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Combating Loneliness in “Expat-land”

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Loneliness in expat-land is a feeling that can unfortunately be constant – what I mean is that it will can come and go with every transition. Sometimes it creeps in during the holidays or when visiting friends and family. Other times it pounces on you after the big move and the husband is off to work and the kids are off to school – your alone and would love to get a coffee with a friend, a friend that you don’t have in the new place ~yet.

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One of my dear friends just wrote me this week. She’s been in her new country for almost six months. She has two very active toddlers with her, and she left two step children back “home” for college. Her husband is gone this week and she is feeling very lonely and homesick. Can you relate? I know I can.

Or how about the parent of a child with special needs? What I’m about to share is not meant to point fingers or start a pity party club for me. It is just a fact of life, and I’m sure I’m not the only one that has felt this way. So here it goes *deep breath* ~ I have felt at times lonely in the middle of a party. All the adults are gathered in the living room or around the snack table chatting, laughing, and relaxing. The children are outside playing basketball, riding bikes, or in one of the rooms playing legos or dolls. I’m wherever Jie Jie is ~ I’m sitting at a table feeding her a snack or outside helping her “ride” a bike. I’m usually by myself feeling uncomfortable and fighting the big bad bully: Loneliness. Please note that this is only at times, not every time and it is just a fact of my life. 

What did I tell my friend? What do I do in those times when I want to run to my room and cry like a teenager?

I run to my room and cry on my bed like a teenager. Yes, I do. I’ve learned that it’s okay to cry, to be sad. Crying is healthy to do in doses. The key to not letting my tears turn into something worse like depression is that once the tears stop, I immediately begin praising God for who He is and what He has done in my life. I turn on some praise music and sing really loud. I begin a list or look at a list that I’ve made of all the things I have to be thankful for: a home, food, therapy for Jie Jie, school for all my kids, a great husband, sunshine, chocolate, etc.

Then when my mind is starting to lighten up a bit, I call a friend and make a “date” for coffee.

Your Turn: What do you do to fight the battle of loneliness? Please share in the comments below.

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When My Name was Keoko – Book Review

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“What did you like about the book?” I asked my eleven year old son about When My Name was Keoko by Linda Sue Park.

I’m enjoying this season in life. My son is older and now reading books that I find interesting. He doesn’t like discussing them with me still, but he will give me his opinion.

A month ago, or so, I took my son to Taipei American School to listen to Linda Sue Park. After listening to her that evening, I wrote a post about the importance in telling family stories to our children. One of the books that she talked about that night was When My Name was Keoko. Both of us like WWII, so we both couldn’t wait to check that one out from the library.

I thought this was a great book for upper elementary and middle school TCKs. I believe that they could relate in someways, especially if they are South Korean.

1. The characters are TCKs: The events of WWII were from the point of view of Sun-yee and Tai-yul, a Korean sister and brother. The children at this time were really more like TCKs in their own home country. The Japanese occupied Korea and tried to replace the Korean culture with Japanese culture. One of the ways was by changing everyone’s names to Japanese names. So, Sun-yee became Keoko; and Tai-yul became Nobuo. Throughout the story you see the family struggle to hang onto their Korean culture by trying to teach the children what it means to be Korean.

2. Language is important: Korean was forbidden to be used during this time. All classes were conducted in Japanese. No one was to speak or write in Korean. Because of this, the Korean language was almost lost. We see that Sun-yee’s father saw the relationship between culture and language, so he secretly taught her the Korean alphabet.

3. To see the human-being: What I mean is not being judgmental towards other nationalities. Sun-yee’s good friend until she got older was the Japanese neighbor boy. She doesn’t see in her friend what everyone says and calls the Japanese. She is confused by this. When she is older, she does become friends with the Korean girls, but she never has harsh feelings about her neighbor. In fact, they help each other out at different times.

My son’s opinion about the book? He told me that he really liked reading about the Asian side of WWII and that he really liked the ending.

Your Turn: Have you read this book? What did you find in it that your TCK could relate to? Please comment below.

Parenting TCKs Top Ten

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10. You memorize expiration dates: passports and resident cards – because if you don’t and they expire you know how much it will be to get it all worked out.

