Entries Tagged 'Parenting' ↓

I started to call this post A Rough Day. Much of the day was committed to Ethan’s first doctor visit since leaving Korea (he had just seen a doctor before being released to us on February 12). We wanted to get his medical record started here (in fact, we made today’s appointment before going to Korea).

Our visit with Dr. Allen Ettenger (Huntingdon, PA) was a real time investment, but a worthwhile one. We learned a lot.

Ethan weighed 21.7 pounds (in an earlier post, we said he weighed 24.3 pounds, but that was based on wrong information from the caseworker in Korea) and was nearly 30 inches long. Those numbers put him in the 70th percentile in the weight category and the 95th percentile in the length category. IOW, only 5% of boys his age are longer than he, and 30% of boys his age weigh more.

While we learned a lot today, it was also a painful day. Ethan received two vaccinations, one in each leg. He made his displeasure known throughout that part of the building (did we tell you he has strong lungs?!). BTW, Korea’s vaccines, unlike some nations, do not need to be repeated in the States, so we’re simply picking up where Korea left off (Ethan should be happy about that!).

We also just learned that Ethan had a flu shot in January, which may explain why he didn’t catch the flu from us this past weekend. Of all the things we want Ethan to “catch” from us, viruses are not one of them (i.e. important things, like character, are better caught than taught)!

If getting two shots wasn’t bad enough, we decided, with the doctor’s encouragement, to do a lead screening blood test (to establish a baseline), partly because we live in an old house that probably has lead (paint). We’ll have to make sure he doesn’t chew on the paint or pick up paint chips. This could be a real challenge, as he seems to put everything in his mouth.

A lead screening blood test involves drawing blood from the arm. It took two nurses to find a vein they could draw blood from (and, fortunately, the first time was successful!). It was rough — Joleen held him (including his other arm) from behind in a bear hug, one nurse held his arm still, and another nurse drew the blood from his arm. Since there was no room for me, I just watched and listened!

As painful as all of that was, though, the amazing thing was how quickly Ethan recovered, especially from the blood test. As soon as the needle was removed, it was almost as if nothing had happened — although he was pretty emotional/clingy for the rest of the day.

So, yes, it was a rough day. But I’m calling this a new day, because we are making a transition from being reactive to being proactive with Ethan, especially with his sleeping schedule.

Up to this point (naturally, we think), it’s been about survival, which has meant that we’ve given Ethan whatever he’s needed/wanted. FWIW, I think we’re discovering that either, (1) he’s always gotten what he’s wanted, or (2) we look like gullible people.

Dr. Ettenger recommended reading at least a couple chapters of Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems (by Richard Ferber) that deals with helping children develop new, healthy sleeping habits.

Obviously, we don’t have the book yet (we ordered it tonight), but we still began to be a little more proactive tonight. Rather than waiting for him to let us know when he was ready for bed, we were more intentional about our evening routine, starting at 10:00 (we’ll eventually bump this earlier, but for now, 10:00 pm is an improvement over 1:00 am, plus we’ve only been in the States about 6 days, so far).

10:00 — Play with Ethan on living room floor.
10:15 — In Ethan’s room, get him ready for bed, read a Bible story, pray, and give him his bottle.
11:00 — Ethan is asleep (for now!)

The goal (with the Ferber book’s help) will be to wean Ethan from going to sleep with the bottle (which is how his foster mother put him to sleep). We also want to help him learn to put himself to sleep in his crib, rather than us putting him in his crib after he’s fallen asleep (in Korea, he slept beside his foster mother on the floor/mattress, which may particially explain why he’s so fussy whenever he wakes up).

It’s a new day. And, it’s all part of the learning experience!

Ethan’s big challenge right now is having to train two new, sometimes clueless, parents!

Think about it, Ethan had invested six months (of his 8-month-old life) in training a foster mother (an experienced mother of three grown children) to read his signals and meet his needs. Now he has to start all over with two newbies.

To help with the transition, we were supplied information by the foster mother about sleep schedule, eating habits, and things like that. Of course, now that we’re home, in a different time zone, where the food is different, we’re really having to learn everything new anyway, it seems.

Ethan has developed some signals to indicate different things and we’re in the process of learning what they mean. Sometimes when he’s hungry, he smacks his lips. Yesterday, when he wanted a bottle, apparently, he started crawling toward the kitchen. When he’s getting sleepy (but doesn’t really *ever* want to go to sleep) he rubs his eyes with his hands or on a blanket.

But this training process that we’re involved in is a two-way street. As we build a stronger relationship with Ethan, and as we become more confident about what we’re doing, our challenge will become ‘being trained by Ethan’ to ‘training Ethan.’

