Update: Settling in

Wanted to give a very brief update (since it is 1 a.m.):

We have now been home for about 2 1/2 months and everyone is adjusting.  Overall, things are going well, though the adjustment period has been demanding in a number of ways.    We are beginning to emerge a little from our "cocoon" and start to return to some of our "normal" activities.    Although I was a little skeptical of the cocoon concept when I first heard it, I can honestly say that I am a believer in the wisdom of the cocoon period.  Your adopted child needs to attach to YOU.  If you have adopted or are considering adopting, I strongly recommend The Connected Child by Karyn Purvis. The information and strategies are invaluable.

I will backtrack and give more details about our time in Ethiopia and events since our return later, but just wanted to let everyone know we are still here and are doing fine.  Our days have been very full and time to write has been scarce.

On the list of things that would have been nice to know before we got home, I would like to add the following:
It would have been REALLY nice to know that there is an Amharic word for "dead" that sounds tremendously like the English word "safe".
When you, as a parent, tell your new child that you want him to be safe, you would like him to understand that you mean safe, not dead.  Just sayin'.

Gotcha Day

Upon our arrival Monday night, we were informed that we would be picking up our son in the morning and taking him with us to see his birth family in a town about 3 hours away.  We had expected the birth family interview to take place on Saturday, which meant we had to stay up late Monday night to get everything ready.  Amy and I both had less than 4 hours of sleep following our approximate 26 hours of travel since leaving our home Sunday.

We arose early, got everyone ready, and went to breakfast.  The agency social worker arrived as scheduled and took us to the orphanage to pick up our son.  He greeted us with hugs and was excited to meet his siblings for the first time.  When we went back to the vehicle, he immediately jumped into the backseat with his new siblings.

How did we know he was the one?  The ray of sunlight that followed him around helped.

 We journeyed about 3 hours up into the mountains, much of the journey on an unpaved (but gravel) road.  We eventually came to the town of Ankober and found his grandmother, aunt, cousin, and uncle walking along the side of the road.  We went with them to a small cafe and made our introductions.  His family greeted him with hugs and kisses and then greeted us by thanking us profusely and kissing our hands.  We felt so unworthy of this gesture and were greatly humbled.  This family, who had risen at 3 a.m. and WALKED for 6 hours to reach this town, had experienced much greater hardship and loss in their lives than I ever have.  We, on the other hand, have been blessed tremendously in our lives and it was only the blessing of being born and raised in the U.S. that made it possible for us to be there to adopt our son.  We definitely did not deserve such profuse gratitude from this wonderful family.

Reunited with his grandmother

His family's love for him was unquestionable

 We spent about an hour or so with his family, learning as much as we could about our son's past.  His family clearly loved him very much and expressed joy that he was healthy and that he was going to become part of our family.   We then said our "ciao's" and headed up the mountain to the Ankober Palace Lodge for lunch.  The beautiful but weathered faces of his sweet family will be forever etched in our memory, the sculpted ridges and valleys of their faces reflecting the terraced mountainside from which they had emerged.

We then hiked to the Palace Lodge (elevation about 9600 feet) and had an excellent meal of traditional Ethiopian fare for the adults, and spaghetti for the kids.  It's always kind of nice to burn off your meal before you even eat it, and we did so on that hike.  The kids enjoyed playing on the traditional drums in the dining room while waiting for our food.

It was a tiring hike

Always reassuring!

All four of our kids with A's cousin and aunt

The drums were a hit (pun intended)

After finishing our lunch (at about 4 pm), we began the journey back to Addis Abeba, our heads nodding along the way as we struggled to stay semi-awake.  Our new son must have thought we were a bunch of narcoleptics since his siblings were falling asleep on his shoulders as his parents were nodding in the other seats.  We made it back to the guest house, arriving about 9:00 p.m., eating dinner, and then unpacking before finally getting to bed about 2 a.m. (the kids were asleep by midnight, though).  Our embassy appointment would be the next morning at 9, which meant breakfast would be at about 7:30 and that we would have another short night of sleep.  We were exhausted, but thankful to finally be together as a family.

