Evan is standing at the table beside me building a Lego Robot.This is not a kit. It is from his imagination.There are wings and weapons galore.He stops occasionally to update me on all of its powers and destructive capabilities.Evan, like every 7 year old, has quite the imagination.He very much believes in monsters.Especially in the dark. This makes bed time complicated.
I bought bunk beds for the boys before Evan came home last summer.Ben planned to sleep on the top.He said Evan could have the bottom, bigger bunk so that I could lie down with him as he went to sleep. This was something I had done with Ben, and then I would return to my own room.I made a point of sleeping in my own bed.Then, everything changed.
Before long, Ben decided he was lonely on the top bunk, so he came down.The bottom bunk wasn’t quite wide enough for three, so we decided to sleep horizontally.Evan is afraid of the dark and monsters, so we leave the nearby bathroom light on.We all get into the bed with our books.I have to take the middle position to protect Ben, who falls asleep first – and is therefore vulnerable to attacks and harassment by Evan.These are not mean-spirited.Ben is just so peaceful and such an easy target.Evan cannot resist poking him, rolling on him, splaying his legs across Ben.
Evan is oddly impulsive at times – just last night he decided to see what would happen if he tried to lift my eyelid by prying the wing of a toy underneath.Let’s just say, as exhausted as I was, I wasn’t amused.It is unlikely he will try that again.
Evan has an inexhaustible supply of energy and stays awake longer than the rest of us.I have given him a book light, and he enjoys looking through a stack of books nightly.Sometimes, I will wake up in the middle of the night after being whacked with a stray foot or arm and I return to my bed.Sometimes I sleep till the morning.I now understand why God in his infinite wisdom has made me a single parent at this time. I always find evidence of Evan’s nighttime activities – book light on, toys strewn across the bed, food wrappers on the floor.
You might think that Evan would awake exhausted every morning, but he does not.He must get enough sleep, because he functions quite well.Our morning routine is fairly mundane.The boys get up, bathe, dress in their school uniforms, and have breakfast.I am thankful that Evan complies easily with this routine on most mornings.Lord knows, I don’t need extra stress in the morning.Ben and Evan watch a little T.V. while I shower and get ready for work.They watch for the bus.When the bus arrives, we run out the door.Evan bursts past poor Ben, even if Ben is in front of him at the door.He turns to laugh, victorious, and clamors up the steps.Ben groans.I tell them both to have a great day and I stand on the sidewalk as the bus pulls away.I wave and blow kisses as I watch them disappear.Ben waves and blows kisses back.Evan presses his face against the window, puts his thumbs in his ears, waves his fingers and sticks his tongue out as far as he can, wagging his head from side to side.I laugh.That’s my boys, Sweet and Sour.
One of my all time favorite movies is Parenthood, starring Steve Martin and Mary Steenburgen.I thought this movie was hilarious even before I had children.Steve Martin is a Dad who tries too hard to make everything right for his family. He has a hard time accepting the rollercoaster ride that comes along with having children.If you are going to be a parent, you had best bring along your sense of humor - and your juggling skills.
Earlier this week, I was on a ROLL.I had Easter goodies bought and stashed in the trunk of the car.Evan needed an Easter hat for a parade.I bought some cheap Easter stuff at the Dollar store, pipe cleaners, colored foam to cut out bunny ears…you get the picture. This had to go to school on Wednesday.I got it all put together and hid it in my room so it wouldn’t get destroyed.I planned to put it on his head on the way out the door to get on the school bus.I wasn’t going to take any chances.
At my job, grade books had to be finalized a few days earlier than anyone anticipated.I was up in the wee hours of Wednesday morning entering the prerequisite comments and making sure everything was logged in. I had an epic amount of corrected papers ready to be returned in my students’ Wednesday folders. It was full-court-press all morning. Then, it was time to get the boys up.
Two boys up, bathed, uniforms on, breakfast on the table. I stood in the kitchen constructing lunches and signing folders.I glanced at the clock:7:15.Time for me to jump in the shower. I would be out, dressed, combed and made up in time to stick the hat on Evan’s head and greet the school bus outside of our house around 7:40.“I’m good,” I thought, gloating.Everything like clock work, I am Super Mom!I smiled confidently to myself.
“Mooooom,” Ben called into the kitchen.
“Yes, Ben,” I answered, stepping off the podium in my imagination.
“I need to hand in a Science Fair topic,” Ben replied.
“A what? When is that due?” I queried.
“Yesterday.”
Gulp.Ok. Ok.Look at the time. Oh crap.I pull out my 730 Easy Science Experiments book. Flip through; flip through.This is not the science fairs of my youth, when you could crib everything out of the Encyclopedia Britannica.Noooo.You have to have a real, testable hypothesis and plan experiments.
I see a whole section on lemons and conducting electricity with lemons.I show Ben.“Oooh, that looks cool.” Me: “Sure.Sure it does. That’s your project.” Quickly, because it’s easier for me to do it than to help him do it, I type up a few lines explaining his topic and question.Pull the paper from the printer and hand it to him.