9. Home communication becomes a mixture of words and phrases from various languages. (eg. Chinglish)
8. Airport security doesn’t scare you – even with all the changes.
7. Who needs Google Translator when you have a live version living with you? (kids always learn the language quicker)
6.Vacations are planned by looking at countries not gone to.
5. You know certain words like fever, diapers, toilet in many “foreign” languages, but are not fluent in any of them.
4. You don’t need to print off the directions for filling out a passport, because you do it often enough between you and your children.
3. You know the guards and office workers at the Embassy from all the visits for passports, citizen abroad papers, etc.
2. When your child(ren)’s friends come over to the house, your living room looks like a mini United Nations.
Though this is number one, it does NOT in anyway count as my favorite – I’d say it is the hardest of all…

Drum Roll, please……

1. You take your child to college in another country and watch them grow/struggle to figure out who they are as a TCK.

And there you have it, my Parenting TCKs Top Ten

Your Turn: Anything you’d add to this list? Please comment below.

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Debunking the Excuse Rail – Part 3

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Emotions. They can really get to us, well I can say to most of us. There are a few of you out there that are very logical and keep us emotionally minded people grounded. That is why I’m so thankful for my husband – well, I’m not usually so thankful during the time he is being logical and I’m not, but later after I get past all the “feelings” I am so grateful that he was there with his stable mind, especially when dealing with “feout“.

Emotions are not all bad, though. They are good to have. Without them we can’t really comfort those that are hurting, nor can we celebrate with those that are rejoicing. I sometimes tend to be more emotional, than logical. I’m a woman, what can I say? Though, I may have emotional outbursts, I’ve learned to not make decisions based entirely on them. If I did, I’d never get out of bed in the morning and make breakfast for the hungry crew of four. Thus, the reason for debunking those excuses. This is the last of this “series” from me, though as I ponder this topic, I am seeing more places/situations arise – as I’m sure you are probably starting to see in your own life.

This “excuse” that I’m about to share, though, is the winner – the one that began this whole pondering process.

It all began with reading this post on parents of special needs children. Especially this section:

The panic and constant state of anxiety parents of special needs children experience almost become a part of you.  It consumes you.  The nature of the beast becomes embedded in our brains and we know that with so many variables to triggers that we can never completely let our guard down.  Many parents become proficient at being proactive, walking on eggshells and creating a sensory friendly world that is foreign to others.  We are militant in our preparedness to avoid that dreaded meltdown and disregulation that once started can set off a chain reaction that can last hours or even days.  Studies have shown that special needs parents have cortisol levels equal to or higher than war veterans. We are warriors.

Read that last part again, “special needs parents have cortisol levels equal to or higher than war veterans”. If you are wondering, “Cortisol is a biological marker that plays an important role in linking stress exposure to health problems”, says Rick Nauert PhD in his article “Parental Stress with Special-Needs Children“.

And everything made sense...

Okay, honestly I already knew I had high stress in my life. I mean I have performed the  Heimlich countless times, I’ve had surprise nutella splatters, conditioner baths to clean, unplanned wall paintings, falls, a whole handful of hospital stays (with just Jie Jie alone), and I’ve lost the little rascal in an airport. Life is stressful with a special needs child – I agree with both of those articles.

But it was interesting how I responded right after I had the reason for my stress levels.

Yes, my response to the study that my cortisol levels were the same, if not higher than a war veteran’s was lame. I used it as an excuse. In my head I could eat more chocolate “because I’m highly stressed and need it for sanity purposes.” I also used it as an excuse for when I’d get really upset with my other children or with my husband. I found that for a few days I would immediately think of that report and excuse my behavior.  “I can’t help it, my cortisol levels are just too high,” I’d say to myself.

But, something in my gut disagreed, so I began some searching…

In reality, it was the scales and the tightness of my pants that directed that spotlight to my attention of my silly thinking. The book I mentioned in Part 1 also blew this thought process out of my mind. Yes, it is the truth that I’m under some stress, stress that is causing super high levels of cortisol – but it shouldn’t excuse my behavior. In fact, it should have caused me to step up my game in taking care of myself, or as what Dr. Neusert calls in his article, “stress-reduction strategies”.

So there you have it – don’t let scientific reasons become your excuse for your behavior whether towards yourself or to others. We are responsible for how we treat each other – and as parents, especially living overseas, we teach our children how to treat others.

I’ll share next week what those “strategies” are that I’m now doing and I’d like to share what others are doing to reduce their stress. So please share below in the comments what you do to reduce stress, especially if you are a parent of a special needs child living overseas.

 

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Debunking the Excuse Rail – Part 1

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Has this ever happened to you?

It’s the last expat women’s gathering before you move to the next destination. You are physically tired and weary of saying good-bye. You know that in reality, you won’t see most of the ladies again and that in probably a couple of years you won’t remember their names. Saying good-bye stinks, so you decide to skip it and not attend. You can text that you have some last minute things that need to be done before you leave, which is the truth.

