When Hearts Are Exposed

Sometimes it feels like my skin has been ripped off and my heart is there, naked and vulnerable to all the sorrows in the world. Today is one of those days.

I've always experienced seasons like this, my whole life. I can remember being very tiny and feeling like I would simply die from the pain of taking in what was around me. If I saw my elderly neighbor sitting alone through her window, I ached bitterly. If I saw a child crying out of loneliness, the pain would suffocate me. I always thought it was a curse. I didn't understand why I had to feel so much pain. It was and is unbearable at times. And if you share these feelings with others, they often think you are trying to be a martyr or bragging about your sensitivity. Neither is true for me. I almost always, without exception, suffer in silence.

And when these seasons come, I want to hide in my room and weep and weep and pray without ceasing. But life doesn't usually afford me the luxury of a cloistered existence. So instead, I do my best to walk through my days and do what needs to be done, all the while nursing an exposed heart that is being battered by every little measure of suffering it sees.

I know I am one of thousands grieving over what occurred in Japan right now. I won't even let myself watch the news today, because I can't cry anymore. To see the pain so many thousands of people are living is crazy-making. I can't eat, can't sleep...and worse is knowing my agony does not lift one atom of their pain. I pray and pray until I fall asleep, but often berate myself for not being able to conceive of a more practical way to help. What can we do, powerless creatures that we are, but pray? And yet prayer often feels like meaningless gibberish in these times. Words, words, words....while my faraway brothers and sisters break from the mammoth weight of their grief.

I feel my heart throbbing through my skin these last few days. It feels like it will beat right out of my chest wall. It can't hold all these sorrows. And yet I don't know how to have peace about them. I call and call on God and hear my own voice echo in the canyon of grief my heart inhabits.

I know I sound like a little child, I know I should understand these things by now, but I don't. I still ask God every night why there has to be so much suffering in the world. It still sickens me every day to see the world revolving around things that don't matter, while things that DO matter go unnoticed. I can't seem to get an answer. Nothing satisfies. If I'm not actively doing something to alleviate another's pain, I feel useless. If I'm not pushing forward every second to better the lives of those children in Siberia I love, I feel like a hypocrite. Who am I to eat till I'm full when they can't? Who am I to have so many people to love and support me when they don't?

I can't bear it.

There really is nothing you can say to help my heart move back inside my body. I've tried. It's stuck on this very exposed and vulnerable precipice where the wind and waves batter it incessantly. I can only hope this is part of God's bigger plan. I know that suffering has meaning. I know that suffering is often the door to greater and greater glories. But sometimes --- sometimes it just feels like my heart will slowly wear away from all the slings and arrows it catches. Some days it feels like my heart shivers on an exposed cliff during a hurricane, and it has nothing and no one to protect it.

God, if it's Your will, you can keep my heart raw and hurting. But if you can at least wrap it in some insulating blanket of your protection, I am ready to accept that. I share this pain with you, my readers, only because I know this truth:

'Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak

Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break.' ~ Shakespeare

Where Are Their Mothers and Fathers?

Every day that you and I wake up and kiss our children good morning, and make their breakfasts, and cuddle them in our arms is a day these children wake up alone.

These are only five of the 100 children at Orphanage #5. Look at their faces. What did they do to deserve waking up every day of their lives without a mom or a dad to love them? Where are their families? Who is going to step up and out of their comfortable lives to say 'yes' to them? Who is willing to commit their life to nurturing and loving these beautiful little souls?

I get emails on a daily basis from people asking how they might adopt these kids. Emails that express sorrow and concern over their plight. Emails that lead me to think there is hope. But out of the hundreds ( yes, hundreds) of emails I have received in these past 6 months, only two families are serious enough to start looking into a homestudy and contacting the DOE in Russia about a particular child. Why?

Why????

I don't understand why so many people would write me and say a particular child is calling to them, and then not do everything in their power to bring that child home. Help me understand. If you feel drawn to a child, and you are in a position to adopt, why aren't you pursuing it? Please tell me! The truth is that if these children are not adopted, most of them will be dead before they reach 25 years of age. Dead. What on earth is more important than finding their forever moms and dads? If you are called, why aren't you moving heaven and earth to make them yours?

Money is no obstacle. I've explained it a hundred times. Even if it takes you a year to raise the funds to adopt, eventually that child will be home. Even if you have to sell all you can and fundraise and take on extra work, eventually that work will pay off -- there will be a child in a home, safe and loved.

