Back in Kyiv.. Medical Appointment Day ~ Day 28

We woke up on the train today at 5:30. Our arrival time was 6:00 am. We had to haul all that dang luggage to find a cab. Luba hates my luggage. That is no secret. She travels too light. I am concerned about how light she travels actually! It is a medium sized purse that doesn’t look full enough (even including a pile of documents) to have anything more than a wallet inside of it. It seems too light for several days away from home!

I had to get a picture of the purple train for Vika.

A taxi drove us to our apartment and we came in. At least the silence is the only awkward thing with Vika. I am concerned about her showing me or trying to communicate what she needs with me. She rested and we waited around our apartment for our ride to the medical center to complete those forms. The last few days have been very personally demeaning for me in a way. I have never felt more like I didn’t much matter in my life – minus the fact I carried the wallet and contained a valued signature. 
Here is Vika and Luba saying our short goodbyes at our apartment. 

Views from our new apartment in Kyiv.  The kitchen.

 In case you are wondering what that appliance next to the refridgerator is it's the washing maching.  Actually, it's the best washing machine I have used for the past month!

 Our living room.  The only thing I wasn't thrilled about with this aparment was the lack of Internet.  It was supposed to work, but didn't.

 Seperate room for the toilet.  A bit clausterphobic.  They didn't clean the bathroom section of this apartment after the last tenants.  Gross.

 Our bedroom.

The medical appointment was very short compared to what I had originally anticipated. It was basically a small physical with labs and a chest x-ray. I was not really needed since she is old enough to sign for herself. I actually think I was in the way. There was only one part of the morning that I really feel was valuable for me to be there for. It was when the physician told me of what his medical opinion and her history is. They will be getting me a copy of what exists of her medical records for me to take home. He suggested having her new physician look over the form and perform his own physical examination of her.   I was bored enough that I got brave and took a picture of one of the doors of the many different doctors she had to see.

That feeling of uselessness and bank teller continued until after the medical appointment when we finally met up with Nan Cook and her daughter. I have never felt happier to see a friend before. I needed her more than I even knew. It felt very rude to sit at lunch with the 4 of us when only Victoria didn’t speak English. Nan’s daughter is a gem. She was trying to include Vika and to have the limited kind of conversation you can have with her. Vika is still in the place where she isn’t really ready to even try to understand what we are gesturing with our embarrassing pantomiming. That will come. It has to.  
I made her stop for another picture.  I knew that we probably both couldn't get another chance to be in a picture of St. Sophia's together again.  She was thrilled!

Another ramp in Kyiv.  They got the slope right finally, but now they have to work on the dead ending into a window well thing!..

We made plans with Natasha to go walk to downtown in the Central Square to find Internet. Internet and I are just not meant to happen here. It never seems to be an easy thing. The main Internet café at the Central Post Office (the headquarters of all Ukraine) was down. That didn’t help. Natasha is wonderful. I love her. She understands both sides of what we need as adoptive families. She is so sweet and perfect. Vika has never seemed more comfortable with anyone as she is with Natasha. I explained my frustrations and concerns about the way yesterday went down to Natasha. She explained that to Victoria and was able to have a conversation with her where she opened up and actually told Natasha how upsetting that all was for her. I lost it. Again! I told her that if she wanted more time we could take the train back to Zaparizhya tonight and spend through the weekend with her family and in her city. I told her I was sorry. Natasha didn’t think that traveling back was a good idea and honestly it did feel like going backwards to try and say goodbye again right. You can’t undo a goodbye no matter how rushed it was. The better solution is to bring Artyom to us. I was very happy with that solution and I think Victoria is too. It was perfect timing as well. The Cooks are traveling there tonight and I could just send money for Yana to get him a ticket and get it to Artyom. He has never been on a train before; he has never traveled outside of his region before. I am excited to have a full day with him and Vika this weekend. I think she is happy too.

Natasha explained things to Victoria that I have wanted to say to her but in our sign language cannot. She is encouraging her to use the English that she does know and not to be embarrassed by it. Victoria’s self-confidence around Natasha is visibly better. I love it. Tonight at dinner when I insisted through Natasha that she order something more than a salad Natasha explained that she needs to not be embarrassed about her needs and wants around me. I am dying to know them in fact! That was a big breakthrough for us. We left dinner and went to the grocery store and then a store to find items for laundry, etc. She really seems to have brightened up at the thought and the conversations with Artyom coming back for a better goodbye.

My biggest moment of this entire process happened kind of in passing and not very profound to anyone watching, but while we were making arrangements and figuring out how to get Artyom here Victoria was using my phone to call him. She needed to call him back and turned to me and said, “Mom, phone please?” That’s right, you heard me – she called me ‘Mom!’ She has referred to me and really the only word I have heard her say that I understand are our names, ‘Spencer’ and ‘Kerry.’ Naturally I welled up and just burned up inside with joy and happiness and in that one little word our relationship changed. She had a discussion with Spencer and told him she was not comfortable calling us by ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad.’ I became her Mother in her eyes tonight. She began treating me more like her Mother. She got more and more comfortable using it throughout the evening and is letting me ‘mother’ her more.

At our apartment we put away groceries. She is happy (and so am I) that I brought the DS. I finally got to have a discussion with her through sign language about taking a shower and washing her clothes. We were a bit unclear with the need for 2 things for her hair. She didn’t want to use the conditioner, but I insisted that she use both. I also gave her actual soap to use as opposed to that bar of whatever that brown chunk of stuff is they use at the orphanage. I took all of the clothes she had been wearing and put them in the washer. Finally the locker room smell has left the apartment!

I had purchased a few DVD’s in Russian for her to use and reconfigured the media player on my laptop to play region 5 movies. There are still quite a few bugs and glitches but we spent the evening watching ‘Tangled’ in Russian. She laughed. It is so much more fun when she understands her surroundings. When we first arrived at the apartment I put all of our things in the room with the queen bed. She immediately moved her blanket and napped on the couch. I brought her a pillowcase and set her up in the bed with me. We used different blankets so I thought that would help her feel more comfortable with it. She actually didn’t seem to mind at all. Tomorrow we will work on brushing teeth. It was a long day and thankfully it had a good ending. Have I mentioned how much I adore Natasha? She is a lifesaver. She calls herself a ‘crutch’ for the kids, but honestly, we need that for a while until we work out a few basic understandings.