a plane and headed down to the sun, sand, palm trees, and Rum Runners of the Dominican Republic (“Mommy you know the ‘Minican ‘Pubbik right next to Haiti where the earth cracked?” “Um, no honey I didn’t know that actually”). We read, we lazed around, we took walks, and we missed Rinat- but just a little bit. It was fantastic and much much needed. The second day we were there, Peter said “I think we should do this once a year. It’s a necessity.” So there is our very hopeful resolution. Sometimes it’s just too easy to get caught up in the everyday and forget that we need some time to regroup and become better, happier people and better parents in the process so we are, especially now in light of the impending new addition in our family, going to try very hard to remember to pay attention to ourselves once in a while.

And, speaking of the new addition to our family, our dossier is officially logged into the system in Kaz! YAY! My agency didn’t give me timeframe but from what I can tell from other peoples’ experiences, it seems to be about 1-6 months before we'll be on the way. And our caseworker said it's likely we'll be assigned to the Akmola region which means it could be Astana or some other cities within a few hours of there. Very exciting! We just found this out earlier this week and I am already freaking out (in a good way!). So when I start to get all worked up, I just sing one of Rin’s songs from school- “Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be. The future’s not ours to see. Que sera, sera” and try to focus on right now instead of worrying about what the future holds.

And we definitely are having fun here in the present. Mom came in town for a visit over Easter and then went down to meet Rinat’s new cousin. The time she was here flew by and was so fun! Rinat was on Spring Break so there were trips to the dinosaur museum, the park, picnic with the cousins, cherry blossoms, and lots and lots of Easter eggs full of candy. I can’t believe that the Easter Bunny will be leaving eggs for another person next year. Yay!
And, I hate to do it, but I am going to have to stop allowing anonymous comments. Someone keeps leaving spam comments and it’s aggravating to have to go back and delete them. So now, you can read all you want but if you want to leave a comment, you just need to open an account (it’s free and easy) and comment to your hearts content.
I hope you are all enjoying Spring! I know we sure are. Much love, -m