Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Leavin' on a Jet Plane
It's official--I'll be traveling next Wednesday to pick up our little boy! Praise God that we are getting so close. I am feeling very sad for several families in our agency--they had court dates in August as we did, were delayed until next week, and now just found out they are delayed again until the end of Oct. We are very thankful that we will have Eyerusalem Samuel home very, very soon. I'm getting just a wee bit anxious about going-logistics wise. Luggage, 2 year old, luggage, and what if I get ill? Let's not go there......anyways, happy packing for me. Tomorrow's my Friday--only 2 1/2 work days left!!!!!!
Monday, September 21, 2009
Traveling
We found out today that our fingerprints have been sent (finally!) to Ethiopia. I am hoping that I can have the travel date of Oct. 7th confirmed this week. We cannot wait to see our little boy. Praise God that, no matter what, in less than 30 days I will be able to hold him and help him get through this transition. We found out tonight that John sold his truck so that is also another thing we don't have to think about in the upcoming weeks. Yeah!
Friday, September 4, 2009
Letter to Friends and Family
Dear Family and Friends,
We’ve been on this adoption journey since the Spring of 2008 and we’re almost there. As we write this, we’ve just cleared court and Samuel Eyerusalem Matthews will be coming home in a few weeks. We’re beyond excited.
Before all the craziness of travel and bringing Samuel home sets in, we wanted to share with you some of our thoughts and expectations. This adoption thing is new and exciting for us, but there’s also a lot to learn. We want to share some of that with you ahead of time and explain the rationale behind our choices. We’re always open to questions, but we may not be very receptive to those questions after 23 hours on a plane with a toddler. Hopefully this will resolve some of that.
Language
First and foremost, we need to be sensitive with the language we use to talk about adoption. We’ve brought up some of these issues already, but it’s good to be reminded and will become even more important when Samuel is home and as Mariah, Chloe, and Alexa hear you talk about adoption.
Some examples of language to avoid:
• “own child” – (example: “Why don’t you want your own child?’). Samuel is our own child. Just as we are God’s children or Jesus called Joseph his father without a biological relationship, Samuel is our own child regardless of a genetic connection. If you need to speak about a specific, genetic relationship, please use terms like “biological child” or “birth child”.
• “real” – (example: “Where are his real parents?”). We are Samuel’s real parents. If someone asks you that question, please correct them by saying, “John and Jodi are his real parents.” Instead use terms like “biological family” or “birth mother”.
• Introducing Samuel as our “adopted child” is unnecessary. It will be pretty obvious that he was adopted, but more importantly a statement like that can imply that he’s somehow second rate (did you introduce the girls as our “biological children”?).
• “Orphanage” – This term isn’t offensive, but it can have negative connotations and people can make assumptions about the level of care received. Please use the term “care center” instead. (For the record, Samuel received better care and attention in Ethiopia than he would have as an infant in daycare in the United States.)
• “Third World Country” – Please use the term “developing country” instead as this is the politically correct term for countries such as Ethiopia.
Samuel’s Story
The story of how Samuel was placed for adoption and what happened to his birth family are private and personal. We’ve decided not to share that information at this point in time. This is sacred information to an adopted child and we want to be sensitive to Samuel and make sure he learns his own story in the proper time and in the proper context. The only way to ensure that happens is to protect his story.
We realize this makes for a difficult situation. Even the girls will be curious about Samuel’s story, but we don’t want them to know the story before Samuel does. As kids do, they could taunt him with details of that story and deprive him of learning about his own past in the proper context.
This is all about protecting Samuel and helping him to understand and appreciate his story. And it won’t be easy. More than likely we’ll end up telling him bits and pieces or generalized versions of the story as he’s old enough, and then it will be up to him whether or not he wants to share those pieces of the story with you. If he asks you questions that you can’t answer, simply tell him to ask us.
We hope you’ll understand our reasoning and give us grace as we try to sort out what we can share, with who, and when.