I glance back at the clock.It’s really late. 7:25. I consider for a moment foregoing a shower.Then, “No, I just can’t do that. I will be quick.” I jump in with such velocity I cannot say whether I got wet or perhaps the water just evaporated in the wind I created.I jump out.I wrap my towel around myself thinking, “Throw some clothes on, you can do makeup after the bus.Except…..
“MOOOOM!!!THE BUS IS HERE!!!”Ben is yelling.I run down the hallway, in my towel, unlock the door. Now would be a good time to mention that I live on one of the busiest streets in Savannah.It is not unusual to have colleagues and former colleagues driving by and waving as I put my kids on the bus in the morning. There is no way in God’s green earth that I am stepping out onto the porch.
The bus driver must have seen me, and my predicament, because she mercifully pulled closer to the curb for the kids. I clung to the doorway watching.Embarrassed.She laughed at me.I couldn’t blame her. I’d laugh, too.Then, as the bus pulled away, I realized in a sudden moment of clarity, that I had forgotten to give Evan his Easter hat!
Super Mom, my aspirations!
Ugggh!I walk in, dig through the recycling bin to find Evan’s class newsletter. “Please let the parade be tomorrow!”I am trying simultaneously to figure out how I could manage to drive all the way to Evan’s school with the hat, if need be.I finally find the newsletter and breathe sigh of relief.The parade is tomorrow. I haven’t ruined my kid’s day again.(Some of you may remember that I sent him to school dressed as an elderly man for the 100th day of school, but I had the wrong day!)
I slapped myself together and ran out the door so that I would be on time.At a red light, I looked at the seat next to me and realized I had left the mountain of papers I had worked on in my house.I slumped down and rested my head on the steering wheel. And then I laughed and laughed.Sometimes you have to laugh so you don’t cry. Being a parent is hilarious.You are either laughing at your self or laughing at your kids.
On the last day of school before break, the boys decided to run outside, still in their uniforms, and spray each other with the hose. They were running back and forth, screaming and yelling.Ok –Ben was doing most of the screaming because Evan had the hose.
“Mom!” ( Ben was banging at the back door.)
“Yes?” I look at Ben and he is in hysterics, drenched to the core.
“Evan soaked me!And now I am peeing my pants,” admits Ben, still laughing.
I have Ben strip down right there, and I give him a towel to quickly wrap up in on the way to the bath.Evan is busy spraying down some dirty toys in the yard. It is about 5 pm.I think, “I can leave him alone for a minute and get Ben in the tub.”So, that is what I do.I start Ben’s bath and he climbs in.Then I return to the back door. I look out expecting to see Evan playing with the hose. And he is. There, in the center of my yard which is clearly visible to all neighbors and anyone –police cruiser or pervert- who may be travelling down the back lane on this bright, sunny late afternoon, is Evan -completely naked, standing in a knee-deep plastic toy bin he is filling up for a bath. I trot down into the yard and tell him, “C’mon get in the house! You need clothes!”
Evan assumes I don’t “get it.”He reaches down into the water and splashes some up on himself, and says, “Ahhhhhhhhhh,” grinning ear to ear.
I have to stifle my laughter to avoid encouraging more shenanigans.I pull Evan out of his backyard Jacuzzi and tell him to go inside the house. He does, and I proceed to shut the water off and replace the backyard toys.Inside, the boys are laughing and screaming.Wet clothes are everywhere. All of this has transpired in the 30 minutes since they stepped off the bus.
Lately, I have been reading about the concept of adventure tourism.People pay guides to take them up a mountain or into the jungle.I am thinking of starting my own company.No plane tickets needed.I’ll just send the boys to your house for a week.
By the end of Parenthood, Steve Martin is learning to let go and have fun despite the ups and downs.You have to.Sure, you could go along white-knuckled and tense. But it is way more fun to throw your hands up in the air and laugh the whole way.
(I promised I wouldn't post this to Facebook, but this isn't Facebook! So, it doesn't count! Here is Ben doing the Ice Age Continental Drift.)
I knew from the moment I saw Evan in a photograph that he was my new son.I also knew he was profoundly deaf. I did not widely publicize this detail, partly because I didn’t want to be called a lunatic by my dearest friends.But also, I didn’t want Evan to be known as the “deaf kid.”I wanted the focus to be on Evan as my new son and Ben’s new brother.
For more than a year prior to meeting Evan, we prepared. Ben and I attended sign language classes.I researched online.Along the way, I read about the latest technology, cochlear implants.Most people have by now heard of these.A brief internet search will turn up dozens of videos of kids hearing their parents’ voices for the first time.On the periphery, they seem to be a magical “fix.”I had done enough research to realize that they are not.They are useful to some people, but not for others.I adopted Evan knowing and accepting that this was quite possibly not an option for him.
