FRUA National Board Blog

'Tis the Season.....to Receive a Free Subscription to Russian Life Magazine for Giving to FRUA's Work Providing Hope, Help and Community.

2011-12-04T07:07:00.000-08:00

Your mailbox is overflowing with catalogues, you hear the song “Jingle Bells” everywhere, and the lights on your neighbor’s house are accelerating global warming…yup, the holiday season is here!
Regardless of our individual faith traditions, most Americans celebrate the holiday season with visits to or from families and friends, gifts, food, and parties. Such festivities are often joyous, rewarding, and wonderful! I so enjoy the season’s wonders – I’m no fan of eggnog but I do revel in holiday merriment with family, friends, and colleagues!
It’s also true that the holidays can often be a particularly stressful time of year. The demands on our time, energy, and especially our wallets are sometimes stretched to the brink during the weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year ’s Day. If your house is anything like mine, you are receiving donation appeals from every imaginable charity and wondering what to do with all those free mailing labels??
We on the FRUA national board know there are many charitable organizations vying for your attention and donations during this season. So we have partnered with Russian Life magazine, (whose publisher, Paul Richardson, is a long-time member of FRUA’s advisory board) to offer you a bonus for donating to FRUA. Anyone who donates $35 or more to FRUA between November 8 and December 31 will receive a one-year free subscription to Russian Life magazine*. That’s right – one free year of excellent articles, Russian news, and gorgeous photography for donating to FRUA! Please visit our web site at www.frua.org and click on the Donate Now button to take advantage of this great offer!
While you are on the FRUA website, please also visit the new offerings in our recently updated web store. We are now selling gorgeous cards depicting pictures drawn by Russian orphans as part of an art rehabilitation program. During the holiday season, we are offering these cards at deep discounts for purchases of 100 or more. These unique cards make terrific gifts for family, friends, teachers, grandparents – and are also great for your own holiday card mailing list! Plus, proceeds from card sales will help fund FRUA programs, events, and orphan support projects.
We hope you will take some time during this holiday season to recognize how FRUA has enriched your life and then donate to FRUA. Remember, your donation will help us meet our promise to provide hope, help, and community to adoptive families.
Best wishes for a healthy, happy, and merry holiday season!

Sue Gainor
Chair
National Board of Directors
Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption
www.frua.org

* Current Russian Life subscribers will receive a $5 discount off any book purchase. New subscribers will also get a free copy of “100 Things Everyone Should Know About Russia.” First issue will be the Jan/Feb 2012 issue.

FRUA National Board Meeting Yields Progress Toward Delievering Hope, Help and Community to Adoptive Families

2011-08-04T11:33:00.000-07:00

"Each year, the FRUA National Board of Directors holds an annual meeting at the end of FRUA's fiscal year (July 1 - June 30). This is the only time during the year this all-volunteer Board holds an in-person meeting, although we 'meet' via conference call approximately every 6 weeks. In an effort to reach out to as many regional chapters and members as possible, the Board holds this meeting in different locations across the country. This year, we met July 22-23, 2011, in Colorado. Previous recent meeting locations include Columbus, OH, Minneapolis, MN, Arlington, VA, New York City, NY, and San Francisco, CA.

The Board meeting's purpose is to discuss organizational goals and strategies, financial health, membership trends, outreach efforts, and orphan support programs, among other topics. For many years, the Board met for a single day; in 2008, we expanded the meeting to a day and a half to accommodate all the business we had to cover. Starting in 2010, we expanded the meeting to two full days. These are hugely busy, productive, rewarding, and somewhat exhausting meetings! For 9 hours straight each day, we go over every detail of the organization to discuss what works and what doesn't, look for improvements and efficiencies, propose new initiatives and perhaps delay or reshape others. Ideas fly around the room like lightning bolts and the energy among board members is intense! Keep in mind that everyone there has taken time off work, and time away from families, to focus on the mission of FRUA to meet hte needs of our member families.

Along with our meeting time, we schedule social events to meet and greet FRUA members and representatives from the local adoption community. Because FRUA has two Colorado chapters, we held the first day of our meeting in Colorado Springs and then met members for dinner in a lovely historic restaurant nearby. For our second day, we met in Denver's Technology Center and hosted a dinner in downtown Denver for FRUA members and a few special guests from a non-profit orphan support organization. Both events were delightful - it's so great to connect with members each year in a social setting!

Over the next couple of months, you'll read more about the outcome of our Board meeting and the status of the organization. Details about the meeting and new initiatives will be presented in upcoming issues of The Family Focus, our wonderful membership journal. A thorough review of FRUA activities, as well as summaries of our membership and financial data, will be published in our Annual Report, due out in mid-Oct. Until these summaries arrive in your mailbox, know that FRUA's National Board is working hard to ensure the organization's success now and for the future!"

Sue Gainor
Chair
National Board of Directors
Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption
Hope, Help and Community for Adoptive Families
www.frua.org
chair@frua.org

Father's Have Their Own Ways of Loving and Helping Our Children

2011-06-18T09:58:00.000-07:00

As Father’s Day approaches each year, I generally find myself debating whether to take my husband out for brunch or buy him another electronic device to add to his gadget inventory – or both! This Father’s Day, however, I found myself contemplating how differently mothers and fathers parent their children, and how I see those different parenting styles play out among the adoptive families I know through FRUA.

