Letting It Go....

Things have been better with Ruslan.  I was going to write a post about his general progress, but just writing about his emotional state has taken so long, I’ll get to the rest later. 

In the fall, when I posted about our problems with Ruslan, another mom told me that her Ukranian daughter had been diagnosed with PTSD and was on Zoloft.  I am well aware of the wonders of medication, since I’ve seen Zoloft, Valium and Seroquel at work on different occasions in my little world.  We strongly considered meds, but since Ruslan had been showing steady improvement (and since the local pediatric psychiatrists do not take our insurance and their therapy is $215 per session) we decided that it might be better to wait.  

Besides, I’ve taken friends and family to therapy over the years and seen how helpful it can be, maybe meds wouldn’t be necessary??  I was discussing therapy with a psychiatrist once, trying to understand how/why therapy helps with something like PTSD.  He finally said to me, “The bottom line is that if a person endures trauma, for some reason they are much better off if they are able to face it and almost re-live it by talking it out, but the key to therapy is that they are re-living it in a safe place.”  He said more than that, but that was the gist of his point.  

Luckily, Ruslan loves to talk so after that PTSD connection, I thought I would try to get him to talk about Ukraine.  I told him one night that if he has a memory about Ukraine, I wanted him to talk to me about it because I want to know about his life there.  I expected him to talk about his surgery, since what could be more traumatic than waking up from tendon-lengthening surgery, in a cast and with no pain medication?  Instead, he immediately started to talk about a particular care giver in the orphanage that he didn’t like.  He said she used to hit him on the bottoms of his feet and pull his hair.  This sounded traumatic enough to me but the memory didn’t seem to phase him, he was really matter of fact about it.  So, I asked him if anything else happened and he started to cry and said she locked him in a closet.  That, apparently, is where the bulk of the trauma lay.  He cried for a good long time and kept telling me over and over again that she locked him in a closet.  

Now, before you get too down on Ukranians, it’s only fair to note that, um,  ….I understand.  While I would obviously NEVER lock any child in any closet for any reason, there have been times in the past year that similar ideas have crossed my mind.  Mentally/Emotionally disturbed children are fantastically annoying and at times I have put Ruslan in his bedroom and closed the door, just because I knew I needed to get away from him or I would explode.  Ruslan didn’t have his own room in Ukraine so, I'm not sure if there were all that many convenient places to let him scream things out.  While again, locking a child in a closet in inexcusable on every level, I do understand the necessity of getting away from him at certain points.  

Anyway, back to America.  I had pulled Ruslan onto my lap when he started crying/screaming and I was hugging him tight, thinking that if he just got his crying out, things would be OK.  Well, he cried for a good long time and it was getting rough.  Ruslan gets really tight when he cries and he screams LOUDLY.  Since his body is so stiff, his mouth ends up right at your ear, unless you completely turn him away from you, which is not very comforting.  Well, he kept screaming, “They lock me in a closet! They lock me in a closet!”  So, I quieted him down enough to tell him, “Ruslan, you are not in Ukraine any more.  You are home and everyone loves you here and we would never, never lock you in a closet.”  Now, I thought that was pretty good, but believe me, it was useless.  He quieted down for maybe three seconds and then he went right back into his mantra, still crying, still tight and still very, very angry.  

I wasn’t sure what to do because rather than creating a safe environment that would lead to the ultimate cure-all like the good doctor said, I was in a situation that was getting worse and worse by the minute.  I had the incredible foresight to start this conversation at bedtime, so all the other kids were upstairs, well within ear shot.  They were starting to peek their heads into the room, one by one, trying to figure out what was going on.  I was thinking that I might have to put him down and just let him cry it out and wondering if the rest of the family was going to have PTSD by the end of this when finally, Ruslan changed his mantra and went from, “They lock me in a closet! They lock me in a closet!” to, “WHY MOM?  WHY THEY DO THAT?  WHY? WHY?”  

I finally stumbled on what he needed to hear and told him, “Ruslan, it was WRONG of them to lock you in a closet.”  He actually stopped crying when I said this, and looked at me with full attention, so I went on and said, “It was very wrong of them to lock you or any other child in a closet and I’m SO SORRY that happened to you.  If Mommy or Daddy had been there, we would have done everything we could to stop it and we would have told those people in Ukraine that it is wrong to lock children in a closet and that they should say, ‘Sorry Ruslan,’ for the way that they treated you.”  Thank God, that was the last of the crying.  His body relaxed (more or less), he put his head against my shoulder and let out a deep sigh.

 

Once again, I came to see a little more of the jumbled emotional mass that resides inside my boy.  He was sad and angry, but he wasn’t really sure that his feelings were valid.  Since he wasn’t sure whether he deserved the abuse or was suffering injustice, I suspect he was feeling the anguish of both.  

He took a few minutes to process the whole thing and interpret it on an eight year old level (Daddy, the good guy, comes rushing into the orphanage and beats up all the care-givers and tells them, “NO, NO!  You say, ‘SORRY Ruslan!’”) and we went through a few key points over again, but after a few minutes, he was visibly lighter and I felt we had made progress.  

For several weeks over the fall, that was our drill.  We discussed his memories from the orphanage, his biological parents, his surgery, his Cerebral Palsy, his small size, his walker and on and on to infinity.  After that first day, we fell into a pattern and I got the clue that what he really needed to hear was: what happened was wrong (or very sad), he is right to feel angry or sad about it, Mommy is so sorry that these things happened, God put Ruslan in a safe place now and Mommy and Daddy are here to help/protect Ruslan.  We seem to have to get through all five points before he will really relax and let things go, but to everyone’s relief,  it is possible for him to get there.  

At first it was every few days, then once a week, then twice a month and by Christmas, he had gotten enough of it out that he could reasonably function.  I say this because at some point about mid-December I sent him to time out and rather than screaming in protest and then crying in frustration, he simply went.  He crawled over to the time out chair, sat down and when the egg timer was done, he told me what he did wrong, apologized, and then went back to his toys.  …Glory be to God in the Highest and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men!

We had a few rough days over Christmas, but with travelling, no routine and almost daily excitement/stimulation, we were expecting a few bumps.  Now that we are back into our routine, everyone can see progress.  

I finally got the ultimate affirmation yesterday, January 25, 2012 from Reilly, my eleven year old.  Whenever things were really falling apart with Ruslan or Will, she would often ask me, “Mom, will our family ever be normal again?”  This broke my heart.  I used to tell her, “Yes, our family will be normal again. We’re just going through some changes,” etc.  But, sometime around mid-summer, I decided we’d better face the truth.  I finally told her, “No, our family will probably not ever be the same as it was before we got Will and Ruslan, but that doesn’t mean it will be terrible.  It’s just different.” Then we talked about the changes that happened in our family and how it was worth it to have the boys.  It took a few minutes during that conversation for her to really grasp what I was saying and that life would still be OK, but she did get it, and she hasn’t asked me that question again, probably because the answer was now more depressing than the question.  