Coming Home
One of the biggest challenges we’ll face is the need to bond with Samuel. He has had four different homes in his very short lifetime, so this again is a huge adjustment for him. He’s likely to regress and need to re-learn basic skills.
Because of the importance of forming a quick and strong attachment with Samuel, we’ll be doing things a bit differently than we did with the girls. We’re going to seem rather over-protective, but it’s all in the name of forming an attachment with Samuel so he can feel safe and thrive in our family. We’ve done a lot of research on this, so we hope you’ll trust us and not second-guess our choices.
What does that mean? It means we’ll be promoting attachment with Samuel in a number of ways, including:
• Sleeping in our room/bed.
• “Toddler” wearing. We’ll be holding or carrying Samuel as much as possible. Lots of time will be spent in an Ergo or sling.
• “Funneling” techniques. This is a big one. The basic idea is that we need to be the only source for Samuel’s needs. Everything needs to be funneled through us. This means all feeding, changing, holding, comforting, bathing, dressing, etc. needs to be done by us. Don’t worry—this won’t last forever. It’s only during the initial attachment period, which will take as long as necessary. You will get to spend plenty of time with Samuel, but he’ll need to be in our care. There won’t be the usual game of ‘pass the baby’ (you may not even get to hold Samuel when we first come home) until that attachment is firmly established. And we don’t know how long that will take, so please be patient with us. Trust us, as soon as Samuel’s ready we’ll be happy to let you comfort him when he’s crying. But until then we have to be the ones to meet his basic needs.
• Cocooning. When we first bring Samuel home everything in his short life will have completely changed. One way to minimize that trauma is to minimize additional new experiences. A good way to do that is to bunker down at home and not introduce him to lots of new places. For the first few weeks or months at home we might not go anywhere or do anything. Limiting new experiences also means meeting new people. This will depend on Samuel’s personality, but we may need to take it easy with visitors at first. You will get to meet Samuel right away, but we may need to keep those visits short at first.
• Bonding with Mariah, Chloe, and Alexa. Samuel and the girls will also need to bond to one another and we’ll undoubtedly face some jealousy and regression from Alexa as she gets used to losing her place as the youngest child. While it’d be tempting to let others take care of the girls while we deal with Samuel, that won’t always be helpful. These are just a few of the ways that we’ll be working on bonding with Samuel. We’ll need your help as we go through this, but unfortunately that help will likely mean doing things around the house as opposed to holding our cute boy.
Racial Issues
We’re now a multi-cultural and multi-racial family. There are a lot of issues that can come up here and we want to be open and honest about them. More than anything it’s important to keep an open mind about racial issues. We’re all learning here.
As an example, it’s important that Samuel see people and families who physically look like him and his family in his books and toys. This is also important for the girls. As a family (and really as people) we should be celebrating diversity. That means all races and cultures, not just black and white. This is more our responsibility as parents, but we bring it up just as something to keep in mind. We also need to be clear that we will not tolerate racism. We will not put up with any prejudice or racist comment of any kind about any group of people. We hope that you will also not allow negative, hurtful, racist, or bigoted statements to go unchallenged. Our family will have a zero tolerance policy to these kinds of comments. That may mean confronting someone immediately or simply leaving a situation completely and dealing with the person later. This is non-negotiable. We understand this may be a difficult issue for some, and we’re more than willing to educate and promote understanding, but we will not tolerate continued racist comments or attitudes, whether they’re directed at Samuel or not.
In relation to that, we will be working very hard to keep Ethiopian culture alive for Samuel. We hope that you will respect and encourage that as well as this culture is now part of our family’s culture. We will not tolerate any negative statements about Ethiopia, her people, culture or food.
In Closing
If you have any questions please feel free to ask us. Part of being adoptive parents is helping to educate others in adoption and it’s a role we take very seriously. Ask the hard questions and we will do our best to give you an honest answer. If it is too personal we will simply say “that’s not something we are willing to share” and leave it at that. We want you to be familiar and comfortable with this whole process and talking about it before jetlag sets in is the best time.