A quick tutorial:There are two parts to hearing.There is the access to sound, and then there is the processing of that sound. Without processing capability, sound is, well - just noise. From the time a baby is born, they are hearing sounds and their brains are building the neurological pathways to process those sounds.If a child has not been exposed to sound, the cochlear implant can give the child access to a lot of sound, but it will not be meaningful because those pathways are undeveloped.
Today we went to an audiologist that specializes in evaluating candidates for cochlear implants.She explained that they surgically implant a device into the head.There is another piece that the child would wear outside.It adheres to the implanted piece by a magnet.This would give Evan access to a lot of sound.Unfortunately, this could be very annoying and probably not very helpful.The audiologist went on to explain that at Evan’s age it would likely take intense therapy to help Evan develop any speech.She elaborated that even with considerable intervention; she did not think he would be capable of spoken conversation.(However, he will have the capability to converse in ASL.)
The audiologist suggested that we could continue with the trial with hearing aids that Evan is now involved with at school.He has worked up to wearing them for 30 minutes.She recommended pursuing outside speech therapy, too.What would a speech therapist work on? Recognizing the presence and absence of sound, and patterns of sound. This approach would likely not lead Evan to much useable speech, but it would give him an awareness of sound.In time, there may be a few words.
I expressed that I hardly thought it would be worth risking surgery and the hours of effort it would take to produce a limited amount of speech.Certainly, Evan would be better off spending his time developing reading and math skills.I asked about more classes to further our fluency in ASL so that we could fully integrate with Evan’s world.I hoped I sounded steady, mature, and accepting.I could feel that tightness in my throat and a slight stinging in my eyes.
The doctor kindly offered to call ahead to the surgeon and cancel our consult.She suggested that we may revisit this question if Evan really takes an interest in sound with his hearing aids.She asked if I had any questions.“Not really,” I said.I would follow up by looking into information about more ASL.
There was a toy box in the corner and Evan had been playing throughout our entire conversation.He was oblivious to the gravity of the discussion, to the possibility that he had essentially been ruled exempt from.I smiled at the doctor and thanked her for her time.Evan and I left.He looked at me as if to say, “What was that about?”I just shrugged and told him, “C’mon.”He waved goodbye to the ladies at the counter.
We got in the car and headed towards the nearest Dollar Store. I remembered that I needed to make some kind of Easter hat for Evan for a school parade later this week.The rest of our afternoon was suddenly clear. Evan was in the back seat playing with toys.I desperately did not want to feel disappointed.I knew ahead of time it was not likely an option for Evan.From the moment I decided to adopt Evan, I accepted him along with his deafness. From the beginning, I did not delude myself into thinking that we would just “fix” it.Despite that, as I drove I fought back tears behind my sunglasses.How strange it was to now be on the other side of this question.I glanced back at Evan. He was looking out the window.I reached back to touch his leg and missed.I pulled my hand back, afraid the gesture would betray my emotional turmoil.I didn’t want Evan to sense I was upset.He made a sound to get my attention.I looked back and he was smiling at me, holding his leg up to meet my hand. I reached back and held on for some time.
Recently my sister Peg sent me a book called Far From the Tree, by Anthony Solomon.The author writes about children who are different in some way.It is a heavy, enormous book with chapters dedicated to various issues and conditions.The author begins by discussing how disability often becomes identity.He talks about the grieving a parent must go through on the way to acceptance when their child turns out to be different.I cannot lay claim to such emotions because I chose Evan as he is.I am not sad because he is deaf. Today, I felt sad for Evan, that he will not have the benefits of speech.As a parent, I felt deep regret that I cannot fix this for him.I think back to the beginning, when I didn’t share that he was deaf for fear that this would label him – that this would be all people would think of when they thought about my new son.When I looked into my rear view mirror and saw my little guy looking back at me, I saw both – a gregarious, smart, funny, stubborn seven year old, and a deaf child.It’s all he has ever known.Deafness is part of his identity; he does not see it as a limitation.I watch Evan do everything other kids do – and more – every day.He is perfectly ok with it.And so am I.
Last year, I read an old folktale to my students. The
Reader’s Digest version is this:
An old man and his wife lay in bed night after
night, unable to sleep. A branch had
grown too long on a tree by their bedroom. Every time the wind blew there was a
horrible scratching noise as the limb would scrape against the window. They
went to the village elder to ask his advice.
Oddly, he advised, “Bring the chickens into the house.” The couple was not about to question him, and
did as he prescribed. When the solution was not forthcoming, they kept
returning for more advice. “Bring the pigs into the house.” “Bring the goats into the house.” Bring the cows and horses.” At last, the old couple started to lose
faith, and went to him and complained, “We did as you asked, but we still can’t
sleep.” The old man shrugged and told
them, “ OK, go home and let all the animals out.” The old couple went home and did as he
instructed once more. That night, they
lay in bed and marveled at the quiet stillness of their house. They barely noticed the scratching of the
tree limb as they drifted off to sleep.
