Almost year home!

 ALMOST A YEAR HOME.

(Airport 9/5/2016)

Wow, we have been home with our Sena for just about a year. Can you believe it? Honestly, it seems like we have had her here forever. In a way, I can't believe it's only been a year. I haven't been keeping time so much with her, because honesty I've not had time for such. But as I was scheduling our one year and LAST post adoption visit today, the reality of Sena hitting the year mark home hit me hard. She's been in a family now longer than she was in an orphanage. She is happy and adjusted and hilarious and challenging. She's just our kid. In the beginning she seemed like an orphan. That sounds terribly ugly and harsh, but I don't know how else to say it. A family was foreign to her. She was out of sorts, out of sync and often out of her little mind. As we all were. Which leads me to the rest of my post. I thought in honor of our little darling being home almost a year I would recap. The good, the bad, and the ugly. Enjoy. ;)

 MONTHS 0-3: TOTAL CHAOS

Welcome to the alternate universe that takes place with the rest of the world but is most definitely not the rest of the world. You know that feeling of just getting home with a newborn baby from the hospital and feeling kind of strange because you know the world is still revolving and people are still driving to work, and drinking margaritas at restaurants, and working in the yard and well, just breathing the air outside? But you are kind of in a sweet new baby fog and separate from society for a while? Okay. Take that feeling and multiply it by 1,000. You are SO far from a functioning member of society that you are pretty sure your 4 walls are all you will ever see again. And slightly certain that your yoga pants have now molded into your skin and become a part of your actual anatomy. Take the sleepless nights with erratic sleep from nursing a baby and multiply that one by 100,000. In fact take sleep out of your vocabulary. Jet lagged toddlers who were just kidnapped from all they've ever known don't sleep. At all. But really, not at all. Take a terrified toddler who screams like something super human and stays up until 7am. Literally. Then, add two pissed off two year olds appearing at your face after you've dozed for 13 seconds asking for breakfast, with little faces looking at you and silently screaming "where the heck is my mom, and what have you done to us!" Then do this again every day for about the next 12 weeks. SO SO SO SO not pretty people. Take a mommy who plasters on a smile, desperately wanting to enjoy time with her biological kids in rare moments of calm, but can really only imagine sitting and drinking a cup of coffee while she sends them on "special games" around the house. Like, "umm, hunny can you pretend you are a princess making tea? Okay now go search for that dress up box and play food and walk back to me in 45 minutes once you've found everything. Ok?" And in between forced playtime and walks to the coffee pot, there is fighting. Biting. Hitting. Confusion. A toddler who is smart and superficially charming and most certainly had to be running the show at the orphanage. And siblings who have had it, one who is sweet natured so just clings and break your heart and another who is MAD and causes you to literally call a child psychologist because you are afraid your adopted child was just plucked from a life of poverty only to be murdered by her new American sister. True story. But really, why does this new kid take my toys and sleep with food in each hand. Why does she get whatever she wants? And while we are at it, why is she always strapped on your back mom!? And then poor Sena. Still so confused by it all. This phase is just hard. A phase of going through the motions. I heard someone once say that you just love with your actions until you can love with your heart. And let me tell you what, no words could have ever been more true. As much as I wanted to love Sena deep into my soul those first couple months, I was loving with my hands. Rocking, changing, kissing, singing, taking to the doctor, treating parasites, day in and day out. Like a robot, like an empty vessel. It was simply an action. The heart of it all was still buried deep down under the layers of total exhaustion and complete panic and fear, Yep, that's month’s 1-3 home with our sweet bundle. ;)