Please, please during this Lenten Season, look very closely at your heart. If there is room there for a child, why not commit right here and now to make them yours? It is a long and difficult road - no question -- but there are very few things in this world more pressing than giving a child a home.

Please spread the word -- not only about these 100 children that I so love, but of the estimated 143 million other orphans in the world. They need us. They need more of us willing to sacrifice for them.

Walk In My Shoes, Will You?

A nasty anonymous email will throw anyone for a loop. Why do people bother putting such effort into hurting another human being? I'll never understand it. This woman is angry, I take it. She doesn't like that I 'don't tell it like it is' in my blog concerning my daughter's RAD diagnosis and current behavior. She thinks I should take down the info on RAD and the mention of RAD in my profile if I'm not going to directly address it anymore. Obviously, this is a fellow mom dealing with RAD who feels the need to lash out. So be it. But aren't we here to help one another?

I choose not to blog about the significant spot RAD still holds in our lives because my daughter is older now, and she has friends online and these friends can read. I choose not to blog about the specifics because I respect my daughter's wishes and growing need for privacy. I choose not to tell you all the details of our current day to day life because, frankly, it's none of your business, unless I decide to share it.

I choose not to share about RAD much anymore for other reasons, too. Our lives are far more than my daughter's diagnosis. I actually purged my blog reader of some fellow RAD bloggers a few months ago simply because almost every post I read was so very angry. I hated reading about the parental rage. Even if it wasn't addressed directly, it was there simmering under the letters on the screen. It made me sad, and depressed. It wasn't getting me anywhere. I like reading about what works. I don't enjoy reading about another person's daily traumas that have no resolution. I have enough of my own, to be honest.

It's always best to be honest, so I will say very openly that I am also against many of the methods used by fellow RAD bloggers with their children. For me, it's all about love. I know it's easier in the short run to follow the likes of Nancy Thomas than to get down and dirty with what Heather Forbes asks of you, but I'd rather try harder and take longer, and be true to what I believe is right and true. It's scary to do that kind of work, especially when it requires your own self-reflection. I know not everyone agrees with me, and so that is another reason to keep RAD pretty much out of the conversation in my blog these days. I would rather be a light in the darkness than another mom ranting about how hard RAD is and how there is no cure and no way out.

Hard? You betcha. I feel like I have lived two distinct lives, if truth be told. I have my pre-RAD life and post-RAD life. I lost good friends. Heck, I even lost family for awhile. I lost my child-like exhuberance for life (or alot of it.) I lost the ability to laugh every day, but I'm working on getting it back. I lost a wealth of things. But when I said yes to my daughter, I said yes for life.

These days, we still deal with RAD issues, and of course I do talk with our therapists and a few very close friends about it, but not here. If a mom writes me privately and asks for help, I talk openly with her about my experience, but not here. Here, this blog, is where I try to inspire myself to keep going every day. It's where I explore my own need for inspiration and for my desire to find kindred spirits in this cyber-world. It's where I try to crawl towards the light and even point it out to others when I feel I can.

I'm sorry if this post offends any of you. I'm sorry I don't choose to be part of that RAD club anymore. I am on a different journey now. I'll still write about RAD when I feel inspired to, but probably not directly about our personal experience of RAD here at home. I'll save that for private conversations and emails. I want everything I write here, to the best of my often inadequate and naive human ability, to be about hope and light and making the world a better place. My old bumper sticker said it best,

'My job here is to comfort the disturbed, and to disturb the comfortable.'

Please let me do this without feeling the need to attack or control me. It's what God wants me to do, and who am I to argue with Someone who so obviously has the greater perspective?

Anonymous mom, I have no idea what you are going through right now, but I suspect it is rough and you are lashing out in pain. I will pray for you and hope you find the resolution you are looking for. but I promise you, it is not here with me. Look at your own path, your own shoes. Mine are already filled and hastening down my own path. And --I wish you peace and wisdom on your journey, even though you chose to disturb mine.

My Daughter, My Hero.....It's Been Six Years.

Exactly six years ago today,  I first walked into Orphanage #5 in Prokopyevsk, Russia and met my daughter for the first time. She was tiny and terrified. She did not smile, but I fell in love with this scared little girl and my life has never been the same.