We’ve been pretty lenient in our first week together, mainly because our first priority has been survival. But now that we’re getting to know each other (and getting well), it’s time to start our own training program.

Part of this training will involve working on Ethan’s sleeping schedule as well as his diet. We will take Ethan to his first doctor’s appointment here on Wednesday, where we’ll probably try to get some help with these two areas.

The training continues …

We would appreciate your prayers for our family’s health, especially that Ethan doesn’t get what we had last night!

Joleen and I had the flu last night. My case of it was pretty severe — it was the sickest I’ve ever been. I spent 6 straight hours in the bathroom.

Thankfully, though, Ethan seems to be well, so far.

Our first full day home, I woke up around 7:00 am, after 10 hours of sleep, and wrote the four posts on the blog (while both Joleen and Ethan slept till around 2:00 pm) that I scheduled to appear every few hours, including one this morning. I had no ability to write a post this morning!

Overall, today was a good day with Ethan, even though Joleen and I laid around on couches most of the day. Ethan does pretty well with entertaining himself. Mostly, he likes to grab on to things (e.g. end tables, TV stands, anything!) and pull himself up. As he was once described by his caseworker in Korea, “He’s a very active little guy.”

The roughest things for Ethan now are the times he wakes up during the night. That’s when we hear his terrified crying. While he normally gets up once during the night (according to his foster mother), he’s been up three times so far tonight, and we have several hours to go before he gets up. But, during the day, he laughs a lot, and seems to be adjusting well.

Anyway, pray that Ethan doesn’t get what we had!

I think I am going wrap up this discussion of the kind of culture we want to shape in our home with this post. I’m sure there are parts I’ve missed but I think what I’ve written so far is more than enough to get us started!

“Everything we have is a gift from God. Everything.” (Sweet)

Shaping a Trustee Culture. In a trustee culture, people see themselves as having been entrusted with gifts and resources from God to be used in ways that honor God and further God’s work in the world. IOW, our stuff is not really our stuff, it is a gift from God to be used wisely.

Good stewardship has always been important to us. We’ve written about Teaching Good Money Management and Our Best Money Practices.

Leonard Sweet talks about trusteeship in his book, SoulSalsa …

God owns everything: the cattle, the car, the IRA, the TIAA-CREF. You and I own nothing. Not even ourselves. … We prove our nonownership when we die. You can’t take it with you because it isn’t yours to begin with.

Shaping a trustee culture will require us to be good trustees (or stewards) ourselves. Then we will need to teach Ethan to view himself as a trustee — someone blessed by God to use his God-given resources in ways that honor God.

Well, as I said, this will wrap up a look at the kind of culture we want to shape in our home. Previously, I wrote about shaping a God-centered culture, a learning culture, a high AQ culture, a leadership culture, and a servant culture.

This series has given us an opportunity to be intentional about the kind of culture we want to shape, but now it’s time to put it into to practice with Ethan!

Christ-followers are servants!

We want to raise Ethan in a culture where serving God and others is part of the DNA. A culture where serving God/others is part of the DNA is a culture which says …

It’s not about me!

Rick Warren begins his book, The Purpose-Driven Life, with the words, “It’s not about you.”

“We want to raise Ethan in a culture where serving God and others is part of the DNA.”

We all come into the world, it seems, thinking everything revolves around us. And it first, maybe it does. In fact, for the first 8+ weeks of our time with Ethan, we will both be on parental leave. During this time, we will very much be focused on Ethan! And we can hardly wait!

But as Ethan grows, we want his world to expand beyond himself. It’s an unhealthy attitude for any of us to have that believes, “it’s all about me.”

To help instill a servant culture in our home, we will need to find ways, as a family, to serve — God, each other, others in our church family, and others in the world.

A servant’s heart is a surrendered heart. Jesus demonstrated total surrender like no one else. Perhaps it was because Jesus was reared in a home with a servant culture. He had a mother and father who showed him what surrendered lives look like. As a young (betrothed) wife, Mary was approached by an angel with a mind-boggling opportunity to raise God’s Son. (See Luke 1.26-38.)

Mary, more than a little confused, tried to figure out what it meant. In end, she demonstrated total surrender, saying …

I am the Lord’s servant! Let it happen as you have said.

Now, that’s the kind of attitude we want to help Ethan develop! Of course, that means *we* will need to model that kind of surrender. IOW, shaping a servant culture, a culture where serving God/others is part of the DNA, comes with a pretty big price tag!

This is the fifth part in a series of reflections on the kind of culture we want to create in our home, especially for Ethan. Previously, we’ve written about shaping a Leadership Culture, a God-centered culture, a learning culture, and a high AQ culture. I have a couple other ideas on my list. I’ll try to write about those in the next few days as we prepare to bring Ethan home.