Two weekends ago we brought the Pugs to Aunt Sandy’s. Mind you, in the realm of dogdom, these two
were completely inoffensive. They were more like furniture with fur. But
somehow, having them in the house transformed Evan. On a normal day, Evan channels a blend of
ancient warriors and cartoon characters. Evan-on-Pugs is like Little Rabbit
Foo-Foo.
The Pugs were not amused. They cowered in a corner. One tried to make a break for it and leapt
through a missing picket in my fence – no small feat for a geriatric obese
animal not known for athleticism. One
backed out of its harness upon seeing the boys disembark from the school bus
and hurled his fat little body into oncoming traffic. Evan took none of this personally. Every night after school, Evan would run,
laughing maniacally, through the house scooping up Pugs. In his mind, it was a great game. The Pugs
were horrified. Evan loved it so much he
would sneak out of bed in the middle of the night and go Pug-hunting. I was exhausted.
Then, Aunt Sandy came to the rescue. The Pugs have retired to Jacksonville. Ben and Evan seamlessly resumed
our life before dogs. The remarkable
side effect is that pre-Pug behavior that I found challenging now seems
Absolutely Minor. It’s a little like
hitting your head with a hammer to make you forget a pain in your toe. If you are struggling with any difficulties
that seem unsolvable, I highly recommend it.
Of course, the other force at work here is that Evan is
actually improving on many levels. We
have reached the 8th month of being a family, and I marvel at the
progress Evan has made. When I first met
Evan, he was a surly, somewhat feral child with no formal system of
communication. I watched in dismay as
my new son deliberately stuck his foot out to trip strangers in the Zhengzhou airport. When he was mad at me -which was all the time
- he would grunt, jab his finger in the air, and sometimes hit me. He bore no resemblance to any 6 year old I
knew. He had the confidence of someone
much older. He was not genuinely affectionate.
He did not cry.
He was all mine.
And I was
terrified.
Evan is like a huge toddler, now. If I am working or sitting on the couch, he
wants to sit on my lap. This morning,
Evan crawled into my arms and wanted me to rock him like a baby. He is my 64 pound baby boy. He gives me kisses and tight hugs that feel
like love instead of an attempt to strangle me.
Evan cries now. Normal,
bottom lip-out pouty tears. His eyes
well up. He is turning back into a
little boy again.
Evan laughs….giggles…smiles with twinkling eyes…and not
because he is up to something! (At least
not all the time!)
His personality is coming through in 3-D Technicolor. He can be very funny and loves to be the
center of attention. I would not be at
all surprised if he ended up on the stage some day. Evan loves performing, dancing, and
music. Some evenings, he treats me to
dramatic presentations which usually involve him playing a warrior.
Evan can be very sensitive and caring at times. Last week, we were in the food court in the
Mall and I purchased food for the boys.
I didn’t buy three meals because I knew there would be plenty for me,
too. When we sat down, Evan noticed I
did not have a Styrofoam box. He slid his chair closer to me and positioned his
meal between us. He glanced at me and
gestured, “Eat.”
One of the most impressive areas of progress has been
communication. Evan had no words. Evan presumably lip-read in Mandarin, had no
exposure to English, and had no sign language.
He has spent a little over six months in Kindergarten now. He is in a regular-ed classroom, but gets
pulled out by a deaf-ed teacher. He also has the assistance of a full time
interpreter. With their help and
persistence, Evan now knows all of his upper and lower case letters. He also has surpassed my meager signing
vocabulary and has me struggling to keep up!
Evan is also reading now. Really reading! He comes home with sight word books every
week and can read/sign all the words to me.
All of Evan’s teachers have confirmed what I knew from the beginning:
Evan is one smart little guy.
I don’t want to sugar coat. I think the number one fear most people have
about adoption is that you will bring home Rosemary’s Baby. You could invite a child into your family that
will make you sleep with one eye open and hide all the lighters. The truth is that all children, even
biological ones, are a crap shoot. Open
the newspaper on any given day. You will see stories about children who fell
from their resident parent’s wombs and did not turn out as hoped.
Evan can still be exasperating and I have to stay on my
toes! Evan prefers to learn from
experience. This means “No” sounds like
a dare, and he acts on most of his ideas. I've heard from other parents that this is not necessarily rare.
Prior to adopting, you are required to go through
pre-adoption counseling. You are told to
let go of idyllic fantasies and prepare for a long road ahead. One piece of advice that I think about often
now is that you should not attribute all issues and behaviors to your child’s
previous orphan status. As a teacher, I
have observed that every personality you meet as an adult is present in a
Kindergarten class room. People just are
who they are. They don’t change all that
much. Evan has a very strong personality. He is very
mischievous. I doubt he would be a lot
different if I raised him from infancy.
If Evan and Ben were colors, Ben would be a soft, calming light blue,
and Evan would be Chili Pepper Red.
Don’t feel sorry for Ben, though.
Somehow, this is just what Ben needed.
Ben is becoming stronger and more assertive. I could not have drawn that out of him.