I wrote the following  five years ago, in honor of my daughter, and am reposting it to share with the world the absolutely unspeakable gratitude I have for being given the gift of motherhood. Anastasia Holly, you are God's greatest gift to me, and I love you 'more than words can wield the matter.'

My daughter is at school right now. That might not seem like a miracle to anyone else, but I know what it takes for her to walk in those doors every morning.

My daughter is my hero for so many reasons, and my only sadness is that no one else sees. She should have football stadiums full of cheering, adoring fans. Yes, she is that amazing. My daughter was physically abused and neglected throughout her infancy. We'll never know the details, but the scars remain to remind us both. My daughter was abandoned by the only mother she knew at two and a half years old. By her own birthmother's account she was left outside alone, with her sister, waiting for a mother to return who never did. By this same woman's account, my daughter was later 'taken in' by an abusive neighbor who later tried to kill her. My daughter is my hero, because she fought that day. With her little two-year-old spirit, she fought to live when some sick person supposedly placed her in an oven. She fought when 3rd degree burns covered her arms, legs, head and back. The pain must have been unimaginable, but this little soul wanted to live. According to the police report, a neighbor  heard her screams and rescued her just it time. My heart sinks as I type these words.

My daughter is my hero because, after an entire year in a hospital, likely left alone most of the time and likely tied to her crib, she survived and did not choose to die. God knows she could have. God knows it would have been easier than what was even to come. What was the day like when a Department of Education official came and carried her to the car for her three hour journey to the special Care Baby Orphanage in the dark and hopeless coal-mining town she ended up in? What did she see out the window? What thoughts kept her going? After two years in this place of relative safety, what was it like for her on the day another official came to move her to yet another orphanage - the one for older children? Did she get to say goodbye? Did she have a toy to hug? Was she comforted on the ride? Was she welcomed warmly when she entered the crumbling building that housed one hundred older, lost and silent children just like her? From her recollection there were no hugs, no toys, no comfort. There was only uncertainty and fear. And yet, my daughter faced these things with the courage and resolve of a soldier.

My daughter is my hero because, when she grew older and decided not to take the beatings anymore, she fought back. She fought off the teenage girls who would steal her food and rip her hair out. She fought off the older boys. She fought the bullies who gave her the countless scars that run like miniature riverbeds across her face. She fought the beatings of staff on days she was too sick to go to school, on days the staff could care less, just wanting her out of the way. My daughter is my hero because, she fought and fought at age ten when the staff decided she was not "compliant" enough and sent her to a mental asylum for six months. Torn from the only close friend she had without even a chance to say goodbye, driven for hours into the Siberian wilderness, my daughter fought while they tied her down and shaved her bald. My daughter fought so much that she got  'big needles stuck in me everyday' that made her 'see things like through snow, blurry.' My daughter is my hero because even in this hell of inhuman suffering, she chose to keep living. She didn't have to. She knew plenty of people who didn't. She instead, made a friend and created a make-believe world of family with this older girl that became her safety net, her solace. At night, she still wonders out-loud what happened to this sister-friend who stayed behind. We say prayers for her as we fall asleep. 

My daughter is my hero because when she was returned once again to the orphanage and the girls began to steal her food again, she came up with a plan. She ran miles through the village with her friend and hid behind the stones in the cemetery, waiting. My daughter was smart - she knew that people would leave food on the graves. She hid until the mourners would leave and she could steal the food and run home, with hunger pains soothed for the day. My daughter is my hero for so many horrific events she made it through in one piece, things I cannot even write here because they are too terrible. But if you look at my daughter long enough, you can glimpse these atrocities in the way her eyes dart and shake when she feels the slightest bit of fear. You can see them in the wall she has built up around her that we are carefully, slowly, taking down.

My daughter, my hero - how did you feel when you walked into the room filled with self-important officials and stoic orphanage directors and soul-less translators, and me? I saw the terror in your eyes, and yet, you did not run. When I smiled at you, you looked at me and tilted your head, puppy-like, and just stared. Were smiles so rare in your world? You grimaced when the official snapped the elastic out of your hair (breaking it) so I could 'get a better look' at its brilliance. 'Look at her hair, look at her hair - she is very healthy.' It made me sick. 'Please, please...let her be,' I pleaded. Why were they so shocked I did not want to "examine" your teeth or run my fingers through your hair, or have you sit on my lap? Silly American, they thought.

