One year with an amazing little boy

Did God really place this little miracle in our arms? Our lives? Our family? Yes He did!!! One year ago today, Matt and I rode in a cab in China, to a run down, dingy, dark building to meet our son. As we waited in a room with other families we saw many children meet their mommy's and daddy's for the first time. Some cried and wanted to go back to their nanny, others were intrigued by these new people. Matt and I sat in anticipation wondering when our son would walk through that door, how would he react to us? And then I saw him. This baby, screaming, crying, with no sign of stopping anytime soon. And I just wanted him, I needed to hold him, to soothe him. To let him know that his MaMa(mommy) and BaBa(daddy) were finally there to bring him home. It was like a dream really. He snuggled in, and I never, ever, will let him go. He is ours forever. 

Samuel has accomplished and been through so much in just a year. He has seen numerous doctors and been through 2, 4+ hour surgeries. He has had countless hours of therapy and is making huge strides! In one year, he has gone from barely being able to take 2 ounces of formula at a time, to eating 4 entire peanut butter and jelly sandwiches at once. Okay, so that only happened once, and it was after  being on a strict liquids only diet for 3 weeks, but 4 whole sandwiches is impressive!! He was giving little to no eye contact when we got him, to almost full eye contact now when spoken to. He has gone from being able to only take a couple of steps, to running around the house chasing his brothers. It was a struggle to get him to smile a year ago, and today he smiles at everything he finds funny. He has quite the little sense of humor. He went from never having baths, to every night when I say "time for bath" he runs to the bathtub and puts his arms up to start taking his shirt off. He went from, not only not being able to, but also not wanting to communicate, to having almost 10 signs in sign-language and demanding your attention when he wants or needs something. He has now had his first Easter, 4th of July, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and the most fun of all, his first birthday party. He has learned how much we love our family and friends and he has began to show them love as well. He in fact, has just learned how to blow kisses. It's adorable really. 

I was scared a year ago, before Samuel was placed in my arms, how deeply I would love him. Would he be my baby as much as our first 2 sons? Today I can answer that question. I could answer that question the second he was placed in my arms. YES!!! Samuel Mangels, I love you. I love you completely, with all of my heart. You are my son, my baby, a joy in my life. I can't wait to see where you are and what all will come in the next year. 

Thank you to all of our friends and family who have loved and prayed for Samuel. We are greatful for all of you and everything you have done for our family. 

Our baby is becoming a little boy

I have sat 2 mornings in a row now and just smile in amazement watching our little boy playing. Samuel and Elijah have been pushing their dump trucks around the entire house, filling them up with every hot wheel they can find. They even had their first brotherly argument yesterday when they both wanted the same hot wheel. Elijah was yelling at Samuel that it was his first, and Samuel retaliated by sassing back at Elijah and pinching him. All I could do was smile and then I had to explain to Elijah that his brother was only 2 and maybe we should let him play with the car first and we would take turns. Oh, the little things. 

Samuel is blossoming with appropriate play these days. It's so much fun. He's doing amazing with coloring now and will imitate just about any toy play you show him. He had a blast the other day playing with race car tracks. 

Samuel started speech therapy this week. We worked just a little bit on one step directions. Within minutes he learned how to "put trash in" the trashcan. He thought this was so much fun and wanted us to cheer and clap for him every time he threw a piece of trash away. But you know where this headed after the therapist was gone... Yep. If we can't find anything, we now will be looking in the trashcan. 

In the past few weeks Samuel has really let us into his world. Instead of playing by himself most of the time he now comes to us to engage in his play or if Matt and I are sitting on the couch he climbs up to snuggle in with us. Oh. My heart melts every time!!! I can officially say all 3 of our boys are now snuggle bugs. 

It has been 7 weeks now since lip and nose surgery. Samuel has healed amazingly!!! He is really starting to use his lip and his little muscles are beginning to work. He can say mama and has started licking his lips when eating. He also does this cute little pucker, however I have not gotten him to do it for a kiss yet. I'm working on it. 

