7 Posts in 7 Days... Day 3.

Yana.

Our youngest child is Yana Faustina, she will be 2 in May.

Although she THINKS she is about 12 :-)

You might be tempted to think, "Well she was only in an orphanage for such a short time, everything will be just fine!"

Well....

Yana was a preemie and spent several months in the hospital before she went directly to the orphanage where she spent her whole life...

She did not speak at all when we met her (she now says "mama" "papa" and "Teh-Tuh" for Tessa)

She has night terrors and sleepwalks several times a week.

Yesterday's nap time (like most of them) included her screaming and thrashing when I began to rock her in the chair of the bedroom, her squirming off my lap to go lay on her bed, then 20 seconds later she sits up and looks at me...

I say "you can come rock with mama" and she smiles and jumps out and runs to me and holds her arms up for me and I pick her up and she buries her face in my neck and hugs me with all her might...

We rock for 20 blissful seconds...

Then the screaming and thrashing and trying to get down begins again...

Because for 20 months she was never held or rocked to sleep...

So she wants it... She craves it...

But she is not used to it and sometimes cannot deal with it.

But she has a persistent mama. 

I let her down again.

She comes back AGAIN.

Then when the thrashing and screaming begins again I stand up and bounce her and sing a version of the lullaby I sang to all my fussy babies... But this time it has a few Russian phrases thrown in... And in about 5 minutes her whole body relaxes... I slow the bounce and end the song and snuggle her in bed and leave, counting this nap time as another small moment of healing...

Which we add onto this one...

And this one...

And this one.

And patiently wait for the day when all OUR moments will drown out THOSE moments.