American Dad

This photo shows the bed of one of the little boys Dawit lived with. He loved the stickers and even the blank from where the stickers had been.

I just wanted to take a little break to say yesterday was probably my best birthday ever.

I didn’t get anything. My wife was especially nice to me and even made a nice dinner before I had to cover a council meeting and Dawit sang Happy birthday in his own special way.

But I didn’t get a single gift.

That was by design. It’s not like my friends and family hate me or something.

The plight of about 125 orphans in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – many of whom lived with my new son for almost a year – was really weighing on me this year. Charity.water has had several celebrities “give away their birthday” in order to fund new wells so I thought, “Why can’t I do that?” – even though it is obviously on a much smaller scale.

So I did it.

And my friends and family came through big time. I know of $560 in donations and a couple more checks are in the mail. That means we’ll be just over $600 when it’s all counted. You can look at that two ways.

Either one orphan will be taken care of for 8 weeks or 8 orphans for one week.

That doesn’t sound like a lot.

But I still remember the sheer joy a sheet of stickers brought to those children when we visited in January. In fact, the empty sheet where the smiley face stickers had been brought joy to the children who have so little.

I know the funds people donated in honor of Dawit will mean a lot to his friends who are facing long waits to find their families.

Knowing that these donations helped even a little made this my best birthday yet.

Thank you to everyone who helped make it great.

Sunday was the annual observance of Orphan Sunday.
There are almost 143 million orphans in the world. In Ethiopia, there are almost 5 million orphans. One out of every nine Ethiopian children is considered an orphan.
AIDS, economic issues and other reasons have left more than 10 percent of the children in Ethiopia without parental care.
Sunday also happened to be exactly 4 months since we landed in Wichita with Dawit. He was one of the 5 million Ethiopian orphans. Now he is one of our two children.
Dawit has been a huge blessing and a major test for our family. He is one of the sweetest, funniest kids around. I can’t wait until his English catches up to his personality.
But having a child who is able to handle of so many things for himself who cannot communicate with you can be frustrating – for him and us.
Sunday was a great day. Blake, our almost 8 year old, woke up at 4:30 a.m. and turned on a television. Normally, he would go right back to sleep.
But not Sunday morning. He saw a news report of a record setting earthquake in Oklahoma where most of our family lives.
He was worried. So at 4:30 a.m. he was in our room telling us about it.
I explained to him that I felt the earthquake and, even though it was the largest ever in Oklahoma, no one was hurt and very little damage was done.
He was comforted and, after counting a few sheep, he was back to snoozing.
My wife and I weren’t so lucky. It took us old fogies a lot longer to get back to sleep. After we woke back up in the morning, we got worried about what Dawit was up to.
Normally, he lies in bed waiting for someone to summon him to leave his room. No matter how many times we tell him he can get up when he wakes up, he just can’t shake his training gained from almost a year in orphanages.
But Sunday morning was a breakthrough. Suddenly the door to our room flew open and Dawit said, “Haaallllooo!” with equal parts volume and style. He thought it was hilarious.
We were thrilled – not to have a four year old in our bedroom bright and early, but because it meant he is feeling more and more at home.
Four months in America have been good to Dawit. He has grown two and a half inches, grown more stable on his feet and does great at church and preschool.
Communication has been his biggest hurdle and he is close to overcoming that, as well.
He says about 50 words that you can understand. He has probably 50 more that we know because they are common “Dawitisms,” either English words that he struggles to sound out or other words that he has combined from Tigrinyan, Amharic, and English.
He understands most commands by picking out words he knows and connecting the dots. But he understood to pour his water in the fire pit and to put his socks in the hamper and shoes on his desk.
Those both required some adept dot connecting.
It is amazing how rapidly his adjustment is progressing. Our adjustment is coming along nicely too.
Honestly, at first it felt like we were babysitting someone else’s child. But these months have cemented the bond between us.
As much better as things are now than that first day, I can’t wait to see where we are in another month. I can’t imagine what he will be like in a year.
Sometimes it doesn’t seem real but it is the most real thing we have ever done.
So many orphans never have the chance to make the adjustments to a new family and a new culture. Very few people have the chance to experience the joy it brings to be part of that adjustment.
He is a lucky boy and we are more than blessed to have him.
With two trips to Africa leading to a new addition to the family, 2011 has been a year to remember. We certainly have more than our fair share to be Thankful for.

Dawit is making so much progress. He is doing so well. Considering he has only been with us a little over 100 days, he is making huge strides.
Can you tell I am trying hard to convince myself?
It has been about 5 years since Blake was in diapers. I haven’t touched any other person’s poop since then. I was pretty happy about that.
But Dawit has had several special ways of ending that streak. It has only happened a few times but, strangely enough, circumstances have put me in the clean-up role each time.
This time, Georgia and Blake were at Christmas play practice. I woke Dawit up from his nap and reminded him to go to the bathroom. I went to fix a soda while he did. I realized he hadn’t gotten up yet so I went back in the room and told him it was time to wake up and play.
I told him to come downstairs but he told me he needed to wash. I assumed he meant his hands. So I went in and asked him why his pants were off. He tried to lift his leg and show me what he had done and he fell down butt first right at the door of his room – leaving a perfect gluteal imprint on the white carpet.
I figured out what he needed to wash pretty quickly.
So I spent the next hour bathing him, emptying poopy trash, washing rugs with disgusting footprints, washing surfaces with stinky handprints and cleaning carpets with brown buttprints.
It was great.
He’s four. I guess things happen. Things happen to him a lot.
I try to remind myself that he’s been through more than most but when you are elbow deep in excrement, it is hard to maintain a peaceful, thoughtful disposition.
He has reached so many milestones that have been huge. I just wish one of them would be to stop pooping on himself and our rugs.
When he reaches that milestone, I will be truly happy.
I think I’m going to go wash my hands again. You can never be too careful.

