What We've Learned

You know they say, Kids are great teachers. Boy, is that the case in our house.

Take #1 for instance:He's the first. He taught us to see life through a child's eyes. He taught us to look at what we thought we knew and believed and PROVE it. Awesome. BUT he almost killed me those 1st 6-8 months! I didn't think I'd survive. I mean, he was collicky. He would only breast feed. He ate EVERY 2 hours. I didn't think I would make it. Little did we know he was preparing us for
This guy.

#2

You know, you think you can prepare for birth but then things sneak up on you and make you have to do more prep. We knew he had Down Syndrome and we knew he had a heart condition. We prepared for those as best we could. We did NOT know he had Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension until maybe 3-4 weeks after he was born. We did NOT know PAH has a very slim survival rate and he was given no chance of survival. (probably best we did not know that, huh?) So we had a year of around the clock feedings and medicines through a feeding tube, that I had to insert regularly through his nose because the stinker kept pulling it out. We had multiple doctors visits per month. We kept busy trying to balance his health with #1's need for support and attention.

What did he teach us? (and continues to teach us) Enjoy every moment because you never know if it will be your last. Enjoy the small things and don't worry if it takes longer to get the big things. They will come in due time. You know what else? He taught us we could handle more in our lives than we ever thought. He taught us how much time we wasted on unimportant things. We knew once #2 was out of the woods, we could adopt and handle whatever came our way.

So then came

#3:OH MY. What has she taught us? Let's see. For starters, don't take yourself too seriously. Don't think you are ready for Parent of the Year award, cause you are going to have to prove it daily. She challenges you in ways that make you feel uncomfortable. She makes you work for it. And you know what, that's okay. She has helped us become better parents. I don't think she'd award us Parent of the Year yet. She still has a lot of work left to smooth our rough edges.

Because of our first adoption experience, we felt we could handle another one. That led us to:

#4OMG, he may have taught us the most important life lessons. "Don't Worry, Be Happy" Seize the Moment. It's okay to laugh a LOT. It's okay to sing whenever you feel like it. (this has a secondary benefit of angering #3 who does not like perkiness) It's okay to dance (using your shoulders like they do in Ethiopia) even if the music you are dancing to is inside your head and no one else can hear it. If you are super happy, the best thing to do is the Ethiopian click with your tongue. Basically, just enjoy what life has to offer you. Don't spend too much time planning, just enjoy!

So that is what we are doing. ENJOYING!
Thankful for each day and each child and the lessons they teach us!