Surprise

On my tenth birthday my dad took me bowling so we could have some one on one time.  My mom was making homemade pizza and cake.  I had been upset because we couldn’t afford a party that year but I had gotten over it  and was happy to hang out with my family that day.  When we got home I went in the dining room for dinner and all my friends came leaping out from behind doors, in closets, under the table, shouting “SURPRISE!” It was wonderful.  It was the best kind of surprise. 

On April 12th of this year I took my 11 year old daughter to a routine follow up appointment with her neurosurgeon.  She has hydrocephalus diagnosed at age 2, and gets yearly MRIs to follow up from her third ventriculostomy. My daughter was doing great. We were expecting this to be nothing but a quick visit.  We had the 2 year old with us. We had dinner plans with friends.  Instead, that day, we got the worst kind of surprise.  The MRI had found a small growth in her brainstem.  It had been there the year before and was thought to be a benign finding, almost like a birth defect, that had caused her hydrocephalus in the first place. The growth had grown.  In one year it had nearly doubled in size. It wasn’t a benign finding, it was a brain tumor.  My daughter had a brain tumor. My vibrant, beautiful, smart, happy, 11 year old Sarah had a brain tumor. 

We are approaching the 6 month mark and we have at least a year to go in our treatment but I have been thinking back on the last 6 months quite a bit lately.  I have been surprised by so many things in the last 6 months, mainly by the beauty that I have found in people. It started that day. The medical student who found a toy push car and took Hannah for rides while the neurosurgeon and I talked to Sarah.  The nurse practitioner who then took Sarah to “find Hannah” while I talked to the neurosurgeon.  The busy neurosurgeon at the end of her long clinic day who sat there with me while I sobbed, while I begged her to tell me if my baby was going to die. 

I have been surprised by kindness. Everyone we encounter at the hospital is so kind to us. The nurses who seem happy to see us each week, who ask Sarah about all her activities, who act like accessing her port is the funnest thing they have done all day.  The nurse who talked to me about her NICU days when I was exhausted and post call from resuscitating a micropreemie the night before, who then covered me up with a blanket and reclined my chair when I fell asleep.  The doctor and NP who have laughed and talked and cried with us, who remember from week what Sarah said her next week’s plans were and then ask about them. The lady in the bagel shop who always remembers that we drink chai tea lattes, who gets them started when she sees us coming. Finally, the art teacher, who we absolutely love, who makes chemo Wednesdays fun, who remembered my birthday, my Ruthie’s birthday AND Sarah’s birthday, who brought us some of the cakepops she made for her own birthday because I had told her how to make them and she was so proud.

I have been surprised by joy. By the joy that radiates off my daughter as she paints a new masterpiece while her chemo runs. By the joy on her face when she sees her little chemo buddy Ridge, a precious little 3 year old who just loves his Sarah. By the joy I feel every time she and I sneak away for a little mother daughter time after chemo, exploring new restaurants and shops. By the joy we feel as a family when we get home and our magic chemo meal has been delivered so we can just sit down, have dinner, and enjoy each other’s company.  As depressed and angry as I have been the last six months, sometimes the joy is overwhelming.

I have been surprised by friendship. By the people who went from being nice folks we chatted with at church to being people we can count on in a pinch, people who sometimes just drop by with pizza or lasagna. By the woman who went from being a coworker to being the friend who took it on herself to sign people up to bring us food every single week on chemo day.  By the old friend who went from contacting me whenever we were going to be in the same town or whenever one of us had a problem to texting or calling every Wednesday and making sure we planned some time together ASAP.  By the friend who went from “hey you are fun to hang out with and our kids are all besties” to “you are my lifeline and I don’t think I could have survived the last 6 months without you.” So many people say that tough times show you who your real friends are, implying that most people walk away from you when times get tough.  For me, these tough times have shown me that I am surrounded by more wonderful, beautiful, real friends than I ever imagined.

It's Been Awhile

Wow! So much has happened since that last post.  We've been too busy and life has been too messy to take time to post things on the internet beyond Facebook.  Occasionally though, I feel like I have more to say.

