Selah shared... Day 3 with the girls. URGENT NEED!

Well Selah shared....Sam & Sarah are both sick.  Yesterday both of them were grumpy.  With Sam, sometimes that is par for the course (he has my personality LOL) but Sarah is never grumpy and seldom cries.  Yesterday she was a mess.  Last night it was hard to get Sam to go to bed which is odd since he loves his sleep and usually will walk to his bed and get mad at us if we are not  ready for him to go night night (if he still has some eye drops to do)

This morning they both woke up with their eyes almost glued shut with mucus!  That totally freaked me out!  Thankfully our pediatricians office has Saturday hours and our doctor was there!!  Both of them have junky throats, sinus infections and eye drainage.  They both got three prescriptions.  After two dosages of meds they both are back to normal:) 

I use CVS pharmacy and they've just started a new program.  For every 10 prescriptions, you get back $5 LOL  So far this month, with Selah's regular prescriptions, Sam's 5 eye drop prescriptions, Sam and Sarah's new ones....I'm at 20 prescriptions....it is April 6th LOL  CVS may lose money on us!!!!

Selah on the other hand is doing great, totally back to normal.  I sat with her on the swing for almost 2 hours this afternoon.  My left arm is now useless as she leaned on it the whole time but it was worth it to feel her cuddle into me.  She was so totally relaxed and very content.  At first I thought she'd go to sleep but then she started looking around and was the most alert that I have seen her since last week.  She seemed to look at me anytime I talked to her. 

Sam's speech teacher always stressed to me the importance of "vesicular" movement, swinging movement and how it affects the brain and allows it to learn.  Kids who are blind or visionly challenged CRAVE it!  Sam is addicted to swings, you could swing him 5 hours a day and he'd still want more.  So I felt like the swinging today really seemed to "center" Selah and help her to relax as well as focus. 

 

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So back to my memories of last year.....hope you all like it, I haven't got many comments.  One friend said she was having trouble commenting...maybe something is off with blogspot but I LOVE hearing your comments

 

 

So Day 3 with the girls....   Here is Steve looking out the living room window as we were waiting outside to go to the institution.

 

Here are scenes of our apartment area

 

There were always people going through the garbage

clothes hanging outside

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jon sitting and waiting

 

 

 

First smile:)

 

 

 

 

 

Daddy and Selah

Natasha, Selah's caregiver holding her

 

Selah had to leave

 

 

 

Look at Sarah we thought she was self injuring herself.  Seems that was all scabies. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can you believe this is the same girl???

 

 

Doesn't seem possible does it?  The first picture was taken a year ago today....the bottom picture was taken last Sunday....

 

 

THAT'S LOVE!!!!!

 

I've never shared that top picture of Sarah before...it's rough...but it was real.  And I loved that girl just as much as I love that pretty one in the Easter picture...

 

 

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After we left the orphanage we had a flat (one of many) and I took some pictures on the outskirts of town

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty bleak town...Torez was a booming town until the fall of the USSR.  It was a coal mining town and very prosperous.  I dont' think  too many of the residents are happy with the current conditions.  The town is about 90,000 - 100,000 people about the size of Lakeland for my friends in the area...but that is where the similarities end.  Such a poor town, but I loved it. 

 

Here is our dear George and Sam playing at the apartment.  Jon had his coffee:)  We loved George even before we met him and he was one of the main reasons we had such an enjoyable adoption experience.  We soon felt he was a long lost relative...the wonderful interesting talks we all had together.  What a great friend!  He has facilitated over 100 adoptions and has fans all across the US:)  He handled all our paperwork/court issues with such grace.  We were finished in less than 6 weeks, an adoption of two unrelated girls, at an institution....Selah's case was very complicated but everything went so smooth.  We flew in with about 5 other families, and we were the first ones to go home.  He was amazing!!!

 

 

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URGENT NEED

 

 

http://everlastingmomentum.blogspot.com/ 

 

This is the blog of the family who was just a few weeks from leaving to adopt their little boy and he passed away....  Now they have continued, and have been led to adopt another little boy at the same mental institution as their son.  They are still short about $3000....I have 3000 hits just about every day on here.  If everyone went to their blog and gave $1, we could help them out!  they've suffered a huge heartache on the way to becoming the answer to some little child's prayer.  I can promise you this family will be bringing hope to a hopeless life.  from what I understand, there has only been two adoptions from this mental institution and it is rough...

 

 

Let me tell you what a mental institution or an "internot" is...it is NOT an orphanage.  It is the end of the road.  Children who are considered UN adoptable, like my girls go there at just 4 years of age.  They "age out" of the baby house and instead of going to an orphanage (which is bleak enough) they are sent to a hell hole...there is no other words for it.  At my girls institution, there were children age 4-18 who were mentally and/or physically challenged, boys and girls, then there were the Girls over 18.  The boys are sent to other institutions after they reach 16 or 18 years old.  Many children die in the first year of going to a mental institution.  Torez used to average 5 children dying a month.  Thank God that started changing as Life 2 Orphans came in and provided care givers who helped.  I do not believe Sarah would have lived much longer if we hadn't come and got her, you see the picturs, what do you think?  What you don't see is pictures of her naked, I just could not bring myself to take any of them.  She looked like a skeleton, scary, so tiny....her pelvic area was indescribable...so sunken in. 

 

So you have a chance to help SAVE a child, one who can have a different life, like our girls have.  Please click on their blog and give towards their adoption and pray for them!!!

 

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                            

 

 

 

 

Great day for Selah ------and GroundHog Day begins....

