Neuroreorg, EMDR and Amino Acid Therapy

Well apparently we are now in the possession of the neuro reorg exercises that can unlock "Pandora's Box". We are not really sure what that means, but our interpretation is that the fetal exercises we have just started could possibly open the door to a lot of unresolved trauma in K that could come out in her behaviors. Having just started a therapeutic Kindergarten class, there are a lot of moving pieces and parts and it may be hard if a break down does occur, to determine whether it was the exercises or the transitions. So far, nothing earth shattering with the EMDR other than the bilateral stimulation really seems to help calm her when she starts spiraling out of control, so we have been working specifically between the neuro reorg and the EMDR to help give her some coping techniques when things get stressful that will work for her. The teacher even used the jumping technique today at the first day of school! K has surprised us in the last week expressing her feelings, likes and dislikes in a productive manner on a positive note, on a not so positive note, she has seriously ramped up her irritation of her siblings. I remembered something the other day from the trauma conference in that because our kids hurt so much of the time, they want everyone around them to feel as awful as they do. I realized that this may be what she is doing, and succeeding, so we need to pull out our tool box and do some thinking on that one. We will see how the rest of the week goes, she did rock the mohawk on her first day of school, very Grace Jones!

This picture is worth a 1000 words (but which words)

Is it saying...

Hanging by a thread...

(am or becoming) unraveled...

Bending but not broken...

I'm in a perfectly good mood, but I just loved this picture.  How often does it feel that its just the smallest of threads that are helping to keep it all together.  Just imagine what could be outside the scope of the picture that is at the end of those ropes.  Family?  Work?  The Whole world?  I like to think that in times like that, if a magnifying glass was put on that center thread it wouldn't say "Made in China" or even "Made in the USA", rather "Made in Heaven".    Comforting to know that no matter how hard we're pulled, and tugged, and felt like we're being torn apart, that the strongest fibers within us, will not, and cannot break.  We just need to have Faith and Believe.

Peace

Its and Ear thing.. er I mean nose thing..

The house has a wave of worn down, lethargic, cold-like funk going through it.

#1 is down with a non-mild sinus infection and ear infection.
#2 has been fighting it off
#3 had some coughs..
#4 is so far doing well.

Mama and Papa..  Mama said she's feeling a bit worn out.  Papa is planning on going to the clinic after work because OTC meds have not helped his cold in over a week, so I'm pretty sure I've got the sinus infection also.  And despite much increased sleep the past few days,  I'm still worn out big time.

Gonna be a fun first week of school next week with possibly have the family on antibiotics.

Serenity Now.   Serenity Now.

Despite that, were getting ready for a new school year.   We're transitioning to school time-schedules.  J is going back to work 5x per week.  I'll be 5x per week, but with Monday just being work from home.  We have a brand new set of NeuroReorg exercises to start on.  The Pergola I'm building is showing form.

Its like a hive of activity at that house, only somebody blew smoke at us.. as we're all wiped out :)

Building

There is just something about building something concrete, something that you can watch take shape, visualize, engineer, and work out details that give me a sense of progress and accomplishment. It has been a long summer with K and the negative energy around this place is palatable. So much so that the other night we went to celebrate the sale of our neighbors house and after few drinks i ended up sobbing all over our poor neighbor, nose running, chest heaving, gasping for breath, yes, it was quite a scene. She said to me that night "You are bigger than K's problems". The moment she said that, I knew that the fact that I saw K's problems as bigger than me, was a huge reason I was so depressed. I felt defeated, out of control in my own home. K's problems had become Goliath, looming over me like a mountain, I woke up everyday expecting the worst, waiting for the horrific behaviors, looking for the other shoe that I expected to drop at any second. I couldn't continue with that mentality, it was tearing me apart. Awhile ago, T and I had talked about building an pergola to make our deck more usable. So after some plans had sat on the counter for a few months, T started making some serious calculations, then he bought some lumber, then he started building and I started measure, and planning and moving CMU blocks for a raised patio for an outdoor firepit. It seems so simple, and some would probably consider it avoidance in not addressing my real feelings about K's issues, but there is something about building something, sweating, sore muscles, hauling heavy blocks and seeing something come together before your eyes that makes me feel strong again, like there isn't anything i can't accomplish if I put my mind to it. I am bigger than her problems. "I a prisoner for the Lord strongly urge you to live in a manner worthy of the calling you have received." Ephesians 4:1

Just a Boy and his Papa..

Sure the marathon training schedule read that this weekend was an 18 miler.   Saturday I've been running with a great group of spiritual guys. Its a nice mini escape.  But its 30 minutes away.  It would need to be out there long before 5am to be back in time for when the rest of the guys would show up.

So I decided to go today.  At the last minute I change my long river run route, to doing 3 6 mile loop around the neighborhood.  Why I dunno.  but then it hit me in the middle of lap one.   E1.  If he's up after the 2nd lap, he can ride his bike with me.   The Father/Son Run/Bike I've been waiting for.  It just might work.

I stopped at the house, asked when he needed to be back for swimming. we had time!  Quick E, get your stuff were going out.  As he's rushing, he didn't even know where or for what.  What a trooper.  He was stronger on the hills even.  I thought I would need to keep up with him, but 6miles was still a bit of a long
ride for him.

