Cousins from Cleveland

Uncle Brian brought Morgan and Molly out for a visit last week, and this is the best photo I could get. Lots of laughter and silliness!

It is so special that the cousins get opportunities to hang out like this. They are infrequent but full of memory-making. Molly and Morgan were SO excited to meet Oli and Bella in person - they've seen them through Skype or in pictures, but not face-to-face. They just kept hugging them.

We fit in a visit to the zoo and a lot of hanging out at the house. We love when Dem Clevelanders come to town!

A Boy and his Grandpa

We went bowling for Auntie Rosie's birthday and this is now one of my favorite shots. Benji used to call my dad "Gumpa." We are sad it didn't stick, but we still pull it out every now and then.

Mountain Rain, a Flat Tire, and Apple Pie

Sometimes what we need most is to blow off any of the "normal" routine and just go. Get in the car...and GO.

I actually need this far more often than I am able to do, what with nap needs and pickup schedules and homework requirements and making dinner. But today The Papa and I looked at each other and knew: it was time.

It didn't matter that it was dumping rain. Fewer people on the roads, we thought. We'll go to the top of Palomar Mountain and grab apple pie at Dudley's on the way down. We'll bring some sandwiches and not care if the kids eat the rest of their hungry in pie. We are going to have FUN.

About 25 minutes in, we had a flat. The rain was slightly lighter, and we dug around the boot in hopes that we actually had a spare tire. Yes! We did! As well as a jenky jack that barely worked. Still, we called AAA which was fortuitous because the spare tire needed air.

Brent got the tire changed, the AAA guy filled it with air, and the entire interruption lasted less than an hour. Not bad. We gave the kids all their snacks to keep them happy while they waited. Smart move, I say.

But then we were left with the question: should we attempt to drive up the mountain in the rain on a spare tire? Um...YES! We were seeking adventure and not about to turn back now!

So we drove. Turn after turn up some 4,000 foot elevation, through the clouds. It was misty and mystical.

For The Papa and I, anyway.

Sadie (in the whiny voice): When are we going to get to the apple pie shop? (Every 4 minutes.)

Benji: AUGH. My tummy hurts.

Bella: AAAH!!! AAHHHH!!!!

Oliver: Sop it, Beya! Sop skweeming!!!

Mama: Look how beautiful it is!  Look for the outlines of trees in the mist! It's so lovely!

Bella:  UUUUUUUHHH!!!! (Plus some banging of her head on her seat.)

But persevered we did, stopping briefly at the top to stretch our legs in the pouring rain, and on our way down the mountain we saw wild turkeys in the road. By the time we crept close enough to take a picture, they were in the bushes. Find four turkeys in the photo below:

And of course we stopped for the pie. Sadie wolfed it down. Benji ate it slowly, appreciating every bite. Bella screamed and spit it out, then screamed that Papa ate it for her. (Because...two years old.) And Oliver picked pieces out of it and left the crust. But Mama can't take photos in a crowded hectic place (because...stress), so you'll have to imagine that part.

We put on Wild Kratts for the rest of the ride home (hooray for DVD players in vans - we resist the temptation most of the time, but man, it's handy for the last bit of a long drive) - bought eggs at the egg farm, and honeycomb from the beekeepers on the side of the road.  We made mental notes to look into cabin camping at Lake Henshaw and to come back to one of the pumpkin patches at a roadside farm.

Then we pulled into the garage and put the kids to bed for late afternoon naps, and they actually fell asleep.

Lovely, lovely day.

The things people say...

I grew up in a family of four kids, and I remember how even in the '80's that was sometimes considered a large family (though not uncommon). While we ain't got nuthin' on those folks who do a great job of raising, say, eight or more kiddos, we still end up as a main event when I go out with these punkins on my own.

But I do it. Going to Costco on a weekday morning is really a better use of our time than wasting family time on the weekend when The Papa is home and can hang out with us. If we have to do the divide-and-conquer thing in order to allow one of us an evening off, I'd rather meet a friend for coffee than head out to the grocery store. So I just take a deep breath, pass out some snacks, and go for it.

And here's what we look like: I am wearing Bella on my back; Sadie and Oli are in the child seats, and Benjamin is either orbiting around us like a satellite or dangling off the side of the basket like some sort of unfortunate growth.

I can see why we attract attention.

Most of the time comments are benign:

       "Oh, you've got your hands full!"

       "Wow, how old are they?"

       "Are those two twins?" (Indicating Sadie and Oli.)

       "I could never do that. I can barely handle one." (I have empathy for this parent. That's how I felt for a while with one, and then two. But as they get older, you find strength for the next.)

