Part 1 is here.

Before my daughter's eye surgery to correct crossed eyes, I was told not to worry because the eyeballs wouldn't be removed from her eye sockets. I hadn't even thought about this. So now I was freaked. You aren't going to pull her eyeballs from the sockets.... WHAT EXACTLY are you going to be doing?

They moved the muscle attachment on both eyes.

After surgery here is what she looked like. She had bruises under her eyes from the clamps... more

My daughter loves art of any kinds; painting, drawing, singing, acting. But she really enjoys playing with the Microsoft Paint program on my PC. This picture is a recent creation named "Natasha's Prettiful Colors". She is 8.5 years age going on 15 years.

When my darling first came home from Ukraine (at 3.5 years of age) she didn't know how to play. And her gross motor skills were so delayed that playing with clay and trying to color were frustrating. But she loved singing. It was her form of self-stimulation. She would sing to herself... more

My daughter was a human ping-pong ball when she first came home. She bounced off the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. She was 3.5 years old and always touching, touching, touching. And she was always moving. Her attention span was about 1 second. It was extremely easy to over stimulate her. Common activities like shopping for food or taking a walk in the park were big challenges for me because she was always on the move. At this point I totally understood why parents put leashes on their children.

Then I discovered the calming influence of bathing. Natasha could be... more

My darling daughter, adopted from Ukraine, came home to me at 3.5 years of age as a survivor. She survived her childhood, the orphanage, the adults, the other children, the feral dogs around her orphanage. She was just sure that she could handle everything herself. Control freak to the max.....

After taking a bath (which was a new experience for her by the way... she was used to a sponge bath) she would try and wash her clothing. She also washed dishes and swept. She knew how to work but she didn’t know how to play.

And about attachment.... She didn’t need no freaking attachment.... more

I liked Aleida's post on Siblings, so I am borrowing the idea of reviewing a list and providing a different point of view.

My daughter starts the most interesting conversations while she sits in the back seat of the car and I drive. I gather from talking to other parents this is fairly common. Many of the more interesting conversations about her birth family have happened in the car.

There is a list of 30 Things Adoptees Wish They Knew About Their... more

Many adoptive parents receive the advice to "fake it [love] until you make it". They are being told that love is a verb..... an action to take. The emotion of love will follow the action of love.

I did an informal poll once about "love-at-first-sight" and about 70 parents who adopted from Ukraine replied. Typically with Ukrainian adoption you receive a referral to a child that you have never met. And you won’t receive this referral until your dossier has been approved and you have traveled to Ukraine.

About 50% of these parents fell in love at first sight of their child. A couple of parents did state they fell in love with their child’s referral photo at the Adoption Center.... more

My boss (as well as some friends and family) didn’t understand the damage caused by institutionalization. He didn’t realize there was a difference between a child (A) born in a family with plenty of resources and a child (Z) who lived in an institutional environment. He thought that love would cure all ills.

I would tell him a story about my darling daughter hitting another child. He would quickly tell me that his children did it too. I think he was just trying to reassure me because I was a first time parent. But he was so busy supplying advice that he forgot to listen to me. It was annoying. There are 3 basic differences between child A and child Z. ... more

Here is a good link describing the Ukrainian health care system. It was written for Seattle health care providers so that they could understand their patients who were born in Ukraine.

http://ethnomed.org/ethnomed/voices/ukraine.html

Eastern European medicine is truly different then Western medicine.

Another thing to keep in mind, sometimes a child will receive a diagnose like Hepatitis C without any testing. A doctor may decide on this diagnose because of the birth mother's behavior. Or a child could receive the Hepatitis C diagnose because of Rom (gypsy) heritage.

Here is a web site about Russian... more

There is a poem that has been near to my heart for a while now. It was written by Dorothy Law Nolte and is titled Children Learn What They Live. It is quoted all over the Internet so I am not the only person who loves it.

You can read the poem at http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/Kristone.html. They received permission from the publisher to quote the entire poem.

The first year (after adopting my daughter was Ukraine) was very hard. It was stressful on both of us. My darling daughter had so many issues that I fell back on an old habit.

QUESTION: How do you eat the elephant?

ANSWER:... more

Here are a few items that helped with my daughter. She was adopted as a 3.5 year old child from Ukraine. She came home with overall development delays which included language delays. She spoke Ukrainian and Russian but not very well. My translator constantly struggled to understand her.

Language hint: Don't use words like "do not" or "don't" or "cannot". Instead say things like "no hit". It is very hard for the Russian/Ukrainian speaker to hear the negative at first.

Baby time: She was 3.5 years old but she needed to be treated like a baby. After a bath, I would wrap her in a towel and rock her. I would play the baby games like "counting toes", "this little... more