The Algebra of Dating

I was driving around in the car the other day with my daughter, we were chit-chatting about this and that, nothing in particular. At one point, she looks over at me and asks, "How old do you think I will be when you and Papa will say it's okay for me to date someone that I like?"

Ok. Was not expecting that.
Think fast!
 I joking reply with the standard, "Thirty-five."

She's not having that. She replies, "No. Not a good answer. You can't say thirty-five. Because whatever age you say, like thirty five, I will get to that age and then you will just add five years. So it's more like whatever age+5=dating age for infinity"
I don't really see an issue with this particular equation, but I know this woman-child sitting next to me and I can sense that she is genuinely searching for an answer and she is not in the mood for further joking.

I asked her if there is someone she is interested in dating right now. (and hold my breath)
She tells me that there is not. ( I breathe again)
I think quietly for a moment and tell her that when she does come across someone that she likes in that way, maybe we could talk about dating then and what "dating" might mean for that age and what sort of expectations a partner might have and what our expectations/limitations might be. This satisfied her.

There is no algabraic formula for figuring out when you should date, for who you should date, just as there are no formulas for raising a bright shining star of a daughter. You just sort of have to look for guidance where you can and hope for the best. I really hope that I can guide her through these next years of her life. I want to teach her how to be true to herself, how to remain bright and bold, how to be safe, how to be independent, how to be Evelyn.

Reader-Face!

This is Liam Wayne Ao Zhuang Dillon and today October 13, 2017 he successfully completed reading his very first chapter book!

This is very big time stuff for him. He has struggled with reading for a long time. He loves books and stories, he actually has a very high level vocabulary and his comprehension of read materials whether he reads it or it's read aloud-is off of the charts, but it is the physical act of reading that gives him a hard time. 

You see he was born with his cleft lip and palate, and that directly affected his speech, which has directly impacted his reading and spelling. He is as smart as they come. He just doesn't process reading orally as fast as other kids his age. It is so nice to be able to sit with him, and concentrate for as long as he needs on a chapter, to really focus on the quality of the words and not the quantity. 

Everyday since school at home began he read a chapter aloud and then had to write three complete sentences about the chapter that he read. He would use the book as a reference for spelling and facts, he had to use "good handwriting". At first, he wasn't too sure about the whole idea, but now he loves it and looks forward to reading everyday. He likes to save reading for last so we have lots of time and he doesn't feel rushed. 

I was pleasantly surprised through this entire book with the different words he actually read correctly and how he seemed to know what larger words meant when we stopped him and asked him about the definitions. Word on the street is that he's very excited for the next book in this series (thank you Becca Salani for gifting these to him when we lived in New Jersey!). I have also informed him about the very popular "Hop to 25" a book log that Mama keeps for her students and when they reach 25, they get a special treat. 

So, here's to Liam, the newest reader-face of the Dillon Clan!

Essay by Evelyn Dillon

One of Evelyn's assignments this week was to peruse our poetry collection and find a poem that moved her, then turn in a five paragraph essay about that poem. This is the poem she chose and her subsequent essay.

Everything

I want to make poems that say right out, plainly,
what I mean, that don't go looking for the
laces of elaboration, puffed sleeves.  I want to
keep close and use often words like
heavy, heart, joy, soon, and to cherish
the question mark and her bold sister

the dash.  I want to write with quiet hands.  I
want to write while crossing the fields that are
fresh with daises and everlasting and the
ordinary grass.  I want to make poems while thinking of
the bread of heaven and the
cup of astonishment; let them be

songs in which nothing is neglected,
not a hope, not a promise.  I want to make poems
that look into the earth and the heavens
and see the unseeable.  I want them to honor
both the heart of faith, and the light of the world;
the gladness that says, without any words, everything.