Sometimes people are a little more intrusive, more out of ignorance or an attempt to be nice than anything:

       "Are they all yours?" (Definitely noticing that we don't look much alike.) When I answer, "Yes," they sometimes follow up with, "I mean, are they all yours?"

       "Wow!  You look great for having all these kids! I mean, look at you!" as they eyeball my 10 month old.  (So...do I take credit for a body that didn't actually bounce back from labor four times? One time I mentioned adoption, but that opened up a can of worms with a very loud and tactless lady, so now I just say thanks and let them think I'm Supermom.)

I do try to be strategic about when we go out en masse. I much prefer decently behaved kids to wild and whiny ones. Folks will often use my children's occasional good behavior as a segue into telling me about the kids they witnessed yesterday melting down in public. A checker at Costco once went on and on about the parents who went through the entire warehouse with two screaming and crying little ones.
       "I mean, why didn't they just take them home? Who does that? They should have fed them something."
       What I am thinking is, that could have been me. That could be me tomorrow. The thing is, if the bystander is irritated by the child's behavior, you can be darn sure that parent is, too. No one likes being the person with squawking kids in a public space. No one goes out thinking - "I feel like getting judged for my parenting today. Come on tired, hungry kids, let's do this!" But we all find ourselves in that position from time to time. And we are there because we feel like it is the best option out of available (unfortunate) options...like feeding everyone water and dry beans for dinner that night.

Anyhoo. My favorite story is next.

One morning I'm walking through the halls at the doctor's office, herding the children to someone's appointment. An old man starts talking to us as we pass. "Oh, you sure got your hands full!"

"Yes, I do." I smile at him. He smiles at me, but his eyes are already drifting from one child to the next. He is counting and processing.

"Ah, you've got quite a young man right there," he says, indicating Benjamin.

"Yep, he's getting big!" I beckon Sadie to catch up; she's a drifter. The man continues taking it all in.

"Wow, those two are barely...wow...how do you get them all places? Oh."  He spots Bella on my back now. "Oh..."

Here we go.

"Are those all yours? Don't you think you have enough?"  We keep walking.

"You probably should slow down now!" His voice is raised, and he is irritated. He does not like that I have four kids. He thinks I procreated four times. He thinks there is something very wrong with that. He probably noticed that three baby daddies were involved.

We now get to absorb the discontent of any vocal person who believes that four plus kids is a problem. And this happens (not always as colorfully) with some regularity. Since we became a large family six months ago, I have fielded verbal barbs three times. That's an average of once every two months. I do think that the ages of the kids is part of what bothers people - they just look like so many and so unmanageable. And not everyone is comfortable with the busy-ness of little people. (Heck, I'm not totally comfortable with the busy-ness of my little people!)

I'm not mad or on a rant or anything. I know there is a lot of ignorance that simply comes from lack of experience. But I am baffled by the mindset that it's OK to make public comments about a stranger's family. In every instance of disrespect, the individual was someone who had gray hair. In other words, they were old enough to know better. Or perhaps they were old enough to think that their opinion mattered more than mine when it comes to my family.

I'll leave my observations there. For now, if you see us out in public, just imagine the circus dropped by. Feel free to smile and wave.

Catching Up - dem Clevelanders visit

Back in February, mere days after Oliver and Isabella joined the family, Brent's mom (Gramma Doro), sister (Aunt Amy) and niece, Morgan, arrived for a visit that had been planned a long time earlier. Oh, they were so gracious.

With the doubling of kiddos and the lack of sleep we were getting, I totally failed in the hospitality department, but they never complained. Mom even made dinners for us.

One lovely afternoon we sat and drank margaritas in the backyard while the kids turned a few items into a water slide. First climb up...

then slide down. They took turns sliding and holding the hose.

Oli preferred to watch - except when he was crawling through the secret escape hatch in the castle.

Love those sunny afternoons.

We were so grateful to have their help during the chaos of that first week. I'm not sure their vacation was restful, but it was generous and appreciated.

The Thing that Sucks about Infertility is that It's the Hardest Way to have a Baby

I started out writing this post about the greatest challenge for me as I deal with infertility. And then that one thing turned into two things. And then it turned into a realization that no matter how hard it has been, I really have nothing to complain about. And then the post became moot. And then it became relevant again because suddenly there was a greater truth than the original complaint. So here is my progression of thought along with a happy ending.

Infertility is on my mind of late because I am soon turning 40 years old. As I approached this number, so dreaded by any woman wishing to bear children, I thought: this is it. If I have any shot at possibly getting pregnant, I had better get going on that treatment now. So I did. Seven years ago, or so, we went through a couple rounds of treatment that were unsuccessful...which quickly led to the adoption of Benjamin. This time we decided to try another couple rounds of a slightly more aggressive treatment, but we found out last week that our final attempt still did not take. We're done with medical intervention now.