However, last night our family had a reasonably enjoyable dinner.  Everyone was chatting amiably, Ruslan did not talk every ten seconds, Bill did not lose his temper with Ruslan for talking every ten seconds, I did not glare at Bill for losing his temper, and the dishes of vegetables did not morph into a fatted ox (see Proverbs 15:17).   

Toward the end of dinner, Reilly said in front of everyone, “Mom, you were wrong about our family.”  So, I gave her my standard answer.  “Don’t be silly.  I am never wrong.”  Reilly, God bless her, smiled and said, “You said our family would never be normal again.  But we are back to normal now.  You were wrong Mom.”  

Of course, my immediate thought was that this hardly matters, since we are about to screw everything all up again anyway, and adopt two more girls, I’m certain to come out right in the end.  But, I let it go. 

* Proverbs 15:17  Better is a dish of vegetables where love is, than a fattened ox served with hatred.  

I Thought If I Came Here, It Would Stop

So, my friend Maryann lost her husband (Bruce) in May.  Over the summer, I started hatching a plan to get her away from home for the holidays.  I spent a considerable amount of effort convincing her to spend Thanksgiving with us at a beach house in North Carolina.  Most of the effort lied in keeping my mouth shut and letting her make the decision on her own, but it was effort all the same.  In the end, she came. 

I was so relieved.  I’m always glad to have her company because she’s really nice to be around, but also relieved, because then I didn’t have to think about her at home, alone, on a holiday.  When I think she’s in pain, I have an irrational urge to hover over her like a panther and mercilessly shred anyone who gets within five feet.  This is totally unjustified, since she’s a competent adult, but it’s still there.  So, we spent Thanksgiving at the beach house where I was able to indiscreetly hover and no one was the wiser.  It was perfect.  It’s always beautiful there and totally NOT Thanksgiving-like, which is exactly what we needed. 

We were in Corolla, NC.
You can drive out on the beach anytime you like and see wild horses.

This is the view from our deck. 

This is the local lighthouse.

You can climb the lighthouse for a small fee (that becomes a large fee when multiplied by all the friends, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins).  This is looking up the stairwell. 

This is all the kids, except Ruslan who wanted to stay home with his grandma.  Since, more than likely, I would have been the one to carry him up those stairs, I didn't press the issue. 

Talk all you want about great men who lead armies, rule wall street, change the world through their innovative thinking and exploit their good looks to sell Cornflakes.  MY HUSBAND opened a Monopoly game on Thanksgiving Day, managed to rotate 11 restless children past GO and emerged hours later, having accomplished a the impossible—a tear free, TV free morning in a house full of friends and relatives. ....Be still my heart.

Anyway, once I saw that Thanksgiving was going well, I started planting the seeds about getting away for Christmas.  We ended up at a ski resort, a perfectly rational Christmas plan, unless the resort is south of the Mason-Dixon.  I’m a Yankee, and let me tell you, no one even THOUGHT about skiing in my hometown unless the weather was AT LEAST below 30 and no one went with enthusiasm unless it was below 20.   Our first full day there, the high at our ski resort was 45 degrees.  They had made “snow” the night before and they had two lifts open, but I was skeptical.  On the plus side, the place was empty, on the minus side, we were looking at skiing on snow cones.  In the end, Bill stayed back with our three youngest, while Maryann and I took the six older kids to ski on the slushy ice.

The boys all got snowboards and the girls got skis.  Reilly, my eleven year old, cried and wailed all the way down her first run, telling me she hated it.  Halfway down the second run, she caught on and I didn’t see her for the rest of the day.  When it was time to go, I stood at the end of the run near the lift entrance where she could see me.  She headed straight for me and about ten feet out, I thought she was going to plow right into my knees, but she did a perfect “S” curve and parallel parked two inches from my nose.  If there had been anything similar to snow that day, she would have sprayed it in my face.

Matt and Paul were a different story. Have I mentioned that all the boys got snowboards?  Paul, being a little smaller and more coordinated, was able to catch on OK.  Matt, my oldest, didn’t take to it well at all.   He’s 14 years old, but he hit a growth spurt and is now in size 17 clothes (with a size 14 butt, but that’s a different post).  He spent most of the day on his teeny tiny butt.  A few years ago, this would have sent him into a tizzy, but, now that he’s older, it all came out in fierce, targeted sarcasm.  As we were going up the ski lift together, he went into considerably long streams of incidents where I clearly wronged him and usually ended with, “and now you’ve got me going down an ice-covered mountain strapped to a tid-bit of stick!”  I finally told him to stop complaining or I would use his college fund to finance a visit to the spa. 

About five hours in, Paul fell and hurt his wrist.  I had been itching to try out those snow boards all morning, so I decided this was my chance.  I got him some ice, made sure he was reasonably comfortable, convinced him that he was too injured to board any further and strapped on his clunky boots.  Snowboarding is one of those sports that looks possible, until you get strapped in and then you realize what insanity it is.  Matt went up the lift with me to “help.”  As I was ignoring his instructions, I took a moment to take in the skiers (rather than the scenery) and noticed that there were no other females on snowboards.  Then I noticed that, of the boys on boards, there were very few people over twenty and only one who looked over thirty.  Putting these two observations together I realized there were NO OTHER middle aged women on snowboards!  Could there be a reason for this? 

I started thinking about those V8 commercials on TV where people have white rectangles over their heads indicating how many servings of vegetables they’ve had each day.  Only, the rectangles I imagined had numbers designating the skiers/snowboarders IQ, or labels like, “too old for this,”  “about to face-plant,” and “Aaaahhhh!!.” 

We got to the end of the lift and I wiped out on the downramp.  The rectangle over my sons head changed from, “annoyed” to “dreams come true” while mine started streaming obscenities.  On a snowboard, there is no way to move your feet.  If you are at all used to keeping yourself balanced with your legs, you have some adjustments to make.  At first, I was making it OK.  I’d go a few feet and then fall before I really got any momentum going.  The trick was to fall on your fists, not your wrist or butt, which (legend told) is much more painful, especially on ICE.   Unfortunately, I started getting better and working up some momentum and distance in between falls.  In fact, I have to say, in  defense of my own skill, that I did make it down the first half of the hill in reasonable form.  I even had enough control to look around a little more and notice that a lot of my fellow boarders were made up largely of adolescent boys with somewhat blank, “1000 yard stare” expressions (and appropriately empty boxes over their heads).  I asked Matt (who was, it’s only fair to note, behind me) whether that was a function or a prerequisite to snowboarding, but he didn’t seem to hear.  His rectangle was back to “annoyed” and mine was “acquiring 1000 yard stare” (this is foreshadowing).  As I was pondering this, I was getting better and better, with more and more momentum and then suddenly, I hit a little rise and I was airborne. 