The poem "Everything" by Mary Oliver leaves me thinking about how wonderful this poem is. I believe she writes this poem to tell the reader what she wants each of her poems to achieve, what impact on the world she wants the poems make, and what her poems are about. I wonder if she is proud of how well her poem can speak to people of different ages and strike them with wonder and curiosity, because she should be proud. 

She writes at the beginning of her poem, "I want to make poems that say right out, plainly what I mean,". By writing this, I believe she is explaining what she would like her poems to achieve. She wants them to achieve being straight forward in what she wants to say. Also in stanza one she states, "...and to cherish the question mark,". By this, I think she is trying to say she wants to always ask questions and learn, and maybes is trying to make the reader stay curious and ask questions too. She wants to continue to wonder about the world.

In stanza two it says, "I want to write while crossing the fields that are fresh with daisies and everlasting and the ordinary grass."and with this I supposes is saying what she wants her poems to be about. I think she is saying that she wants her poems to be about her traveling and appreciating the world around her, just like she appreciates daisies and the green of the "ordinary grass". Mary wants to take her readers with her on her journeys by describing through poetry to give them images of how she sees things . I also believe she would like her poems to be different from other poets.

Mary heart fully writes in stanza three, "I want to make poems that look into the path and the heaven and the the unseeable. I want them to honor both the heart of faith, and the light of the world; the gladness that says without any words, everything."By this, I think she means she wants her poems to say what other people miss. She wants to write about the overlooked things in life. To express things people under-appreciate.

Lastly, I believe she wants others to see the world in different ways, the poem "Everything"is about how Mary Oliver wants her poems to be like and how she wants to express herself, because the poem is very straight forward and the words she uses gives imagery and feeling, thoughts and emotions to the reader. My thoughts are that the poem shows how wonderful and fantastic she wants to be able to to be as she writes about to way she sees the world. The poem she wrote, I believe, she would love for it to import the world and help people see it from a different point of view and she should be proud of this poem, because I think it has achieved what she wants it to say.

The Brass Dragon Academy

In what may seem an abrupt change of events, because they totally were (in a way), we have taken the kids out of school and re-started our homeschooling routine. In lots of ways though, the decision was not abrupt and had been coming for quite awhile, it was just that final few things that tipped us over the edge that happened all in one weekend and we pulled the plug on Public School, got the kids back home and started our curriculum.

I want to go on record as saying that there are pros and cons to each type of schooling, but for us, homeschooling is what seems to be the best and what offers us the opportunity to be ourselves and the best version of the kind of family that we want to be.

Both of my kids were very stressed out in the public school setting, though they were each successful as measured by the system. The constant testing, the rigid schedules, the rules, the inability to use the restroom when Ev needed to (yes, this became a huge thing- if you knew Ev you would really get it), the fact that the better Ev performed, the more they expected. Liam had an IEP but we honestly could not see many results from the program, this was the second year in a row, he was on the Class Dojo system which uses that system of marking children for bad behavior, his love of reading was being smothered out of him. There were just lots of reasons. Also their bus ride was an hour each way so they had to be at the bus stop at 6 am in the morning and did not get home until 4 pm, so their day was technically longer than their father's work day. All of this and I haven't even discussed the social issues that they were facing- the racial insults, the bullying... My kids were miserable. We were all miserable. My family was suffering.

Luckily, my husband and I are in a position where we can do something about it. We could make a change for our kids. We could return to something that we knew, although not perfect, worked for us. We had never gotten rid of our homeschooling stuff. We had homeschooled before, so it wasn't like we were starting cold and were deathly afraid to do it. So we just... did it.

The difference in my kids on the first day of homeschool was palpable.

This is week 2. And yes, there has already been a few "attitudes". Like I said, it's not perfect. But, we love it. Liam is reading SO MUCH. Ev is writing and reading so much more. The history curriculum we have planned is going to be pretty in depth. Lots of Art planned (Ev has told me that I'm a better Art teacher than the one at her school was!) I'm very excited for our Science unit. Some not so fun things like Grammar and Spelling, but hey- that's life.

