Sunday, November 7, 2010

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Saturday

On Saturday morning, Ruslan finally pooped.  You remember he was constipated a few days ago (Thursday).  Well, I wasn’t really sure we got to the mother load, but at the time, he had put a huge effort into pooping and produced a reasonable amount so I took him off the toilet to give him a break.  He didn’t ask to poop again and since he knows how to ask, I just let it go.  I figured eventually, it has to come out.  Well it did.  Saturday morning while he was sleeping, it ALL came out.  My theory is that when he is sleeping, his muscles are finally relaxed and his involuntary muscles were able to push everything out.  Bill discovered him (phew!).  I have to say, Bill dealt with the whole mess, cleaned up Ruslan, got him dressed, got his pajamas in the laundry, and cleaned his bedding in the bathtub (washer is too small) all with very little help from me.   

Yeah Baby!  See what a day with a toddler on the bus/metro plan can produce (see previous post)?  I knew it was better than taking a taxi. 

Since things are starting to get dull, we decided to go sightseeing.  We went back to the Hydro-park that we visited a few weeks ago.  It is on a set of islands in the middle of the Dnipro River.  We went north this time off the metro because I wanted to see if I could find the bridge that I had jumped off the last time I was here as a college student in 1988.  It was  a pedestrian bridge, but wide enough for cars and there is one connecting two islands that I think could be it.  We finally found it and I got some pictures.  It definitely FELT like the right bridge, but I won’t know for sure until I get home and compare photographs. 

We stayed on the bridge a while to take in the scenery.  They have made beaches along all the islands' edges and put restaurants and little amusement parks in the centers.  There were a few bathers on the beach and I told the kids about the Ukrainian bathing fashions.  ALL the women wear bikinis and ALL the men wear speedos (sans jocks), regardless of their age, weight, or stature.  As I was explaining the problems with this, and just as Matt was commenting that he would not want to be here in the summer, Reilly spotted a man stark-naked on the beach, slowly walking into the water.  He was too far away to see many details, but still, it was NOT a pretty sight.  She pulled her hat down over her face and walked blindly forward until we were off the bridge.  Then they all looked at me like it was somehow my fault.  Really.  It was 55 degrees outside and the water, no doubt, was colder.  I could NOT have anticipated that!



We decided to stay away from the beaches and got lunch at a little outdoor pizza stand.  It was seven dollars for three mini pizzas, five juice boxes and two cokes.  The pizza here LOOKS appetizing.  They cover it with some red stuff and then they add salami, mushrooms, peppers and little bits of meat and put some white stuff on top.  It doesn’t smell quite right, but it LOOKS good, so we keep giving it another try.  This last experience should cure us.  The red stuff is most certainly ketchup and the white stuff on top tastes tragically similar to miracle whip—definitely not cheese.  It was awful.  The only saving grace was that it was served on some cheap gray paper squares and the pizza absorbed the flavor of the paper.  In this case it was a good thing.

Then we went to a little outdoor museum called Keiv in Miniature.  To compensate for her earlier torture, we gave Reilly the video camera and told her she could video tape the whole thing.  She really got into it.  She videoed every building, talking about whether or where we had seen it, zoomed in and out, got the signs in the front and, all in all, spent about 45 minutes taping.  Sadly, when we got to the exit and she went to turn off the camera, she realized she’d had it on standby the whole time, so none of it was recorded.  She was crushed. She cried. She sobbed.  She wailed.  We finally gave her the camera and she, Sharon and I went back into the  museum so she could tape it over again while Bill went ahead (slowly) with the boys.  Reilly was so devastated, she cried the whole time while she was making the new tape.  Her narrative was one long lament, made mostly of incomplete sentences interspersed with cries and sniffles and sobs. To make matters worse , she wanted me to remember all the jokes I had made and re-do them in the exact same voices, which I didn’t always get right.  I should have known at that point that my role as a mother was in danger of total failure on this day.



The top photo is the entrance, the middle is of a church we visited when we first came here and the bottom photo is Matt and Paul "crying" at the mini-airport, thinking of flying home. 


Since things were generally falling apart, we decided to go home early.  It is two separate metro lines, red to green, then a fifteen minute walk.  The trip home took about 45 minutes and the kids got more tired and grumpy with each minute.  In our apartment building, Reilly was a little too slow getting out of the elevator and the door closed her in.  She was in such a fragile state emotionally that I practically pounded a hole in the wall trying to get the elevator door to open again.  She eventually made it back to our floor, but she was in the elevator with two strangers and looking like she was going to fall to pieces.  She was starting to feel the whole world was against her, so I got her on the couch and let her cry it out.  Matt saw her crying and set up the DVD to play the next episode of Pride and Prejudice.  It was very sweet.  All the kids were huddled on the couch watching except for Paul, who was staying as far away as possible. 

We’ve been dancing around Ruslan (in a metaphorical sense) trying to find a good balance between establishing ourselves as parents, but still letting him have some control over his environment, since this is all so new for him.  While he was in the orphanage he had a whole plethora of care givers and each one probably had a different parenting philosophy.  We are guessing there was most likely a WIDE range of standards and rules to which he was held.