  We added Sarah to our family and then BAM, we added a baby.  It has been hectic and crazy but I have to say that things have ended up just like we had hoped, just like Ruthie's picture in that last post (plus Bryan of course and with Hannah added too).  We have a house full of love.  The very thing we wanted. 

Things took an unexpected turn last April with Sarah's tumor diagnosis but we are coping. It has made me want to try my hand back and blogging though.  I have a lot of things in my head that I feel like I need to get out and if reading it helps anybody, or at least gives them enough insight not to hate me when I act weird, so much the better. 

In six hours we will finally meet Sarah...wow!  I really thought this day would never come.  I am so incredibly excited and yet a little sad at the same time.  There are going to be a lot of firsts today but there are also a lot of lasts.  This is the last day of easy street parenting for us.  Parenting is never easy but in reality, we have two children who are pretty easy.  They are our biological children, they have been with me since conception.  No one has harmed them or abused them.  They speak English.  They know the rules of our house.  They love us and they know we love them...no question.  And there are only two of them.  I can hold one by each hand.  Those days are over.  Sarah has had a tough life so far.  She doesn't know who we are or what we may do to her.  She has no idea that we will love her unconditionally forever.  She won't even understand us when we speak to her.  All the sights, smells and tastes of our house will be foreign to her.  Her life is about to be completely and totally rocked.

But this is what she is gaining...what WE are gaining.  This is Ruthie's interpretation of today.  There is a lot of love in this picture.  This may not be what today ends up looking like but hopefully sometime down the road, it is what our family will look like (with Bryan in the picture of course.)  There is a lot of love in this picture and a lot of love in our family.  

If you have a minute this evening, or if you are awake at 1 AM (which is 1PM in China), say a little prayer for us.  We could use it.

Born From Loss (It's Friday...Sunday's comin')

This day sucks.  Quite frankly this day of the year always sucks for me.  Which is a really selfish way of saying that this day sucks for me because it sucks for my husband and I hate to see him sad.  Ten years ago today my husband lost his best friend.  Ok, let's be honest, not his best friend, his girlfriend.  And let's be even more honest to say not just his girlfriend but the woman he thought he would marry.  They had made plans, were waiting until she graduated and they had all their grad school plans firmed up and then it would happen...except it didn't...because she died...ten years ago today.  

Even though we are ridiculously happy together this day always leaves him a little blue and leaves me a little confused.  After all, if he is happy with me, how can he mourn the loss of another woman?  I've never been able to understand it, that is until this year.   

This year we are waiting on pins and needles to be told that we can come to China and pick up this darling little girl but we would not be on this journey had we not experienced two gut wrenching losses within about 6 months of each other.  I am holding neither a 10 month old nor a 3 month old but I am ecstatic to soon be holding an 8 year old.  This has been an eye opening journey about the state of the world, about parenting, about adoption, and about expanding our capacity to love.  I wouldn't give it up for anything yet we wouldn't even be on this journey were it not for our losses.  

Our little Sarah has experienced unspeakable loss.  She has lost her family, her identity, her first foster family and she is about to lose her second.  She will be gaining a forever family but not before she loses everything she knows.  She will lose her friends, her cuisine, her culture.  We plan to preserve these things where we can but let's face it, we will still be a bunch of white people trying to do Chinese holidays, culture and cuisine some justice.  

I get really uncomfortable when people talk about fate, soul mates and God always meaning for us (Bobby and I, or Sarah and our family) to be together.  You see, that implies a whole lot of things that I just don't think God is responsible for.  If Bobby and I are soul mates then what was Katherine?  A bump in the road, a girl who was meant to die?  I doubt that very seriously.  And what about Sarah?  Did God intend for mother to leave her by the side of the road?  Is that why He created her?  Of course not.  

I know that at some point she will ask questions about why her parents couldn't keep her and why God let that happen.  She will question why people say that we were meant to be a family.  She will not understand how she can mourn for her birth mother and her foster mother and still love us.  Even more than that, Bryan and Ruthie will question this, just like I have questioned Bobby year after year on March 1st.  I think that because of the origins of our family I will have an answer for them.