So, please wish us luck.
I'm going to need it.
I have an eighth grader and a third grader.

Cleft Lip & Palate Awareness Week

In honor of Cleft Lip & Palate Awareness Week, I thought I might talk a some about my wonderful son Liam, our journey to him and his journey with his CL&P.

Liam before lip repair in China

Our approach to being the parents of a child with a Cleft Lip and Palate is different than most as we knew right from the start that we were jumping into being the parents of a child that had a cleft lip and palate. We started Liam's adoption about 3 years after Evelyn was home and on the second time around, it was very clear to us that we wanted to bring a child home that not only needed a family, but a child that needed us in other ways too, I think that's the simplest way to put it. We set out to complete a Special Needs Adoption, which is to say, a child that has a medical need of some sort.

Our first glimpse of Liam

Very early on in the process, Les and I had to sit down and complete a Medical Conditions Checklist. If you aren't sure what that is, it's a list of potential medical conditions that a child can present with, anything from prematurity, to anemia, from HIV to complex heart conditions and anything in between. Once you have been to China and you have seen children waiting in a hallway to meet a family to call their own, and you look at a list like that, you realize very quickly that there is not only one child behind every condition on that list but hundreds and they are each a precious individual and they each deserve the chance to have a family and thrive. The night we sat down to decide which medical conditions we might be able to manage as a family and which ones we might not, still haunts me. Among the conditions we checked off, we did decide that cleft palate and/or lip was something we could handle. I knew exactly what it was, I also knew the stigma attached to that medical condition in Chinese culture, I knew that Speech Therapy and multiple surgeries would be a part of the deal but I just knew that I could do it. Les agreed.

Another picture sent from China while we waited

A cleft palate is when, in utero, the roof of the mouth doesn't close completely and the baby is born with an opening there, this can encompass the soft palate or the hard palate or both. Sometimes this opening extends to all of the way through the front jaw line and into the upper lip and it can affect the appearance of the nose on the affected side. The child can also have a cleft on one side; a unilateral cleft or both sides; a bilateral cleft. 

Another picture from the Orphanage

We submitted our paperwork and we waited. And we waited for yet another child to call our own. We had several conditions on the list; we had said that we would take boy or a girl. One snowy day we got a call. Our agency had a file that they thought we might be interested in. A small boy with a unilateral cleft lip and palate fourth degree (this meant both soft and hard palate were involved as well as the jaw line) but that he was on target developmentally, he was extremely precocious, he was bright, funny, and had been in Foster Care, would I like to see a picture and some information? "OH! We'll take him!", was my reply. The agency lady said, "Mrs. Dillon? Aren't you married? Wouldn't you like to talk this over with your husband? Don't you want to see the file first? Have a pediatrician look it over?" I Laughed. "Oh yeah. I'll call my husband in. He's shoveling the driveway. But this is our son, I know it. Do NOT GIVE THIS FILE TO ANYONE ELSE. I'll call you back in 10 minutes."

The first time in my arms

Two months later, we were in China once again. It was hot. Again. It was a different large room. But it was filled with people and we were waiting once again to hear our name, straining to see where our baby(toddler actually) was. He was in a corner, playing with a  broken blue truck. We had to bribe him with food. It didn't take long for him to warm up to us though. He liked that we had food and that Evelyn made sure none of the other kids took that truck away from him. Soon we were back in a quiet hotel room with him and our time as a family of four began. 

Liam and the blue truck

First moments as sister and brother

To tell you that Liam is my personal hero would be an understatement. I have watched that boy change countries at a time when it is most difficult to make that transition and he survived. He survived his time in China without a family of his own, being unable to verbally communicate. He has gone through years of not having people understand his speech and I have never once seen him be frustrated at anyone over that. He has been through multiple surgeries and he faces each one with a spirit of courage and grace beyond his young years. Above and beyond all of the stuff that comes along with having a cleft lip and apart he is just a boy, with all of the trimmings. He is my Liam. He is the sweetest and most giving little person, always ready with a smile or a kind gesture. His smile lights up the room. Evelyn came into our lives and made us whole but Liam came into our lives and completed us. We were all missing something until this kind, clumsy, wacky fella waltzed into our lives. 

