Update

Life back in Tennessee has finally adjusted to a normal hum.  Jeff and I are adjusting to our jobs, and my mom is back with us again.  Having her at the house at the end of the school day has been a relief for me.  I wasn't crazy about Zhenya coming home on the bus to an empty house.  Most days, I have to work a couple hours after school gets out, so I can never make it home before he did each day.

The kids had a great time dressing up for Halloween.  Leeza was a rainbow princess and Zhenya dressed like Indiana Jones.  They had a lot of fun, but I have never stood in line so much for Halloween.  We went to the mall and stood in line.  Then, the next day, we went to a trunk or treat hosted by the sheriff's department and stood in line.  Next year, we are just hitting the neighborhood and that's it!!

Since last October, Zhenya has been having recurring fevers.  It has been the weirdest thing and no symptoms that really fit with anything.  We have been told he had strep throat, possibly cat scratch fever, then finally they said he had mono.  Well it has been a year and the fevers keep coming back.  Today we had an appointment with an infectious disease doctor at Vanderbilt.  She asked tons and tons of questions...of course I had no answer for many of them because we have no substantial family history.  She said she didn't think it was anything serious or life threatening, but we certainly need to find out why the fevers keep coming back.  Every time, the fever goes over 101, he has to miss school.  So for the next month, we are logging his temperature every morning and every evening.  If he has a fever, then we have to log his temp more often.  We go back on December 3rd to look at all the data and test results.  Please pray for wisdom for the doctor to really figure out what is going on.  It is concerning for a child his age to have so many fever that can get as high as 103.  Outside of the fevers, he has been pretty healthy.  Leeza had been doing really well, and we had not seen any seizure activity for quite some time.  Now out of the blue, she has had a few seizure just over the past week.  After the first of the year, we are taking her back to have an updated EEG.  Her dosage has been increased, so hopefully the seizures are under control. 

School for both kiddos has been a totally different story.  Zhenya started 6th grade at Oakland Middle, and we never had a chance to find out anything about the school or how things worked.  I was unable to attend meet the teacher night because we were having meet the teacher night at my school.  I did email his teachers to let them know his history and his needs for support.  It took a bit before he even saw a teacher who works with English language learners.  They tested him with a screener and sent me a note saying he didn't qualify for ESL.  At first, I wasn't sure what I thought, but after spending some time working with him, I emailed and asked them to look at his records because he had not tested out of ESL in Colorado.   He began seeing the ESL teacher a bit.  Parent teacher conferences were last week, and grade wise he is not doing well at ALL.  Then, I find out that his school doesn't even have information showing he was in ESL.  After some phone calls, I find out that they haven't even requested the information from the correct department in Colorado.  Now that I know what they need to do, I hope he can get the help he needs and raise his grades.

Last year, Leeza was making slow progress, she was the only 1st grade who received special education services in her class, so she was able to get a lot of support in her class.  She also had an amazing teacher who was able to really provider her with individualized instruction.  Second grade has been a different story.  She still has another fabulous teacher who can provide her with great instruction, but the expectations for a second grader are so much more than she is ready to do at this point.  The school system had to test her to determine her eligibility for special education services in Tennessee.  After receiving the test scores, we had to make a tough decision about her educational services.  Socially, she has been doing fabulous this year.  She has made a lot of friends in her homeroom, and that was really important to me to that she not miss out on getting to maintain the social times with her homeroom.  The girls in her class just love her.  Her homeroom teacher also felt that during parts of the reading block that Leeza was really developing and learning oral language that she really needs especially as an English language learner.  After an 2 hour meeting, we decided that she needs to spend most of her day in a special education class for students with more significant and/or severe needs due the effects of her health issues on her cognitive processing.  

  It was such a tough decision for me, and I am still struggling with it.  On Friday, I took her to meet the kids and see her new class, and the kiddos were so excited that they were getting a new friend.  I tried to hype up the change, and it worked.  Leeza was so excited to go to her new class on Monday.   Today was day two, and she is doing well.  Thankfully, she doesn't understand what the change means as much as I know what the change means.  I wasn't certain if I was going to share any of this, but I felt I need to because I know others who are thinking of adopting or in the process of adopting read different blogs.  I want to share the ups and the downs.  Moving your child out of the "regular" class into a special class is a really emotional choice.  This is not the plan we have for our kids especially since we didn't plan to have a special needs adoption.  I have shed numerous tears over this, and I am even holding back tears as I type.

