A few days past... It was filled with making Christmas Cookies (which she ABSOLUTELY loved), and preparing for my son's 3rd birthday and my dad's birthday (same day - his age is being left out for his benefit). :) We planned to have a small family gathering with just my family and Josh's family. The only problem was that we kind of forgot to get some stuff for the party.
One thing NHFC suggests during training, is that you NOT take your host child to Wal-mart if you can help it. Don't do it within the first few days of their arrival, especially. Why? Because it is completely overwhelming. In fact, I even get overwhelmed when I go there - and I'm "used" to that place! Unfortunately, we found ourselves needing to stop there briefly to get something for our son's birthday party... Bad idea. We knew it wasn't a great thing in the first place because it would be overwhelming, but we didn't understand how this would be displayed in Anna's actions.
She shut down.
The first few minutes we were there she did fine. We heard a few "oohs" and "aaahs." Then, after about 5 minutes, her smile was gone, she stopped talking or responding to any of our questions, and she just kind of got grumpy. She totally shut down.
We had already planned to go in and get out right away, so we were glad we didn't have to be there long. We went through the check out and a few minutes we got in the car and drove away, she was fine. In a way, I'm glad we went there. It was good to see how she reacted in a place like that and how we could take care of the situation because we figured more of that would come. Not necessarily Wal-mart, but other situations. That is how she dealt with stress and overwhelming situations. It was good to know. Remove her from the situation and let her adjust. It could have been worse, however. I don't suggest taking a host child to Wal-mart just to see how they deal with overwhelming situations. You never know what could happen...
Anyways, we got home and were ready for the next day's party. We knew our son would be getting some gifts, so we asked that his gifts would be accompanied by one for Anna as well. Our families were happy to oblige (and wanted to give her gifts anyway), so that worked out well. The night of the party, we did our traditional M&M cake decorating which includes throwing M&Ms at the cake until everyone's bowl of M&Ms are secured to the entire cake. It's fun. Anna enjoyed it, but cautiously.
The party also included some great family time. During this entire time, Anna stuck by me like I had been glued to her. Absolutely no problem with me. However, when it came to gift-time, she was pretty unsure what to do. We had almost a Wal-mart shut down again. I found out that in Ukraine, when given a gift, a person doesn't open it then and there... so, the fact that we wanted her to open her gifts in front of everyone must have been a bit strange to her. But she did it. She thanked everyone... and then she went silent. She laid on my lap the rest of the evening and fell asleep. I'm sure jet lag was still an issue, and it was a sweet time... but we were starting to see how overloading it was to her to see all these things and be given all these gifts. They were small gifts, practical gifts, things she could wear or use back in Ukraine. Thankfully, we had been warned. New Horizons did a fantastic job informing parents of what to expect when it came to overwhelming situations such as this. We knew it was unavoidable for Christmas and wanted her to know that Christmas was not about the gifts we give each other, but the greatest gift given to us - Jesus Christ and salvation through Him. I think as time passed, as she watched our family, she understood this... but within the first few days of being here, it was a bit foreign to her.
In all, we were starting to get a glimpse into this young lady's life. We were starting to see what made her tick, what excited her, what made her sad or angry. We were starting to understand that she did not care for chicken, but would eat all the sweets in the house if you let her. She was letting us get to know her, non-verbally, and we were totally in love with this child. We knew she was a special girl - sent to our family to change our lives.