My daughter, you are my hero because, despite all the years of hurts and abuses and terror and silent dark nights, you took a chance on me. You didn't know me. You were told that Americans chop you up and sell your organs. You were teased by the staff that I was a 'fat and stupid American' who would 'never come back for you.' The gifts I gave you that day were stolen from you. Still, the next day you came back, smiling. I watched you run down the stairs as I walked in the door. You took my hand and traced my nervous fingers with yours as we walked into the meeting room. You did not ask what presents I brought. You did not ask for food, though you had skipped both breakfast and lunch in order to sit and watch for me by the window. You just sat by me with that curious, soulful look, trying to make sense of the words that came out of my mouth. My dear, sweet, beautiful girl. You are the bravest most wonderful soul I have ever met. I want to call it from rooftops and sing it in songs, and beat drums down my street to call out all the complacent people of the world to witness your absolute beauty. God, you are beautiful. And every time a person walks by you, not noticing, I want to grab them and say 'Look at this girl...look!' You are my light, Anastasia.... truly, truly my reason for being, my all.

It is a year, this week, since I walked into that god-forsaken place and met you. A year. And I am here, dear sweet girl, to tell you I am the luckiest mom in the world. Oh, God yes, the luckiest.

The Absolute Joy of Sacrifice

St Gemma, whose whole life was a sacrifice.

Blessed Lent, everyone!

There is joy in sacrifice. Absolute joy. Don't let the world fool you-- sacrifice is not all sorrow and ashes and pain. Sacrifice brings a deep and abiding joy into your heart. The deeper the sacrifice, the deeper the joy. Of course sacrifice can be painful, but the end results are always joy.

Think about the sacrifice a mother makes to birth a child...nine months of giving over her body to another human being, and the final hours of this sacrifice, before the child takes its first breath, are hours of mind-boggling pain. I know, I've been there holding the hand of many friends as they gave birth. The pain they were willing to experience in order to birth their child was downright terrifying to watch. And then? And then their child is there, taking its first breath and crying out to the world 'I'm here!' The sacrifice is a pale memory when it stands side by side with the reality of a new life. A new life!

Every sacrifice brings pain, yes, but the reward is always oceans and mountains bigger than the pain. During this Lenten season, whether Christian or Jew, Atheist or Pantheist, try the road of sacrifice and see where it takes you. I promise you will not be disappointed. The deeper the sacrifice, the deeper your joy will be. What better pay off can you ask for? Even the bank doesn't give returns like that on your savings account! It's miraculous, really.

The challenge I offer you today, is think of at least one material thing you love. Then give it away to someone who could use it, or sell it and use the proceeds for some greater good that you know needs the funds. Easy? No. But you will be stunned at the effects of this gesture, if you do it with love.

“We cannot all do great things, but we can all do small things with great love.”

~Mother Teresa

Little Sacrifices

We live in the 'me' generation. Don't let anyone fool you that it was in the 70s...it's now. Yesterday, I begrudgingly watched tv with my daughter. Cartoons. it was my way of doing something she liked to do without complaint..lol. It was hard. but what struck me was how many commercials make reference to 'me' time and putting yourself first, and how 'right' they make it sound. It made me sad. My personal belief is that the most important, and healing, time we can spend is for others. And it doesn't take much.

Today's challenge, for those interested, is to try to complete ten (yes, ten!) little sacrifices for others in the next 24 hours. Tiny little gestures that put others first. It's very easy! You can let someone ahead of you in traffic, you can insist the young frazzled mother behind you in the grocery line go ahead of you, you could offer to pick up a friends' kids from school, you could clean up the trash on your street, or even just a big smile and eye contact to a weary convenient store worker. All these little sacrifices add up.

'Teach this triple truth to all: A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity.' ~ Buddha

'Do all the good you can and make as little fuss about it as possible.' ~ Charles Dickens

'How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment to improve the world.' ~ Anne Frank

These Kids Want A Family! (Repost)

(Urged to repost this. So I am. It's from December 2010)

I feel compelled today to remind everyone who reads my blog that the children you are sending gifts to have one gift they desire more than any other -- a family. More than half of the children at orphanage #5 are currently available for adoption.Why aren't they being adopted? Many reasons, but the primary one is that they are not babies. Adopting an older child is not for the faint-hearted, but I cannot imagine anything more rewarding in life than giving a home to an older child.