So it's over. The lingering hope that our unidentified issue could be circumvented by science...done. Moving on. No babies in this womb. The grief finally ambushed me.

My first complaint about infertility is that it just makes growing a family hard. No option is simple. None are cheap. You have to really want to add a baby to your family. And whether you do it through medicine or adoption, it is a long and challenging process. 

There is the issue of money - medicine costs money. Adoption costs money. Money that some folks would use for a tropical vacation or dramatic home improvements or to pay off college loans.

There is the pain factor. Giving oneself shots in the belly is really no fun. Though I must say, I got a kick out of looking at my husband after he jabbed an intro-muscular needle into my right butt cheek and reflecting on how we never anticipated that living out our wedding vows would include sticking a needle in one of our arses.

Adoption requires struggling through mounds of paperwork and jumping into an intimate friendship on the count of three. It requires adding more people to the family, and being available to others who are experiencing a loss at the very moment you are experiencing the joy of addition.

I sum up these challenges with this: for those of us who are infertile, simply getting to the point of attempting to add a child requires a ridiculous amount of forethought, planning, decision-making, and effort. And for every thought one has toward a possible next step, there are numerous thoughts that pop up against that course of action.

The second burden on my heart is that I just want to experience pregnancy and birthing. I am the mama who dreamed of natural birth, of doing things at home, of breastfeeding for an uncomfortably long time. Some of my friends think me a bit of a hippie. Call it what you will, I really wanted to give birth and be present for it all along the way. I do not have that choice...and my heart hurts a bit.

But as much as I am tempted to complain about it, we who are infertile are not unique in our struggle. In a lifetime, a couple will be faced with any number of health challenges, child-bearing or rearing challenges, life-and-death challenges. Some of us get cancer. Some experience miscarriages in between healthy births. Some give birth and then discover their child has a grave illness or developmental issue. Some give birth once and then can't anymore, and their family growth gets cut off prematurely. Lots of couples deal with financial constraints as they consider having another child. Lots encounter struggles during pregnancy or have premature births.

I can't mope about my situation. Especially because here is where it led:

I am privileged to have the children I have through open adoption. PRIVILEGED. They are dear and amazing little people. I have seen God work through our situation time and time again. And how can I dishonor that by rewriting the script this time around? Why would I want to? I don't have any desire to change our past or the family I have been given, so I will look at this latest moment of grief through a different lens.

I will set aside my feelings of loss to embrace our next journey - we intend to pursue another open adoption. Our final one, as far as I can tell. There must be another boy or girl growing in the womb of a mama who is looking for safety and love in a package that resembles our family.  So we will get out there and wait for her.

The thing that sucks about infertility is that it is the hardest way to have a baby. But in the end, that's not so bad.

Flashback to 4th of July

Trying to catch up here, folks. For the 4th of July, we hung out at my folks' house where the kids got to meet their (then) new baby cousin, Caleb.

Gigi (short for great-grandma) made an appearance, as did Auntie Rosie.

Grandpa rocked the grill - a favorite pastime we all appreciate.

Almost as much as we appreciate Grandpa's wine cellar as demonstrated by Uncle Mike.

Benjamin declared at the time of this photo that we needed a baby.

And then we went to watch fireworks with all our little buddies from church. We've accumulated quite a playgroup, and these kiddos are becoming fast friends.

Catching Up

Here's a list, in no particular order, of the notable and mundane in the last six months at The P-Pod. Some will require an entire post to fully appreciate, but I will have to get to that later.

1. Sadie loves bubble baths.  Actually, both kids do, so we frequently fill the kiddie pool in the backyard with bubbles and the kids take their evening baths outside. Oh, the joys of summer. As can be seen above, Sadie still fits in a utility sink and that is often where we launder her.

2. Last January, Benjamin turned five. I can't believe I haven't posted any photos from his party.

3. Last February, Sadie turned two. No photos up yet. Ack.

4. During Thanksgiving and New Year's Eve we were able to get up to the Sierras for some hiking and sledding.  At one point there were four adults and seven kids. Maks and Tati had not been sledding like that before. We hiked to the bottom of a drained reservoir - an awe-inspiring experience!

5. Maks and Tati were reunified with their father after a year in our home. We were sad to say goodbye, but happy that the family had stabilized.