  Leeza is the light of our day.  Her kind and sensitive heart...her loving nature.  I keep thinking this shouldn't be so tough since I am a special education teacher.  I have had conversations with parents about why moving their child is in the best interest of the child.  But now when faced with the decision myself, it really has changed my thought process.  If nothing else, having a child with significant academic needs has helped me be a better, more sensitive special education teacher especially when dealing with parents.   Leeza has so many wonderful strengths and in the long term, Jeff and I know she is going to be fine.  Nothing changes how we feel about her.  This change in plan is not a life sentence, Leeza will learn to read and write.  She will learn to count money and tell time.   A few months ago, God made me a promise about Leeza and her health/cognitive functioning.  I am continually reminding myself that God loves her so much more than I could ever love her.  He has a plan for her life regardless of what is going on right now.  Her new special education teacher said something to me yesterday...she reminded me that by adopting Leeza, I already changed her life for the better...that even though this wasn't my plan for her..I had already kept her from the future she would have had in Ukraine. 

Look what we got today!

The cute little blonde with curly hair is Zhenya! Yes, the little one that looks like a girl.  His aunt sent it to us today.  It made me cry to see what my boy looked like when he was little.  I am supposing he is 2 or 3 here.  She said he was very social when he was little and very independent.  Yep, that sounds like my Zhenya.  Since she didn't send a photo of Leeza, I am assuming she doesn't have one.   But I will take what I can get, I am SOOOOOOOOO thrilled to have this picture of my cute little blondie.

Going home soon

Wow, I haven't written anything in a long time.  I guess I am well overdue for an update. First thing first, we are moving back to Tennessee in about a month and a half. Jeff graduates from bible school in 3 weeks, and he will head back to Nashville to his old job in radio. Since the school year is not out, the kids and I will stay here until the end of May. Then we will have about a month of limbo land because our house will not be available until July.  We have tenants living there currently,but their lease is up at the end of June. Then we can move back into OUR house. I never really thought I cared about having my own house, but after renting for two years I have discovered that I like having my own place. Now that I have discovered Pinterest, I can fix the things I didn't like in our house with all the fabulous ideas I found.  :-). The kids have taken the news pretty well.  I expected Zhenya to be the one to be upset, but it was actually Leeza.  She said she would miss her teacher.  She has a super fabulous teacher this year. I reminded her that she would be going to 2nd grade, and her teacher teaches 1st grade.  I also told her that if we are in our own house, we can MAYBE get a bigger dog in the future.  No pet deposits or landlord rules to worry about. After that, she was perfectly fine with moving.  We really feel like it is a God thing with going back home. There have just been too many signs that this is what we are supposed to do. We had planned to stay here in Colorado another year and see the sights on the West side of the states, but clearly that is not in God's plan for us. I have to admit that I am pretty happy about the move. I have never really felt at home here in Colorado. It is beautiful, but just not home. Not to mention that I have not felt well for most of our time living here. The dry air and high altitude is too much for me. I am still gasping for breath even though we have been here almost two years.   Anyway, we have to get everything packed up fast and furious. Then, I have to find a job in Tennessee.
On other news, we have been in contact with our children's older brother. Zhenya had a cell phone from Ukraine, but the battery was dead.  We finally found a charge that would work with it, and we got their brother's phone number.  I sent him a text message a few weeks ago, and he calls my phone at 3 AM.   He is rapidly speaking in Russian which I don't speak. I tell him in my very rustic Russian that I don't speak Russian well. So he puts his wife on the phone....I think she said one English word and then went back to Russian.  I can tell you that I don't understand female Russian either. They hung up and sent me a text message to find their brother on a Russian classmates website. It took a few days, but I found him. It was worth all the hassle when the kids got to see his picture.  They just kept saying over and over, "That is my brother!" I almost cried.  I posted  pictures of the kids for him to see. This week, an aunt emailed. It was a bit amusing because she made a comment about being so worried if the kids were alive or not. I assured her that we are good people and that we love them very much.  While I do have moments of anxiety about being in contact with them, we felt it was the right thing to do.  I would hate not knowing if my siblings were okay if they lived in another country with people who were strangers to me.  Not to mention all the media hype about children being adopted and being killed or hurt...so I suppose I can understand the aunt's concern. It is just amusing to me because I know how sick Leeza was in the orphanage. Outside of keeping the seizures under control, she is a picture of health now. Zhenya is healthy for the most part as well. Though he has somehow gotten mono, and he runs high fevers every few weeks for about 4 days. We are hoping they get further apart and stop altogether soon. Anyway, I hope we can have a good relationship with their brother and aunt. I also hope to find out background information in regards to medical history. It would be nice to know about how their parents died, and if any illnesses run in their family.

The kids are doing great, and they are growing.  School has its challenging moments particularly for Leeza, but she is making progress and that is all I ask. Zhenya is getting his preteen sassiness and moodiness..and all that comes with the preteen years.....ugh! If only, he would learn to stop talking while he is ahead.....not sure when that will happen. Got to love it! Well, that is the update for now.  Please pray for our upcoming move and that I find the right job.