When Liam first came home from China, we called his tongue The Veal Cutlet as he had absolutely no muscle tone in it whatsoever. He had no muscle tone in his cheeks. I guess it's important for me to tell you here that Liam did have surgery in China to repair his lip but when we met him at the age of 22 months to bring him home, his palate was still unrepaired. At that time he was still eating mostly from a Cleft Bottle and soft foods that he could mush. He had never learned to suck, there wasn't much in the way of chewing action, and some foods would just come right back out of his nose. We had at least two years of solid work to strengthen to muscles in his tongue and cheeks just so that he could lick peanut butter off of his lips, THEN we could work on his speech sounds.

When he first cam home, we started right away with Baby Sign Language. It was all we had. Liam left China at the age where the brain looses it's first language faster than it can pick up a second language so it does this weird shut down thing and he was really mad and refused to make any verbal sounds except to cry for a few weeks (that was fun). Then once he started to pick up English, it was completely guttural sounds, no consonants at all. We had to use Signs. He ended up having over 300 that we used.

We started ST right away. That continues to this day, he is eight years old. At this time, he goes simply for "clean-up" issues and maintaining good habits, all of his cleft related issues are a thing of the past. But as we move through different surgeries and appliances, those cleft related speech issues will crop up again.

His first surgery was to repair that open palate once we were home. While he still had an open palate to deal with he drooled almost constantly. He could cram fistfuls of food up in that opening, it was quite impressive really, so I had to watch him carefully. We also had to watch no to give him any thing too drastically hot or too cold as the open palate is very sensitive. Eventually he needed a second palate revision as the first one was too tight. Liam had a very wide cleft and we knew that going into the first surgery there might have to be a second one. Along with the sound palate surgery, they did a scar revision on his lip from the surgery in China (that scar was very tight and causing pulling and soreness) and they worked on the tip of his nose to even out some of the slanting from the loss of cartilage.

Right after first palate repair

After second palate repair and lip revision

Day 2 of 2nd palate surgery/lip revision

Post-surgical stitch abscess(quite common)

One week after that second surgery

We are preparing for the upcoming Bone Graft that kids with that cleft in the upper jaw (Alveolar Cleft) need to have when they are about this age so the adult teeth have something to hold onto when they come in. That should be about it, unless Liam decides he wants to have further surgeries on his nose when he is older. Last this time however, he has decided that his nose is just perfect the way it is and he likes his nose and I agree and we have chosen not to have further Plastic Surgery on that. 

Liam age 6 as Robin Hood

Is it easy having a Special Needs kiddo in your life? No. It's not. It's not easy planning All of the Speech Therapy, the Doctor's appointments, the surgeries, watching your child go through it all. Would I do it again? In a minute! Liam has enriched our lives in so many ways. I will never be able to repay that little boy for coming into my life and making it better, for making me a better person. It has been an absolute honor to be his Mama, to be here for him during every scary moment for him, to have him reach out for my had or climb onto my lap. Some conversations have ripped my heart out, the ones about why he has a scar on hid face and no one else does, the ones about kids at school teasing him, the ones where he decides, with a maturity far beyond that of an eight year old, that he likes his nose just fine and the surgeon is the one in the wrong for expecting him to change his face...Some conversations have been the kind that make my heart swell, the ones where he tells me that he trusts me to handle everything and to just let him know what needs to happen as it's going to happen, that he thinks I am the best Mama ever and he is glad that we are together, the ones where he looks at me and simple tells me that he loves me. Cleft palate or not, this is my son and he is simply the best boy in the world, I wouldn't trade him for all of the gold in the Universe.

