Nine-ish Months

We recently passed the nine month mark of Ephraim’s adoption, what a whirlwind these past months have been! (Ha, apparently a whirlwind because we are actually closer to the ten month mark by the time I actually got around to posting this.)

To be honest, I wasn’t prepared for the amount of time we’d spend dealing with some medical issues with Ephraim . . . overall he’s healthy but he’s had quite a few smaller things that add up to approximately 21 doctors appointments, one ambulance ride and one night in the hospital in the last eight months (with more appointments in the future and surgery in the next year or two). He came home on month four of six for medication for TB (of which two months worth were lost in our luggage by the airline), had appointments and skin tests at the TB clinic, he’s had three seizures, updates on immunizations, specialist appointments for his eyes, allergy tests and has currently done three rounds of medication in an attempt to remove a parasite.

As far as the bonding goes and the overall transition I’d have to say it’s gone better than I ever could have imagined. I can’t believe that 10 months ago Ephraim didn’t know any English and he now says some pretty cute sentences and is definitely on par for the average kid his age. He’s actually really quite smart (shapes are his specialty, he especially loves to point out hexagons as we are driving) and I don’t think it will be long before he’s quite advanced for his age. In some ways that makes me a little sad, I wonder where he’d be if he had more attention for the first 18 months of his life, but usually I’m just excited to see where this bright little boy goes.

He can currently sing his ABC’s and enjoys doing the classic Melissa & Doug wooden alphabet puzzle and recognizes a few letters, he can count to 12, knows most shapes, has started learning his colors (orange is definitely a favorite), will sit through about 15 minutes of reading (about 6 or so board books) and loves music and singing.

He has developed past the parrot stage and has a lot of things to say and questions to ask, and he finally answers questions instead of just repeating the questions back (much more helpful).

He continues on with his helpful attitude, emptying the dishwasher is still a favorite, and now he likes to help set the table and will put away just about anything you ask him to.

Physically he’s doing pretty amazing, he shot up over 2 inches from his birthday (May) to August and is just under the mark where Raeca was when she turned 2. At his 2 year check up he was in the second percentile for height (in a group of 100 kids he’d be the second shortest), but I suspect he’s surpassed that now.

All in all, it’s been a good 9 months, I can’t believe how far he’s come.

In some ways I feel like I’ve crawled into a bit of a hole this year and haven’t seen some of my friends as much in the past nine months as I’d like to and then I think about all of the above (mostly the medical stuff) and realize why. Now I finally understand why so many friends I had made online before they finalized their adoptions kind of gave up on life online afterwards, even when things are going well over all, it still a state of crazy.*

I am looking forward to November when we hit the one year mark, I can’t wait to have a little celebration. 🙂

*For those who have friends who have adopted, I’d urge you today to take a moment and reach out to them, it might feel like they’ve forgotten you, they haven’t, they are probably just swimming so hard to stay afloat they don’t have any extra energy to reach out to you.

P.S. Here’s his 6 month update and my series on supporting adoptive families.