My feet went straight up, right in front of me, my arms went out to my sides, I hovered in mid air just long enough to think to myself, “This is bad, very, very  --WHAM!!   I landed right on my tailbone, on the ice.  I’m 46, so it’s been several years since I landed on my tailbone.  It’s just as painful as I remember.  It took me a few seconds to get my bearings again.  When I was coherent enough, I hit on the realization that the 1000 yard stare is not necessarily a requirement to snowboarding, since it will inevitably come with time.  Normally, in one of my past lives, I would have jumped right up and kept on going down the hill (Death Before Defeat!), but as a testament to my age, my sanity or my ability to be taught, I caught on that the rectangle over my head was now flashing, “OSTEOPOROSIS.” 

I unstrapped my snowboard and walked down the rest of the hill with my son sliding down beside me, just out of arms length, serenading me with taunts.  I finally made it back to a bench and after a short rest, I went to find Paul and fight him for the ice pack.  I ended up sitting on a pile of “snow” and walking around as though I was keeping a cantaloupe between my knees for the rest of the weekend. 

The next day was Christmas.  We opened presents, had a huge breakfast, observed the kids fighting, and settled down to unlimited TV for the morning.  Then Bill, who had his fill of small children for the week, took the older kids to see a violent movie while Maryann and I took the younger, more well adjusted kids ice skating.  If I hadn’t bruised my tailbone, I would have gone on the ice with them all, but I was terrified of falling again and losing my cantaloupe.  This was probably better in the end.  I shoved Ruslan, walker and all, out on the ice and immediately, someone came over and offered to help him and someone else helped with Will.  They had a blast.  Everyone was great with them.   

Unfortunately, this is when everything suddenly hit me all at once.  I don’t know if it was Ruslan, screaming with glee out on the ice, or Maryann and her kids, sort of drifting through the holiday, everyone missing Bruce, or the fact that my tailbone was KILLING me… whatever it was, I started to cry.  I hate public crying.  I did everything I could to stop it.  I prayed.  I bit my lip.  I gritted my teeth and I tried to think about Oreos.  Nevertheless, tears were just streaming down my face. 

I know I was obvious because middle aged women started coming over to me, putting their hands on my shoulder and telling me  how cute Ruslan was, what an inspiration it was to see him on the ice, how brave and happy he looked in his walker, how lucky I was to be his mother, and etc.  I didn’t want to tell the truth and say, “Actually, he’s usually a pain in the ass and I’m crying about the pain in MY ass,” so I just kept my mouth shut, nodded sweetly and stayed as far away from Maryann as possible until I could pull my pathetic self together.

After dinner, Bill offered to watch the kids so Maryann and I could go out.  We thought about going to the hot tubs, but if we did, I knew we’d just end up talking about Bruce and crying (again).  Maryann hadn’t been to a movie theater since Bruce died so we decided to see a movie.  Maryann said she could handle anything but a sappy romance.  I was with her there.  So, we ended up seeing, “We Bought a Zoo,” about a dad who, ironically enough, loses his wife and buys a zoo.  Unfortunately, it is well done, well written and well acted.  Whoever wrote that script …they get it.  Do not see this movie without at least 50 tissues in your pockets, especially if you’re with your friend who has just lost her husband.

About half way through the movie, when everything is falling apart; the zoo is in trouble, the son is rebelling, the tiger dies, the dad is just in agony over his missing wife, and everyone in the audience realizes that 20^th Century Fox is passing our souls through a cheese grater, Matt Damon (the dad) rather unexpectedly blurts out, “I thought if I came here, it would stop.”   I knew exactly what he was talking about.  If it seems like we were running scared over the holidays, that is because we were.  By design, it was nothing like Christmas.  We weren’t at home, we didn’t read the Christmas story, we didn’t have the Jesus birthday cake, no one freaked out over the evening meal, I didn’t over eat.  For the adults, it was more something we were trying to get through or past.  I want to write that God took away the pain of loss and that there is a balm in Gilead, but that’s not the way it is. There are some things that are just too hard to face head on and yet, no matter how hard or fast or far you run, it just. doesn’t. stop.    

Five Mesmerized Children, Four Cups of Vegetables, Omega-Three Fatty Acids, Two Competent Adults and One Word Sentences

A few days ago, I was late with dinner.  I know I was late, because I passed Will as I was coming up from the basement with some frozen chicken.  He was on the way down the stairs (he follows me everywhere), and I was on the way back up.  I noticed that he was carrying the red cup we use to measure dry dog food.  Sure enough, it was half full and when I asked him to open his mouth, he smiled and turned his head.  I gave those little chipmunk cheeks a squeeze and found a stash of about ten Pedigree dog food chunks that he was storing for the winter.  I realized my starving child was snacking on dog food. 

I can’t remember if I took the cup away right then, but I’m darned sure I didn’t scoop the soggy kibbles out of his cheeks.  I went back upstairs and checked the bag instead.  It said things like, “100% Complete and Balanced Nutrition!” and “Advanced Anti-Oxidant Formula with high levels of long-chain omega-3 fatty acids to help support joint health.”  It also listed whole wheat as the first ingredient, chicken as the second and no sugar, which is more than I can say for Chocolate Teddy Grahams.  I figured he was safe.  I actually did a little cost comparison later on and   …Oh, sorry. I digress.

For the record, I did eventually take away the red cup and put away the dog food.  Then I put the chicken in the microwave to thaw, and went upstairs to talk to Bill. 

“I have an announcement.” 

(tap, tap, tap on the keyboard…)  “Yes?” 

“Every day around dinner time, I want you to come downstairs and just hang with us.”
(tap, tap, tap on keyboard….pinky taps Enter….instant results….) "Oh?"
...“You’ll have to leave the computer to do this.  Then you’ll need to walk down the stairs, into the living room and actually talk with some of the smaller humans who live with us.  There won’t be any computers involved and you will be required to communicate verbally."
(silence.  Tap, tap, tap) "Mmmm."
"…Am I getting through?”

“Sure.”

“I don’t want to ask too much, but at some point during the evening, I’d also like you to use complete sentences, the kind with both a subject and a verb.” 

(tap, tap, tap, Enter)  “….Ok.”