Liam age 8 just before Second Grade

Family Day Anniversary

May 8, 2005. Les and I found ourselves in the most unlikely of places, the middle of a crowded Conference Room in a hotel in China. Halfway around the world from anyone or anything we had ever known, straining desperately to hear the sound of our last name called out so that we might head to the double doors in the front of the room, to reach out and take hold of a tiny child that we had only ever seen a single photograph of, but whom we were already completely and hopelessly in love with.

I kept stretching to see if I could catch a glimpse of her, the one little tiny baby that was to be mine, but there were fourteen babies, fourteen nannies, and several Orphanage Directors with hotel staff and the Adoption Agency folks there too, and I just could not see her. My one photograph, I would later realize made it seem like she was much bigger than she actually was, and it was also very outdated....but still I wanted so badly to start making up for lost time. To start drinking in every single moment that I could, to start reading expressions, to see her, to see that this was real, that it was really happening, that there was really going to be a baby just for me at long last.

Finally, after eternity, they called out "Dillon!" and as I walked forward with wooded legs and my heart pounding so hard that I thought I might be having a coronary event, I saw a Nanny from the orphanage make her way from the very back of the crowd where she had been pacing with my little one (no wonder I didn't catch a glimpse of my baby), we came together at the doorway. I didn't take time for the customary pleasantries, I just reached out and took Evelyn. She was already crying and upset. I could hear that she was hoarse, so I knew right away that she was probably sick, I just wanted her in my arms right that instant. I took her and I never looked back. I never looked back. If someone had said, "Oh that's the wrong baby, or Oh sorry, you can't have her" things would have gone very, very badly for the entire country right then and there. She was mine and that was final.

Adoption is a funny thing. I say all of the time that the four of us came together through pain and that is true, but there is such beauty and love and complexity in the stories of adoption. When you find your children out there in the great, wide world and you make a warm haven for the family you want in life, there is a miracle in that so far beyond biology that involves choice and the diligence of the human spirit, I can not begin to describe it. That is not to say I believe that what I have with my children surpasses what birth families have, but I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt that the love I have for my children is the same. The same. And if anyone doubts that, I would suggest to them that they think upon the words my mother said to me when I was talking about adoption with her, "It isn't the giving birth to a child that makes you their mother, it's the day in and day out of taking care of them, meeting their needs, being there for them and putting them before yourself over and over again- that's what makes you a mother." 

Over the years Evelyn has blessed our lives with a joy that is immeasurable. She is a person of highest quality. She is kind, intelligent, bright, well mannered, she is diligent in her studies, she works hard, she always has a kind word, she laughs easy, she walks around singing and giggling... I could spend entire volumes speaking about what a joy this girl has been. I will tell you this, the moment that I took her into my arms, I knew that my life had finally begun, but I really had no idea just how wonderful of a life it would be. I am so lucky to be able to live this life along side her and have a child such as this call me Mama. 

                                                         

 

She will be thirteen in just one short month and I can not fathom where the time has gone, but I do know that I am eternally thankful that my body was broken and busted so that I was forced to search the world for my children. I have found in these two- miracles beyond understanding. My heart is full to bursting everyday that I am alive because I have these beautiful children in my life. I love the country of China for the beautiful gift, for entrusting me with the lives of these two precious people. 

Evelyn is a person full of light. She shines. I wish I could take credit for that. I can't. It's just her. I tell  her all of the time, I went to China for you, not just any baby girl, but you, because you are my daughter, you are the one that I needed, the one that made us all complete. 