Finally, thank you. You have all supported us through this long and tiring process and that means the world. We’re almost there and we know you’ll continue to support us and help us welcome Samuel into our family.
Love,
John and Jodi
——-
If you are interested in any of our resources these books were a huge help to us during the process:
The Weaver’s Craft
There is No Me Without You
Attaching in Adoption
Adoption Parenting: Creating a Toolbox, Building Connections
I am Chocolate, You are Vanilla
We’ve been on this adoption journey since the Spring of 2008 and we’re almost there. As we write this, we’ve just cleared court and Samuel Eyerusalem Matthews will be coming home in a few weeks. We’re beyond excited.
Before all the craziness of travel and bringing Samuel home sets in, we wanted to share with you some of our thoughts and expectations. This adoption thing is new and exciting for us, but there’s also a lot to learn. We want to share some of that with you ahead of time and explain the rationale behind our choices. We’re always open to questions, but we may not be very receptive to those questions after 23 hours on a plane with a toddler. Hopefully this will resolve some of that.
Language
First and foremost, we need to be sensitive with the language we use to talk about adoption. We’ve brought up some of these issues already, but it’s good to be reminded and will become even more important when Samuel is home and as Mariah, Chloe, and Alexa hear you talk about adoption.
Some examples of language to avoid:
• “own child” – (example: “Why don’t you want your own child?’). Samuel is our own child. Just as we are God’s children or Jesus called Joseph his father without a biological relationship, Samuel is our own child regardless of a genetic connection. If you need to speak about a specific, genetic relationship, please use terms like “biological child” or “birth child”.
• “real” – (example: “Where are his real parents?”). We are Samuel’s real parents. If someone asks you that question, please correct them by saying, “John and Jodi are his real parents.” Instead use terms like “biological family” or “birth mother”.
• Introducing Samuel as our “adopted child” is unnecessary. It will be pretty obvious that he was adopted, but more importantly a statement like that can imply that he’s somehow second rate (did you introduce the girls as our “biological children”?).
• “Orphanage” – This term isn’t offensive, but it can have negative connotations and people can make assumptions about the level of care received. Please use the term “care center” instead. (For the record, Samuel received better care and attention in Ethiopia than he would have as an infant in daycare in the United States.)
• “Third World Country” – Please use the term “developing country” instead as this is the politically correct term for countries such as Ethiopia.
Samuel’s Story
The story of how Samuel was placed for adoption and what happened to his birth family are private and personal. We’ve decided not to share that information at this point in time. This is sacred information to an adopted child and we want to be sensitive to Samuel and make sure he learns his own story in the proper time and in the proper context. The only way to ensure that happens is to protect his story.
We realize this makes for a difficult situation. Even the girls will be curious about Samuel’s story, but we don’t want them to know the story before Samuel does. As kids do, they could taunt him with details of that story and deprive him of learning about his own past in the proper context.
This is all about protecting Samuel and helping him to understand and appreciate his story. And it won’t be easy. More than likely we’ll end up telling him bits and pieces or generalized versions of the story as he’s old enough, and then it will be up to him whether or not he wants to share those pieces of the story with you. If he asks you questions that you can’t answer, simply tell him to ask us.
We hope you’ll understand our reasoning and give us grace as we try to sort out what we can share, with who, and when.
Coming Home
One of the biggest challenges we’ll face is the need to bond with Samuel. He has had four different homes in his very short lifetime, so this again is a huge adjustment for him. He’s likely to regress and need to re-learn basic skills.
Because of the importance of forming a quick and strong attachment with Samuel, we’ll be doing things a bit differently than we did with the girls. We’re going to seem rather over-protective, but it’s all in the name of forming an attachment with Samuel so he can feel safe and thrive in our family. We’ve done a lot of research on this, so we hope you’ll trust us and not second-guess our choices.