As
for me, I am doing well. I've evolved
from thinking I was an awesome parent (pre-Evan), to thinking I was a terrible,
clueless parent, to thinking lately, “Wow, I might be getting good at this
yet!” These past months have taught me that if you aren't doing something
uncomfortable, you aren't growing. This
quote from Buddha
has special significanceto me now: “When
you realize how perfect everything is you will tilt your head back and laugh at
the sky”
Brothers....
A few of you may remember, one of the names I considered for Evan (before I met him) was Marlon. Everyone said it reminded them of a fish instead of Brando. Coincidentally, this picture was on a wall in a Western restaurant in China this summer. Evan does have the swagger!
Evan decided to join a performance at Forsyth Park last weekend.
If parenting were ice skating, then pre-Evan, I was Dorothy Hamill pirouetting effortlessly and gliding along with a big smile and outstretched arms.
Post-Evan, I am at times stiff legged, inching forward, at times hugging the railing, and other times moving swiftly forward, body wobbling, arms flailing, legs splaying - hoping for control while anticipating a messy crash.
In fact, and this is huge for my Type-A/control freak self, I am getting used to the idea that my life will forevermore be somewhat out of control – a mess.This is not because Evan is adopted.It’s not because Evan is deaf.It is because Evan is Evan – which he would still be even if he were neither of the former.
Evan lives in full-court-press mode.He is gregarious, confident, funny and loving. He is also stubborn and maddening at times.I have let more than the standard two weeks pass since my last blog, so here are some snapshots of our lives…
The Laundromat:
Recently, our washing machine broke right before the weekend, usually a big laundry time.With a bed-wetter in the house and limited amounts of sheets and blankets, this is a huge crisis.I called and ordered another, but the earliest delivery date was a week away.Friday night after school, I piled the car with so much laundry I could barely close the trunk.Off we went.
As we pulled up to the Laundromat, I saw instant trouble.The storefront is made entirely of floor-to-ceiling windows.Inside, there was a boy of about 10 or 11 playing with a remote control car.He could not have sensed what was coming.Poor kid.
We got out of our car and Evan ran inside. I quickly retrieved a rolling basket and unloaded the car with Ben’s help. I got the washers loaded and could hear Evan laughing and running around.Soon, I didn’t hear the car anymore.I rounded the corner and the boy now had his car on top of a covered trash can.He was standing between Evan and his car, unsure of what to do.Evan was oblivious to the boy’s discomfort.I grabbed Evan by the hand and gently asked, “Is he bothering you?”The boy must have been a nice kid, because he seemed to be afraid to admit what I already knew.His older sister, however, was not.“YES, he is.”
I led Evan away.Evan signed to me, “He is my friend!”This really meant, “He has a cool toy and I want to take over.”I realized that I would have no peace, and neither would this boy, if we waited for the clothes inside the store.I took the boys to the car and we waited there.Evan thought I was a major drag. Oh, well.
By the time the clothes were out of the dryer, the family with the RC car was leaving.Ben, Evan and I went back in to fold the mountain of laundry.The boys helped with some.Evan decided to make friends with the lady working there, and spent some time “helping” her.She didn’t seem to mind. I marveled at how sometimes other people are better with him than I am.Of course, he is often better for other people than he is for me!
Clothes folded, we rolled the basket back out to the car.I started loading the numerous bags into the trunk, one eye on the kids.Three adults sat inside in chairs facing the glass wall looking out onto the parking lot.This must have reminded Evan of a stage, because I looked up to find Evan putting on a no-holds-barred dancing exposition. (This is something Ben would not have conceived of in a million-trillion years.I couldn’t pay Ben to make a spectacle of himself. )
Evan was shaking his bottom, twirling, incorporating tai chi moves, and doing the Uma Thurman V-hand across the eyes that Pulp Fiction immortalized.This went on for ten minutes. I watched in amazement. The family inside laughed and videotaped him.Ben said, “OMG!”about twenty times.When it was time to go, Evan faced his audience and solemnly gave a samurai-type bow with the fist of one hand against the flat palm of the other, in front of his chest.In the car, he waved vigorously to his adoring fans and signed to me that they liked his show.He was quite pleased with himself.
As I drove home, I thought about Evan’s enormous confidence level. Evan starts off with the basic assumption that everyone will and should like him.This can be highly annoying, like when he wanted to be boy-with-car’s best friend.This can also lead to awe-inspiring, hilarious displays of confidence and showmanship.Children come to us as complex packages of raw materials.As parents, we only hope that we can shape all that into something productive and socially acceptable.
The Dogs
I was wrong.I may need meds.Perhaps it’s early dementia setting in.I have no further explanation.I saw the 8 year old pugs at the Home Show.The Humane Society ambushed me when I least expected it.I am highly susceptible to pugs.Their flat faces and fat bodies, big soulful eyes, swirly tales and lazy dispositions….I am a sucker for all of that.
Cowboy and Buddha have been together their whole life.Now, they found themselves in a corral at the Home Show.Someone surrendered them.Maybe their dog-parent got old and sick and couldn’t keep them.I do not know. I petted them.Ben petted them.Evan ignored them and went to the cat cage.I could feel the pull on my heart like furry little magnetic waves washing over me.Evan was now at another table, probably touching things he ought not to.Must----pull----away---Must---- have----will---power…..