My husband and I became parents with the birth of our older son. Like many husbands, mine struggled to carve out his parenting role with an infant who was almost completely dependent on me. As our son grew and weaned from nursing, he and my husband slowly began developing his relationship. In short order, my husband and son developed a wonderful relationship - they adored each other!

When we adopted our son Connor, both my husband and I had reevaluate our parenting styles to connect with our new baby. In the early days, it was all about affection and food, so we could both interact with Connor in these arenas. Having seen few if any men, however, Connor was initially afraid of my husband and routinely covered his eyes when my husband entered the room. I can’t imagine how emotionally difficult this initial rejection must have been for my husband. But he and Connor worked through it and eventually they developed a loving relationship.

Over the years, Connor struggled with childhood apraxia of speech – leaving him largely unable to speak until around age 6 – and was eventually diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and Pervasive Development Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified. A child with these diagnoses is necessarily more challenging to parent that a neuro-typical child. More importantly, they demanded that my husband and I develop new and different parenting skills.

Like many adoptive mothers I know, I’d spent years reading everything I could get my hands on about raising internationally adopted, post-institutionalized children. So when presented with Connor’s challenges, I immediately began reading all kinds of books and studies on apraxia, FASD, and PDD-NOS. I spoke with doctors, professionals, and practitioners. I attended conferences and seminars. Most importantly, I consulted with mothers, lots of mothers.

My husband, on the other hand, did none of those things. Lacking a community of adoptive fathers to tap into, my husband’s ability to parent Connor’s many challenges did not develop apace and, in fact, fell behind as my competence and confidence grew. Over time, I became expert in understanding and dealing with my son’s challenges while my husband struggled. Over time, I became increasingly angry at my husband, feeling that he’d punted his responsibility to raise a neurologically atypical child.

Recently, I had an epiphany. I realized that my husband hadn’t punted his responsibility as a parent to Connor. No, he didn’t read all the stuff I read. And no, he didn’t spend hours on line with other fathers dissecting his son’s behaviors and therapies. But, as different from mine as they were, I couldn’t overlook his contributions to our son. My husband takes our son on subway rides to the airport on weekend mornings to watch planes take off and land. Much to my utter horror, he takes Connor on the roof to help hang holiday lights. He pushes Connor to test his limits in situations where I would jump in to “rescue” him. In many ways, my husband teaches Connor self-confidence by not treating him as if he were impaired.

I suspect other over-achieving mothers harbor secret (or not so secret) resentment toward their husbands, who may parent very differently than they, themselves, do. So this Father’s Day, I realize it’s long overdue that I acknowledge the gifts of love and time my husband gives to both our sons. My gift to my husband, this and every future Father’s Day, is to appreciate that he’s a wonderful father.

Sue Gainor
Chair
National Board of Directors
Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption
Hope, Help and Community for Adoptive Families
www.frua.org
chair@frua.org

Approaching Summer, Keeping the IEP in Mind.

2011-06-06T14:55:00.000-07:00

FRUA National Education Chair, Pat Gerke has a Masters in Counseling and has worked in the field of Developmental Disabilities for over 25 years in a wide range of specialty areas including adult services (vocational and residential), healthcare, advocacy and spirituality/inclusion. She teaches two courses each spring related to Disabilities, at Rutgers University and she and her husband Jay adopted their two children, Matthew and Iryna, in Ukraine. This is her summer message to FRUA members:

Summer is upon us. While we all prepare for a much-deserved break, this is a good time, when the pressure is off, to consider the IEP. Have you, like so many of us, had to prepare for your child's IEP (Individualized Education Plan) meeting or is it still ahead? How DO you prepare? Do you go into it loaded with ammunition like you are armed and dangerous? Do you look forward to discussing your child's present level of performance - or do you dread it?!

if you are like many FRUA members, the end of the school year and the spring IEP meeting can be filled with anxiety and worry. Self-doubt about what to expect or ask for can cloud judgment about what a child needs or is capable of achieving. Its is not too late to think through how things went and to plan for how you and your child will approach the fall semester. Summer is the time to ask questions, talk with other FRUA parent members and consult with experts to learn more. And it can also mean more time for you to be with and observe your child away from formal learning environments.

Remember, YOU are an equal member of an IEP team. Without you there really isn't a team! Get to know your child's PLEP, rights, strengths AND needs! Be ready to collaborate and compromise. But know what is non-negotiable as well! Always remember, YOU ARE the expert on your child, no one else!

Pat Gerke
FRUA National Education Chair

Announcing the Expanded 2011 FRUA Scholarship Program

2011-01-22T13:25:00.000-08:00

Four Scholarships only for internationally adopted children,
from Russia, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia.

Since FRUA’s inception, our organization has focused on education: educating parents about international adoption, about the importance of support and community, about some of the challenges our children may face, about resources available to help our children succeed. Much of this education occurred informally from parent-to-parent in FRUA chapters across the country. Some of this education has been provided more formally through our annual “Focus on Education” conferences. Regardless of the delivery “mechanism,” we have always put a premium on ensuring our members have the information, support, and resources they need.