Or maybe this?

“I know that we just moved here and I should learn the language, but I don’t think it is possible. I’m too old to learn a new language. My brain just can’t handle all the vocabulary words and grammar. I can just use my phone app for translation.”

Excuses. We all have them. Sometimes they are legit reasons, and sometimes they just make us feel better. I’d have to say though that most of us live with the latter. We don’t want to feel like we’ve done something wrong/bad. I know I don’t like this feeling, but does having an excuse make it any better? Or is the excuse more like applying concealer in hopes that people will not see those blemishes in my life?

I’ve been challenged with these thoughts after reading the book Lies that Women Believe by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. The book is not about expat living, but I applied some of the “challenges” to areas in my life that deal with living overseas and raising TCKs. The one chapter that spoke the greatest to me was chapter eight on emotions. To summarize, Mrs. DeMoss writes that much research and discovery has been made regarding women during their times of physical changes. She challenges women that though our hormones are the reason for feeling out of control, quick tempered, etc that we shouldn’t let them be the excuse for being mean and nasty to the people around us.

This got me to thinking about expat living and raising TCKs. Research has been done on TCKs, on the stress of moving, and honestly on all areas in life. How many times have I let the reason of research become my excuse for my behavior?

I’m breaking this post down into three parts to make it shorter and digestible, meaning hopefully you’ll be able to read it in one sitting and be able to ponder about it yourself. So, look for Part 1 and 2 next week. They are just a couple of things I’ve thought of. Be ready to share because I really do like hearing your thoughts.

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Nontraditional Holiday? Why not?

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For the ‘American’ part of our family, the big holiday is coming up quickly. You know, Thanksgiving. Turkey, stuffing, sweet potato souffle, pumpkin pie, and all the rest of the good stuff. In the past we’ve celebrated with fellow expats (aka adopted family) gathered around our own table or their table – or even larger gatherings where we rented space at the international school to feast.

This year is different.

This year we did not buy a turkey. I did not make stuffing. I didn’t even make a pumpkin pie. In fact, we are not even going to be home for Thanksgiving. We are leaving and taking a much needed mini vacation.

How do I feel about this? Actually, relieved. I’m not stressed about putting food together . I’m not worried about how Jie Jie is going to act/react at the gathering. I’m excited. We haven’t vacationed as a family in quite a while – like two years. We’ve gone to the US and visited family, but we didn’t go anywhere to shut off completely as a family. We’ve had stay-cations  but we tend to work anyway. We need to go away with books and games. I can’t wait -(actually, by the time you read this we will already be gone).

Why be nontraditional when this is the time I should be teaching my children about “their home” culture?

1. The thought of being away from family is too much this year. This is what one of my friends told me as she related their plans for the Thanksgiving break. They were planning to not have a huge feast at their home as they have in years past, but instead go to a different city and help at an orphanage with a group of other expats. I thought this was a brilliant way to fight the holiday blues. Go and serve others. And with that they are teaching their kids empathy for others.

2. The thought of doing anymore work is going to kill me. This is me, I raise my hand waving my white flag. I’m tired and the thought of cooking and prepping makes me swoon. And we have an “I Am a Hero Game” that we will travel six hours for the day before, so we decided to add time away and explore a small island off the main island.

I totally agree that holidays are a great way to teach kids about your own home culture. It helps them relate and understand where they came from. I understand that and agree. I get the full blown celebrations with all the fun crafts, food, and pre-recorded football games. I have done this – except the football game. We are European football fans, not so much the American football. So, my kids are not going to get a turkey this year. Will they survive? YES.

We really went wild this year – we put up our tree before Thanksgiving! We usually do this the weekend following Thanksgiving, but I wanted to come back to a decorated apartment. 

So, Happy Thanksgiving to you all! If you are eating turkey and pumpkin pie I wish you well as I sit at the beach reading a book and watching the kids play in the ocean. I’m thankful for time with my family.

Your Turn: How do you celebrate holidays? Do you go all out with every tradition? Do you ever do a nontraditional type of holiday? Please share in the comments below.

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Adoption Awareness Month: Our story

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Why did you adopt? asked an elderly Chinese lady at the playground.

Why not? I asked her back.

She shrugged and said it was not Chinese culture to do such things. I nodded in understanding, but saddened that it wasn’t. This mini-conversation took place a little over five years ago in mainland China. The lady wasn’t mean or snide. She truly wanted to know why I would choose to adopt a child whose ancestors we know nothing about.

