What you should know about Orphan Hosting (part one)

Until today, writing this blog has been very easy; I am simply re-telling our family's love story. This post, however, is not flowing out the way my past blogs have.  I want to tell everyone how magical and wonderful adopting teens can be, but there is just no way to skirt around the fact that there is some really sad stuff that happened before we all met. I have so many fears in writing about this. My biggest fear is that it will upset my adopted children (even though they are the ones who sent me to my room to write my next blog post after nine hours at my "real job"). My second biggest fear is that I will not do the subject justice.  I am not an orphan hosting expert.  I am not an adoption expert.  I am far from a parenting expert.  The problem with this subject is that there are not enough "experts"! Most parents who are in the middle of the experience do not have time to sit down and write about it. My favorite saying through this whole experience has been, "There are no books for this!"  Sure, there are some great adoption books out there about connection, trauma, attachment, cocooning, red flags, issues, and how to deal with rude comments from the public, but there are NO books that talk about just the everyday "stuff", and certainly not about hosting.

Of course, as with everything, every experience is unique, with some commonalities. Most people can relate to how incredibly exhausting bringing a newborn baby home from the hospital is.  Hosting orphans is kind of like that with some pretty major exceptions.   

Exception #1:  THERE ARE NO NAPS. 

There was no "sleep when the baby sleeps" about this experience. The kids we hosted were active. (Far more active than their American counterparts!)  From our experience, and what we have heard from others, there are a few reasons for this.  The first is just obvious....there is a seven hour time difference between here and Ukraine. The other reasons are a little less obvious to those of us who are not "in the know".  When you are being raised in an institutionalized setting, going to sleep is not always a safe idea.  Sleeping brings on nightmares about things from the past. Sleep also makes you vulnerable; you can't protect yourself when you are asleep.  A coping mechanism that many of these children learn is how to self-stimulate to keep themselves awake ALL NIGHT LONG.  One long-term effect of this habit is that these children do not have the opportunity to grow properly.  That's because growth hormone is normally released during sleep. If someone consistently gets too little sleep (known as "sleep deprivation"), growth hormone is suppressed. Ukrainian orphans are typically two sizes smaller than their American counterparts, and this is one of the major reasons. Vitalik, our now 12 year old son, looked about two years younger than our younger, biological son. Here is a picture to demonstrate:

On the left is my biological son Colby, age 9.  On the right is my adopted son, Vitalik, then 11. The first few nights you host an older child, you might find something like this at 3:00am:

These kids don't cry like newborns to let you know they need something. They won't even come into your room to tell you they had a bad dream or that they are awake.They will stay very quiet and fend for themselves.  They will tell you to go back to bed, and that you don't need to stay awake with them. You will be exhausted and want to go back to bed, but if you stay awake, something magical happens. They start to trust you and bond with you.  Some of my most favorite first memories with Vitalik took place when the rest of the continent was asleep.  Not very different than with the son I gave birth to!

Exception #2: THERE IS NO CUTE LAYETTE TO DRESS THEM IN

Chances are, even if you have the most supportive friends and family in the whole world, no one threw you a baby shower.  If you have friends that give you hand-me-downs their kids out-grew, and toys to play with, these are your BEST friends. They are the ones that "get it".  The children will arrive with exactly two outfits...the one they are wearing when they meet you and something to sleep in (I would not even venture to say "pajamas".)  The clothes they bring are not even their own clothes.  They are community clothes from the orphanage.  Someone has taken inventory, and these clothes BETTER make it back to Ukraine at the end of the trip, regardless of how worn out or inappropriate they may be.  (EVEN if they are underwear with a Play Boy Bunny logo and you want to burn them.) Additionally, even though you have been nesting with the best of the pregnant parents and having a blast, don't be shocked, hurt, or surprised if the kids don't like anything you bought them.  So, for fun times sake, here are some AMAZING outfits Shad and I picked out for Lera that she hated.

A newborn baby may vomit on or soil their cute new clothing, but your hosted teen child will most likely just tell you straight out, that it is not their "style" and/or make a face and say the one English word they know, "NO." If you are under the mistaken assumption that an orphan would love ANYTHING new, you need to take a trip to Ukraine and see how fashion conscious this culture is.  Cute little clothes from Justice were just not going to cut it. Colby's Gymboree hand-me-downs were not exactly Vitalik's style either. We were so ill-equipped for parenting tweens!  The truth is, we were so ill-equipped for parenting a newborn too. The biggest difference  here, is that the newborn couldn't tell you what a failure you were (and by God's grace, they forget all the stupid stuff you did!)

Exception #3: FEEDING IS MORE THAN FORMULA OR "BREAST IS BEST"
What on earth do you feed these kids?!?!?  One thing I know for absolute certain, is that you do NOT feed them McDonald's, or pizza, or hamburgers, or hot-dogs, or anything AMERICAN.  If the food is AMERICAN, it is going to make them fat.  The end.  The last thing on earth a child from Ukraine wants to be is FAT.  They are happy to tell you all about this in any words, translator app on your phone, or through charades.  "You" (they point) have BIG belly.  "Me" have six pack!"  This is a source of pride.  They know Americans are fat, and they are not going to go back to Ukraine in this condition.  Ice-cream, on the other hand was NOT American, and they could eat a pint of Ben and Jerry's and not lose any of their Ukrainian pride. Fortunately, our hosting agency, Marina's Kids had a very simple "cook book" so we had some idea those first few days. Over the three weeks that we had the kids, they did gain some much needed weight, and they also had a safe environment to sleep in. We had to keep them away from the bathroom scales, but while our kids were with us they had the proper combination of sleep and nutrition to grow. Even over a three week span of time, this was a huge gift!

Exception #4: THE KIDS DON'T SPEAK ENGLISH

Oh wait!! Our biological son didn't speak English either!  All he did was cry (we think it was in English, but he was born in Miami, so for all we knew, he was crying in Spanish).  To my husband and I, this is the most funny reason people give for not hosting.  The kids didn't speak English, but they could communicate FAR more than any newborn I have ever met.  We had a blast with this! The best part about hosting was NOT speaking a common language. It was a challenge!  We made our best effort to learn words from their language as we tried to teach them ours.  It was like a game. Vitalik laughed and laughed and laughed at some of my mis-pronunciations. Now, I say these same Russian phrases to him wrong "on purpose" because it makes for some funny memories.  He had some funny pronunciations that I will never forget too.  For example, the President of the United States was "Balack Oh Mama!" and the Christmas movie where the kid gets left behind for a Paris vacation is called, "Hone Aloma". 

Exception #5: YOU DON'T GET TO KEEP THEM

This is the most difficult part about the hosting experience. You fall in love with these kids, you think they may love you too, and then you have to send them back without knowing what the future has in store.  I have had many people say, "I could never do that! I would get too attached!" or "I don't think I could ever put my son (or daughter) through that!"  Well, friends, my best reply to this is, "There are no certainties in life." The only method that I am aware of for avoiding bad feelings is to never be born in the first place.  People leave, or let you down, get sick, or pass away every single day. I have not yet figured a way around this fact of life.  In fact, in my experience, the people who handle the uncertainties of this process the best ARE the people who have experienced major loss in their life. It takes a major loss to appreciate the time you have with these children, it takes a major loss to empathatize properly with a child who has been through a traumatic past, and it also takes an understanding that we don't *really* have control over anything.  I don't believe in living life recklessly, however, I do believe that God helps those that help themselves.  I believe that big risks equal big rewards. I believe in "Go Big or Go Home".  

I believe in Orphan Hosting.