“I have to go get my son,” I said to the nice- Humane-Society lady -trickster that could smell a bleeding heart a mile away.
“Here, take our card,” she said smiling.
I stuck the card in my coat pocket and tried to forget their little faces.Someone will take them, I told myself.All week long, every time I reached in my pocket for something, I pulled out that card.Then, Friday morning I opened my newspaper to see Cowboy featured in the Pets-for-Adoption section.My heart sank. They were still without a home.Two days later, we rode past the animal shelter on the way to drop some stuff off at Goodwill.
Ben said, “Mommy, can we go see the dogs?”
(And this is where I lost my mind.)“Sure. Why not?”
We walked the dogs. We liked the dogs.We left and went to lunch. Ben asked about the dogs every 15 minutes.I thought about them, stuck in that kennel with all those doggies yapping.What an undignified predicament for two old pugs that were probably loved their whole life.We returned and adopted the dogs.
World peace ended.
Evan could not, would not, leave them alone.The boy who barely looked at them at the Home Show was now relentlessly obsessed with them.Since bringing the dogs home, Evan has chased them non-stop.Capturing doggies is his new favorite game.And this is where his “of course everyone should like me” mentality (see laundry story above) fails badly.The dogs, sadly, do not like Evan.They are afraid of his stomping feet and loud shrieks of laughter.They do not want to be pushed, pulled or hauled away to be his headrest in the tent while he watches TV.They do not enjoy his experiments when he tries to see if he can ride them, or what their eyeballs feel like, or what will happen if he covers their nose and mouth.
I enlisted Evan’s teachers who tried to model appropriate behavior with a stuffed dog.I drew pictures of a dog with his tail up = happy face, and tail down = sad face.Evan added straight tails to my pictures and drew a straight face in like his behavior chart at school.
Suffice to say, nothing could convince Evan that he should take a different approach with the dogs.Why be nice and gentle when you can be forceful and get instant gratification? To illustrate how little Evan understands the nature of a pet, when I would step in to stop him from hauling them off, Evan would take a commanding stance and angrily point the way he wanted them to go.As if.
The dogs had their minds made up, too.They tuck tails and run from him.I had them on leashes one day as the boys were coming off the school bus.Cowboy saw Evan.He panicked and backed out of his harness and ran into traffic.I was not sure if he was trying to escape or commit suicide.
I started posting S.O.S. messages on Facebook. Friends offered suggestions and organizations to call.One friend even set up a meeting for us with potential dog-parents.The would-be daddies weren’t sure about two dogs, and I didn’t want them to be separated.A couple days ago, the angels smiled on me, (or the dogs). My almost-in-laws, aka Aunt Sandy and Uncle Truck, called to say they would take the dogs.For Cowboy and Buddha, this is like winning the doggie- lottery.Next week they will move to a spacious home in Jacksonville, FL with a lovely landscaped yard to roam, better medical care than I have, no small children, and doting parents who are known to allow dogs in the bed with them.
I’m not sure how the transfer will go, but I know it is the right thing to do. Ben is happy that he will still get to see them.I feel good that my unexplainable lapse of judgment has inadvertently led these old pups to a fantastic retirement home.And though I’m sure Evan will initially disagree, life will be better without Mommy chasing him continuously yelling, “No! Stop that!!”
Mysteries and Milestones
January marks Evan’s 6th month as part of our family.He also turned 7 on January 27th*.
(*We are unsure of his actual birth date, since he was left with no paperwork of any kind. The orphanage in Xin Xiang estimated that he was 3 when they found him by himself outside the Civil Affairs Office.They gave him a birthday of January 27th.Ben was luckier.His birth mother left a note with the time and date of his birth. )
We marked Evan’s birthday with a simple gathering of a few friends at Golden Corral. Evan loves the buffet there. In the summer, both boys will have a family birthday party at Nanei’s.I got him a Transformer cake and he received a few presents. (The boys already have too much!)Evan decided to entertain everyone around us with some more dancing.I am starting to get used to this.
Birthdays with adopted children always make you wonder about their origins.I was not lucky enough to hold either of my sons at birth.I wonder about the woman who was.Ben’s mother must have tried to figure out a way to keep him.She waited 7 days before leaving him with a note outside a police station.I can only imagine that his cleft lip and palate made it impossible to feed him.She saved his life.She blessed mine eternally.
Evan’s story is infinitely more complicated.No note.Left at 3 years old. Deaf and not speaking.A mystery.I had assumed based on the barest of details that perhaps Evan’s birthparents had only lately come to know he was deaf and decided they couldn’t keep him. Or, maybe he became ill and lost his hearing. In China, the one child policy means that you only have one chance to raise a child that could support you in old age.China has few resources or opportunities for the deaf or handicapped.It is not unusual for special needs children to be abandoned.I took it for granted that I would never know what actually happened.
