Diagnosis

No easy way to start this post so here it goes....we found out on Tuesday that Emma has partial, permanent, hearing loss in both of her ears.


This came as a complete shock to Matt and I.  Yes, I was at the U of M ears/nose/throat doctor but I went with one banana at nap time thinking we were going to have a quick conversation about tubes.  5 hours, 3 tests, and an ear molding for hearing aids later, I left to drive home. My phone died by the time the banana was gone.  So when I showed up 3 hours late at dinner time, Matt knew something was wrong.


We had no indication this was coming. Emma seems to be hearing fine and her words are actually coming along great. But, apparently, partial hearing loss is like that. If we had not had her tested, we may not have known until she was 4 or 5 when her speech was delayed.


In fact...when we got home, my pediatrician actually said the hearing and eye test were not required if I did not suspect anything. I scheduled the eye appt about a month ago when a few ppl mentioned that Emma had a lazy eye (of course I didn't notice that either) and the hearing test got scheduled routinely at that time.    So while this is heartbreaking for me as a mama, I am very glad we were able to detect this early.


We are still absorbing this information and trying to understand what it means. If you know of anyone who also has a child who is hard of hearing, please pass their information along (or pass them my blog). To be brutally honest, hearing loss was not one of the needs we said we were comfortable with when we first started Emma's adoption. Emma's referral listed her hearing as 'normal'.


Some friends have asked me if I am upset with China for the missed diagnosis.  After 4 days of thinking about it, I realize I am not upset at all. God knew better then to list her file as hard of hearing.  He knew we were her parents and lined up everything to make that happen. Matt and I may think we know what we 'need' but God is the only one who really knows that.  We just have to let go and trust that things will work out!


In the meantime, Emma is just adjusting great. She says mama now and I know she means me (for those adoptive parents out there you know how amazing this feeling is)!  She also says dada, nana (banning), more,  poo poo, & bye bye.  Moreover, we have twice caught her fake crying after she 'fake' fell down  while playing with Lexie.  Smart girl. :-)

Emma in FL in early March - see full pictures of our vacation here!

Please pray for Matt and I as we figure out how to navigate these waters. Pray to give us peace with this diagnosis and to give us the guidance of what we can do to help our little miracle continue to grow & adjust.

The Gift

I haven't been posting to the blog because there isn't a ton to say.   We have settled into our routine, both daily and sleep schedules, and the latter continues to be a challenge.

 Here is an example of our schedule:

5:30 - Dinner
6:30 - Baths
6:45 - 7:15 - Books & Emma to bed in her room
7:15 - 7:45 - Books & Lexie to Bedin her room
9:00 - 9:10 - Emma's 1st wake, Christy or Matt goes to soothe her
10:30 - Matt to bed
11:00 - 11:10 - Emma 2nd waking, Christy to sooth her
11:10 - Christy to bed
1:30 -2:00 am Emma 3rd waking - Matt grabs Emma from her bed and puts her on the floor next to Christys side of the bed (on a crib mattress). Christy gives Emma a bottle.
3:30 - 3:40 am - Emma's 4th wake up - Christy soothes her (without getting out of my bed, yea!)
5:45 am -  6:00 am - Emma's 5th wake up (for the day) -  Matt gets up with her
7:00 am - Christy & Lexie are up

So you can see, its not perfect but it works for us. My DH is amazing too btw. He is such a trooper and has taken the brunt of 'figuring out' this night time schedule (I am horrible with lack of sleep). I couldn't have done this with anyone else.

Anyway, we had finally 'accepted' the night time schedule and then our world was rocked last night. I am having a hard time not tearing up just writing it.

she
slept
through
the
night

To be clear here...this is not a sleep through the night via the 'six hour' clause many books reference. I mean we put her to bed at 7 pm last night in her own bed and she didn't wake up out of her own bed until 5:45 am.  Note - there was no hint this was going to happen. No lead up to this. The example of getting up 5 times has occurred most nights since we have been home, including the night before last.

I am not sure why on 2/25/2012 it happened. I am calling it a huge gift from God.  A 'wink' from God to tell us that we can do this and things WILL get better.

Of course, Lexie was up last night from 2:30 - 3:30 but that is just par for the course of being parents of two, right?! :-)


********************************************************************
For those of you asking for pictures, here you go!!

Emma on the ice in MN
(Matt was so excited b/c the public park near my sisters house had this awesome rink!)

Lexie using her skates from Santa!

Daddy teaching Lexie to skate

Family Picture
(Skating is hard work - hence the crying from Lexie)

Mary, Lexie, Emma, and George the next am
(Cousins)

Playdate with our friends the Clarks
(Emma loved this box, she thought it was the best 'toy' in the house)

Lexie & Devin (Cousin) at the pool
(hint - this is what we do to get Lexie out of the house while Emma is napping in the afternoon!)

Next week we are off to Florida & Disney so should have some adorable pictures of the girls from there!!

The news

Today we had some good and some bad news....

The Good News
Grandma Lilley came over to babysit Emma & Lexie this evening so we could have a few hours off to play cards with our friends. The plan was to put Emma to bed and then sneak out for a few hours while they put Lexie down.  My parents came over a little early and brought a delicious dinner,...super nice. At bedtime my mom went to rock Emma and give her a bottle.   Here is where the good news comes in....Emma went ballistic. Seriously went crazy that it wasn't mom or dad putting her to bed.  SCORE!!!  We have both been loving this little girl to pieces and it kills us when she doesn't outwardly love us back. It is so hard when she doesn't recognize us when we walk in a room or seem to care when a stranger takes her from us.  This reaction to grandma rocking her was exactly what we have been waiting for and we were both ecstatic (sorry Grandma!!)!