We had some time together.  So some of nature's early morning friends (all the animals are out early morning if you didn't know).  Good time.  Not sure what the rest of the day will hold (except for sore legs for me), but  the day sure started off awesome.  Thanks E!  And thank you Lord for the opportunity.

Peace

An update, neuroreorg and EMDR

It has been awhile since we have updated our progress with our neuroreorg and how it is going with our daughter. With weekends away and vacations over the summer, we have struggled to fit all the daily therapy into our schedule. We have tried to double up some days knowing we would be missing others. Then there was a 2 week hiatus for a android and tonsil surgery at the end of June. While this brought the therapy to a screeching halt, we felt, as did the doctor, that the size of her adenoids and tonsils were impacting her fatigue and endurance as well as likely causing sleep apnea. Nothing like starving a brain you are trying to repair of oxygen every night! So we took the plunge and are glad to have the surgery and recovery time behind us. We will be meeting with our neuro reorg practitioner in a few weeks to check the progress and hopefully will graduate to some new therapies. I can't say we have seen any dramatic changes in behaviors, etc, so I am curious what we will hear in a few weeks. For the sake of her privacy, I will not go into detail, but we did have a very serious issue occur a few weeks back, followed a few days later by, what we felt, was an honest recollection of some memories from Congo. We were shaken to our core by this and it has been some very tense weeks in our home making sure things are in place to keep everyone safe. Whether it be the comfort level she now has with us, or the neuro reorg that is trigging some of this, we met with an EMDR therapist yesterday to help her to start processing the trauma that is coming out. We are very hopeful this therapist will be able to give her some appropriate tools to self sooth and coping techniques as well as help her process what she likely went through in Congo. Starting to think we might be able to start a private therapy practice once we have been through all these therapies! God is faithful and we have been blessed by the people he has put in our path to help heal her! Hoping for a more positive update from Traumatown next week! Traumatown, the place you never planned to visit, but now that you are here, you can't figure out how to leave.

Adoption Ethics and Orphanage Care

Adoption is about loss, loss of a birth family, loss of a culture, a country. There is no way around it. As I read this blog post http://www.gracelings.org/2012/07/guest-post-walking-away-from-ugandan.html last week about a failed Ugandan adoption, it stirred many feelings in me and our 4 adoptions. We adopted first out of selfishness. We wanted a family. Our first adoption, we were ignorant. We were more concerned about buying the best baby stroller than the fact that our need for a young baby was driving a horrific supply and demand chain that was playing out in Guatemala with mothers selling their babies to enable them to feed their other children. Hindsight is always 20/20 and once our eyes were open, we realized our agency was doing little to better the conditions in Guatemala. They were a business and out to make a buck. For our second adoption in Ethiopia, we chose an agency with a fantastic child sponsorship program that was working hard to keep families together. They were building schools and other improvements to strengthen communities. About that time, we got involved with World Vision and started raising money on our own to keep families together and build communities along with sponsoring a child from our kids birth countries. It seemed like such a small thing to do to try and swing the pendulum away from the quick and easy answer of adoption to help enable kids to be raised by extended families and supported to attend school. We mindfully stepped further in this direction when we adopted from Congo, choosing to work with a group that was not about adoption, but about improving conditions in the DRC. We also chose to adopt out of birth order, enabling us to provide a home for an older child and not feed a supply and demand chain as agencies rushed to open pilot programs in the DRC when Ethiopian adoptions began to slow. But we failed, again. Failed to question, failed to go beyond the lemming mindset of adoptive parents, failed stand up and say, “Hey! This isn’t right, I demand more information”. Don’t get me wrong, we love our daughter, and with all her challenges, we will not give up on her, but damn it, she had an option that would have allowed her to stay in her birth country. An option that not many orphans have in the DRC, of a loving Godly single woman that cared deeply for her that we would have more than willingly supported. We could have impacted 6 lives through a sponsorship of this single mother of 4 kids had we known at the time ! But sponsorship is messy, right? It take time to locate and check out families willing to foster and reporting to make sure corruption isn’t involved and visits to check on the children and and and…. It’s much cleaner and easier for an NGO to build a brick a mortar building with shiny new floors, beds and mattresses to house more orphans than to actually go out and find foster families willing to love and raise these children in a family setting. We stopped building orphanages in the US over 50 years ago, but for Africa, LET’S GO BUILD ANOTHER ORPHANAGE! We can’t claim to be helping when we are just perpetuating a system that has already failed once. The best and the fanciest institutional care facility cannot replace a family. If you are truly not about adoption, then investigate these kids backgrounds before they are referred to an adoptive family, find out if there is a family member or neighbor willing to step forward with a little support, find out if the only reason the child has been relinquished is because the family cannot afford a life saving surgery or medicine, find out if the birth mother passed away in child birth and the family just can’t afford formula, then use the funds that would have gone into brick and mortar to keep a family together. Then come back and tell me you aren’t about adoption and I might consider believing you.

MmoooHooo Ha Ha! Love This!

Thought for Today

‎"When we leave our comfort zones, God can freely work in our lives. When we let go of our plans, God can use us in His bigger plan." -Richard Stearns, president of World Vision U.S.

Fruitylicious

Sometimes you just need to eat a bunch of fruit loops w/o Milk as a snack.  I'm just sayin'  ...
They're good :) 

For some, If life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Thats good.  But Fruit Loops (even the
Aldi brand) are just fruitylicious!