In about 7 more weeks we will be heading back to the hospital for palate surgery. We are nervous but anxious to get past this hurdle. We will also have another hearing test then to find out if we will be proceeding with hearing aids or not. We are very anxious for Samuel to be able to finally have the opportunity to make great strides in speech and communication. Hearing and his cleft have kept him from that for almost 3 years, but not much longer!!! 

Once again, I can't express what an amazing miracle this little boy is. I thank God that he made him for our family. I can't imagine life without him. 

Here are some pictures from the last 7 weeks. You can see quite the transformation!! 

Update . . . where to start???

I had to re-read our last blog post to see where we left off.  Whew!  We've been slacking!  Hold on tight . . . heeeeeere we go.

So abnormal blood test results cancelled our last surgery date.  The abnormality had to do with his blood clotting too slowly.  Off to the Hematology Clinic we went!  Hematology draws more labs.  They come back . . . normal!  Yep, that's right, two abnormal . . . go see the specialists . . . normal.  Go figure.  So they decided to re-test four weeks later.  Fast forward four weeks (last week of July), normal again.  The hematology doc said he wasn't surprised, given Samuel's background.  Slow clotting is an immune response to sickness.  Institutionalized kids have to fight sickness on their own.  They don't have medication, clean environments, proper hygiene, etc.  Consequently, their immune response is different than ours.  If a virus shows up in me, I may clot slowly for a week.  Virus shows up in Samuel, he may clot slowly for weeks or even months.  The abnormal blood test was most likely Samuel's body overreacting to a virus in his system from weeks or months before.  His little body is still in that institutional "survival mode".  It's a tragic reality, but a testament to the strength of kids left to fend for themselves. The good news from the time with the specialists was that nothing major was going on.  The great news, we were cleared for surgery on August 15th!!!!

So today was the day we've been waiting for!  We got to the hospital a bit before noon.  (Amy and I can't express how grateful we are to have a children's hospital 10 minutes away from our home.  Children's Mercy is top notch and world class.  We can't say enough good things about the staff and facility).  We got checked in and began meeting with individuals from all the teams involved in Samuel's surgery.  On the list for today's surgery: an ear tube, an ABR, and cleft lip and nose repair.

Samuel has one ear drum with fluid and one ear drum with a hole (likely due to infection).  The side with a hole doesn't need a tube.  The hole acts as a tube, preventing fluid build up.  They may try to patch the hole since it is so big, but that wouldn't happen until he is older.  The other side needed a tube.  Thirty minutes in to surgery we met the ENT doc.  Everything went well.  On to the ABR.

ABR is Auditory Brainstem Response.  Basically, they hook him up to sensors, play some sounds, and see how much he is hearing.  It took about 45 minutes for this part.  The ear with a hole shows mild hearing loss.  He no doubt hears out of it, just below what is considered "normal" hearing.  The tubed ear had better hearing, but was also showed mild hearing loss.  This is the tough side to decipher.  After all, he did just have a tube put in and the fluid behind his drum drained.  It is expected that hearing in this ear will get better over the next few days/weeks.  So . . . we will re-test in a few weeks and see if there is any improvement.  If both ears show mild loss, we will start investigating hearing aids.  If the tubed ear is considered "normal" in a few weeks, we will probably just let it go for now.  No major surprises so far.  We were well aware of the ear issues with cleft kiddos.  To hear Samuel has some wasn't a shocker.  If he needs help hearing . . . we'll get some help.  If not . . . we won't :)

Time for the main event!  Cleft lip and nose repair.  We took the long way around to find Samuel's surgeon.  We really backed in to it.  Before even going to China, at the recommendation of our international adoption pediatrician, we had planned on using Dr Jiang for Samuel's lip and palate repair.  After arriving home with Samuel, our international adoption pediatrician suggested using a different doc for surgery.  Well . . . road block after road block led us back to Dr Jiang.  Bottom line, either doc is skilled to do great work on Samuel.  Bottom, bottom line . . . Dr Jiang was the right guy for this job.  I bragged on our children's hospital earlier . . . I'm bragging ten times more on Dr Jiang right now.  He is extremely skilled and has a bedside manner that should be envied by all.  We feel blessed beyond measure to have had Dr Jiang's hands work on Samuel.