Why did you adopt? asked a young mother holding her crippled boy.

You know that I’m a Christian, and well it was God. I really honestly can’t explain it any other way. I answered back not sure how she would react to my response. We had just discussed therapy exercises that Jie Jie was doing. (In case you are new, Jie Jie is my daughter with Cri-du-Chat; Mei Mei is my adopted Chinese daughter). I knew that she was thinking we were crazy for adopting after knowing we had a special needs daughter.

The above, I’m sure, is what most people think when they first meet our family. It may even have been your thought when you read our “About Me” page. I know that would be my first thought reading such a thing about another family. Are they crazy?

Honestly, I can only say it was a God-thing. Before Jie Jie was born, we fostered a newborn orphan for ten months. I was not able to adopt at that time due to my age, and we moved to a new city and couldn’t take her with us. She was almost a year old when we left her with a kind Chinese lady who we trusted. It was so difficult, but peaceful.

It was God’s plan.

After Jie Jie was born, we looked into the adoption process, but a few weeks later Jie Jie was very ill, which led to the mountain of tests and onto the summit of the result: Cri-du-Chat with silent aspiration. Our dreams of adopting were zapped. We really believed that  with her physical needs – and not to leave out the medical bills – there would be no way that we could even think about adopting at that point.

Two months later, back in our city in mainland China, we received the news that the little Chinese girl that we had fostered was taken back to the orphanage. We were mortified and sick. We prayed about it. Uwe asked me what was holding me back with adopting – was it Jie Jie’s needs or money. Jie Jie’s needs were not that “difficult”, we were able to feed her very easily and I was doing therapy with her at home. It was money. He felt the same. We decided right there that IF God was wanting us to adopt, then He’d provide the finances to pay off the medical bills and for the adoptions.

Long story short, God provided for all of those things to happen within two months. The surprise was that this little girl that we had fostered was not the girl God had in mind for us to adopt. In a matter of a few weeks, after we had our home study completed (which was a miracle to get an appointment so quickly), we found out that the fostered girl had been adopted.

Grief, sadness, mixed with anger swept my husband and I. Though, as we searched our hearts and God, we realized that His plan was this: To just use this foster girl as a catalyst to get Mei Mei into our family. (I believe He used it to cause the family who was fostering her to adopt her as well. She was back in their home in about two months time.) **By the way,we had asked this family if they were adopting or not and they had told us “No” in words, but in Chinese culture were telling us “Yes”. A lesson learned in culture clashing – in a later post, maybe.

We never would have seriously considered adopting had the foster child not been taken back. God used that tough situation to move us forward.

So see, I really can’t answer that question any other way. It really was God who brought Mei Mei into our family and I will be forever grateful that He did. I love that bundle of energy and passionate little girl.

The month of November is apparently Adoption Awareness Month. I really hadn’t heard of it until just last week, but what a great idea. There are so many children around the world in need of a home. Don’t worry, I’m not going to pressure you to make a commitment to adopt, but I would like you to at least give it a thought.

If you know you can’t adopt or even foster, what can you do to help these kids out? Ask the local social worker, schools, or orphanages how you can help them. At the very least, you could pray for these children to find forever families of their own.

Your Turn: If you have adopted share your story. It doesn’t have to be an overseas adoption. If you are thinking about it and have any questions, please ask. I will try to answer if I can. Please comment below.

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Happy Mid-Autumn Festival

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Tonight is probably my favorite Chinese holiday of the year. It isn’t Chinese New Year – which I think if I had been a TCK in Asia and got red envelopes with money inside every year, I’d probably move CNY to the number one spot.

It isn’t Lantern Festival, which is pretty cool with all the very ornate lanterns lit up.

It’s Mid-Autumn Festival -

I like it for several reasons.

1. It’s outside – I like watching the families gather outside to bbq on small hibachis. They have short tables and stools that they squat around with the hibachi in the middle. Everyone is cooking and chatting.

2. Aroma – I like the smell of the charcoal burning and the meat cooking.

3. Food – I really like mooncakes. I like the red-bean paste ones the best, but the rest of the family prefer the pineapple ones. Some of you may think, “Red-bean? What?” Just trust me, it is sweet and yummy.

This past week, I had the opportunity at school to make mooncakes. Homemade mooncakes. One of the moms came and taught all the kids how to make the dough and wrap it all us. It was so much fun. My son informed us that it was the best he has ever had.

