Monday, December 6, 2010

Eli's Memories

Of the two boys, Lucas is usually the one who talks about the Philippines, the people, the orphanage and their friends there. Eli doesn't like to talk about any of it. We've not pushed. Usually he listens to Lucas and nods his head with a couple details coming out. We take our ques from them as to what questions we ask.

Mike and I are still trying to figure out the trigger for tonight's conversation at supper. Eli was making quick work of his chicken when he stopped, looked up and started talking about waiting for his mom and dad, he stopped pointed at us and said "that's you," then talked about being told we were coming and the plane rides from Zamboanga to Manila and then to HIS home, again he stopped to say, "this home, my home." He talked about his auntie's letting him buy candy for the airplane trip to Manila and then sleeping at the hotel and on the plane home with us. He even talked about what he had to eat in the restaurants the week we spent in Manila. He had me worried that he'd actually start naming the restaurants.

It was amazing the detail he came up with. He literally has not talked about a lot of those things for the past year but they were sitting inside until he was ready to let them resurface. I was really happy to finally start hearing those memories from him. For the most part they were things we had learned through Lucas but to hear Eli put a voice to them himself was huge.

I am totally flabbergasted by both Lucas and Eli, not only are they moving forward with learning all that their new lives bring along but they are also learning to look at, process and hopefully put to rest some of their earlier experiences and realize that there were good times in the past and it's okay to talk about them. Doesn't matter how many times we say it's ok to talk about things until they are ready it's not going to happen, whether it takes a year or a life time, I think we all will be learning for years to come.

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