..."Brackish and Incandescent"...: Regression and Leaping Forward

Last week, as I blogged about, we had the marvelous experience of the first meeting with The Singer's foster parents in our home. I shared in earlier blogs about his responses. For the most part, as soon as they left, he seemed reassured and at peace. Life has gone on in the subsequent days, as normal.

However, I didn't blog about The Bruiser's responses.

For those of you who are unaware. The Singer and The Bruiser were adopted on the same day. They are only 1 week apart in age. The Singer having been given the blessing of spending his early years in a foster home...The Bruiser however, spent his everyday in our local orphanage...institutionalized. We are making it a point to connect with his main Nanny, as she too lives here in our city, as we hope to provide a link to his history as we have been able to with our other 3 adopted ones.

When we received the boys in June, we were shocked to see the developmental differences between the two boys. Please don't misunderstand me, we have been around adoption now for several years, I have been trained/well read/seen evidence of institutional delays in children. We expected that The Bruiser would suffer from those delays. Perhaps it was so striking due to the fact that we had these two sons, of identical age, and to see that The Singer was beyond expectation in regards to developmental milestones...whereas The Bruiser was at least 12-18months behind. The difference was so stark. At 2 years 8 months old, the Bruiser could walk only short distances (due to weak muscles), could be planted on the floor with limited stimuli for long periods of time, could not feed himself, was not potty trained, etc. Also anytime he would come up to any bar like object at his mouth level (especially something metal, porcelain, or COLD)...he would put it into his mouth...no matter the location we were in or how DISGUSTING the object.There are various other developmental milestones that were lagging as well...but these demonstrate some of the bigger issues.

Of course, we adapted to his needs and settled into having a 1 year old child, instead of a 2.5 year old.

We celebrated his hasty potty training, as we couldn't continue to send him to school with no pants on (see earlier posts.) And, he can now run around quite well with his brothers. We never take the stroller out for him anymore, whereas we simply had to for the first 2.5 months as he was too uncoordinated to walk very far. We attributed this to the institutionalized situation of lots of "crib time." However now, he can go shopping with us all day, walking quite rapidly and confidently. Only struggling sometimes from the effects of his right foot's inward turn.

Returning to the day of the The Singer's foster parent visit...

During their visit, The Bruiser seemed really teary and irritable. In fact, Daddy had to take him out of the room and to our bedroom for a bit of quiet-calming time. It did strike us as odd, but, the events going on were so animated...we dismissed it.

Then I asked The Singer's foster mom if she had ever seen/knew The Bruiser while he lived in the orphanage. She said, "of course." She apparently went to the orphanage often as she is a key person in the local fostering community, so not only was she familiar with him...but he was familiar with her.

She said that even though he was the oldest boy in his "grouping" living at the orphanage, every time she saw him out of his crib, he was in the nanny's arms, being treated like a baby.

The night went on and we discussed little else about The Bruiser, but he did seem a big clingy to his Daddy throughout the rest of the event.

However, the next day, he began to wet his pants. Standing next to me, emptying his bladder in a massive puddle on the floor, without even the reaction of "uh oh!" It was like he was totally checked-out. Four times in that day it happened. Keep in mind that in the 3 weeks prior, absolutely NO daytime accidents, and eagerly telling anyone near that he had to go to the potty...

It lasted only one day...and then the next day it was as if he returned to his right self again.

I'm certainly aware of regressions that most kids exhibit from time to time. We've experienced them with each of our kids. But this was so dramatic, and accompanied by his complete lack of reaction...that it was clear to us that something had triggered it. As it began the very next morning after The Singer's foster mother's visit...it must have been connected to it.

Now I'm ever so eager to dive into exploring more detail about his life at the orphanage. As we live only a short distance away, and we have some key relationships to facilitate it...I have to get some more understanding. Seeing The Singer's foster mom must have been the trigger...it must have made him feel insecure at the very least...and at the worst, triggered some really difficult emotional memories.

The day after he was brought to meet us at the Civil Affairs office, we returned to sign the final papers that we indeed DID want to adopt these boys. A representative of the orphanage, there to witness and sign the documents for both boys, asked The Bruiser did he want to go back to the orphanage to see his special Nanny? His response, a firm, "Bu Yuo"..."Don't want." They seemed a bit surprised by his response, but smiled and commented on the "good match" he was with his family.

I've heard that such a response is not all together uncommon, that only a few days after children from orphanages come to their parents that during arranged "visits" to their orphanages that the children show no signs of "homesickness," if you will.

Still, I've got to do more reading, more delving into this issue of institutionalized living...and try to uncover more of the mysteries of The Bruiser's early life. Psychologically something was triggered that set him off balance for the next day after seeing someone he associated with the orphanage... I brought the book The Connected Child by Purvis Here with me this year...and now have a dear Sister back There who will be reading it with me...maybe more insights will come there.

Yesterday however, as I saw him sitting at the table...eating his breakfast...feeding himself with little mess, I was reminded how far he's come in 3.5 months. When he told me later in the morning, "Momma, look at me," in clear English, and them promptly did a dance that had us all in stitches...I thought of his progress again. And as I watched him run down the street, still with a bit of a "baby's gait," but unassisted, and SO JOYFUL...I was reassured that he is flourishing, leaping forward in every area developmentally.

When enrolling the boys in school Here, we had to give them Chinese names. With all our children, we have kept a portion of their first names...usually the third character...which is typically doubled and used to call a baby or small child his/her name. For instance, if the child's third character is Ping, generally he/she is called "Ping Ping."

With all of the kids, we have released the surname or first character portion of the child's name (usually named after the city in which their supervising orphanage is located.) Also, the second character, which in the case of our kids has been a second indicator that they were orphans, we have left behind. So, their "new" Chinese names have our Chinese family surname, a 2nd character we choose to capture something special about the child...and then the third character...their "baby name"...as well.

We chose the 2nd character for The Singer, pronounced "Ge"(guh), because that character means "musical." For The Bruiser, we chose a 2nd character "Chao," because it means to "surpass" or to "overcome." This is of course our prayer for him, that he surpass and overcome any obstacles from his special needs...both physical and emotional.

He just came in to greet me this morning. He wanted me to put him up in my arms, to hug him, and to rub his back while he woke up. As I held him and whispered a prayer for his healing and wholeness...I called him by his Chinese name...three characters that mean he belongs to this family, that he will surpass and overcome, and that he is strong (the meaning of his baby name)...I believe that this is true...