It's either that, or genetics, but the upshot is that Ruslan likes to be in control.  We had a few battles that day so far, over who pushed his stroller, whether he could have cookies and coke for lunch instead of pizza and juice, and who sat next to him at meals.  So, besides Reilly, Ruslan was also in a funk. 

For dinner, I made chicken chili.  I found chili powder at the market, but I didn’t put it in the chili, I just served it on the side.  So the ‘chili’ was really just chicken, onion, garlic, red and green peppers (not hot), salt and lots and lots of beans (see first paragraph) and served over rice.  As soon as Ruslan saw it, he freaked out.  He nodded "no, no" and started panicking, stirring the chili and, I finally realized, trying to get the bits of red pepper out.  If you remember my red pepper experience from a few weeks ago, you’ll know this was not an entirely unreasonable response.  I showed him that the peppers weren’t hot and let him push them to the side off the bowl.  He still looked like he was about to lose it.  I showed him that he could eat some plain rice and chicken, but he still was not satisfied.  He sat back and started rocking back and forth and crying quietly.

I decided to ignore him because I felt he was trying to manipulate.  Our kids have to drink their milk and finish their meal in order to get dessert.  He knows this rule and he started off the dinner by not drinking his milk with the rest of us.  He just pushed it away while we drank ours.  So, I braced myself for a fight, because he really likes dessert.  Oddly enough, after about five minutes of rocking, he abruptly stopped, mixed the peppers back into his chili, ate it up, asked for seconds (?) and drank his milk!

However, the day was not yet done.  At bedtime, he likes to have a small bottle of water by his bed.  Since he can’t get up and get a drink on his own, we are fine with this. Sadly, we couldn’t find his little water bottle, so I put a cup of water by his bed.  He freaked.  He kept asking for the bottle and I kept telling him I couldn’t find it.  He finally lost all control and started screaming inconsolably.  I asked him if anything was hurting him, since he knows how to say ouch, but he just wanted his water bottle.  After about five minutes, we gave him three chances to stop screaming and then moved his bed to the couch in the kitchen.  This was not solely punishment.  Our other children were just wide-eyed with concern since NONE of us have EVER seen a kid shriek as loudly and as long as this one.  Bill and I vacillated between thinking that something was genuinely wrong, that he was crying off stress, that he didn’t know how to comfort himself and we should help him, and thinking that this was a flat out temper tantrum and we should deal with it as such.  When we put him in the kitchen, he kept screaming (and I do mean screaming) “MAMA!  MAMA!!” but my presence did NOTHING to calm him down, so I left and we let him cry it out. 

This is my sixth child.  I have NEVER seen a child scream as long and loud as this one.  I’ve seen kids scream equally loud, but only for ten seconds or so.  He screamed like we were cutting him to pieces with a jagged knife without ever pausing for breath.  If he had paused even once, I would have gone in to comfort him, but NOTHING DOING.  We peeked in on him every ten minutes or so, then left to stand by the phone, waiting for the neighbors or the police to call.   Twice he got off the couch and crawled over to the door screaming “MAMA! MAMA!” the whole time.  There was no way I was going to respond to that, so Bill just picked him up dispassionately and put him back on the couch.  He screamed ALL THE LOUDER.  Words alone cannot express how loudly that child was screaming.  I’ve never heard anything like it. 

We’ve been teaching him to use words and he is really smart.  So, for example, instead of asking “uh,uh” for things, we tell him a word and he has to repeat it to get what he wants.  Usually after just one time, he remembers the word.  Well, to get me, he needs to say, “Mama, come.”  I don’t come running when he yells or whines.  I KNOW he knows how to say “Mama, come,” but occasionally he whines and so I send someone else to remind him what to say and then he says it. 

After fifteen minutes, I was worried that this was going to last a good long time.  After thirty minutes, with no sign of slowing down, I thought about setting up a sleep schedule with Bill.  Well, after FORTY FIVE minutes of freakish screaming, Ruslan suddenly stopped and said, “Mama, please come.”  So, I opened the door (I’d been standing outside the whole time) and I said, very quietly, “Mama, please come?”  and he said, “Mama please come” and pointed to the living room.  I told him “no more crying” which he fully understood.  He nodded yes, and I took him back to the living room, where he laid down quietly and without complaint.  I gave him a drink of water from the CUP by his bed, then gave him a hug and kiss and he closed his eyes.

WOW.

After five minutes, we checked on him again. He had stolen Reilly’s pillow and was sleeping next to her, not in his bed.  I gave Reilly her pillow back and put Ruslan where he belonged.  He knew full well what he had done, but he stared to whine again, so I held up one finger and said, “This is ONE.  On THREE you go back to the kitchen,” pointing to the kitchen.  He stopped whining immediately, laid down and didn’t make a peep until morning. 

Thank God THAT day is over.




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