The Bad News
About 4 mins after my parents arrived for dinner, Lexie started to cough & throw up.  At first I thought maybe it was gag reflex but after the 3rd time she threw up, we realized this was probably the stomach flu.  The norovirus has been going around so we think she caught it from someone this past week.  We just read all about it and it seems like it is very hard to keep from spreading...especially with a 1 year old in the house who puts everything in her mouth.  I can only assume we are all in for it.  I just pray we don't get it at the same time!  Needless to say,  with all the crying and throwing up, we sent my parents home and called our friends to let them know we would not make it to cards this evening.

I will leave you on a high note with a few pictures from yesterday.  We visited Matts' Great Grandma  - Emma & Lexie's Great Great Grandma- yesterday.  The trip went really well and we were able to meet up with Great Great uncle Lon as well.

 Great Great Grandma Gay and Emma

Great Great pushing Emma in her walker! They had a blast doing this around the apt!

 Great Great Uncle Lon & Emma goofing around (Emma really had an affinity for Uncle Lon!)

 The whole crew!  

Note: Great Great Grandma Gay keeps the apt pretty darn warm.  This is why Lexie is 1/2 naked in the photos. I can't remember why she was crying though!

Great Great Grandma Gay & Lexie on a 'walk' down her hallway

One month since Gotcha day!

We have had Emma in our arms for a full month! She is such a joy, we just feel so very lucky to be able to have in our family!

Here are a few pictures over the past week:

 Emma on her moose from Santa

Lexie is learning to share!!

 Emma after a meal! This girl loves to eat!

 Wearing daddy's Tigers hat

This is what we wake up to every morning, too cute!!

We are slowly getting used to her sleep situation. I wouldn't say its getting better...we are just figuring out how to make it work. There is no way around it, we just have to put in the hard work with her at night so she continues to attach to us. To know we are not going anywhere.  Every child challenges you in different ways, this is where I am still learning from this precious child!

We are also planning a few trips in the remaining 7 weeks of leave. Visiting family & maybe a trip to Florida to visit the sunshine. :-)

Reality & Blessings

Reality
The reality of being home is that Emma has a hard time staying asleep.  She is awake all night tossing and turning, checking, and rechecking to make sure we are still there.  We have been co-sleeping with her but she still wakes up to check and recheck.

When we first got home, I thought  she just wanted to co-sleep (I had been fighting that in China to keep my rest). We thought that perhaps her foster family co-slept and that if we did that she would sleep more soundly.  It didn't help. 4 days later, we were just all exhausted.   Then, 2 nights ago,  my DH agreed to sleep on her floor as she slept in her toddler bed (as opposed to the crib she slept in while in China). She still popped her head up every 40 mins to check that he was there; however,  as long as he was there, she was good and went back down to sleep (on her own!).  She didn't need us in bed with her, she just wanted to make sure we hadn't left her. :-(

I have a great online community of adoptive parents that are helping me brainstorm my way around this while Emma learns we are not going anywhere.  We are pulling out every stop in the book -- natural products, music, a lovey, etc.  Honestly, I underestimated it when they told us that most kiddos coming home have sleep challenges.  I thought 'Oh i had a newborn, I get it'.  Nope. This is totally different from anything we saw with Alexis.  I want to openly say this so adoptive parents who are waiting know. You gotta prepare yourself for a tough first week home. Tougher then anything we saw in China at night.

Blessings
During the day Emma is a dream and such a blessing to our family.  A few updates since we have been home:

• She eats like a champ & continually uses the signs for 'more' food and 'down' from her high chair. 
• She can traverse her way up the stairs (I found her on the landing one day this week so the gates went up immediately) and she just learned yesterday how to go down the stoop to our mudroom (1 step) backwards so she doesn't fall.  :-)  
• We had our first Dr's Appt and she did great. Poor thing was pricked 4 times for the 12 vials of blood but they got it all eventually and so far so good!

We have wonderful friends and family who have been bringing us dinner so we haven't had to cook this week at all, thank God. Thank you to everyone who brought us something, we so appreciated it!

Lexie is loving being a big sister but having a hard time sharing our time. To be expected.  Funny story....one day this week Matt walked in the playroom to find Lexie with a pair of kids scissors behind her back and a guilty face. He asked her what she did and she said 'I gave Emma a haircut'.   It was all we could do not to smile.

Emma's 'first' haircut from Lexie

Even with all the sleep issues, we were bound and determined to do some 'family' events this week. We went ice skating on Monday (before everyone got sick). Emma slept through the event.  Lexie loved her new skates but is still warming up to the idea of being on the ice. She has already asked to go again though so that is a good sign!

Emma sacked out as Lexie and Daddy come back from hitting the ice

We also hit the pool yesterday morning.  It was good for about 20 mins until everyone got cold.  Still 20 mins is pretty good for an outing!The only glitch -- getting two kiddos plus parents dressed and undressed in a small locker room is clearly still something we need to master, lol.

Emma's first swimming adventure

That is the update for now. We are doing well...so freaking thankful for our employer who give us maternity and paternity leave for the next 9 weeks.

Welcome Home!!

We are home!!

Here is just a snapshot of what we had waiting for us at the airport when we arrived! Seriously, we had an absolutely huge group of people waiting for us, we are so grateful for everyone who came to share the day with us!

Kiddos waiting outside customs

 Coming through from customs

My girl who I missed more then I could have imagined

 Our family of 4!

Emma was pretty much exhausted so really didn't open up and start smiling until we got home.  Here are a few pictures from that evening:

 Girls in their new dresses

Aunt Catherine (who helped watch Lexie while we were gone) & Emma

If you like what you see, view the full set of pictures here

We are exhausted and trying to get on the right timezone but I just wanted to say THANK YOU to everyone who followed our blog, sent me emails, and supported us by helping out with Lexie while we are gone.  We love you all.