"I don't know."  I will tell her.  "I don't know why your mother left you.  I don't know why my babies died.  What I do know is that I love you.  I know that God brought us together and made something right and joyful out of something so wrong and so sad."

Our family is one born from loss.  Like so many metaphors that are out there:  the phoenix rising from the ashes, the rainbow after the storm.  

One of my favorite priests years ago gave a Good Friday homily in which he talked about what that Friday must have been like for the apostles.  How horrible it was for them because they did not know.  They did not know that in two days Sunday would come and everything would be turned around.  He talked about how we each have our Fridays, the days in which it seems no good will ever find us.  We have to remember about Sunday.  We have to look around and say to ourselves...it's Friday...Sunday's comin'.  I said that to myself as I lay on a table last April.  That day was my Friday but Sarah is my Sunday.  This day 10 years ago was Bobby's Friday but we, his family, are his Sunday.  A family born of loss but oh, what a beautiful family it is.  

Try to remember that when you are in a bad place, when you feel discouraged or hopeless, if you let Him,  our Lord will bring joy from your pain, beauty from your loss.  It's Friday...Sunday's comin'.

As this year comes to a close I find myself feeling disillusioned and disenchanted, all the dis words really.  It just has not been a good year.  I mean, overall we're all healthy and alive.  That's more than a lot of people can say.  Don't get me wrong, the year has had it's moments.  The above picture was one of them.  My kids are awesome.  We have had a small miracle in my nephew's ability to overcome what should have been a devastating diagnosis, so I should be happy, right?  Not so much.

Anybody who knows me knows I love to have a plan, a plan and a list.  I like to be able to see what will happen throughout my day and the days ahead, to know what is coming and what to expect.  It's the control freak in me coming out.  You'd think this would make me more organized but, alas, it doesn't.  I started 2012 with a plan, a relatively simple one, get pregnant.  I was already working out like crazy and was in great shape so this would be an awesome, easy pregnancy.  And this time, instead of an apneic, intubated baby or surprise breech C-section, this pregnancy would end with a triumphant VBAC, a healthy pink baby that was plopped on my chest and immediately latched.  I would end this pregnancy feeling powerful, not powerless.  Again, not so much.  The getting pregnant part was easy enough but staying that way seems to have become a problem.

Suddenly I was a woman with no plan, no direction, a ship without a rudder like that Lemonheads' song.  I know who I was, who I used to be.  I was a runner.  I was 60 days into Insanity (a great workout by the way.)  I did yoga.  I was a healthy person.  I believed in eating whole foods, avoiding fast food unless absolutely necessary while on call.  I liked the occasional (emphasis on that word occasional) Starbucks.  I took my kids on nature walks.  I knit them sweaters and socks, sewed clothes for them.  I planted a garden every year.  I followed Flylady.  Suddenly none of this interested me anymore.  Except for the Starbucks part, that went from occasional to almost daily.

During the last half of the year Bobby and I developed a different plan.  We would add to our family through adoption.  We found a child on a waiting child list and fell in love.  This little girl became my rudder, my direction. (Oh how I wish I could show you her picture but I'm not allowed to yet.)   I threw myself into the process of bringing her home.  I obsessed over paperwork.  Unfortunately, this has led to a bit of a technology obsession.  I can't stop checking those waiting child lists even though I know I can't bring another child home right now.  I obsess over adoption related message boards, looking for anything that helps me feel closer to the daughter I cannot hold.  I obsessively check my e-mail and my Facebook page.  I walk around holding my iPhone scrolling through emails and Facebook posts like a zombie.  It's not healthy.  It's not me.  Where did the healthy person go?  Where is the runner, the gardener, the foodie?