What does that mean? It means we’ll be promoting attachment with Samuel in a number of ways, including:
• Sleeping in our room/bed.
• “Toddler” wearing. We’ll be holding or carrying Samuel as much as possible. Lots of time will be spent in an Ergo or sling.
• “Funneling” techniques. This is a big one. The basic idea is that we need to be the only source for Samuel’s needs. Everything needs to be funneled through us. This means all feeding, changing, holding, comforting, bathing, dressing, etc. needs to be done by us. Don’t worry—this won’t last forever. It’s only during the initial attachment period, which will take as long as necessary. You will get to spend plenty of time with Samuel, but he’ll need to be in our care. There won’t be the usual game of ‘pass the baby’ (you may not even get to hold Samuel when we first come home) until that attachment is firmly established. And we don’t know how long that will take, so please be patient with us. Trust us, as soon as Samuel’s ready we’ll be happy to let you comfort him when he’s crying. But until then we have to be the ones to meet his basic needs.
• Cocooning. When we first bring Samuel home everything in his short life will have completely changed. One way to minimize that trauma is to minimize additional new experiences. A good way to do that is to bunker down at home and not introduce him to lots of new places. For the first few weeks or months at home we might not go anywhere or do anything. Limiting new experiences also means meeting new people. This will depend on Samuel’s personality, but we may need to take it easy with visitors at first. You will get to meet Samuel right away, but we may need to keep those visits short at first.
• Bonding with Mariah, Chloe, and Alexa. Samuel and the girls will also need to bond to one another and we’ll undoubtedly face some jealousy and regression from Alexa as she gets used to losing her place as the youngest child. While it’d be tempting to let others take care of the girls while we deal with Samuel, that won’t always be helpful. These are just a few of the ways that we’ll be working on bonding with Samuel. We’ll need your help as we go through this, but unfortunately that help will likely mean doing things around the house as opposed to holding our cute boy.
Racial Issues
We’re now a multi-cultural and multi-racial family. There are a lot of issues that can come up here and we want to be open and honest about them. More than anything it’s important to keep an open mind about racial issues. We’re all learning here.
As an example, it’s important that Samuel see people and families who physically look like him and his family in his books and toys. This is also important for the girls. As a family (and really as people) we should be celebrating diversity. That means all races and cultures, not just black and white. This is more our responsibility as parents, but we bring it up just as something to keep in mind. We also need to be clear that we will not tolerate racism. We will not put up with any prejudice or racist comment of any kind about any group of people. We hope that you will also not allow negative, hurtful, racist, or bigoted statements to go unchallenged. Our family will have a zero tolerance policy to these kinds of comments. That may mean confronting someone immediately or simply leaving a situation completely and dealing with the person later. This is non-negotiable. We understand this may be a difficult issue for some, and we’re more than willing to educate and promote understanding, but we will not tolerate continued racist comments or attitudes, whether they’re directed at Samuel or not.
In relation to that, we will be working very hard to keep Ethiopian culture alive for Samuel. We hope that you will respect and encourage that as well as this culture is now part of our family’s culture. We will not tolerate any negative statements about Ethiopia, her people, culture or food.
In Closing
If you have any questions please feel free to ask us. Part of being adoptive parents is helping to educate others in adoption and it’s a role we take very seriously. Ask the hard questions and we will do our best to give you an honest answer. If it is too personal we will simply say “that’s not something we are willing to share” and leave it at that. We want you to be familiar and comfortable with this whole process and talking about it before jetlag sets in is the best time.
Finally, thank you. You have all supported us through this long and tiring process and that means the world. We’re almost there and we know you’ll continue to support us and help us welcome Samuel into our family.
Love,
John and Jodi
——-
If you are interested in any of our resources these books were a huge help to us during the process:
The Weaver’s Craft
There is No Me Without You
Attaching in Adoption
Adoption Parenting: Creating a Toolbox, Building Connections
I am Chocolate, You are Vanilla
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