One night, after having a temper tantrum, Evan was sobbing. He started signing/miming thunder and lightning and a tornado.I gave him a confused look. (I’m getting really good at that!)
He grabbed some paper from my computer printer and sat on my lap.He started drawing purposefully.A house or building.Dark clouds with lightning bolts.A massive tornado next to the house. He drew a monster face on it.A stick figure on top of the house.He told me that was him.He mimed the lightning and tornado again.He mimed someone shaking him awake. He mimed/signed crying.He signed the house was gone.No more house.He drew another picture.A stick figure in a car – or a van? Tears coming down. Big Tears.He wrote “Evan” next to the stick figure.
My heart broke.I signed to Evan, “Who woke you?”
Evan paused to remember the sign.
“Father.”
He looked at me.His eyes were sad.I held him.This stubborn, maddening, delightful, surprising, fearless, confident little boy…there was no telling what losses he had endured, what led him to me.I saved the drawings for future conversations.My heart ached.Evan moved on to playing, as only children can do.
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Sometimes, I marvel at where my life has taken me.I distinctly remember a day delivering mail in Key West, bored out of my mind, the days before my sons and teaching. I was in the twilight of a relationship that was heading nowhere.I prayed, “Lord, surely you made me for more than this?I want to be useful.I want to have a family. Surely, You made me for more than sticking mail in boxes?”(Be careful what you wish for!)
This morning, my sons are sitting across from me, nicely cooperating while they build a Lego set.I am skating forward cautiously, keeping my balance, moving my feet forward.I am not fooled, though.Later today, there will certainly be arm-flailing chaos.Dorothy Hamill didn’t know what she was missing.
(Sorry the video is sideways...I can't figure out/am too lazy/ how to fix that.
“Don’t look back unless you are planning on going that way.”
This completely gels with my constant mantra of “Put one foot in front of the other.”It must have resonated with several other positive thinkers because the “Likes” and concurring comments racked up quickly.
Then, I realized, it was all wrong.
This is what Evan has taught me over the past few weeks.
Over the last month, Evan has been ornery – both at school and at home.His teachers reported that he was pushing at all the boundaries, testing all of the rules. He came home with a sad face on his behavior log for hitting another child.I asked him, “Why did you hit?”Evan looked at me, sad, and signed, “He had the guitar.”I asked, “Did you want the guitar?” Evan looked sad and just nodded.I signed that we would have to ask Santa for a guitar.This pleased Evan greatly and he smiled.
At home, I have seen behaviors resurface that I had not seen since the early weeks of China.Hitting.Seething at me.Spitting on the floor.In the house.Yep.The urge to sugar coat here is palpable.I don’t want to turn anyone off considering adoption – particularly the adoption of an older child.I like writing about the inspirational side of this process, leaving everyone with the warm fuzzies.But, I suspect it would not surprise anyone in Evan’s fan-base to discover that there are plenty of difficult days.
Most children have difficulty expressing themselves.Even adults can’t always readily define what is bothering them.Evan’s lack of speech and hearing exponentially exacerbates this.Clearly, something has been bothering him.I would like to report that I was understanding and saintly-nurturing through this, but mostly I was disappointed and frustrated.
Evan wasn’t all that pleased with me, either. One evening, he sat at the dining room table and drew a grid to represent a calendar.There were numbers in every square. The icons for Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas were clear. In one square, Evan drew a jack-o-lantern.Several squares down the line was a turkey.Then, more numbers and a Christmas tree.
I thought instantly: calendar.It turns out this was my report card.
(This is where I must confess my failing. Halloween has never been a big deal for us.Ben doesn’t like costumes, so we have always passed on this.I bought Evan a costume so he could participate with his class.I also bought a big, beautiful pumpkin for the house. Unfortunately, I never got around to carving that pumpkin.After helping Ben through tons of homework nightly, making dinner, and taking care of a million other things, it never seemed convenient to get elbow deep in pumpkin guts.The pumpkin stood in the kitchen- refusing to rot- like a great orange albatross, a monument to my shortcomings as a mother and a human being.I couldn’t throw it away because I kept thinking, “I am going to make this right.”I never did. Evan would point at it a couple of times a week, make the sign for 'knife', and gesture at me with a look of absolute disgust.)
Now, Evan looked up from his calendar, pointed to the jack-o-lantern square, jabbed the air towards me, and pen-in-hand emphatically X’d out the square.Not just once, but over and over to underline his disappointment.I pointed to the turkey, hoping for leniency. I signed that I did cook a turkey for Thanksgiving.Evan glared at me, flipped the paper over, and drew a GIANT sad face, mimicking the daily report from his teacher. This was what I earned.Shame on me.
The pumpkin finally got put out as I prepared for our Christmas visit to my Mom’s.It was still firm and orange, mocking me, and I couldn’t bear to toss it in the trash.I quietly left it on my neighbor’s stairs as we loaded the car to go to the airport.
