3 months home

Three months! Before we brought Jacob home I was telling myself 3 months would be a benchmark, not to worry until three months if things were crazy, that things would start to feel better at three months. I was coaching myself mentally just in case. Even with my first three babies the three month mark was significant. And while we have had the best first three months possible with our sweet boy, there is still something special about the three month mark. It makes things feel even more real.

It seems like our boy has always been here. Brad and I frequently look at each other and say, "he's from Russia", like it's a new discovery. It just doesn't feel like we spent the first 13 months of his life apart. It doesn't feel like he is any different than our first three children. I still hold to my original comment just weeks after bringing Jacob home that things are better/easier/smoother for me with 4 children. It really does feel like Jacob had been missing from our family and we didn't know it until we got him home.

This is a pretty huge blessing, and I have to admit that even now I am waiting for a reality check. But it has not come like I thought it would. I admit there are moments-we all have moments. The "holy cow I have 4 children what-am-I-doing" moments. But I expected our bond to take much longer to build.

For those of you who did not know us when Drew was born, I experienced moderate to severe Post Pardum Depression (PPD) after his birth. Post Adoption Depression (PAD) is also very common and Brad and I both worried about the possibility of struggles after bringing Jacob home. We weren't sure what types of stressors we might encounter and how they might effect both of our ability to bond with our newest addition.

I feel blessed to have the experience and knowledge I gained through my struggles with PPD to guide me this time around. Bringing a toddler home is tricky business. Welcoming a child who has been raised in an institutionalised environment is challenging. Managing the emotions of a different kind of exhaustion in the first weeks (jet lag on top of sleep deprivation) is hard. Helping our three children understand how to act appropriately with their new 'baby' brother who is not actually a baby is frustrating. And trying to manage my personal adjustment to everything (fatigue, frustration, perceived failures, and just plain being overwhelmed) while simultaneously staying cooped up on "lock down" is enough to make anyone struggle to keep a healthy mind set.

Without my experience with PPD after Drew's birth I'm not sure  things would be going so well. Hind sight is 20/20, but I sure am glad Heavenly Father knew I would need that knowledge and believed I was strong enough to come through it.

Jacob's 3 month milestones:
-Spoken words!! "Dada", "Mama", "Nana", "Papa"
-climbing up stairs, safely coming down one single stair
-running (at least the adorable 'baby' run that toddlers do)
-table foods: sandwiches, soups, pastas, rice, potatoes, pancakes, canned fruits and cooked vegetables
-throwing... everything...
-Jacob can handle outings without the front pack now! We have even tried one back-to-back outing including more than one destination.

It just keeps getting better and better...