 MONTHS 3-6: BABY STEPS

We can leave the house! Yay! Okay, well we can drive down the street and stop every 7-10 minutes when Sena drops something. Because unlike biological kids, we are still desperately trying to gain the trust of this child and don't let her scream. So when a bag of rice chexs hits the floor of the mini van and the new toddler starts rocking in her car seat and sobbing uncontrollably you pull over. Lordy. It's a bit much, but onward we go. This phase brings the appearance of normal, but a reality of "not so much." We have laughter from all family members. Sometimes. We are kind of getting into a groove, but are still so tired. Still taking turns sleeping on the floor on a mattress in Sena’s room. Still rocking for 1-2 hours at naptime, while the two year olds fill the toilets full of toilet paper, or cover themselves in permanent markers. A daily near heart attack every day from 12-2pm. BUT we do have legit laughter and happiness in the midst, at least a handful of times every day. We have ENGLISH. Praise the lord above. Words and not just grunting. Major and I mean major turning point. Did I mention how tired I was? Let me assure you that a grunting toddler, who screams in my face unable to communicate on the daily was not music to my exhausted ears. We have Christmas and happy family time. We travel and arrive at the destination and realize that we made it an entire trip with just one meltdown. Not seven. We have two year old sisters introducing their "new baby sister Sena from Africa" to every human they meet, beaming with pride. Hmmm, maybe we didn't ruin them after all?! We notice Sena trusting that when we put her down we aren't really gone. We see phenomenal, only God given and supernatural attachment occurring with us. She is ours. We leave the kids, ALL of the kids with babysitters and go out on dates. We still can't leave a room for long without someone attacking the other, but hey mama can leave the room long enough to put on a bra and brush her teeth. Progress! We get enough sleep at night to actually remember the days. These kids are pretty cute huh? We find ourselves sitting on the cough at night while the kids play peacefully and just look at each other, relieved, smiling, happy. This is the phase of life where I feel like we are the people on the helicopter at the end of Jurassic park. All silently sitting there, knowing they were almost all killed by vicious dinosaurs, but the narrowly made it out in one piece. This is us. In the helicopter, looking below at the carnage, but knowing its all going to be okay. We made it out in one piece. We celebrate two third birthdays and one second birthday. More happiness. Finding joy. Learning that Sena is actually really funny. Has a knack for humor. She is smart too. Really smart. A sponge. Loves her family. Calls everyone by name and is almost straight up chatting with us. Happiness is seen. Saddness is still too near the surface, however. She is healing but not healed. Our family is healing and growing and stretching. God is teaching us a beautiful new normal. We are making it.

 MONTHS 6-9: SLEEP SLEEP SLEEP!

Praise the Lord we are SLEEPING! Sena starts sleeping. All night. She also lets us rock her and put her right in bed. No more bedtime hysteria. She knows we will still be there in the morning. The bedtime control is disappearing. Speaking of control. Did that child actually just leave a full plate of mac n cheese on the table to hop down and go play with her sisters? Did I hallucinate or does she now totally trust another meal will come and would rather run and play like a normal kid? We have sisters. No more irrational fighting. Just normal sibling stuff. It's a breath of fresh air. And remember that child that I was just going through the motions with? You better believe that mama bear will attack to kill if you mess with my baby girl now. Love has formed. Real. Visceral. Just, and I mean JUST like any biological child kind of love has formed. She is mine. Ours. Always and forever. That "orphan" we knew in the early months? She is gone. This treasured child is happy and peaceful. Loves to wake up and say "good morning precious mama!" A little doll. A firecracker. A demanding, loud, strong willed, BIG personality little doll, but she is ours. Quirks and ALL. She is perfect for us. Life starts to just feel normal. No more time for looking back and remembering "what was", we are completely happy with "what is." Our new normal, although challenging at times, is what we want our new normal to be. Because without Sena we wouldn't be us. She has taught us compassion, and strength, and beauty from the ashes. We have all been redeemed by this new addition. Broken and remade better than we were before.

 MONTHS 9-12: JUST A FAMILY WITH A BROWN BABY

Adoption isn't in the front of our every thought anymore. Sena continues, and may always continue to be a bit irrational and requires a whole lot of grace in parenting, but really don't all kids? We are just "The Agan's" and happen to have a little baby with brown skin. Our focus is no longer on surviving. We are living life. Teaching three little girls to love each other and to say their prayers, and to stop stealing each other’s Barbie’s, you know real important life skills! ;) We have a normal marriage again and can put three little kids to bed and know that they will most likely be sleeping until the morning. We are filling the fridge with healthy food and hitting the gyms again. We are happy. Settled. New people that would never in a million years want to go back to the pre adoption family. We have a SWEET, and I mean really really really sweet Ethiopian daughter who loves her family and thinks her twin sisters hung the moon! Desperate to be just like them and just likes to be near them. We have spontaneous hugs and kisses. We have three affectionate, loved kids. We just have a family. A family only God could have made. But such a blessing of a family if I say so myself. We are so thankful to be nearing this one year mark. We do feel like it was a battle, some of us more wounded and built back up than others. But we serve a God of endless grace and mercy and His mercies are truly new each morning!

The end. Onto year two! The year of no more children joining the family! :)