6. Benjamin has decided that girls can't be cool. He also doesn't like to do girl things or use girl colors. I am not sure who taught him that, and I especially can't believe that my showing him videos of female race car drivers (surviving crashes, no less!), stunt motorcyclists, and rock stars has not altered this perception.

7.  Benjamin appears to have some dancing ability. Maybe it falls under the category of modern dance, but it's there.

8.  Two days after our foster kiddos moved out, we got on a plane bound for Ohio. We spent two weeks visiting Brent's family in the Cleveland area and Benjamin's biological families in Upstate NY. It was lovely. (Not easy...but lovely.)

9. Shortly thereafter, we went camping in Big Bear with some friends.

10. And in between those trips, my sister had a baby! Welcome to the world Caleb Nathaniel Vandewarker! (The name is on par with Benjamin Anwel Petrencsik. I approve.)

11. I've been learning a lot about Sensory Processing Disorder and how Benjamin has several of the symptoms. This is part of what has made his behavior challenging and why a lot of adults don't know what to do with him if he begins a meltdown.  He is mildly affected, but he can be very challenging. Because of all that I've learned and the empathy I have for parents with kids who require more than the usual amount of stamina to parent, I am starting a parent support group. Parents who are attending have children who are difficult for all kinds of different reasons, but there are many commonalities in our experiences. It's just launching, so I will share more on that later.

12. Sadie will be going to preschool two days a week. Hooray!  She needs more stimulation than I am able to provide. She is extremely social, active, smart and wholly committed to displaying the typical characteristics of being two.

13. Benjamin is going to be a KINDERGARTENER. Oh, I both wipe a tear from my eye and dance a mini jig. He is going to love learning. He will thrive in the structured environment. But I am sad that this sweet time of littleness is coming to an end. He is already excited about his school uniforms and the arrival of his big boy backpack.

14. Maybe our house will have less shrieking in it when school starts. I tell you, the heckling that Benjamin does combined with Sadie's angry screams...

15. Outside of the heckling and squawking, our family is feeling more like a unit these days. I have had to really work on re-bonding with the kids after the fostering situation was over. We were all stretched and it was good for us. God's hand was in all of it, even the really difficult parts. And now we are recuperating. We haven't done much this summer (probably part of the reason the kids are presently coming out of their skin) but that was the point - I needed to reestablish some routines, some slowness, some time for tender moments and books being read and lazy mornings. We are now all ready to move on to what fall and the commencement of school have to offer. It is good.

16. Some time in the past year I started saying no to writing and editing assignments. I could not find the time to keep working on those projects. I am planning to ease back in, but I have deeply needed this time of rest so it may be a while before I am back in the groove.

17. I still have not painted my front doors, but I anticipate having more time once school starts. There are loads of house projects that need attention.

18. We finally hired a gopher service to free our yard from the tyranny of the rodent. In an act of serendipity, our neighbor (whose untended yard is the hub of the kingdom) decided to get gopher service, too! I am beyond excited - I will be able to have a winter garden this year.

19. In typical Jessica fashion, I just discovered a pile of sealed and stamped envelopes: thank you cards for Christmas and birthday gifts...all from December through February. Ahem. Perhaps I will get them in the mail this week. I wouldn't hold your breath.

And...that's the end.  (For now!)

BenTV 023: The P-Pod Heads East

What a beautiful trip we took this month!

We spent most of our time in Cleveland, staying with Brent's sister and her family. The kids played constantly - swinging, hunting for snakes, catching fireflies, running through the sprinklers, driving the kiddie Jeep, riding bikes. Such great memories. We were able to be there for Molly's fourth birthday (she's about six months older than Benjamin). Brent's dad and his wife even came up from Florida during our stay. We saw EVERYONE!

We made an overnight excursion to Marietta, where Brent went to college. It's a quaint little town. Brent's college buddy, Karl, and his wife and daughter joined us. The guys hadn't seen each other for decades.

Rochester also called our name...we visited folks in Benjamin's birthfamily. They're family now, but I feel like I should clarify the relationship for the blog. It will help y'all keep this gigantic family sorted out. We hung out with Emma and Kevin, spent the night at Nana and Poppi's house, and the following day had lunch under the trees at Emma's house with Kevin's family. What a glorious setting. Aunties and cousins were everywhere.

Without further ado, here is the slideshow:

An Addled Appendix, and Whoa, a Few Heavy Thoughts

Auntie Bek went to the hospital some time early this morning. Abdominal pangs that felt like stabbing sensations. By late morning she was in an ambulance being transferred downtown so that she could be in surgery at 11:00. She emerged, shortly thereafter, groggy and missing an appendix. C'est la vie.