I left the room.  Apparently, I’d penetrated the great wall, because a few minutes later, Bill came downstairs.  He did the customary glance toward the living room (five children and a dog piled in front of Timmy Turner), glance toward the kitchen (your basic mess), weighed the lesser of many evils, and started to load the dishwasher. 

Will was sitting next to me on the butcher block island while I cut vegetables.  I've eventually figured out that it’s easier to have him next to me on the counter than tripping over him on the floor.  The microwave beeped.  I lifted Will off the counter, took the chicken out of the microwave, put it on the counter next to the sink and realized I needed to wait until Bill was done with the dishes before I could rinse it off.  I cut a few more vegetables, threw the waste in the trash, saw that Bill was closing the door to the dishwasher, and went to get my chicken.

My chicken was gone.

I asked Bill, “where is my chicken?” 

He said, “hmmm?.”

“I put it on the counter next to you.  Where is it?”

And then Bill said, “I don’t know where the chicken is. ...It was on the counter. …What did you do with it?”  As if I knew where the chicken was and I was just asking him to make conversation.

We both glanced along the kitchen counter tops, saw that the chicken was gone and went to look for the dog.  However, the dog was on the couch, comfortably nestled between two mesmerized children.  She did not look guilty.  It also happened to be pouring rain outside. Starving as she is, I didn’t think that the dog would brave all that rain just for some chicken, especially when there were dried chicken kibbles waiting for her in the red cup. 

That left the children.  They are not above hiding things from me if the urge arrives.  They’ve hidden my keys enough times to warrant interest, but not dead fowl.  I asked each of them in turn if they had taken my chicken and they all replied, “no” with appropriately bored expressions.  Then I asked, "Does ANYONE around here communicate with more than one word?"  Someone said, "no."

I went back to the kitchen.
There was Will.  I said, “Will, did you take mommy’s chicken?

Will smiled and yelled, “YES!”

“Ok, what did you do with it?”

Will smiled again, threw his hands up in the air and said, “I  ATE  IT!”

What does one do with this?  Bill and I started tearing the house apart, looking for the chicken.  It couldn’t have vaporized.  It had to be somewhere.  At first, I was just concerned about dinner.  I hadn’t been shopping in a while and that was the last of the meat, so if we didn’t have chicken, we were looking at dried beans, which take a while to prepare.  Then, as time progressed, I started to really wonder where the chicken might be and realized that in a few days, a dead chicken might REALLY SMELL.  I had a mouse die once under my kitchen cabinets and it was AWFUL.

We started in the kitchen and made bigger and bigger circles looking up and down, trying to think where WE might go if WE were a dead chicken.  After about ten minutes, I started to doubt myself.  Did I really take the chicken up from the basement?  I went back down to check the freezer.  No chicken.  Then I thought, “perhaps I absentmindedly took it upstairs? I went upstairs and went through all the bedrooms and the bathrooms.  I even dug through the laundry. 

Meanwhile, Will was following me around the house and screaming, “I TOOK IT!! I TOOK THE CHICKEN!”  But every time I asked him where it was, he threw his hands up in the air and said, “IN MY TUMMY!”  then he flashed me his huge smile.  Bill was looking all over the place and when the chicken didn’t turn up, he actually asked me, “Are you losing your mind?” as if this was my fault.   So I said, “LOOK, you saw me put the chicken down next to the sink.  I walked away.  YOU are the last person seen with the chicken, therefore, YOU are the person-of-interest here.  What did you do with my chicken?"

I also thought that perhaps I like him better when he limits himself to those one word sentences.

We finally decided to send Bill to the store and brace ourselves for the dead chicken smell that was bound to greet us in a few days.  As Bill was walking toward the garage, he passed the dog cage.  We have a wooden dog cage that is designed to look like an end table.  It’s really cute and the kids love to play in there.  Will spends a lot of his time gathering things for his personal museum.  Sure enough, Bill glanced inside and there was the chicken. 

I asked Will if he had put the chicken in the dog cage?  He gave me his biggest smile, threw his hands up in the air and said, “YES!! I TOOK IT!  I TOOK THE CHICKEN!”  When I asked him “Why did you take mommy’s chicken?”  He smiled and said, “Because.”   

Have I Mentioned That Two of My Boys Have CP?

I began writing this post to justify a coveted CP “button” on my blog.  But, then I realized that, unbelievably,  I've never written the story of our “decision” to adopt Ruslan and Will.   (and, of course, the cool CP button is not appearing on my post. ...sigh...anyway...)

I first heard about Ruslan from my friend Amy.  She has a web site full of special needs children in Ukraine who are waiting for families.  (http://ukraineadopt.com/waiting-children.html) She posted about a boy, Sergey, who was in an institution.  By the time I heard about him, he was six years old and had been tied to his bed for a year; no school, no therapy, no movement, no bathroom (they just wipe up after him)… nothing.   He was kept half dressed and left on a vinyl mattress all day and all night.   He had developed Scoliosis from lying on his side all the time.  He also had rickets and had lost a lot of his mental ability.  He couldn’t walk, couldn’t talk and no longer even responded to his name.  At the time, we already had five kids at home and our oldest was starting to become a  handful.  We finally decided that Sergey was so involved, we really couldn’t handle him.  So, we said, “no.”  

In the end, God took care of it.  Sergey was adopted by another family in NC.  However, the damn had already burst.  Before I heard about Sergey, I knew that there were orphanages in the world, I already had two adopted kids, but I had NO IDEA that there were children who were tied to their bed 24/7.   ….Now I knew. 

About a year later, Amy contacted me about Ruslan, who had CP and was headed for the same institution.  I wrote down all I could about him and took the information to my husband.  He said, (and I'm quoting him directly here) he said, “No. No Way.  Not a chance.”  I took this as a “Let’s think about it,” and told Amy we were interested.  A few days later, I got a call from Sandy, who had met Ruslan in Ukraine and could give me first hand information about him.  After talking with her for a few minutes, I took the phone to Bill who would NOT even TALK with her on the phone!!  It was a little embarrassing, to have to tell Sandy that my husband REFUSED to even TALK with her.  I started to think that maybe I had mis-read him and I needed a new strategy.  So, I started to pray.  To make a long story short, the next time I asked my husband about Ruslan, God had done such a number on his heart that my husband actually, TOOK HIS HANDS OFF HIS KEYBOARD, looked me in the eye, and said to me, “I guess as long as we’re going over there, we might as well get two, right?” 

I LOVE that!!  Two years and several thousand dollars later, we are now the proud parents of Will (six years old) and Ruslan (eight years old) both from Ukraine, both with CP, both the size of five year olds, and both physically challenged, mentally delayed and emotionally disturbed. 