I am not in the adoption field, but I do want to do everything in my power to advocate for these kids. As you can imagine, many of them are very jealous that D is being adopted, and wonder why no one has come for them. Are you the person they've been waiting for? Are you willing to do what it takes to bring them home? Here are a few random things you absolutely need in order to adopt:

1. Infinite Patience: it can take as little as four months but as much as a year or so ( longer if complications occur) to bring a child home. It depends on so many factors that it is impossible to gauge a time frame. But isn't a child worth the wait?

2. A Lifetime Commitment : Older children come home with many problems. They are damaged and hurting and it takes a great deal of time for them to heal but again, isn't it worth the time and effort? I know my daughter was and is. You cannot adopt these children expecting gratitude from them. You need to be the adult who leads them to healing. You cannot give up on them. Ever.

3. A Loving Heart : And by love, I mean the action word. You need to have enough love to put someone else first. You need enough love to say goodbye to your former life and welcome a whole new type of life in -- one of sacrifice and some suffering. ( Sorry, need to be honest here.) You need to be willing to make this child your life's work, the work of your heart. You need to be willing to let go of expectations, and just allow that child to move at his or her pace in healing. It can take a lifetime.

Of course there are other practical requirements -- You need to be healthy, you need to make enough money to qualify, but that's fairly easy. I only made $30,000 a year when I adopted Nastia. You don't need to be married (I'm single) You do not need to own a home (I don't.) You do not need to be rich (I'm not.) You do not need to even have a college degree. ( I do, but not everyone who adopts does!)

If you want to adopt, and you meet the above criteria, you should adopt. Plain and simple. Too many people let either the financial concerns or the fear of the paperwork get in the way. It's hard, I won't lie. It took me five years to save the money to adopt Nastia. Five years. Filling out the paperwork was one of the most difficult things I've ever done in my life ( I'd rather climb Mt Everest, to be honest) Having ADHD made it very difficult to get through all the documents, but I did it. Slowly and painstakingly. You can, too.

Don't let age be a deterrent either! In Russia you can adopt well into your fifties, as long as you are no more than 45 years older than the child you are adopting. Meaning, I can still adopt children ages 5 and up . But Latvia has no upper age limit! My friend Jama is adopting a 14 year old right now, and she is 61! ( Hope you don't mind my sharing, Jama!)

Here's the thing -- I truly believe that there is nothing more urgent and important in this world that finding homes for orphaned children. These are real flesh and blood children we are talking about. I met them, held their hands, wiped their tears, and listened to their desperate pleas for families. I met hundreds of them in Russia, and yet there are millions more throughout the world.

Lives matters. Souls matter. Christmas presents, houses, ipads and ipods, vacations, jewelry, fancy clothing, spa visits, -- Do NOT matter! AT ALL! Every extra dollar you spend on things you don't need could be making a difference in the life of a child. Strike that -- it could be the difference between life and death for them. Truly - life or death.

Can't adopt? Why not give to someone's adoption fund? I plan on committing a monthly donation to adoption funds once I get D home. Why not commit to raising a specific amount for a family that wants to adopt but needs a little leg up financially?

Here are some of the kids waiting at Orphanage #5. They are even 'advertised' on the new orphanage website. They are waiting, waiting so very long to have someone to love them enough to climb that mountain for them.

Christina

Valya

Dima and Angelina ( not related, just in same photo)

Rosa, who has a younger brother Vasya.

Pray for these kids. Advocate for them. Tell people about them. If you can't adopt, try sending them monthly care packages or letters. It may be a pain to translate a letter into Russian from one of those online programs -- but it's not impossible. I do it at least once a week.

Want to adopt but don't have the funds? There are countless organizations that give grants to help. There are also amazing organizations like Reece's Rainbow that make adopting down syndrome and special needs children very affordable. If money is your excuse, throw it out the window. It is a flimsy excuse. If I can adopt as a single mother in this economy, making under $40,000 a year, you can. Start saving now! Hold yard sales, bake sales, have an online auction, sell things! I'm currently selling things on craigslist and it may end up paying for half of D's adoption costs! Look around your house -- you'll be amazed at what you find you can sell!

Ok, I am stepping down off the soapbox. But I'm not saying I won't get back up on it very soon :)