Is this a midlife crisis?  Maybe.  But somehow I don't think driving a red convertible or partying with twentysomethings is going to help.  Instead I find myself longing for simplicity, peace, focus.  So what's the answer?  What is the plan for 2013?  I don't know at this point but I intend to spend the next 3 weeks trying to figure it out.  I need a detox, a technology detox, a sedentary lifestyle detox, a disillusionment detox.  For 3 weeks I'm staying away from Facebook.  I'm checking my e-mail only twice a day and only from the phone so it's not so easy to start reading stupid Yahoo articles.  Maybe I'll start Couch to 5K back up to refind my inner runner.  Maybe I'll actually go to a yoga class at the Y or restart those Insanity DVDs (that is if I can figure out how to get the sticky kid fingerprints off the plyometrics one.)  Mainly I'm going to slow down, be quiet, and listen.  There will be lots of hot tea and a lot of reading of my "tree hugging hippy" magazines.  There will be a lot of time spent outside whenever the weather allows.  More nature walks, more slowing down, more prayer, more listening.  With any luck, the end of 3 weeks will find me with a plan for 2013 and more importantly, with some peace.

Happy New Year, everybody!

Superbowl Sunday!

I have to admit I haven't paid much attention to the NFL this year.  I've asked 10 times, "who's in the Superbowl again?"  Then I say "really, wasn't that a few years ago?"  The kids have just made it harder to pay attention to sports.  Occasionally I can grab Ruthie and get her to say "C.A.T.S Cats! Cats! Cats!" but that's about it.  Otherwise I have to find something for her and Bryan to do while a game is on which usually puts me in a room without a TV.

Today the kid distraction was the Puppy Bowl.  Whoever invented that thing was a genius.  Actually, it was probably somebody who just wanted to watch the game without his/her kids whining about it.  Plop a bunch of puppies in pen with some toys and watch them go to town, what kid wouldn't love it.  Even Bryan found it interesting for a good 20 minutes.  And yes, that is Post-Nap-No-Pants Roo perched on the coffee table in the messiest corner of our house watching it.  (Obviously this was prior to kick-off since she's in the living room and Dada hasn't come and changed the channel yet.)

So, with the kids occupied, Bobby got to watch the game and I got to work on a few things that I really wanted to accomplish.  We had CSA veggies that really needed to be dealt with so there were broccoli soup and hot pocket style cabbage rolls calling my name.  Throw in some homemade bread and a bunch of sewing projects I've needed to tend to and you've got yourself a full afternoon.  Ruthie helped me with the dough for the hot pockets, running back and forth between the kitchen and the TV to give me updates on all the highlights of the Puppy Bowl, while Bobby played with Bryan and tried to get him to cheer for the Giants.

Did Ruthie and Bryan eat any of this great food.  Of course not!  Well, they ate the bread parts anyway and Roo choked down 4 bites of soup.  Did I get as much sewing done as I would have liked?  Of course not!  But I cut out fabric for some pants for Roo, a bag that I promised my cleaning lady months ago, and another one for my best friend's birthday, not to mention Roo's bento box carrier and a laptop sleeve for our new computer, so some good progress anyway.   I'm hoping to get to those projects Monday but you never know.  Monday also starts the "Whole Food Kitchen" e-course I've signed up for so there may be a lot more cooking I need to do (yay!)  Plus I've just ordered a "Healthy Snacks on the Go" e-book from Katie at www.kitchenstewardship.com so there are a bunch of yummy things I'm hoping to get to on Monday!

Groundhog Day!

I admit it.  I've been a blog slacker.  This handmade thing is time consuming.  Then we did a show, our computer got stolen, lots of little (and big) things have kept me away.  But today is Groundhog Day.  What better day to get started again!  In a few days I will post a few of the things we have been up to in the last few months but today I just want to jump back in with a few pics of the days leading up to Groundhog Day.  It's been cloudy this morning, so hopefully the little rodent will not be able to see his shadow.  I say this but  then, it's been so mild this winter, would six more weeks of it be so bad?

Yesterday was a prime example of the mild weather.  Seventy degrees and sunny.  When Ruthie came home from school we all took off our shoes and played outside, running and crawing around in the grass, drawing with chalk, blowing bubbles and playing hopscotch.  Inside we painted, had tea and just played.  A good (though not very productive) day for all concerned.