Responses and THANK YOU!

First, I want to thank everyone who took the time to write comments, respond on a Yahoo group or send me an email.  I received over 50 responses, and have read every one of them.  The opinions have been overwhelmingly supportive of changing his age, and there have been many suggestions ranging from contacting his foster mother to changing his age by just one year instead of two.

The responses that were not in favor of changing his age all made some excellent points, and I appreciate them greatly.  Definitely things to think about!  One person said that changing the immigration paperwork is next to impossible, another was concerned about the special education services he might lose if he suddenly starts doing better in school because we changed his age, and several people were concerned that he might enter puberty earlier than his peers.

Based on the questions and suggestions I’ve received, I’m going to work on the following:

1. Talk with my social worker and ask if she has experienced this before, and what her opinion on it is.

2. Contact Declan’s foster mother in China and ask her opinion on how old he was when he came to her

3. Research how to change the age, and if changing the immigration paperwork is necessary or if we can just do the birth certificate

4. Speak to the special education staff at his school about services.  He is partially hearing impaired, so his IEP won’t go away even if he starts doing better academically, but I want to know the possible ramifications if we do this

5. Call the pediatrician and discuss puberty question, as well as his opinion on changing Declan’s age

6. Contact the county court to find out the steps for applying for the birth certificate with a new age

7. Continue weighing the pros and the cons and make a decision within the next few months.

This is a huge decision, that will have possibly unforeseen consequences.  We need to be able to justify our choice to Declan in the future, but we also need to find a way to describe it to him now.  My gut feeling is that he will accept it fairly easily.  He’s just that kind of kid – he deals well with change, marches into his surgeries with courage and a smile, and will try something new with very little coaxing.  I hope that his natural resilience will allow him to move on confidently with a new age that makes him younger than Eva.

On another note, I started this blog about 6 weeks ago to keep friends and family posted about Eva's "surprise" heart surgery, and have already had almost 4,000 visits.  Thank you to everyone for being interested in my family and especially to those who have commented and sent me email!  

Today Eva took her yearly ELL (ESL) test - I took her in for an hour to get it done.  She still receives services, even though she's reading above her grade level and has a great vocabulary.  That test must be HARD.

Last night Christopher taught Eva and Declan how to cut french bread.  

Tomorrow’s post is about my oldest son, Brennen, and his experiences lately in school.