Bitter-Sweet

While Jack was off on his paper chase with Sergei, the girls and I hung out together – they were no longer residents of the orphanage – they were really & truly ours (well, Jack’s… but what’s mine is his & what’s his is mine, right?). Jack and I went to the orphanage at 8am on Thursday morning to pick up the girls and then we had Thursday and Friday together. We spent our time at the hotel (they were very excited to take a shower and put on new clothes!), we went to “Jazz” to play video games and walk around the mall, and we went back to the orphanage each day to visit and say good-bye.

I was nervous about whether or not everyone Zhenya would be ready to leave the orphanage, but they all had their suitcases packed and ready to go. They had exchanged addresses (Katya had little slips of paper with her new name and address that she had copied and passed around), given away things (Zhenya didn’t come with a single photo we had sent with her and she had over 300, I think), and attended their last day of school there. They were very excited as we walked down the street rolling their suitcases toward the hotel Thursday morning.

We had taken Zhenya’s class to get pizza the day before our court hearing and planned to do something fun for Katya & Kristina’s classes as well. We arranged with the caregivers to have a going away party for both classes in the cafeteria on Friday afternoon just before 3pm. On Thursday night, the girls had a great time picking out cake & ice cream. We bought 5 cakes and 7 or 8 cartons of ice cream. Fortunately our hotel room had a full sized refrigerator! We had a taxi take us and all of our food to the orphanage Friday afternoon. Zhenya hung out with her friends while we partied in the cafeteria. The kids were so excited to get cake & ice cream. We fed about 50 kids cake and ice cream until they were about to bust. Some children had 3 pieces of cake! The also had Fanta and Coca-Cola to drink and a little goody bag we put together at the hotel. All of the kids were very grateful and told me thank you several times. It was such a Joy to get to know these little guys. I would have never considered adopting a 10 or 12 year old a few years ago, but there are so many wonderful kids this age – consider hosting one!

When it came time to say good-bye the final time (Friday night), all three girls were very somber. I know it hasn’t been easy on them – even Katya has admitted that she is very afraid to be adopted and come live with us. And, for the two days we stayed in Severodonetsk, the pull of the orphanage on Zhenya was great. She wanted to be there with her friends. Even after her friends followed us to the hotel on Friday night to say good-bye, she wanted to go back and say good-bye again – “just 15 minutes, Mama” she kept saying in Russian… “please, Mama”. I knew that as soon as we were out of the city and in the unfamiliar, she would do fine with us, but I didn’t want to risk her being pulled away while we were there. I told her that when Jack got back from getting the paperwork, he could go with her, but she couldn’t go alone. I assured her that she had said her good-byes and going back would only cause her friends to cry again. It was a nervous night for me… Jack had a separate room in the hotel because the rooms only accommodate 3 people (ours had 4) & I slept with the room key in my pocket for fear that Zhenya would try to leave in the night (the hotel doors cannot be opened without a key). She pouted at dinner & refused to eat, but she seemed to realize I wouldn’t give in. She refused to let Jack go with her to see her friends – she’d rather not go.

It was a quiet exit from Severodonetsk the following morning. We had a 2 1/2 hour drive to the Donetsk airport to catch our flight and aside from the motion sickness (Katya), it was pretty good. The flight to Kyiv was great – only an hour.

We were all tired and the girls had mixed emotions, I’m sure. I had mixed emotions… knowing that they may never come back – so much left behind. I cannot comprehend the loss. We usually only think about what a child gains when he/she is adopted, but there is a lot to mourn for most of the children. If you do not know your relatives, that must be sad… leaving without a chance to even say good-bye to people you don’t really know. If you know your siblings, grandmother, aunts, uncles (as in the case of our girls), and then you say good-bye… all while these people you know are okay with your leaving, it must make your heart ache. Would it not feel like rejection to be let go? I pray one day that the girls will open up and be able to talk about how they have felt the past few weeks.