This is our view tonight as Mid-Autumn Festival is being celebrated all around us. My little TCKs are in bed now and I’m enjoying the quiet, but I wanted to wish you all a Happy Mid-Autumn Festival this year!

 

 

When our TCKs Hurt – a plea for prayer

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Parenting has its up and downs. We want to pull out our hair one minute and wrap our arms around the little tornado.

They come into our lives as a precious bundle of drool, that we just Ooh and Aah about to anyone that is willing to listen. They grow and we are amazed at their first giggle, their first roll over, their first…you get the picture.

Then only a few years later, we stand with tissue in hand as they enter their classroom for the first time, wondering where did time go, wishing we could rewind just a few years as each passing day seems to speed up.

We get caught up in the mundane of the schedule – our life. When BAM! Life does a flip-flop-double somersault in the pit of our stomach. Our precious bundle is admitted into the hospital.

My stomach has been in knots this week. It’s not my own child, but my friend’s son.

Benjy was admitted just over a week ago and has spent the last four days in ICU. After several rounds of testing they have a diagnosis: Wilson’s Disease. But, right now his liver is not functioning. They have cleaned out his plasma three times now. The next few days are critical – his liver must start working on its own or a transplant is needed.

His mother is the only suitable donor.

My heart has really ached for this family. So, that is why I am asking – no pleading – that you take one minute out of your day to pray for Benjy.

Will you? 

I did an interview with his parents last spring. If you would like to get to know the family better, you can click here.

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5 Tips for International Traveling with Special Needs Children

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Wheelchair

photo by Tom Magliery

Earlier this week I posted about traveling with kids alone. I had just traveled with my two girls alone from Asia to the US. My oldest daughter has special needs, so I wanted to add a few other tips regarding travel with special needs children.

1. Ask for help. This may sound obvious, but sometimes I get into an independent mode and forget to ask for help. I have found that most people are willing to help when asked. During this last trip I asked for help with getting my carry-on down from the overhead compartment. I also asked the flight attendants for extra water. I have to mention that the flight attendants on my flights were extremely helpful and nice. Anyone that travels often will know how oddly pleasant this was.

2. Accept help. Another obvious, but for the flaw I have about independence, I have to remind myself to accept the help that is offered. I know I’m pathetic at times. This trip a man helped me get my luggage from the hotel van into the airport. Although, one needs to be careful and watchful about strangers when traveling alone, I have found that most people just want to be helpful.

3. Wheelchair/stroller use. If you don’t have a wheelchair to bring or you don’t want to deal with yours after you arrive at your destination, then use the airline’s wheelchairs. In the past, we have let the airlines know that we needed it and they have had them ready with someone to push them for us. One instance, we even got to ride in the golf cart from one gate to the next. For this trip, I chose to bring our own wheelchair. Jie Jie is walking okay, but she tires easily and with jet-lag and such I was afraid of meltdowns. I checked her wheelchair in at the gate and she walked onto the plane on her own. When we arrived we had to wait a bit, but they brought her wheelchair to us. Although, I do remember a few years ago they forgot to load the stroller, but the airline was great about providing a wheelchair at each layover. A few days later our stroller arrived at our door from the airline. So, if you do take your stroller/wheelchair make sure you have the correct address on the check-in tag.

4. Make it known. Let the people at check-in, security, and at the gate know that you have a child with special needs. This may sound so ridiculous, but I found that not everyone “saw” Jie Jie’s situation. I guess they thought she was just a child in a stroller? Anyway, letting the people know made all the difference. We were able to board earlier, and the security went really smooth. They were understood that we were going to be slower. Some officers helped me put my carry-ons on the x-ray belt. Most of them smiled and were friendly with the kids. I know this ALL depends on the individual, but I really had a good experience with security checks. 

5. Be grateful. I think as a parent of special needs children we sometimes have the expectation that we should get special treatment. Don’t get me wrong here, I agree that the disabled have rights and we need to stand in and fight for those rights. That is not what I’m getting at here. What I’m saying is, we shouldn’t forget to say “Thank you” to those who help, even if it is part of their job. Smiling at the people who are helping and being pleasant is another way of showing gratitude and it brightens their day, too. Demonstrating gratitude for our children, whether they are disabled or not, is a great way to begin teaching them to be grateful and polite to others early on. *Note that with international traveling, other cultures may not treat children with special needs with the same “rights” as the country you come from.

Your Turn: Have you traveled  with your special needs child? What are some tips that you have? Please share in the comments below.

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