Prayer requests and more

Hello everyone! Sorry we have taken a while to post again, but a lot has been going on, as you can imagine! First off, however, I would like to ask for you to pray for our facilitator, Denis. He has a history of heart problems, and he seems to have repeated incidents of heart pain and he has gone to the hospital where they give him some type of injections to help it, and has gone to try to get diagnosis, but nothing came of it and it is also expensive for him (as far as I can tell). Anyway, I called him this morning about something and he told me he was in the hospital for heart pain again and he had not slept for a couple of days due to the pain. He said they gave him some injection to help but it only allowed him a few hours of sleep and he woke up with the pain again. He even went so far as to tell me that in case anything happened to him, that all our documents are with him. :( Again, his name is Denis and he is only 29 years old. He is unmarried.

Also, please pray for us as well because Chloe and Phoebe are very sick with colds (or worse), and Phoebe seems to have croup from it. Josh is also sick, but not as much as the two girls (yet). We are hoping this will not delay our return home and it is not very fun either (I was up all night with Phoebe and Chloe is always miserable).

Aside from all that, I would say that things have been going very well. I thought I would mention one of the issues that Noah has that somewhat impacts our care for him. He has an ectopic anus. This roughly means that when he was formed in the womb, the canal (for lack of a better term, I am not a physician!) that was to be where the poop comes out is further forward than usual. Usually, kids like this basically just leak poop all day. Noah seems to really try to control it still the best way he can, although since he does not have the usual muscles around that canal that contract and control the poop as well as signal to his brain when he needs to poop, this can be difficult. We believe his prognosis is very good after surgery in the US, and we hope that one day he can live a lot more normally.

But as you can guess, we have more "accidents" than usual and wiping him is not as easy since the "hole" is further forward. I hope this is not too much detail for you, but I don't mind sharing this, and I was thinking that some of you might be wondering what his problem is because he looks so great otherwise (yes, he is a handsome little boy! Please indulge my bragging about this just this time).

So for now, a big part of our life is POOP, POOP, POOP! This is not only because of Noah, but Zoë has probably had just as many accidents and we obviously have to change Phoebe's diapers as necessary as well. However, I do have to say that things have been improving quite quickly. Every difficulty we have had with them is already getting better each day. We really thank God for that.

The second day we had Noah he had a poop accident and we decided we needed to just go ahead and bathe him and get the "orphanage" washed off of him as well. Well, like Zoë, he wasn't bathed frequently there, so a bath in itself is a very scary experience for them the first time. His was much worse, however, because while Josh had started to bathe him and he was already crying about it, the washing machine that drains into the tub was doing a load of laundry and we weren't thinking about it and it let out water. Noah started screaming and Josh finally realized it was HOT water coming out! Josh is an engineer and had looked at it previously and was (and still is) certain that it was only hooked up to cold water so we were shocked to find Noah was getting Hot water spilled on him. Josh figured that the machine must have an internal heating device. Now I also know why our stuff was shrinking, I couldn't figure it out. How our clothes were shrinking being washed in cold water and hanged to dry? The man who installed it recommended that setting, but it obviously has hot water, and the cycle is about 2 1/2 hours I believe. Noah recovered, however, with the help of a couple of things we gave him to play with in the water.

In a lot of ways, we are really starting from ground zero with these kids. From hygiene, to manners, to morals and teaching right from wrong, we can see we have a long way to go. We have started on the use of please, thank you, and things like using a napkin and eating over your plate to where you don't spill food all over yourself. We have made much progress in toilet etiquette. Zoë no longer rolls her hands in her underwear while she waits on the potty and we have started to teach Noah that it is not ok to wipe poop on your shirt if you happen to get it on your hand while you are wiping. Noah at first would dart off the toilet as well, leaving poop smeared all over the toilet and not having wiped either. We have had the usual 3 year old battles of nap time and sharing (Noah has a big problem with hoarding toys and pouting up a storm when he is told it is time to get ready for bed or a nap). We have caught them lying to get things they want. Thankfully God is with us and we know he is sufficient to meet our needs! He knows where they are now, and that they probably have not heard of his love for them, or that he is not pleased with disobedience and lying, etc.

They are both very smart and do a lot of cute things too. They love all the kisses and hugs they can get. They like to involve us in their play and do things like bring us "chai" (tea) or "coifeh" (coffee). Zoë is the reassuring one who likes to stroke anyone lightly on the arm or head if they are upset or sick. Noah likes to explore everything in sight and take things apart. He has already found many things to get into that none of the other kids did in the whole time we have been at this apartment! (I think Josh is getting his first taste of what his mom dealt with when he was a boy!) Noah does have some speech problems though. We have got him to say some sounds he has difficulty with but it is not easy for him. A funny thing happened when we were trying to get him to say Zoë's name properly (both because of his pronunciation problems and because he has known her for so long as Luba). We were saying ZZZZZZZZZZZZoë to get him to get the Z sound right so he would not call her Doey. He got the Z sound and said "ZZzzzzzzzzLuba!). That is his sense of humor. He seems to love being a clown.

Well, that is about all for now. Recently I was reading in the Psalms and had a lot of comfort in this verse:

Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always. Psalm 105:4

When I feel run down I want to remember this, and look to HIM for HIS strength. HE is sufficient. I know I can not do this on my own, but only with the help of the Lord and to Him do I want to give all the glory and praise!

Tara