First Will, who is so much easier to write about.  He turned six a few weeks ago.  He has Ataxic CP  (the floppy kind).  He can walk and really can do just about anything physically, but he falls a lot and he has low muscle tone.  My guess is that he also has FAS (Fetal Alcohol Syndrome) and he’s microcephalic.  Besides the therapies, the only way his CP really affects our family life at the moment is that he needs to hold someone’s hand when he walks.  He’s charming enough that this is not a problem.  He has four eager siblings who line up to help him wherever we go. 

My other CP son is Ruslan.  He is eight and has Spastic CP (the tight kind).  His official diagnosis is Spastic Diplegia (below the hips) but his arms are SO TIGHT that I think he could easily fall into the Spastic Quadriplegia category.  His CP is more of an issue.  When he came here, he could not hold himself up on his legs.  Even with a walker, he was pretty much using his arm strength to stay up and dragging his legs.  He can now walk with a walker, using his legs for support, but he has no balance.  My personal hunch is that this is about as good as things are going to get, but we’ll keep trying.   Also, when he came, he could barely hold a pencil and was totally dependent on his caregivers for EVERYTHING.  He can now take care of all his personal needs (wash and dress himself, play by himself, feed himself etc.) and last night before bed, he was writing his letters on a wide ruled sheet of paper and keeping them within the lines.  

 It’s been amazing to watch his progress.  Because of this, we bend over backward to get him to do as much as he can independently.  It takes a lot of time and half the people in my county think I am a tyrant.  However, I am OK with this.  I’m in the habit of telling the “helpful” people in my local Wal Mart, “Thank you, but unless you want to follow him around for the rest of his life, you’re not really helping.” 

Both boys get PT and OT at school and they both get extra PT and horse therapy after school twice a week.   I stretch Ruslan every morning for about 30 minutes and he sometimes needs help with transitions.  We haul his walker and wheelchair on the bike rack on the back of our Ford and we don't do anything quickly.  It's not pretty, but really, the most surprising thing about the CP is that, as far as their PHYSICAL disability is concerned, once you embrace it and fit it into your routine, it’s usually not a big deal.

The mental and emotional baggage they came with….that’s a different story.  

<a href="http://elliestumbo.blogspot.com/search/label/CP%20connection/" style="border: none;"><img alt="Stumbo Family Story" src="http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/hh90/ellenstumbo/CP-connection.jpg" style="width: 129px; height: 129px;"/></a>

Money Week

Bill’s company reimburses employees for certain adoption expenses. We received a hearty reimbursement check a few weeks ago. It was a mere fraction of our actual expenses, but it was still nice to have that little bump. For a few days, we were rich!

Sunday: We arrived at church both on time and reasonably well groomed. Unfortunately, we also forgot Ruslan’s walker. This meant that one of us had to carry him or two of us hold his hands as he walked to church and the car. After church, we went swimming. In light of our new finances, Bill talked me into a family membership at a local health club (left to my own reasoning, I could have easily proved that it is more economical to remain unhealthy and die young rather than pay the monthly membership fee). We’ve been going swimming on Sunday afternoons because their “therapy pool,” which is kept at a balmy 96 degrees, is open for free swim on Sundays. Oh, to be WARM! It’s almost worth the price (almost). It’s one of the best things we’ve ever done. We have something to look forward to after church and the kids come home wiped out so my essential Sunday afternoon naps are uninterrupted. The one drawback of the day was that we also had to carry/walk Ruslan to and from the pool since we still didn’t have the walker. On that note, things with Ruslan have been much, much better. I’ll write more about that later. Thankfully, he is improving significantly.

On Sunday night, Bill mentioned that he ordered a new bike on e-bay that he’d been obsessing over for a few weeks, bringing his total up to three bicycles. Discretion forbids that I name the price here, but suffice to say that it was more than my first car and a good chunk of that reimbursement check. We were poor again.

This is our following conversation:

Marnie: “This is why we are all starving. You keep squandering all the grocery money.”
Bill: “I knew you were going to say that. Nothing you say can surprise me anymore.”
Marnie: “Good, in that case I’ll just let you know right now that we are going to adopt two more girls.”
Bill: (pause) “Ok. Just let me have some say in the whole thing.”
Marnie: “Of course you’re going to have some say. It’s going to be your idea.”
Then I gave him a kiss on the cheek and left to rake the living room.

On Monday we began horseback riding lessons at a new farm. Ruslan and Will are getting “Horse Therapy” once a week at a farm in town. Three of my other kids got wind of the deal (how does one say, “no” to one child and “yes” to another?), so it was three riding lessons plus two horse therapy sessions each time. Oh my, that was painful. I started calling around and found a local farm that offers lessons for about half the price and is only three miles from our house rather than fifteen. As soon as I turned into the driveway of this farm, I was struck with the sin of covetousness. It is BEAUTIFUL. The farm is in a small valley and butts up to the mountains. They have an incredible mountain view and I am going to get to see it every week, for half price! (Thank you God, for that view.) I wonder how they ever get anything done. If I lived there, I would spend all my time just soaking in those mountains. It was cleansing for my soul, which is good because…

Later that night I mentioned to Bill that maybe we could buy a second walker for Ruslan and just keep it in the car. My reasoning for this is that our garage is in the basement (I know, what total idiots would adopt a handicapped child while living in a multi-level house?) and helping Ruslan down the stairs and into the car is a full-man job, usually falling on me. One of the other kids will take Will down, but for some reason, I am the one who usually ends up making the trip back upstairs to get the walker, if I remember at all. This means three trips to the car for every outing: one for Ruslan, one for the walker and one for whatever it is that I realize I forgot as I’m backing out of the driveway. Plus, I finally found a reasonable supplier (http://www.kayeproducts.com) and I got our last walker for $200 (negligible considering I was steered toward $2000 walkers when this all began). So, I made the case to Bill and (brace yourself) biker-boy actually said to me, “I don’t know. $200 seems like an awful lot of money just to eliminate a trip upstairs.” I did not mention the bike/healthclub membership at this time because in the next breath, Bill asked me if I had found any girls to adopt. I hadn’t even started looking. This was a gloriously unexpected opening. I decided I would be more effective if I fumed over the money issue for a few days and went to look at special needs girls available for adoption on the internet.

On Tuesday, I fumed.