One of the things I look forward to as a parent is raising Ethan in the context of a leadership culture. Leadership is important to us; we’re both leaders. While we don’t yet know what gifts God has given him (and others God may develop in him in the future), we certainly want to provide an atmosphere where God can grow him to be a leader in whatever areas he discovers his giftedness.

In the Scriptures, particularly with the leaders in the Old Testament, there are so many examples of children following in the footsteps of their parents. Often when the parent was a bad leader, the child was also a bad leader, and vice versa. There were exceptions, of course, but they seem to be few and far between. The challenge for us is to provide the best environment we can so that Ethan will be an effective, godly leader.

Role Models
Everybody needs good role models. As parents, we’ll automatically be role models for Ethan, and that will include modeling leadership. We’ll also ensure that he is exposed to other good leaders so that he can learn from them, too. Having good role models is essential for learning leadership!

Opportunities to Lead
Learning leadership from others is necessary, but it’s not enough. You can’t develop leadership without actually leading. IOW, leadership skills are best developed on the job, putting them into practice. That means we’ll need to give Ethan opportunities to lead as he grows and matures (although we’re not exactly sure what that will look like yet).

Again, we don’t know what God has in store for Ethan, but everyone, regardless of giftedness, can benefit from a strong leadership culture. Everyone leads in some capacity — in school, in the workplace, as a parent, or any number of other contexts. May God help us to take our task of providing a leadership culture for Ethan to heart!

Well, this is part of a series of posts written in preparation for bringing Ethan home. Previously, we’ve written about shaping a God-centered culture, a learning culture, and a high AQ culture.

Parents, in particular, will recognize these three words: Some assembly required!

We’ve already gotten a little taste of them, too, as we prepare to bring Ethan home. We both put a crib together a few weeks ago, and my (Randy) latest project was putting together a stroller. Actually, I took on the task of choosing the stroller, too. I wanted to make sure it was tough enough to go anywhere. It even comes complete with its own tire pump in the basket underneath!

Joleen is going to try to use the same logic in choosing a “tough” looking diaper bag. We’ll see.

Anyway, when I took the stroller out of the box, it came in a number of pieces. For the fun of it, I tried putting most of it together without looking at the directions (which I did), but toward the end, the directions became necessary!

Now this is a stroller!

Shaping culture. That’s what we’ve been thinking about lately as we prepare to bring Ethan home in a few weeks. So far, we’ve talked about shaping a God-centered culture and a learning culture. Next up, we want to shape a high AQ culture.

Behind this idea of a high AQ culture is an excellent book, Adversity Quotient: Turning Obstacles into Opportunities, by Paul Stoltz, who suggests that one’s AQ is more important than one’s IQ. “AQ is a measure of how you respond to adversity.” (Paul Stoltz)

While IQ measures one’s intelligence, AQ measures how one handles adversity. AQ is about resilience, how you react when things don’t go your way.

Stoltz says there are 3 kinds of people …

1. Quitters simply quit climbing at some point along the journey.
2. Campers may start out okay, but somewhere along the way, they get tired and take a much-needed break (which we all need from time to time). However, they enjoy resting and camping out so much that they decide to stay right where they are. They decide they’ve gone far enough.
3. Climbers keep climbing no matter what obstacles get in their way, no matter what kinds of temptations or distractions come along. Sure, they take regular breaks and camp out from time to time, but their camp is a temporary location, not a permanent residence. Their eyes are on the destination, and they keep climbing!

While Paul Stoltz wrote Adversity Quotient in the 1990s, the concept of AQ is nothing new. The Apostle Paul (and others in Scripture) talked about (and modeled) the importance of high AQ centuries ago …

Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing. (James 1.2-4)

Paul also wrote, “Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again—rejoice!” (Philippians 4.4; see also 1 Thessalonians 5.16).

The basic idea is that no matter what you’re going through — when you feel out of control — you still get to choose your response. Scripture, life’s manual for living a God-honoring life, is full of examples of people who handled adversity well (as well as examples of people who didn’t) that we can learn from.

We want to cultivate a high AQ environment so that our child will have a AQ. We want to raise a climber, a person who’s resilient and keeps pursuing God’s plan no matter what.

Shaping a high AQ culture is going to be challenging, but the stakes are pretty high. In order to shape a high AQ culture in our home we must teach and model how to handle adversity. We’ll have to be aware of how we react to things (what we say, how we act, what we do afterward, etc.) because our little one will be watching!