Selah had a good day.  She slept great last night which meant we did too!  I only got up with her once to change her and even then she had a low normal heart rate.  Her PT came today and said her legs looked great:)  She worked with her for quite awhile and said that her ankles were not drawing up in the least bit (very important!)  YEAH!  Some kids have the surgery and then draw up as soon as they are out of the casts.  Usually the doctors wait a year or so before doing the surgery to ensure that that won't happen but Thank God it seems like it has been the right thing to do for Selah and it has worked.  She will get her brand new wheelchair on Monday:)  We are hoping it will be much more comfy for her than anything else we have tried. 

Her heart rate and BP have stayed good today, even during therapy.  I am so thankful for medicine!  I believe God gives doctors and scientists the wisdom to research and develop medicines to help others.  To see what a difference being on an antibiotic has made in her in the past few days is reason enough to be thankful!!!!!!

After PT we went crossbow shopping.  We didn't buy Steve anything for Christmas.  He has had a renewed interested in crossbows and archery and wanted to get one.  So this is his very late Christmas present but one I think he will really enjoy!  He is quite the marksman!  We also had to buy a new target as the crossbow would have blown up the one Shad uses for his bow and arrow  (oh and now Shad wants a new bow!)   I like for them to have anything that will keep them outside and off the tv/games! 

 

Jon looking at the crossbow  ( I liked the second archery shop the best they had a waiting room area!)

 

Steve is happy

 

 

All the animals there were killed by either a crossbow or a bow and arrow including the gator

 

I saw a baby gator in a pond near the hospital yesterday.  he better watch out LOL

 

 

 

 

it takes strength to pull that back (or in my case to hold it steady LOL)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Steve says he wants to go hunting...I can NOT believe I raised a child who wants to hunt!!!!!  What happened?  He used to be such an animal lover!

 

We also went to Whole Foods today...that was an experience.  I'd love for us to only eat organic, but it is expensive.  Luckily I can buy some of the brands they carry at Publix and it is cheaper there!  But it was fun and I loved that there was nothing with nitrates in it in the store.  All the meats were nitrides free.  I hate nitrates and really feel like they are very dangerous.  It is in almost all CURED meats BUT you can look and find things without it if you try. 

 

So that was our big day out on the town.

 

 

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Thinking back to one year ago...we started what we called "Ground Hog Days".  If you ever have seen the movie where Bill Murray has to repeat ONE day of his life over and over....then you'll know what I mean LOL

 

We would get up and be ready to meet our driver by 9 or 9:15 am.  Be at the orphanage by 9:30 and see the girls till 11:30 or if we were lucky and the driver was busy...maybe till noon.  Then we'd go back to the apartment, eat, go walking around or to the Internet cafe....  Same thing every day but I loved it.

 

Actually we had to go to one of the government buildings that next day for something and then we were back to see the girls....

 

a person cleaning the square downtown

Jon and Lenin  (not John Lennon LOL)

Lenin and me

gangs of stray dogs everywhere  A man was attacked outside out apartment the second night we were there.  a gang of dogs were all over him.  we didn't know what to do, it's not like you can call 911!  A lady came out and hit the dogs with a broom and they left him and he hobbled inside.

 

 

 

yes we were obsessed with Lenin....It just amazed us to see him.  In Kiev there is a small bust of him, we saw it but in Torez....just 30 miles or so from Russia...Lenin is everywhere!  I have pictures of him that I will show...

The movie theater

 

So after the additional paperwork was done we were off to see the girls. 

 

 

 

Here we are with Selah's personal caregiver Natasha.  She was WONDERFUL and actually cared for Selah.  She had recently taught her to walk.  she was paid for by a ministry called Life 2 Orphans prior to Natasha working with Selah, we think she stayed in her tiny crib. 

 

 

 

 

 

Sarah was so weak and tired she'd just lay in my lap

 

 

 

 

 

I was so worried about her

 

 

 

I really like this picture of us

Selah had to go...

 

The girl holding Selah and the one in the striped shirts live there.  The little girl in the pink was a small child who lived there and the lady in the white was Sarah's caregiver

 

I hated giving the girls up daily.  It was hard.

 

 

 

then back to the apartment to have some sort of adventure.  Our living room was the windows behind Jon's shoulder and the bedroom was the next set down. 

 

Soviet housing

 

 

Can I say again how much I/we loved Ukraine?

 

I went quite annoyed and put out that they (the government) would require so much time from us...but I loved every minute of it!  I love that place in a way I can not describe.  Honestly I started wondering if perhaps my family had some roots in Ukraine when I see how much Sarah and Sam resemble each other and the uncanny way I fell in love with that country.  It is a prickly country LOL not one that is easy to love, or easy to live in but I loved it.  It's not like I've never been out of the country before I've traveled but never felt the draw of a country like I do Ukraine. 

 

So that was our second day...we were falling in love with two little girls like crazy...still a little worried about Selah's needs but you will see in the pictures how she began responding more and more.  Sarah was so weak, she'd hold herself up a bit and then just go limp.  It was not her relaxing on me, it was a sick little girl.  You can't really see but on the top of her head, she had bumps, they were covered with various colors of creams, but it bled almost daily.  her hands were covered and bloody at times.  She had scabies...but as you can see she was all over me and I never got it.   I'm so thankful we got to Sarah when we did, I do not think she would have lived much longer.   Selah was in a  much better situation (so to speak) but still needed us.  She had a really good happy caregiver and a 16 yr old teen girl in her room to play with her.  Sarah had no one.  They acted very superstitious towards Sarah since she only had one eye.  I made it a point to show them how much I loved her.  I wish they could see her now! 

 

 

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Please keep Selah in prayer that the meds will work quickly and that she will regain the ground she loses when she is sick.