Big Doings for Liam

Liam is eight now.
That is a pretty big time is you are a kiddo born with a Cleft lip and palate. Eight years old means that it's time to get ready for the Almighty Bone Grafting Surgery. Not all kids who have a cleft palate need this surgery, but kids who have a fourth degree cleft do. That Fourth Degree terminology means that Liam's cleft goes through his upper jaw line, his Alveolar jaw. We have been waiting and watching adult tooth eruption and jaw growth for the timing of this surgery and we think we have things narrowed down.
Last month Liam and I traveled from Florida to Philadelphia to meet with his Cleft team, just like we do every year, and we laid out a plan. Everyone coordinates with me calling everyone to keep them in line and all on the same page. By everyone, I mean: The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, the insurance, the PCM, the local orthodontics team, the local ENT and anyone else we nee to loop in. If this sounds like a part time job, and maddening and fruitless, it is. It absolutely is.
Here's the thing though, Liam doesn't like to do things easy. He likes to keep things interesting. So in addition to this whole bone grafting thing and needing braces for six months and all of that needing to be timed just right and coordinated across half of the country... He decided to display some hearing loss in his left ear when we were in Philly last month. Nice.

So we had to come home and find an ENT to run further hearing tests. Turns out his hearing is fine but he is going to need some tubes in his ears because (insert Charlie Brown adult talking sound here)  mwah mwah mwah mwah mwah ENT ear talk stuff about dimples in the ear drums, bone gaps, fluid build up..... whatever. I may have been a Nurse, but man the ears always bored the shit out of me- just put the tubes in already!
We schedule the surgery. Four days away at 8:00pm Liam hollers from his bedroom, "Mama! My face feels funny!!!" In my head I'm like,"That's an odd effing thing to say but Liam never complains about anything so I guess I better act like a Mom and check this out." Good thing I did. In the space of thirty minutes that kid's face had gone from normal to looking like he was storing a baseball in his cheek for winter! It was warm to the touch and sore and I knew we were in trouble but my family was visiting from Ohio so I didn't say anything because I didn't want to panic anyone. The child had Facial Cellulitis!!! OMG. So the next day, the swelling was worse and the redness you would expect with Cellulits was present and off to the Dr we went, the DR says it's from a spacer in his mouth. A spacer he has from having a tooth extracted. But a nurse in the office and I were like "....." So I was like "Liam we are going to the Dentist. We go to the Dentist. The Dentist was like, "Spacers don't cause infections, abscessed teeth do" (and thus the nurse and I were proven right) so Liam had an emergency tooth extraction and was put on a very powerful antibiotic for 10 days, his tubes were out off until tomorrow and his sister decided that freaking out over having allergies would be the thing she needed to do for 15 days (but that's a whole other blog entry).
 OH! And I totally get that I maybe should have gone to the Dentist first but Liam had absolutely NO TOOTH PAIN. I could bore you with how the infection had bypassed the nerve and made it into the buckle space of the cheek but you would stop reading. I made the Dentist tell me like 37 times how I wasn't an idiot for thinking it was a tooth because there wasn't tooth pain- she was laughing her ass off at me. I kept saying ,"I assessed every tooth!!! Every tooth!!! "
In true Liam fashion, that boy never once complained. Not about his little face hurting. Not about taking that terrible antibiotic three times a day for ten days. Not about being woken up at 4 am for ten days straight to take that stuff. Not about having to swish a horrible mouth wash to heal his gums from the tooth extraction. Not even when his cousin whacked him in his sore cheek with a pool noodle. He is a tough kid and he just takes everything that happens with courage and grace. He trusts me to help him though things. He listens to my explanation of how things are going to happen, how medicine will help him. He is the sweetest and bravest little boy. I hate so much that he has so may things to face in life. I am glad that he trusts me to help him through it all though, it is one of my greatest honors in life.
We did find out that he won't have to have any palate expansion in preparation for his bone graft, for cleft kids, this is a pretty big deal, it will dave him quite a lot of pain and frustration. I am not sure yet when this bone graft will take place, this was my last call of "Hey guys, wtf is happening?" to everyone, hopefully I will have some clarification soon. What is do know is that whenever it happens my son will handle it like a person much older than he is and the maturity with which he handles himself will both maze me and break my heart because he just shouldn't know how to handle those type is situations.