Lip and nose repair was slated for two to two and a half hours.  We received a phone call in the waiting room when they began the repair.  After every bit of two and a half hours, our eyes caught Dr Jiang in the waiting room.  We headed to a conference room for the story.  First, Samuel did well.  This was far more than a formality.  The effects of anesthesia are different in some people.  It can be very dangerous.  Prior to surgery, Amy and I were asked all kinds of health history related questions.  Fact of the matter is, as adoptive parents . . . we just don't know the answer.  I can answer for the last six months, but thats it!  So it was a better feeling that usual to hear he did well through the surgery.  Dr Jiang proceeded to tell us that it went as good as it could have possibly gone.  Samuel will be taped up for the next few days, so the final result is a bit hidden for now, but doc did take cell phone pictures before he was taped up.  The pictures were extraordinary.  Dr Jiang is a talented surgeon.  He worked hard to keep as much symmetry and balance as possible.  He had told us in earlier meetings he would give Samuel an Asian nose :)  We thanked him and told him what a great job he did.  He told us Samuel "took him to his limits" as a surgeon.  Most cleft surgeries are done at a much earlier age.  While Samuel isn't even three years old, he is considered older to be having cleft repair surgery by United States standards.  Most are done here before one year old.  As Samuel was getting older, the gaps in his lips grew further and further apart.  This became the challenge.  Though his surgeon may have been taken to his limits, you'd never know it by seeing Samuel today.

For now, Samuel is resting with his mama at the hospital.  The two older boys are with me at home.  They went to see little brother earlier this evening.  Micah was a bit overwhelmed by the whole thing and was ready to go shortly after getting there.  Elijah was ready to show off his little brother to anyone who would stand still for a few seconds, then he was ready to go . . . til he found out there was a game room with a Wii in it.  No surprises from either of those two.

I sit here tonight feeling as though my cup runneth over.  So thankful for the best children's hospital and surgeon that I could dream of.  Thankful for a support system that has a line of people waiting to help do something, anything.  Parents to help with older brothers, grandparents to sit in waiting rooms or spread the word about surgery to folks praying all over the country, brothers and sisters thinking and praying, friends on the edge of their seats waiting for news on Facebook or text message, other adoptive families who were in our shoes in the past few months excited for whats ahead, churches praying, teachers inquiring, meals offered . . . I could go on and on . . . Amy and I are honored and humbled.  We are thankful to be able to be a mom and dad to a little Chinese boy that needed a mom and dad.

We are most thankful to God . . . for showing us how to love others . . . to love orphans . . . by the way He loves us.

Now for some pictures!

Brothers.

Lunch at the zoo

Feeding himself!!!  Remember formula-only just 6 months ago?!?!?!?

At his first baseball game.  Go Royals!!!

Love that big ole clefty smile :)

Before surgery.

After surgery.  We will post more post-surgery pics after he has a little more healing time.

Frustrated, but faithful

So tomorrow was supposed to be the very LONG awaited first surgery for our little Samuel. Well, once again, the surgery has been cancelled/postponed. This time was due to some abnormal blood tests. We went in for our pre-operation appointment 2 weeks ago and everything went fine. We had a simple blood draw to make sure Samuels blood was clotting fast enough, since oral surgeries tend to bleed a lot more than other surgeries and with all of the saliva, the blood tends to clot slower (all things we've learned in the past 2 weeks). We got a call the next day that his blood was clotting at a slower rate than what they were comfortable with and that they would like to retest in a week in case he just had a virus that was throwing the numbers off. So we went in last Thursday for another blood draw and within hours got the dreaded call that again the labs were abnormal. 

