Confessions in Kiev....

A friend of mine - currently in Ukraine finishing the last steps of adopting  two boys - reminded me of an incident that happened when I was in Kiev with Alex.  An incident I chose not to blog about as it does not paint me in the best light but now that he's been home and has survived his first couple of years, I think I will confess and add this to our adoption journal.

Here goes....

When you fly half way around the world to a foreign country to adopt a street wise orphan, your sense of right or wrong gets a little skewed. You feel more like the child that can't understand people and/or what's going on around you. You are there to pay and sign. Sign and pay. What you are signing and what you are paying for is often times not explained to you. You just do it and hope that whatever you are signing and paying for will get you one step closer to getting on that plane and going home with your new child in hand. You just nod and smile and hope everyone around you does not think you are the idiot you feel like.

So that's where I was, Nodding and smiling and delayed a WEEK due to passport picture issues when the unthinkable happened.

I lost Alex.

In downtown Kiev.

It was stupid and my fault. He wanted to go to the store and I let him go. We had been together everyday through the ten day wait and then another ten days solid and we were both going stir crazy! There was a little store across the parking lot that I assumed he was asking to go to and I didn't think anything of it. I gave him money. I think he was wanting a snack and to buy me chocolate? Yes, chocolate is what I needed to get through the day so, off he went. 

And then he didn't come back.

For a very long time.

In fact, after an thirty minutes, I walked to the store to see what was taking so long. No Alex. Anywhere. Our apartment was just minutes from "the square" and the heart of the city and all of a sudden it hit me. What have I done? I thought of downtown Salt Lake and how I would NEVER let my children wander around alone there. Never! And what had I just done? Let Alex do that very thing only in a much bigger city! I had no idea what to do. How could I explain this to the police. What was he wearing? Do I even have a printed out photo to show around? 

Luckily, Amy and Mary were with me - and they offered to go look for him and told me to stay put in case he came back to the apartment. I was frantic. Here I was his mother for just over a week and I lost him! Oh my gosh. 

I realized just what a terrible mother I was to this boy already. The fact that he could understand people and had to do the talking for us, gave me this warped sense of his ability to take care of himself. Not to mention that he had pretty much been taking care of himself most of his life? Unless you've been there, you don't understand what it's like to not be able to understand people. He could. He could talk to people, ask questions and he was respected and recognized by the adults we had transactions with because I was backing him with my fist full of Grivina and blank look. I had grown lax. I had assumed too much. Kiev is not a family friendly city and unlike Dnipro where he roamed the streets and knew every nook and cranny, he had never been there before.

What was I thinking?

I kept thinking about all the irresponsible parenting I had dished out so far: I  had given him money to go buy and haggle with the street vendors while I checked emails and wrote blogs at the Internet cafe. He was no where in sight as I desperately made contact with home. He could have very easily been kidnapped, hit by a car or carried off by a pack of stray dogs.

I had him navigate us to a terrible Mexican restaurant - where it was rumored we could get real Mexican food. He was the lone native speaker leading a bunch of adults through the subway AT NIGHT. Would I expect that of my home grown children at age ten? Please. 

I had  him order at all the restaurants for the both of us,  tell the waitress I wanted ice in my drink, and ask for directions and instructions. He did all this and more.  He would even check our bill and count the change and make sure we were not being taken advantage of. 

He would warn ME not to step on the man-hole covers (where there were any) pantomiming how I would fall down the hole and die and hush me up in the stores so people wouldn't hear my English and try to rob us blind. He would carry my bags and remind me to lock the doors. He really took care of me and yet HE was the one that needed a mother? Wat kind of mother did he get? One that let him wander off in a major, crowed city full of people (with questionable morals based on their dress and inebriated walk), with no address, no phone number, no way to call me. I'm not even sure he knew my full name.

I could picture the headlines: "Brrusht furcust ver gerrs htick zer surk zerer stera" Translation:  "Dumb American loses child with in days of becoming his mother!"
An hour later he walked in without a care in the world with package in hand!
I wanted to hug him and strangle him at the same time!!

Yes, he went to the store but not the little store across the parking lot. He went to some store clear across the square  that he had seen earlier that day, the line to pay was long and it took an hour but here was my chocolate. I wanted to hug him and strangle him all at the same time! 

I was minutes away from calling my translator to help me contact the police.

I-Yi-Yi!

So, there you have it. 

The truth.