May 23, 2007 Journal Entry

Gotchya Day was today!

We were all calm this morning, ready to pick up our kids. Before leaving I went on the email to tell the parents a little about the first meeting. While doing so a man came in looking for me. It was Robel’s father. He was here to thank us for our kindness [taking things back and forth to Vancouver] and for us to use his service to drive us anywhere we wanted whenever we wanted. I was glad Selemnah was there to help explain what was happening and that we did not need his driving today. We told him tomorrow afternoon we would go out, and then if Mikiyas was doing well we would have dinner at his home.

We then left to pick up our boy! Mikiyas recognized us and did come to us fine. He is slow in movement with everything. We brought his two cars and he right away dropped other toys for those.

We played and hung out for a while. The clothes we brought yesterday fit him perfectly. He looked so cute in new clothes that actually fit. We were finally asked to go speak with Haregwain and receive our finalized adoption paperwork. It was confirmed that Mikiyas is from Addis, and is not Oromos. Other information we received, we are keeping for our family. While waiting for the other families to finish each of their meetings, Mikiyas became antsy and frustrated. Giving him some food was the answer, following which he relaxed a lot allowing himself to be more open.

After all the families finished, we gave gifts to the staff and went outside for photos with them. Mikiyas was being passed around by the staff, which began to stress him out. He had a look of great concern on his face. When I took him back, I cried for him. I could only imagine the pain and stress that a child so young could have endured – some things most adults would never have endured in a lifetime.

Today, we had our first family photo.

During the drive back to the Weygoss, he fell asleep in my arms.

Mikiyas awoke sitting on the bed. He was okay, just looking around. We ordered lunch right away since it was late in the afternoon. He had already missed snack time, lunch, nap and was going on to the second snack time. Mikiyas ate bread – loves it – and some vegetable soup. His first meal with us.

Going for a walk to the Shoa Market later was good for us, Mikiyas relaxing nicely in my arms. We came back to no electricity, but were able to give him a bath in another suite that had an outside window [our bathroom didn’t]. He seemed to know what the bath was all about, only standing and raising his arms as needed. He did not understand play time. He then went to sleep.

So the other news is:

1. Mikiyas hates having his clothes taken off. He has temper tantrums that include kicking, hitting and throwing. We finally had to have Selemnah talk to him in Amharic. After that, he allowed us to do some things. I actually started to sneakily take his socks and shoes off while walking up the stairs after our walk.

2. Mikiyas does not appear to be potty trained as we were advised. Perhaps it is just stress. We’ll see about tomorrow. Right now, he has an absolute fear of going near the toilet. We, and the neighbours, now know that his voice box works well and he has large lungs.

3. Mikiyas wants a sippy cup at bed. We may have to regress as we were advised he does not have anything at bed. It was apparent tonight that this was a necessity for him to feel comfortable. This could pass once he trusts us more.

4. Mikiyas is 17 months, the exact age we were advised. That is good news. However, he seems delayed. He is incredibly smart figuring out how things work very quickly, but his movements and actions remind me of a 10 month old. Perhaps it’s just not enough interaction with toys or other people.

5. He has one scabby bump on his head. It’s small. We washed his hair with T-gel so hopefully that will help clear up any remaining ... I don’t know what.

6. My feeding him and giving him some water was the best thing I could have done at the foster home today. He really opened up to play and relax with us.

7. Mikiyas is ticklish and enjoys airplane rides. When you get him going, he just giggles.

8. He tries so hard not to smile, sucking in his lip to look like a monkey.

9. He finally spoke near the end of the day, calling me Ama [sounds more like Ema but you could hear the Ama]. Then before the bath he was saying mamamamama very quickly. He wasn’t impressed with bath time.

10. His left eye won’t stop running tears and is puffy. It appears he has an eye infection. There are also little bumps and dry skin around the eye.

11. He has a very hard, round belly. Some clothes that should fit can't fit.

12. His four front top teeth appear to be rotted, not having completed growing in. This gives him the appearance of having fangs.