This got me thinking as I was driving to Costco with Little P...it was almost time for Auntie Bek (my sister Rebekah, for those of you just tuning in) to endure her first incision...and I was thinking, Thank God it's a routine surgery. I mean, these days getting your appendix removed is like a teeth cleaning (with a one-week recovery time). But there was a time it was not. And had we lived some years ago (100 perhaps? 80?), I would be down one sister in a few days, either because her appendix would rupture and they would never have known how to avoid it, or because the surgery would have been likely to give her a lethal infection.

This was something for me to ponder because I'm kind of a survival of the fittest girl. It's not that I don't have compassion (I've been called a bleeding heart on a fair number of occasions, and many a conservative friend thinks I'm nuts), it's just that I don't think we as humans deserve much. I think, and I'm working this out in my head still, but I think we really only deserve not to be harassed/tortured/abused/murdered/raped/beaten by other people. Beyond that, I don't know that we "deserve" anything. Even advanced medical procedures simply because they exist.

We have this idea, in our society, that if a thing exists, we have a right to it. If it makes our life more convenient or comfortable, well, doesn't that fall under our Constitutional right to pursue happiness? This entitlement really skews our approach to the real things of life. Base level...whether you are God-revering, God-fearing, or God-smearing, we live and we die. We are mammals. We are subject to the same physical laws as the rest of the world. We are mortal and there's nothing we can do about it.

Last week I read this article in the New York Times about illegal immigrants who had benefitted from a clinic that was able to treat their kidney problems with dialysis due to taxpayer monies and additional funding raised from philanthropists. It was a wonderful blessing to these families who were not paying a penny. The clinic absorbed multi-million dollar losses and finally had to close down. In the closing, however, they still somehow managed to pay for several months of treatments at other facilities for their former clients.

Now some of these people have used up their treatments and not found another form of care, some have gone back to Mexico or wherever and are paying out of their savings accounts, and all are being represented by some lawyers who have tried to sue this clinic for closing down. ?!!

While I am terribly confused how someone in a country illegally has the "right" to free healthcare enough to sue a broke hospital when it can no longer provide said free healthcare, that is not the point. I was startled when one of the people interviewed griped about having to dip into her savings account to pay for treatments in Mexico. I am amazed at this perspective because I have known families who have had to fundraise in order to pay for their child's leukemia treatments, for their kid's long-term hospital visit. My friend's mother was denied insurance based on her previous condition - breast cancer. I know people who have started their own HSAs (Health Savings Accounts) to cover routine medical expenses. I have lived in Africa in regions where the nearest clinic (a non-air-conditioned, concrete block building with six multi-bed rooms that provided iodine as one of the best things they'd got) is eight miles away and folks can only access it by foot or by the occasional bus, or perhaps they could borrow a neighbor's donkey cart or something.

While in Zimbabwe, I opened the door of my hut to one of my students whose thumb was swollen to the size of her hand from a deep, inflamed, pus-filled wound incurred by an accident with a plough some days hence. I was giving her $25 so that she could go to the clinic and finally get it fixed before gangrene set in and took her arm or her life. That $25? That was Zim currency. About $3 in U.S. terms.

Now tell me, really? We all "deserve" everything we want (medically or otherwise) just because we live in America?

It is tragic, to be sure, that a 14-year-old girl who is part of her family's livelihood could lose an arm or life over something like 40 stitches and a dose of iodine. Terribly tragic. And for a moment in time I thought that if I had only gone to Zimbabwe for three years in order to save Mildred's life with $3, well, that was precious to me.

But we are animals. Animals with a soul, as I believe. But just animals if you're not the God-type. Our lives have beauty, dignity, worth, meaning and purpose imbued by God, but without Him, we're living, breathing dirt. And to dust we shall return. No one can deny that.

So our obsession with living life as the most comfortable, beautiful, whole, intelligent, happy, wealthy people? Really, really ironic.

I am not trying to make sense, so please, no one attack me here. I am not building a case or an argument or anything. Just sharing the stuff I started pondering as a result of my sister's minor surgery.

So back to A.B. I thought, in awe, of what our family would look like if it were a hundred years ago. We would probably be minus my sister by the end of the week, so there would be two sisters and one brother. And this sister, me, couldn't have kids (at least, as it so appears thus far in my life). I don't even know what adoption looked like back then - probably we would have taken in some orphans or something. The P-Pod, circa 1903. Weird, huh.

I am so grateful for modern science and the fact that an appendectomy is now a safe, out-patient surgery. A.B. was home in bed by the end of the day, and she'll be absent from work for the following week. We will be keeping her husband fed in the mean time, and Little P will no doubt be visiting her tomorrow.