We found out a lot about our 4-year old adopted son from Ethiopia today.

Language has been an issue since he joined our family on June 26. We got back to America with him on July 6. Every day since has been a pop quiz in English for the little guy.

One problems he has experienced is the very different sounds and vocalizations between his native language of Tigrinya, his secondary language of Amharic and his destination language of English.

To help him express himself before he can physically say the words, my wife has been teaching him sign language. It worked with our seven-year-old as an infant and Dawit is taking to sign language very quickly. He has a conceptual understanding of language. He just can’t mouth the words. So he is learning some basic sign to bridge the gap.

When I got home from work on Tuesday, I found out that he is able to seamlessly cross linguistic boundaries.

I was talking to my wife about how the day had gone and she told me that Dawit had a sharp mind. He found a souvenir we bought on our trip to take custody of him. She told him we got that in Ethiopia.

He patted his chest and said, “Dawit, Ethiopia.” I said, “That’s right. We got you in Ethiopia. Can you say Addis Ababa?”

He immediately did the sign for flower.

You see, Addis Ababa is the capital of Ethiopia, but its literal Amharic meaning is “new flower.”

I asked him to say Addis Ababa and he signed flower. He has been learning translations from English to sign. He heard an Amharic word, mentally translated it to English and expressed it in sign.

We have been told to expect him to gain language in 4 months – one month for each year of life.

I worry that living for an entire year with no ability to understand those around him or speak to anyone in his native language could slow that progress.

But he is a smart little boy. Who knows what language he’ll be speaking by Thanksgiving?

I’m working on a column right now about how our kids learn.

I think parents need to work hard and capitalize on every teachable moment. Your kids are learning. You might as well be doing the teaching.

A few weeks ago in church, my son started was enjoying a song during the worship service and began doing a dance called The Sprinkler. I promise he didn’t learn that at home. My wife and I are Baptists, we have never “sprinkled.”

When I asked my son which one of his television shows he learned that dance from he told me it wasn’t television at all. He said he had learned it from our preacher’s wife during Children’s Church one week.

I was glad to be off the hook on that one. But last week I found out that he was learning in a lot of different places. He called up a Nickelodeon show on OnDemand called Nick News. The woman on the news was explaining to children about all of the different religions in the world and how children should be tolerant of all of them etc. etc.

Trust me when I tell you that my child won’t learn spiritual truths from Nick News, Spongebob Squarepants, or Scooby Doo. We turned that program off, had a little talk and headed off to church.

I won’t always be in the room when something like that comes up. He needs to be secure in what he believes before those moments come his way. I don’t want him to know what I believe. I want him to develop his own beliefs so he can withstand pressure to conform to someone else’s views.

We owe it to our kids to be the ones who provide their life lessons. Don’t abdicate your duties.

I ran this column in our newspapers this week. http://www.augustagazette.com/opinions/x1009559928/Kent-Bush-Communication-problems-are-frustrating

It is funny how difficult life is when a fully functioning child can’t understand a thing you say and vice versa. He tries, but Dawit still slips back and forth between the two Ethiopian dialects he was exposed to. Then he will use a little English on you just to keep you guessing.

Everyone tells you it is a quick transition. It won’t seem quick.

The failure to communicate doesn’t stop the little guy from trying. He talks all the time.

Until I learn more Amharic or he learns more English I am just going to continue talking loud and using a lot of made up sign language.

There is a delicate balance to be struck when you have adopted a young boy from Ethiopia.

I am assuming I am correct about that. We haven’t found that balance yet, but we’re trying.

Today, we tried to expose Dawit to his first movie on the big screen. Like any 4-year old, he loves cars (he calls them bibis) and any excuse to eat popcorn and M&Ms seemed like a good idea.

It was – for about 15 minutes. Unfortunately, Cars II is about 2 hours long.

When that curtain first went up, his eyes were as big as saucers. He was elbow deep in a popcorn tub and had his M&Ms at the ready. He was mesmerized.

But after the movie started, he lost the storyline because he speaks very little English. He can tell you where his nose, teeth, eyes and belly are but those skills don’t really translate to understanding a cartoon about personified automobiles.

So he pouted a bit. Then he cried a little. He took a trip to the bathroom. And then he settled in for a $7 nap.

We wanted to give him an amazing experience. Instead, we gave him a nap.

We just marked it down as another lesson learned. It wasn’t our first and I doubt it will be our last.

My wife and I knew that adopting a 4-year old Ethiopian boy would have some rough spots.

Dawit spoke a northern Ethiopian dialect for three years, spent the last nine months learning Amharic and has about 3 weeks of English under his belt now. We knew that would cause some issues.

We had no idea how many issues.

He is learning some words to help him get his needs met. He knows all about juice and he understands some basic concepts. But he is still fighting to keep Amharic words for water and car and other little phrases. Some of it may be a control issue. Some is just pure orneriness.

At first, he would react to these language barriers with hysterical screaming fits and pouting. Now that he has figured out that we actually like him and aren’t trying to be mean to him, he just pouts in brief intervals.

Overall,the bonding and transition couldn’t have been much smoother for a 4-year old who has been with us for less than a month. That doesn’t mean it’s been easy.

But nothing that is good is ever easy. And having our completed family together under one roof has surely been good.

PS – This is my first blog post. I’m a publisher/columnist by trade and training. Make sure you leave some feedback to let me know what you think. Thanks,Kb.