Today we saw a hematologist for the first time to first: determine what is causing the abnormal labs and second: to figure out a course of action to be able to treat this so we can proceed with Samuels surgery. 6 vials of blood and an hour and a half later, we left with a follow up appointment for one month. It will be next week before we have test results. So until then, we'll keep taping Samuels lip in preparation for surgery and enjoy our last little bit of time before his face is forever transformed. 

I have to admit, when we got the call last week that surgery was going to be postponed once again (since this has now happened 3 times, getting within a week of surgery to be told it is cancelled) I cried for a bit. I was so frustrated. Why does this keep happening? Our poor baby has been through enough with all this prep we were really ready this time. Yet throughout this week, Matt and I just continue to be reminded how perfect and amazing God's plan has been throughout this entire process. So we stand faithful, knowing that all of this is God's perfect plan for our Samuel and our family. In His time, it will all happen. 

So on a fun positive note we have some very good news to share!! Samuel was recently reevaluated by his therapist, and he did amazing!!! Shortly after bringing him home, he tested at about a 9-12 month level. This time, not even 5 months later, he was testing at almost 24 months in almost every area (with the exception of speech of course). Our big guy is just surprising us all the time at the strides he's making. He is truly a very very special gift that God has given us. 

We OFFICIALLY have surgery on the calendar!!

Well this post has been a long time coming.... We have been on a roller coaster since the last post. We had scheduled surgery twice with the surgeon we had been with since Samuel came home. Both times it was cancelled for different reasons. The surgeons nurse called and informed us last week that after months of waiting, he would not be able to do the surgery. There was just not a hospital around, besides the children's hospital in Kansas City (that he does not perform surgeries at) that was willing to take Samuel. Needless to say, we were crushed and wondered what God had in His plan for us next. Well, today we began to get some answers. 

We went to Children's Mercy Hospital this morning knowing that we would be hearing a completely different philosophy for Samuel's surgery than what we had bought into for the last several months. Matt and I went in this morning saying we would listen to what this doc had to say and then come home and discuss wether we wanted to let him operate on our baby, or if we'd be seeking out another surgeon across the state. 

We spent an hour with Dr. Jiang (yes he's Chinese) and Matt and I looked at each other and knew we didn't need to go home and discuss anything. This was what was best for Samuel. So we put a tentative date on the calendar for a June 27th lip repair, followed by palate repair in 3 months. We have begun "taping" now, until his lip repair surgery. This will help pull down his lip and pull back his front gum line. I will post a picture below. It looks kind of like a butterfly strip. We are very excited and were very thankful that Dr. Jiang spent an entire hour explaining,in depth, his reasons for the way he wants to do Samuel's surgeries. 

So here is just a quick update on how Samuel is doing:

He has gained 8 lbs and over 2 inches since we got him in China. 

He just now has switched from a bottle completely to a big boy cup!

He is eating solids at all meals. Literally what we eat, he eats. We are completely amazed how he maneuvers and is able to chew his food. Tonight, for example, we ate pulled pork sandwiches, green beans and cottage cheese. He ate an ENTIRE sandwich!!!

He now gets very excited when his daddy gets home from work, and runs to him with arms raised for a hug and kiss.

We still hit our head out of habit and when over-stimulated, but we are working very hard to overcome this and he is doing great. 

He has started running. 

He giggles all the time. 

He loves to snuggle! 

He is pointing to communicate what he needs/wants. 

Eye contact is improving greatly. 

He has created quite the bond with his big brothers and they absolutely adore him. 

We have began throwing 2 year old tantrums, but he recovers pretty quickly. 

He loves to play and swing outside. 

He has had his first Starbucks :) it was just a vanilla steamer, no caffeine. 

Overall, we are thrilled with Samuel's strides since coming home. We love him with everything we have and are so excited to be a part of his life. Thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers, we feel and appreciate all of them.