On Wednesday, my friend Maryann called. She’s the one who lost her husband in a biking accident in May. She misses him dreadfully and my heart aches for her on a daily basis. An officer from her base in Japan was in the states and he called that day asking if he could stop by. She invited him to dinner and about half way through the evening, he mentioned that the military was finished investigating the bicycle accident. They had held onto her husband’s bike and helmet during the investigation. Since it was over, he was returning them to Maryann. He had brought the bike with him to the states, assembled it, and he had it with him. He told her there was still some blood on the helmet, but the bike was undamaged. He put it in her garage before he left. She still hadn’t looked at it when we talked, but eventually, she’s going to have to walk into that garage. So…. That was hard.

Talking with Maryann served to remind me that my husband does have some redeeming qualities. He is, after all, alive. I brought up the walker again, mentioning this time that it is a mere FRACTION of the cost of his THIRD bike. Then I paused for effect. Then I told him that I forgive him for being imperceptive about our money, but if he doesn’t agree about the second walker, I’ll write about it in my blog. He said, “Go ahead. If you do, I’ll take pictures of our living room and post them in the comment section.” However, I am not afraid of this. I reminded him that most of my readers are women and that both of our mothers like me best. He told me to order the walker.

On Thursday I got a report back from a gait clinic where I had taken Ruslan in August. After three months, they finally sent me his evaluation. The doctor decided that his condition was not severe enough for surgery at this time, but asked to see him for another evaluation in two years. In the meantime, they recommend that we continue with physical therapy, horse therapy and swimming. This freed up a bicycle-sized chunk of money that would have gone toward the deductible/copay of the surgery: anesthesiologist, drugs administered, surgeon, use of the facility, and follow up appointments. I know this because of what we went through with Will’s eye surgery. We were rich again.

Later that night, Will told me, “my tooth hurt.” I suddenly remembered that Will had so many cavities when I first took him to the dentist, they recommended putting him under general anesthesia and filling them all at once. At the time, Will had eye surgery coming up, braces he was getting used to, trips we were about to take and family coming to visit. I decided to put it off for a while. Sadly, so much has been going on in the meantime that I totally forgot about his teeth. Pitiful. I had left him with unfilled cavities for six months! I felt horrible and spent the night berating myself and hoping that he would wake up pain free.

On Friday morning, the first thing Will said to me when he woke up was that his tooth hurt. Perfect. I should have taken care of this months ago. I spent most of the morning in a guilt ridden state. My dentist doesn’t work on Fridays. Apparently she is not alone in this. I left a message asking for an appointment to put Will under the general anesthesia and get the other cavities filled. Then I started calling dentists to see if anyone had an opening between now and Thanksgiving. I thought if I could just get that one problem tooth taken care of, we could get through Thanksgiving pain free and deal with the other cavities later. I finally got an emergency appointment and ran to pick up Will from school. He was in the middle of his Thanksgiving feast, wearing a T-shirt dyed brown, cut with fringes and painted with Indian-type stuff. He also had a paper headdress with six feathers (he’s an important Indian) and I brought along Cookie Monster, Elmo and the “Big Yellow Bird,” just in case. He was the picture of special needs cuteness. I sheepishly explained our situation to the dentist who looked in Will’s mouth expecting a mine field. What she found was that his teeth shouldn’t be causing him any pain, but he had an ulcer on the inside of his cheek. It was $85 for the office visit. For the second time this year, I had taken my child to a doctor, only to find out they really didn’t need to be seen.

Last night Bill asked me again about girls available to adopt. I found about ten that would fit easily into our family. So, I showed him the list and we picked a few that I am going to ask for more information about. I didn’t mention the fee schedule. From my perspective the children are a given, it’s the money that comes and goes. We ended up talking about a few house repairs/ improvements that we really need to take care of and Bill handed me an application for a 0% credit card. We are poor again. …It’s better this way.

My Husband Shaved His Legs

My husband shaved his legs. 

I’m having a hard time dealing with this emotionally.  After all, the man is half Norwegian.  It’s not like he was particularly hairy to begin with.  Before we married, I mocked him enough about his lack of manly­­ chest hair that one of our groomsmen gave us some of his own chest hair as a wedding gift.  I tried to implant them with a safety pin as Bill was sleeping but it didn’t really work.  Plus, shortly after that I learned that the “waxed look” was in, so I let it go. 

Bill hit puberty a few years later and grew enough manly body hair to put him farther along the spectrum.  Even though God graciously made up for what might be considered a deficiency, Bill has no appreciation for God’s merciful bounty.  He shaved it off last Wednesday night.  I think he may be taking particular evil glory in this, because he waited until bedtime, when I was certain to be nearby.  First he went at it with the electric clippers then he took a razor in the shower. 

I now have a husband with prettier legs than me.  I also have two teen age sons who are paying very close attention.  For the past few days, every time Bill walks into a room, they sort of shriek and hide their eyes.  And then we have the “bald” comments to add to the family conversations.  When Bill said, “Reilly, I’m putting my foot down...”  Matt muttered “I’m putting my BALD foot down...” and so it goes.  

It all started a few years ago when Bill bought a road bike.  He’s steadily been getting faster and faster until this year, he realized he had a shot at hitting the top spot in the “Masters” category for triathlons in his series.  Not entirely according to talent/training mind you.  The man is an engineer.  He figured out the point system and then realized if he went to the less well attended races, he had a better shot at placing high and getting more points.  On the last race of the season, he had a chance at the top spot --if his competition didn’t show up.  He did show up, of course, and beat Bill by one second.  So, Bill missed the first place Masters spot over one second.  

I gave him a new nickname (Loser) for a few weeks after that, which was really fun for me, but it’s only fair to note that what happened next is partly my fault.   Bill took revenge by signing up for the Beach to Battleship Iron-Man Triathlon in North Carolina.  http://beach2battleship.com/

The triathlon works like this:   Swimming is first with the entry at the tip of Wrightsville Beach and a frigid swim up the bay for 2.4 miles.  The racers exit at a dock and run to T1 (Transition 1) where the racers can change out of their wet suits, into their racing clothes and grab their bikes.  Then they bike for 112 miles and end up at a second transition area (T2), on an island where the battleship North Carolina is dry docked.  Here they drop off their bikes, change into their running shoes and then do the 26.4 mile marathon (Freaks).  They finish at the same T2 spot where everyone has a good cry and then we all go home.

Thank God, Bill is not a complete idiot.  He signed up as part of a relay team.  Relay teams have an advantage because they don’t have the built up fatigue of the other racers.  Also, for the transition, all they have to do is meet and pass off an ankle bracelet with the electronic chip/timer.  They don’t have to change clothes/shoes like the other racers.   Bill did the bike race while two of his friends, Glen and Casey, did the swim and the run.  

Have I mentioned that we have six kids?  Bill said he would go alone but, “it would be more fun if you came along…”  Then he went through his check list:  smile, look her in the eyes, adopt loving, hopeful expression, a gentle squeeze on the arm, count silently to 100 and wait for response.  Repeat as needed until subject complies. 