The trip to RI was mostly uneventful.But when we arrived, Evan’s behavior continued to be challenging.I do realize that the quality of children’s behavior has an inverse relationship with the proximity of Christmas, but this seemed to be more. Other mothers confided that this regression and re-testing is not abnormal.Kids sometimes need to push to make sure you are still there to push back.It just so happens that Evan’s “pushing” draws from a deeper, more difficult place.
Threats of landing on the naughty list did not work.The day before Christmas, in an attempt to help both Ben and Evan burn off some pre-Christmas energy, I took them both to the park near my mother’s house.On our walk back, up a steep hill, Evan ran ahead.Clearly, he thought he was winning some kind of race and looked backwards to taunt us.Ben and I continued to walk at a casual pace.
Three-quarters of the way up the hill, I took a step and felt a sickening, painful POP in the back of my calf.Something had snapped. I fell to the ground, one leg useless.Ben reached down, “Mommy, are you ok???”He asked with deep concern.As I explained that something was wrong with my leg, I looked up and saw Evan looking at us from half a block away.He pointed at us and laughed at me.The hare to my defeated tortoise.He ran on ahead to my mother’s house, ran inside, and stripped to his underwear - the victor.
Ben helped me hobble home, offering himself as a human crutch.I made a mental note to make sure to specify that this child will be the one to make decisions about my elder-care.
Evan ran back out into the yard to watch our arrival.As he danced in the December air in nothing but his Ninjago underwear, he was oblivious to the cold and my pain.I hobbled indoors and made arrangements for a ride to the ER. Ben hovered.Evan played in the living room.I told Evan I was going to the doctor. He waved his hands at me dismissively, “Go.”
When I returned, hours later, on crutches, Evan seemed unfazed.Ben asked if I was going to be ok.I reassured him that this was just a temporary condition and he seemed relieved.The day wound down and we went to bed in full anticipation of Santa’s arrival.
On Christmas morning, Ben woke first at 6 a.m. wanted to run down stairs.Evan was still sleeping.Remarkably, it took several minutes to wake him up. He is new to this whole Santa-concept, so I don’t know if he forgot – or if he just wasn’t sure how it all worked.The difficulty is that I had to get him to open his eyes so I could sign to him that Santa came and there were presents under the tree.Finally, after shaking him and practically lifting his eyelids myself, Evan looked at me.I told him “Santa came!”He got up – but not with the excitement you would imagine. I figured he would rev up once he saw the stacks of presents under the tree.
We all walked downstairs.Ben may have flown – I don’t think his feet touched the floor.I expected an explosion of excitement when Evan saw the tree.He approached with caution.Certainly not the unbridled child-reaction I expected.I showed Evan his name on the gifts.He looked at me and signed, “Guitar?”I told him to open the presents and see.The smaller gifts on top were met with lukewarm enthusiasm.Finally, he got to the bottom box, somewhat triangular in shape.Evan’s eyes lit up! He tore it open. Inside was a child-sized acoustic guitar painted blue with orange flames.He opened the box and took it out and kissed it.I got a “thumbs-up” with a big grin.
Evan danced around with that guitar demonstrating moves that he had clearly picked up from watching music videos somewhere.At one point, he hopped across the living room on one leg, strumming ala Chuck Berry. This was Evan’s Christmas dream, and I (Santa) had not messed it up.Evan will be the first deaf rock star, I have no doubt.
Since Christmas, Evan carries his guitar with him everywhere.He sleeps with it.He insisted on taking it to the Laundromat and grocery store because, he mimed to me, he will sing for people and wave at them.Evan is still Evan – occasionally he forgets it is a guitar and he holds it over his head like a weapon to whack someone with.I’ve had to take the guitar from him a couple of times.Evan always apologizes and promises to do better.
Overall, Evan’s behavior seems to be improving again.I’m sure the challenges will continue.As I review the past month, I wonder if Evan had to “return to China” to see if I would still choose him – or to see if he would still choose me! Maybe, he was afraid deep-down that Christmas would fail to meet his expectations like Halloween. I can only wonder.January will mark 6 months of epic changes for this little guy.
Perhaps he will need to regress occasionally to confirm where he came from and feel in control of where he is going.Maybe we all do.The success of sites like Facebook is literally built on our desire to look back – to connect our past with our present, and link it to our future.Looking back helps us to be successful today and to make hopefully better decisions tomorrow.
When I tell people that Evan’s most prized Santa-gift was a guitar, it is met with bewilderment.It is, I’m told, the LAST thing they would think that a deaf child would want.I could have dismissed Evan’s request and deferred to my own beliefs about what he would enjoy more. But I remembered my own childhood and my mother telling me I could be anything I wanted.Despite being on the lower rungs economically, she encouraged all my dreams.When I wanted to go to a private high school, she told me I could go anywhere I wanted if I worked to pay for it.Because she believed in me, I now see all obstacles as things to be circumnavigated.There are no walls.Looking back, I can see the power that has given me in my life.This is the gift I want most to give my children year after year.This year, for Evan, it is painted blue and shaped like a guitar.
