Bald is Beautiful....

I’d venture to say that all adoptive families are astounded at how “right” their adoptive children are for their families. During all the frustrations and delays that kept us from sending in our initial paperwork, I kept telling myself that it would all be worth it because if not for the delays we would not have the child who was meant for us.

There are many reasons Danny is such a good fit for our family. Some of them are deep, spiritual and philosophical. Then there are the million little reasons that make me smile every day.

Baldness is one of them. My little Guatemalan son has less hair then either of my European children had. Ever. Until that is, my Josh lost his hair to chemo. It was only then that I was able to realize the sweetness of kissing a little bald scalp, of looking at all the cute little dents and divots that occur naturally on every head.

Of course, Danny is not a substitute for Josh and Josh was not a holding place for Danny. They are each unique individuals and integral parts of this family. But how amazing is it that my last kiss for Josh and my first kiss for Danny was of a little fuzzy bald head.

If you see babies from Guatemala you might say, “What are the odds that there would even be a bald Guatemalan baby, and what are the odds that he would end up in your family?” But I believe that Danny was destined for our family from the beginning, so I think the odds were pretty good all along!

Now that he’s here and I’ve gotten the gift of a bald-headed kiss, our boy is starting to sprout hair!

Here are a few pictures of Danny’s new growth!

And a few photos of Gracie then and now - who has gone from straight black hair to curly light brown with no baldness in between!

Uncharted Waters...

This week marks a bittersweet milestone for us. I promised myself I wouldn’t try to figure out the date – it’s just a day. I vowed that to know it was coming was enough and I wouldn’t give it another thought.

But when you try not to think about something, it’s a pretty sure bet that you will.

It happened when Gracie put on a pair of PJ’s that belonged to Josh. They were a favorite of Josh’s and I thought Gracie would get a kick out of them. I warned her that they had feet which she doesn’t like. But she declared that she now loved pajamas with feet.

She put them on and as you can see from the picture, started dancing joyfully around. It’s always great to see her in Josh’s clothes. Then I noticed that they fit her perfectly – perhaps even a tad too tight. These were never tight on Josh and the feet were always a bit too long.

So that night as I was falling asleep – my mind went where I swore I wouldn’t take it. I did the math and figured out that this week, for the first time, Gracie is older then Josh ever was.

I don’t know what to make of it really. There are things Gracie was doing months ago that Josh never did, and things that Josh could do that Gracie can’t yet do. But nevertheless, for the first time since Gracie was born we are in new territory.

In some way it feels as if a path we were walking with Josh has come to an end. He is no longer guiding us as parents through the memories of how things were when he was a particular age.

Even though I have been a parent to Josh for eight years, I am a new parent of a three and a third year old child.

I have loved finding pictures of Gracie and Josh and now Danny doing the same thing at the same age. Now I can’t do that anymore.

I chose these two pictures of Gracie and Josh, for the last time at the same age, because I love the complete joy and abandon in each of their faces. It’s the way I remember Josh. And although it’s just a date, and it doesn’t alter my memory or my love for him, it’s been weighing on my mind all week.

Danny Can!

It’s easy to focus on the things to worry about and I confess to doing a lot of that. But while I’ve been fretting the days away, Danny has been busy.

How many of us would have the optimism and the drive to learn a new language, master a new form of mobility, learn a new routine, figure out how to out-wit a much larger person who keeps taking our toys and all the while charm the living daylights out of all the new people in our life?

This sweet boy who came to us able to stay in a sitting position if someone put him there, but unable to roll over, crawl or get into a sitting position can now do all of the above. Our amazing boy joined our family only able to communicate through adorable coos and lalala’s. Now he is learning English and has figured out how to communicate with us.

Here’s a partial list of Danny’s many accomplishments:

He can roll over!

He can crawl!

He can pull himself into a stand!

He can walk behind his push toys!

He can comb his hair!

He can sign for: “Done”, “more”, “bottle”, “bye” and of course, “no”.

He can say: “Duh Duh” = “Done”; “bah-duh” = “bottle”; “buh buh” = “bye bye” and or course, “no” = “no”.

"Bottle": his first word, his first sign and his favorite thing!

He has doubled the number of teeth in his mouth. From two and a half to four in and two more on the way.

He uses appropriate hand motions without prompting when we say certain things. (This was a biggie for the developmental people.) When we say “bye” he waves; when we say “bottle” he signs and says “bah-duh”;

Here’s our favorite – what he does when we say “oh no!”

We are so proud of this boy who is working so hard and accomplishing so much.


You go, Danny!



Oh yeah, one more thing: He's got great taste in football teams!

I fell in love Friday night...

I think it happens to every parent. You love your kids from the start. You love them so much you can’t imagine that you could love them more. Then every once in a while there’s a moment that completely flips your heart. There’s a surge of love so strong and overwhelming and it shifts you into a world of love you couldn’t imagine existed just a moment ago…

As you know, sleep has been a tough issue. My heart has been breaking for Danny imagining him waking up and crying for a person and a place that are no longer a part of his life.

But the other day, a dear friend, helped me frame Danny’s crying in another light. She asked me to view Danny’s cries not as desolate cries of abandonment but rather, cries summoning us to be sure we are still there. She told me that older adopted children are able to articulate this as the reason they wake up in the middle of the night. This simple re-framing gave me so much empowerment as a parent. It made me realize that I could actually offer comfort to Danny rather than just helpless empathy.