We took the kids out of school early Thursday and drove the rest of the day to Wilmington, NC.  On Friday, Bill drove the bike course, went to the pre-race meeting and we met up with his team mates to eat dinner and humbly pray that the racers, their wives, children and marriages all survived the next day.

On Saturday morning at 5:30am we snuck out of the hotel room and I drove Bill and Casey to the race site and dropped them off.  I now had two hours to wake/feed/grab the kids and get back to T1 to see Bill off.  When I tried to wake them, Matt and Paul merely rolled their eyes.  Reilly smiled and said, “no thanks Mom,” and when I asked Sharon if she wanted to come with me to watch Daddy start his race she said, “not even one little bit!” and put the covers over her head.   This left me with Ruslan and Will, my least mobile children and Mary (Casey’s wife) and their three kids ages 6, 4 and 2—not exactly mobile either.

We got to T1 about 8am.  It was a mad house.  There were 750 people doing the full triathlon and 1,000 doing the half (as in “half the distance,” 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.2 mile run; for the more emotionally well-adjusted racers).  The swim started about 7:20am and Glen was such a fast swimmer that by the time we found Bill, we really only got to talk to him for a few minutes before Glen ran into T1.  Glen was the tenth swimmer to finish, but since they had such a fast transition, Bill was the second cyclist out of T1. 

He told me later what a rush it was.  As the second cyclist out of the transition area, the crowd was going NUTS!  The streets were lined with patches of cheering people all the way out of town.  He passed the first cyclist about two miles into the race so for the next fifteen miles, Bill was the lead cyclist.  There was a motorcycle that trailed the lead biker, so they all knew Bill was in the lead.  Then he got passed and he was second again until about ten miles before the end of the race when he got passed again.  Every few miles, there were aid stations with water, food and people cheering like crazy.

Meanwhile, Mary and I were back at T1.  It was a 112 mile race, so if Bill averaged 25 mph, that meant just over 4 hours to walk back to the car, drive to the hotel, wake/feed/grab the other kids and drive about 10 miles to a ferry to take us to T2.  We needed every second.  It was murder.  Suffice to say that it involved two closed roads, missed directions, Droid internet not working (!), an invisible trolley and me jumping a curb and parking on grass in order to catch a “water taxi” over to T2.  We didn’t get there until 12:30 and I was frantic thinking that we’d missed Bill.

The second transition area is on an island on the Cape Fear River.  There is NO WAY it was a big enough area to hold 1750 racers and their families.  It was packed!  Plus, apparently, the island floods every day at high tide.  We waited by the road on a strip of land about three feet wide with the racers on one side and a swamp on the other.   It was cold and windy.  Mary, Glen and I had nine total kids between us aged 2 to 14 that we were trying to keep on the three foot strip, out of the water, out of the road, warm, entertained and alive while we watched for Bill.  There were tons of racers coming in because 1,000 of them were just doing half the distance and coming into the same T2 area.  There was no indication re: which racers were from the full or half Iron Man.  We finally decided to look for expensive bikes/helmets and shaved legs.  I was expecting Bill at 1:00 at the very latest, but that time came and went with no Bill.  I felt better thinking that we hadn’t seen many other racers who might be  doing the full race, but the minutes were starting to add up.  1:05, 1:10, 1:15, the last time he was this late, he had wiped out and left half his left hip on the roadside.  I was getting worried.

In fact, I was near tears for most of the morning.  While Bill was biking, there was no way we could communicate.  I was worried that he was cold or hungry, that he was getting rained on, that he pulled a muscle or was cramping, that he wiped out or that he was dead.  He normally averages about 23 to 25 miles and hour on flat land and he has wiped out and hurt himself in the past.  Plus lurking in the back of my mind was the fact that Maryann’s husband, Bruce, died in a biking accident just five months ago in May.  It was a hard morning for me.  As we were driving toward T2 Matt finally asked me, “Mom, what is WRONG?”  So, grabbing the teachable moment, I said to him, “Matt, you’ll understand someday, but when you get married, it’s like God takes part of your soul and melds it with the other person’s.  When they hurt, you hurt, and that’s just the way it is.  It only gets worse when you have kids, because the same thing happens, until your soul feels like Swiss cheese and you just don’t have much left to work with.”  Matt looked over at me, rolled his eyes, said, “Geez Mom, it’s like you’re Voldemort!” and I felt my teachable moment end.

Bill finally arrived at about 1:25.  He was the 17th fastest out of the 750 racers, but since Glen swam so fast and their transition was so quick, Bill was among the first few racers with shaved legs to arrive.  We were waving like mad but he never saw us.  I rudely left Mary with the kids and ran over to T2 to find him.  He looked AWFUL.  He was in so much pain, he couldn’t move but he couldn’t stay still either.  He kept stopping, then leaning, then moving around again, then stopping, then leaning, trying to get the cramps out, but knowing he didn’t have enough energy left to stand on his own to stretch, and looking for somewhere to lean again.  I’m sure his blood sugar was low.   He was cold.  He was wet, and he kept saying things like, “Don’t EVER LET ME DO THAT AGAIN!!”  and, “It was SO WINDY and IT RAINED!”  and “Everything HURTS!”  and, “If I EVER even TALK about doing this again, take a baseball bat to my bike!”   (NOTE: It’s a carbon frame.  The whole bike would shatter.  This was our one moment of complete unity throughout the day.)

He looked like he was about to collapse and he needed to eat so I went back for the kids and we finally found him sitting on an ant hill with his back against a wall and his eyes closed, oblivious to the world.  He eventually laid down next to the ants and fell asleep for about two hours.  In the meantime, I found a quiet corner to plant, water and feed my kids and spent the rest of the time running back and forth between Bill, Mary and my kids.  The sun drifted West, more-half racers arrived, it got colder and more windy.  Bill finally woke up and we all went to wait for Casey at the finish line.

This is the transition site/island with the Battleship in the background.

Besides the twice daily flooding, the island we were on is bordered by the Cape Fear River.  There were no fences around the edge, just a few rocks and then a drop off into the water.  The finish line was on the outside of the island and every few minutes a child would dash off toward the river.  We almost missed Casey coming in.  He finished in 3 hours, 10 minutes and he was the first full Iron Man racer to cross the finish line.  I have to say, it was awesome to watch OUR GUY run into the tape.  He was great though.  He didn’t break it.  Because he was a relay runner he gave the tape back to the officials so the lunatic-freak-Iron-Man who actually did the race all by himself could break it.  He arrived 18 seconds after Casey, having done the swim, bike and run all by himself in essentially the same amount of time it took our team to do it as a relay.  Knowing how much time, training and emotional effort Bill and his friends had put into this as a relay, all I could think was, “that man is either single, or he is about to be.” 