Looking for Career Opportunities?

Change of pace here, but had to share this one.

Had a drug rep visit the office today (at an inconvenient time; I know, it's shocking) to share the great new coupon program that gives patients $100 off every prescription and can be used an unlimited number of times.

Thoughts:

1.  How big is the profit margin on this drug if you can give $100 off every prescription?
2.  I asked if they needed a medical director, since it is apparently far more profitable to sell drugs than to prescribe them.  She didn't answer.
3.  If you ever wonder why your insurance premium is so high, look at the profits and executive salaries of insurance companies, drug companies, hospitals, and EHR companies.  Paying your doctor is a rather small fraction of your healthcare costs.
4.  If your career goal includes earning money, try to move up the corporate ladder in one of the above 4 industries.

That is all.

Brief Update - Ethiopia Travel Days

For those who have been looking for updates, I apologize for not posting in a while.  We have been in survival mode for the past 4-6 weeks and are just now emerging a little.

We returned to Addis Abeba, Ethiopia on January 21 to pick up our son.  We had a little anxiety on the way over since our flight left Atlanta 40 minutes late and we only had an hour and a half layover in Frankfurt.  On top of that, snow and ice were bad in Frankfurt at the time and we spent a little extra time circling in Germany before we could land (although the captain was nice enough to let us know that we had enough fuel to circle for "a while").  Our flight attendant (I will not use the word stewardess) told us we would not make the connecting flight, but that the airline would take care of us since we would have to spend the night in Frankfurt.  Not that I would typically mind a day of sightseeing in Europe, but we were supposed to pick up our son the following morning and we really needed to make the connecting flight.  Once we did land, we had about 30 minutes before our connecting flight was supposed to leave.  Unfortunately, there was no one manning the gate and we had to wait for airport crew to come open the doors.  We had Amy move to the front of the airplane so she could exit quickly and run to the next gate and ask them to wait for us before departing.

Once the doors opened, Amy sprinted to the next gate, but had to go through security again before she could proceed.  She made it through and got to the gate with about 10 minutes to spare.  They told her they would wait, but to hurry and get the rest of us there.  She quickly bought the water bottles with squirt tops that we wanted to take with us to Ethiopia (easier for tooth brushing) and ran back to security to meet us.  I had hustled with the kids to try to get to the gate, but we were slowed down by security.  They ended up looking through two of our bags before letting us through.  We ran to the gate with about a minute to spare, boarded the airplane a bit out of breath (which was only about 1/3 full since so many flights into Frankfurt had been cancelled) and then waited about 2 hours before we finally took off.  We waited on the tarmac so long that we had to be deiced again before leaving.

The late departure caused us to arrive in Addis around 11 pm instead of 9 pm.   Because there were significant delays getting our visas in Addis, it took about 90 minutes to finally get out of the airport.  By the time we got to the guest house, got the kids settled, and unpacked enough for the next day, it was about 3 a.m. and we were scheduled for breakfast the next morning at 7:30 a.m. so we could pick up our son early in the day and travel to meet his family.  Amy and I each got about 3 hours of sleep that night and hoped we would not be too exhausted when our son joined us the next morning.

Time Flies

Has it really been a month since I last posted?
     It has been a difficult month to do any writing for a few reasons.  First, it is winter and I am a pediatrician, so work has been pretty busy and the work days have been long.  Second, my partner was out of town for a couple of weeks, making work even busier (it's o.k., though, because she will have to cover for me when we return to Ethiopia to bring our son home).  It was actually a blessing to have the extra busyness at work, since that will help as we are facing the last chunk of adoption expenses.
     One of the other large reasons that it has been hard to write is the waiting.  We are anxious to bring our son home, even more so since we have been to Ethiopia and spent time with him.  It is strange to have a child halfway around the world.  There have been a couple of delays since we passed court in early November, but we now seem to be getting close to getting U.S. Embassy approval and being able to return for him.
     I'm sure I'll have more to write soon.