Well, I guess I knew this before, but being a good papa is a lot of work. Yesterday, I made the comment to Shelly and Vica (that’s how she spells it, not Vika) that by the time we got home, the kids would think papas were for playing and mamas were for other stuff. Today, I feel completely different. Now, I’m sure they feel more like papas are for keeping children in line. This is a strange flip-flop, but it seems to all boil down to the children consciously or subconsciously trying to figure out if we really love them like we’re supposed to.

Aleksa seemed to test me in one way this morning and in a completely different way this evening. This morning, she kept running into the little garden, wanting to play in a ground-level birdbath that had at least 20 hornets flying around it. Papa kept bringing her back out and telling her not to. After 3 to 5 of these little excursions, Papa put her in his lap and wouldn’t let her down. She certainly made a fuss, but it wasn’t nearly as long as I was prepared for, which is good. This evening, it barely even seemed like a test, but I think it was. She told Mama that she had to go potty again, but took her on a wild goose chase. When Mama brought her back, Aleksa decided that it was Papa’s turn. So, expecting a wild goose chase, I listened as she chattered and pointed. I talked back, pretending that we could understand each other, and she seemed happy. She led me by the hand, straight to her bathroom! To be honest, here’s what I was thinking. “AAHHH!! I’ve never done this before!!!” But, she did her thing and came back out, while I looked for a light switch. When she came out, I helped her wash and dry her hands. They have an extra step of rinsing their hands in a little basin, which she pointed out to me quite happily. After we were done, she turned to me and held out her arms so I would pick her up! WOOHOO! It was her idea this time! When we came back out, it was time to go, so I put her down. Then, she asked me to carry her to her “groupa”. So, I walked over to where I knew it was, but she pointed down farther, taking me on a short little detour. When I realized what she was up to, I turned around and ran back with her. She laughed the whole way. It was great. When I put her down, Adam and Liana were there with big hugs ready, and seemed rather content. It was a good ending to a possibly traumatic visit. (Read on.)

Adam didn’t really want to come with us this morning, but we made him come. I think the expression was more of a “I’m bored with you guys” than a “I don’t like you”, but it still was a little scary. When we pulled out the legos, he really dove into them, so that made us feel better. (He didn’t even ask for the computer or the camera this time.) This afternoon, he came much easier, and we made sure we gave him extra hugs. While I was dealing with Liana, I made a point of sitting next to him and rubbing his back as I held Liana. Also, when he did something good, I made a point of saying that he was a good boy, and he grinned. The thing I enjoyed the most was at the start of our afternoon visit though. Shelly and I were talking about English and how we would all speak it soon. They were sort of grinning and eating. Somewhere in the conversation, I rubbed Adam’s head and told him that he was an American boy. He really seemed to enjoy that comment. Later, after Liana was near the end of her problem, she kicked at Adam. I told her to say she was sorry to Adam, and she said that he wasn’t Adam! He then confidently corrected her. I don’t know how much that factored into Liana’s improvement, but it wasn’t much after that when she started to be much better.

Liana caused us some worry this afternoon. It is clear to us that attention is a big issue, and with three children, it is very hard to provide the required amounts of attention – particularly if any of the other orphanage children come over to get what they can. One of those girls was standing there while Liana tried to open her peanuts. She had opened them a little, and was carefully trying to get them open farther. Then, they exploded. I jumped up and started grabbing as many as I could, but the other little girl had grabbed a few. After a little bit, I pushed the other girl back toward her group, and came back to see Liana having a fit with Mama. She wouldn’t eat the peanuts that had caused the problem, and she was saying things that equated to “bad mama” or “not my mama”, etc. After a while, Aleksa decided to take Mama on that walk, so I took Liana. She seemed ok with that, but it got a little worse. We thought the taxi was back already and that we had to go, which _really_ complicated things. I put her down, and thought things were sort of ok. Then realized that they weren’t when she shouted something at me, which very much sounded like she didn’t want us to come back. So I picked her up and we had a “discussion”, that went something like this. “I am your papa.” “No you’re not.” “Yes I am.” “No.” “I love you, Liana.” “No you don’t.” “Yes.” “No.” “Yes.” “No.” – etc. Meanwhile, Adam was nearby, observing things without trying to look like he was really there (or maybe not wanting to be there).

During this time, something crystallized in my mind. Based upon some stories that I have heard about me and my siblings as well as many other children, I knew that this was a sort of contest. So, I consciously thought to myself that I would not let her win, no matter how long she wanted to go. So, I calmly and repeatedly affirmed that I was her papa and that I did love her. After the argument had quieted down (without her attitude necessarily improving), Shelly and I sang a couple songs as she sat in my lap with her arms folded. I pulled her close to me then, and she didn’t resist. So, I contented myself with that for a bit. After a while, she started eating her peanuts, which really sort of made me think things were on the upward track. Then, she got up and started walking away somewhat slowly. I had been watching Adam as he kept saying, “Look, Papa” at the different things he was making. But, I didn’t know where she was headed or why, so I got up and walked up to her. When I reached her, I gently took her arm. She didn’t even try to resist, as I turned her around and brought her back to the bench area we were at. I still wasn’t completely sure things were ok, but when one of their caregivers came to work, walking through our area, Adam and Liana both ran up to her excitedly. I was afraid that Liana might follow her away from us, but she stopped several steps away from me and turned around on her own. That was when I knew that things were definitely going to be ok.

When I came back from my little trip with Aleksa, I got a big, grinning hug from Liana, and that really made the whole day much brighter. Adam was happy to hug me goodbye, too. So, we left feeling like our family had won a battle. It was good.

If this sort of blog entry can help some future adoptive (or natural) parents to deal with their children, I would be happy. But mostly, I hope to keep these notes to show our kids later when they are ready to see what we did in order to make us a family.