So Friday night when Danny started crying, I scooped him up and brought him in bed with me, I told him we were here for him and would never leave. Instead of reaching for his teddy bear or blanket, my sweet boy turned in to me and snuggled up against me and fell asleep. And I fell in love. I was completely overwhelmed with the realization that this sweet boy needed me and depended on me. I felt overwhelming, immense love in the desire to protect and nurture him for as long as I draw breath and beyond.

It’s slow but steady progress and I’m still exhausted. But each time I comfort him to sleep I now feel I’ve offered him a bit more security and one less reason to worry. Instead of hurting for him, I am healing with him.

Thank you E. Sweet dreams to all.

Trust and Respect

NOTE: The other night I prepared another post lamenting the poor treatment we received from the agency handling Danny’s adoption. I almost deleted the whole thing because I've posted about this before. But I realized that I need to re-express my frustration one more time before I even begin to tell our story. We were not treated anywhere near as badly as many people were, but I still find myself very very angry; partly for our situation and partly for others who have had to go through, and continue to go through so much. You can see that even late in writing of this, I wondered if I should delete it. But in the end, I’m posting it, mainly as therapy for me. You don’t have to read it – you can skip directly to the pictures at the end. Either way, thanks for checking in on us!

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Just as Danny has some set-backs to overcome, so do I. My instinct to trust and my confidence in others’ trust in me has taken a step backwards during this process.

I have to start with a story that sets the gold standard of trust and respect. It happened during Josh’s first hospital stay.

The nurse was hooking up the IV saline drip when I noticed some bubbles in the line. The nurse explained that they were very small and nothing to worry about. She paused and took a careful look at my face and then without saying another word, unhooked the tube and let the saline run into a towel until all the bubbles were gone. I thanked her and then apologized for questioning the work she was doing.

God bless this wonderful nurse. Her reply to my apology was to tell me that the nurses appreciated parents’ questions. She said questions always made them think harder about the job they were doing. She said that in serious work it’s always good to have people ask questions and keep you on your toes.

From that day on, I never hesitated to ask questions and even sometimes to ask for another opinion. There were times when my questions resulted in changes that were better for Josh and one time when my questions kept him from a stint on life support.

Why oh why did this not happen during Danny’s adoption? We were discouraged from asking questions. We didn’t even have access to the people directly involved in the adoption. We were told that parents were not to try to learn information about their case through Guatemalan sources even though case progress in PGN is available to the public.

If someone had listened to my questions and acted on them, our case would have been more then two months further along by the end of the year: possibly enough to have brought Danny home much sooner. As it was, we almost missed the year-end cutoff which would have invalidated our adoption.

During this ordeal, I found myself hesitating to assert myself in other areas. I noticed that I no longer assumed that people had the best of intentions. I felt the need to grovel and “suck-up” to people if I needed a favor. I remember asking someone: “since when do I assume that people need an incentive to treat me nicely?”

The ironic thing is that during this process the vast majority of people we met and worked with treated us very well. It is amazing how little it takes from a few people to undermine one’s confidence.

My advice to anyone heading down the adoption road is this:

Make sure the agency you work with is willing to provide regular and direct communication with you. The fewer intermediaries that lie between you and the people handling the adoption the better. Make sure they don’t object to you independently researching your case. Make sure they are confident enough in the work they do and trusting enough of you to welcome second opinions if your case runs into trouble. Make sure they respect you enough to make you a full partner in the process.

The best predictor of future performance is past history. Ask them about some of their worst cases. Ask them how they resolved the issues. If they have nothing to hide, they should be more then willing to fully brief you on the possible road blocks that lie ahead.

A lot of people make a lot of money in the adoption process. But profit should never be the objective. This should not be a “for profit” venture. In the midst of all the paperwork and process there is a child, your child.

I realize that a lot of what I’m saying is a paraphrase from a previous post. I’m stuck in the preamble to the details of this road we’ve travelled. Reading what I wrote, I see that I’m still very angry and hurt. I’m hurt that we never received a sincere apology or explanation for what happened. I’m angry because three times during the writing of this post I’ve had to run upstairs to calm a sweet boy who wakes up crying and scared and who did nothing to deserve it. Would he have come home sooner? I don’t know. Could things have been different? I don’t know. But the casual way that we were treated makes me wonder about all of it.

I’ve looked at what I’ve written above and debated deleting all of it. You don’t need to hear me re-hash this over and over. But I need to say it. Hopefully in saying it enough I can let it go and we can all get a good night’s sleep around here.

After all of this I’ll repeat what I’ve said before: this journey was worth every tear and every sleepless night. We have never once regretted embarking on this road. Our kids, all three of them, continue to surprise and amaze us. Every minute with them is a tremendous Gift.

One thing that I’ve never lost confidence in is the friendships that we have carried with us through the years. I know I don’t need to bribe any of you for your friendship! But I can certainly reward you for reading this far with a few pictures from last week!

How I actually managed to color-coordinate them I'll never know...

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The jury is still out on whether the crib helps with sleep issues, but there's unaminous agreement that it's a lot of fun!

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Sweet boy

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Sweet Girl

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Please...no photos until I perfect my technique!