Of course, we’ll never have perfect AQs. We’ll mess up at times, but we hope to do our best, with God’s help. We believe the quality — and the impact — of his Ethan’s life depends greatly on his AQ!

Today in our worship gatherings, we announced that we are both receiving parental leave upon our return from Korea, where we will pick up our adopted son.

Here’s the announcement …

News About Randy & Joleen’s Parental Leave

As you know, we are adopting a baby boy from Korea. We expect to travel to Korea to pick him up sometime in or around February (at which time, Ethan will be about 8 months old).

In the United Methodist Church, pastors are able to take 8 weeks of paid parental leave. We both plan to take this time (plus 2 weeks of vacation, to cover our time in Korea), and we have followed the Book of Discipline, which included filing our requests with our respective SPRCs and the District Superintendent. Recently, the Cabinet (the Bishop and District Superintendents of the Conference) granted approval.

As you may imagine, bonding time of parents and child is very important. It’s especially important in the case of international adoption. Not only will we use this time for bonding, but we will also be dealing with transitioning issues — change of location, culture change, 12 hour change in time zone, change in baby formula, and a whole new life for the three of us!

Over the course of the next few months (of waiting time and transitioning time), we would appreciate your prayers for …

• God to work out all the details

• God to help us finish our dissertations (and graduate in May)
• Our trip to/from Korea (including long flight with Ethan)
• The bonding and transition of our family

Also, while we are in Korea, we will be connecting with a ministry(ies) as part of a cross-cultural experience requirement for our doctor of ministry programs.

While we are on leave, area United Methodist pastors will be on call for pastoral emergencies. Rev. Tiffany Freeman will be a guest speaker two times in each of our churches so that Holy Communion can be celebrated. On the other weeks, lay speakers will fill in. Some details still need to be worked out with our SPRCs, but we wanted to inform you about our upcoming parental leaves.

Thanks for your support and your prayers!

Randy & Joleen

Regular readers of our blog will know that we are thinking a lot about parenting these days as we prepare to bring Ethan home from Korea. Part of our thinking recently has been about how best to pray for him — now and in the years to come!

Randy recently posted several prayers for the journey. These will be good, especially down the road as Ethan begins to make more decisions for himself. “Praying the scriptures is a powerful way to pray!”

We’ve just begun to gather some scriptures that we want to incorporate into our prayers for Ethan. Here’s what we’ve collected so far …

For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs. (Zephaniah 3.17)

Ephesians 6.1-4 offers some valuable praying material. Here, Paul admonishes children, “obey your parents,” and “honor your father and mother,” noting that “this is the first commandment with a promise: If you honor your father and mother, ‘things will go well for you, and you will have a long life on the earth.’” But Paul also cautions parents, “do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them. Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction that comes from the Lord.” Good stuff to pray.

I have not stopped thanking God for you. I pray for you constantly, asking God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to give you spiritual wisdom and insight so that you might grow in your knowledge of God. I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance. I also pray that you will understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for us who believe him. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the place of honor at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms. Ephesians 1.16-20

When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3.14-21)

A final word: Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil. For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places. Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Then after the battle you will still be standing firm. Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God’s righteousness. For shoes, put on the peace that comes from the Good News so that you will be fully prepared. In addition to all of these, hold up the shield of faith to stop the fiery arrows of the devil. Put on salvation as your helmet, and take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere. (Ephesians 6.10-18)

Now all glory to God, who is able to keep you from falling away and will bring you with great joy into his glorious presence without a single fault. All glory to him who alone is God, our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord. All glory, majesty, power, and authority are his before all time, and in the present, and beyond all time! Amen. (Jude 1.24-25)

Well, this should get us started. We believe that praying the scriptures is a powerful way to pray. If praying the scriptures is unfamiliar to you, here’s an example …

O God, we give you all the glory, for who you who and for all you have blessed us with. Thank you so much for blessing us with Ethan. God, you are able to keep Ethan from falling away. We trust, O God, that you will bring him with great joy into your glorious presence without a single fault. All glory to you, who alone are God, our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord. All glory, majesty, power, and authority are yours before all time, and in the present, and beyond all time! Amen.

The idea is simply to incorporate the language of scripture into your prayers. In some cases you can use the actual language; other times, you may need to change it into the form of a prayer.

Some resources we found online (although we know little about them) that look like they might be worth checking out if you’d like more resources: Praying the Scriptures for Your Children (2001) and Praying the Scriptures for Your Teenager: Discover How to Pray God’s Will for Their Lives (2007), both by Jodie Berndt.

Also check out Kevin Martineau’s recent piece on praying for our children.

What do you pray when you pray for your children? What Scriptures do you pray for them? Feel free to share in the comments section.