In fact, our marriage was in greater and greater jeopardy with each passing moment.  Bill had gone to sit with Casey in the “warming tent” –for athletes only.  It was still cold, still windy, the kids were still tired, still hungry and starting to implode.  I finally put my head in the warming tent and hollered, “BILL, It’s TIME!”  The lines for the water taxi were so long that we decided to risk it and walk to the trolley/bus stops, which turned out to be half a mile away.   I figured out later that I carried Ruslan over three miles by the end of the day.  We have a wheel chair, but with all Bill’s gear and the kids stuff, we didn’t really have room.  Plus, even if we’d taken it, there was no way we could have gotten it on the water taxi, nor moved on the grass.  Ruslan could not maneuver through the crowd in his walker and that left me carrying him.  Usually there is only one transition area and parking nearby so we didn’t expect this to be an issue.   This race was just not set up for the handicapped.

We got back to the hotel about 8pm.  My arms and back were killing me.  I hadn’t had a decent meal all day and I was up to my ears in whining/bickering/tattling.  To make matters worse, there was no use complaining because Bill had a worse day than me.  He kept asking why I was so quiet and I kept telling him, “I’m just wiped out.  I don’t want to talk about it.  I’m done.” Then I finally quit saying anything and hid under my covers in a fetal position, hugging the heating pad, and debating about what form of penance I was going to inflict on Bill, while he finished putting the kids to bed.  I decided I want him to stand in a wind tunnel for nine hours, in two inches of cold water, and every three minutes I’m going to send in whiny children to peck at him with pencil erasers and half-eaten pieces of cold pizza. 

By the next day, Bill had gone from, “I’m NEVER doing that again!” to “If we do this again…” and half way home I noticed he was saying, “The next time we do this…”  which morphed into, "The next time we do this, you need to drive ahead with the kids and meet me at every aid station.  It would really help if I knew I was going to see you every twenty miles," silent nod of the head, "that would really help."

How does one say, "NO" to this?

Another factor: the first prize is really cool.  It’s a piece of teak wood flooring from the original deck of the battle ship. It's impossible to hold that wood in your hands without thinking of the men who walked on those boards, where they were, what they endured, who they were missing, and whether you'll meet them all someday in heaven.

This is the first place award.  Here is a link to some stuff about the ship:

http://www.battleshipnc.com/AbouttheShip/History.aspx

About every three hours now, Bill's eyes will glaze over, he’ll get a sort of dreamy smile on his face and say,  “Marn,  I was the lead bike.  I was the lead bike for fifteen miles.  Everyone who saw me just went NUTS cheering.”  On the one hand, it’s really endearing.  On the other hand, we had a horrible day, we were both nearly collapsing from fatigue.  Everyone was tired, aching, sore and grumpy.  So, half the time I’m happy for him and the other half I want to ask, “Who cares if a bunch to total strangers are cheering for you?  They don’t even know you!  Besides, North Carolina went to Obama in ‘08, and half of those people cheering probably voted for John Edwards!” 

I keep waking up at night with visions of Will falling into the Cape Fear River and me jumping in, but not able to find him in the muddy, rushing water.  Then I roll over in bed and my hand or leg will brush up against Bills smoothly shaved legs.  God only knows how long it’s going to take to get those back to normal. 

…Freak.

Who Hesitates...

So, Ruslan has to do a timeline for a school project.  All of my kids have had to do one in first grade.  They get a large sheet of paper and draw a horizontal line across the middle, then make little vertical dashes to indicate years, starting with the year they were born and ending with the present, marking each year with captions and photos.  We had to make a timeline last year for Sharon.  We adopted her when she was three.  I had some earlier photos of her from her foster mom so it wasn’t too bad, except for the impossible-to-miss fact that she never smiled, even once, in any of those early photos.   

Ruslan is eight years old, so I have to come up with eight photos; one photo and a caption for each year.   The problem is that I don’t have any photos of him younger than about five.   Who would think that something so innocent would cause so much trouble?  I don’t think the people who come up with these assignments ever adopted. 

As I was innocently digging through my photo pile, I came across these pictures:

It was a beautiful evening.  I had been putting our tomato plants in cages.  Reilly and Sharon took some of the leftover tomato cages and made “fashion art” out of them.  At first they were merely decorative, but eventually they came up with the cup-holder model, and the trend really caught on  (don’t try to understand, it’s art).  It was a really fun evening, just as school was winding down and we were all gearing up for summer vacation. 

Anyway, I was doing fine, until I noticed the date on those pictures: May 20^th 2011.  The pictures were taken five months ago, the day before Bruce died.  It was such a contrast.  Here we were relaxing in the midst of a laid back, balmy spring evening.  Who could have guessed what was to come?  In a few hours, I would be on the phone with Maryann, hearing the news that Bruce was dead.  That one overwhelming loss was about to slam into our souls and then surround my every waking thought for the next several months.  All I kept thinking as I looked at those photos was, “God knew.  He knew that whole evening.  He knew what we were in for... in just a few short hours.”

And then I wondered, “Did He hesitate?” 

The first day of school for my kids was August 29^th this year.  That morning, I had a difficult time waking them up, especially my daughter Reilly.  The little ones really don’t mind school and I homeschool the older ones, but Reilly is in fifth grade this year and school is hard for her.  Plus, summer for a ten year old… it’s just the ultimate kid-age; old enough to be a top dog in your little circle of friends, but still young enough to play hard and play well.

I sat at her bedside thinking, “now it’s summer but when I wake her up, summer will be over for her and the school year will begin.  As long as she’s sleeping, it’s still summer.  When she wakes up, summer ends.”  The weeks of sleeping late, staying home, playing with neighbors all day long, swimming, canoeing, and spontaneous roadtrips were about to end.  Enter: early mornings, peer pressure, school lunches, homework, and bedtimes.  I sat watching her sleep for ten full minutes, wondering why I hadn't found a way to stop time and trying, too late, to grab hold of those last few moments and keep her a child in the midst of summer vacation forever.  Of course, I failed.  I wanted her summer to go on for eternity, but I only managed to salvage ten minutes.

I finally mustered the will to wake her up.  After all, there is no stopping time and this was hardly a personal tragedy.  Still it was hard, because I love her so, to see that summer end.

So, I wondered as I was looking at those pictures whether God hesitated before He took Bruce away from Maryann, even if it was just for a second. 

I suppose it doesn’t matter since He still took Bruce in the end.  But all the same, I’d like to know.