As part of our education agenda, FRUA’s national board of directors launched its first-ever scholarship program in 2009. To our knowledge, this is the only national scholarship designed specifically for children adopted from Russia, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. Our goal in establishing this scholarship was to offer an award based neither on grades, grade point averages, test scores, and class ranking nor on family financial need.

In developing our scholarship program, we recognized that academic success for internationally adopted children comes in many forms. For example, our first scholarship recipient was adopted at age 16 and had only been in the U.S. education system for a few short years. While learning English rapidly, he found his niche playing sports. Despite significant obstacles, he graduated with a B average and with is school’s ringing endorsement of his accomplishments.

Our second scholarship recipient followed a completely different path. Adopted as a baby, he had no language or cultural barriers to overcome. Throughout his school years, however, he struggled to succeed despite challenges posed by his attention deficit disorder. His perseverance, and the supports he and his family established put in place, ensured his high school success and serve him well as he pursues his collegiate studies.

As we launch our 2011 scholarship campaign, we can now realize our dream of offering more scholarships than our previous budget allowed. Thanks to a generous donation from a group of FRUA supporters – none of whom have internationally adopted children – we are offering four scholarships this year! Two scholarships will be awarded to high school seniors pursuing post-secondary education in the fall. One scholarship will be awarded to a student who is currently enrolled in post-secondary education. And one scholarship will be awarded to a student whose parent is a regional/chapter board member. Click here for more information and the application forms.

We are delighted to offer these scholarships to our members’ children! And we are doubly delighted to be the sole organization that acknowledges internationally adopted children as a group of students worthy of their own scholarship program! Please join us in sharing the word about this scholarship program – with your friends, neighbors, school districts, and teachers. The more families that know about this special scholarship program, the more wonderful students we can recognize. That’s what hope, help and community are all about!
Sue Gainor
Chair
FRUA National Board of Directors

Hope, Help and Community in 2011

2011-01-03T14:15:00.000-08:00

“If we don't stand up for children, then we don't stand for much.”
Marian Wright Edelman

Somehow we've reached the year 2011. Some of us in FRUA recall that it was in 1991, twenty years ago, that the doors to international adoption began to swing open in Russia as the former Soviet Union ceased to exist. Can it be that long ago? Many of us now have children in college, approaching the age of twenty or even older, who we adopted in those early years. We didn't know what we didn't know.

While international adoption worldwide has slowed in recent years due both to economic and political factors, it is good to pause and consider these questions; have conditions for the children who remain in orphanage limbo improved? What of our children here? What lies ahead?

For those of us who were in the orphanages very early on, you've told us that conditions are, by and large, much better. But material things, while they improve conditions, do not replace a home and family. FRUA has always supported the tenet that the love of a family is life's greatest blessing and the first fundamental right of every child. Much of our early advocacy was focused on keeping the doors of adoption open. It still is.

For many of us, the road to become parents became the road to parenting a child with challenges. For those children given a chance at a home, a family and a future, the outcomes have been, by and large successful. But not, as many FRUA parents know, without trials and tribulations. Our second advocacy role as parents has been and continues to be, to get our children the help they need to be successful.

The extension of FRUA's role in helping parents help our children has always been to support the whole family, offering much needed hope and a supportive community for adoptive families. The role of the FRUA community, has been a major factor in our daughter's success in overcoming early challenges; and I believe our continued involvement into and through her teen years has helped make her the confident, successful college student she is today.

FRUA has not forgotten the children left behind. Just in the past year, FRUA's active Orphanage Support program have put your donations and bequests to work in orphanage projects in Georgia, Ukraine, Poland, and Kazakhstan. Help us do more in 2011 – both with orphanages and in programs for FRUA kids here. We are now set up to take stock gifts and the more funds we receive, the more we can do together. That donation envelope you got with our annual report? Don't throw it away. This year, resolve to give more – of your time and in donations -- so that FRUA can continue to provide more hope, more help and more community to those it is here to serve.

Jan Wondra
Vice Chair
FRUA National Board of Directors

November is National Adoption Awareness Month

2010-11-11T11:07:00.000-08:00

“Words, phrases and photos that describe who I am?”

That was the posting of one of our now college-age FRUA teens this morning on FaceBook. Friends began to respond with wonderful words and appreciation for this most wonderful teen. We're “friends” so I can share this with you. She and my daughter, who come from the same orphanage, call each other their oldest, best friends. I'm not sure if she remembers that November is National Adoption Awareness Month, but I do.

I consider this post another sign of the positive attitudes and amazing success of so many of our FRUA teens; many of whom have overcome great physical and emotional challenges to become who they are today. The road, for them and for their parents, has not necessarily been easy. But the rewards are life-long and arise not just from the wonderful moments of the journey, but the painful ones as well.

Over the years, I have often been asked odd questions about our decision to parent a child not biologically ours, but never-the-less completely connected to the heart and the soul of our family. For us it was a decision rooted in mysticism and motivated by a fairly unique situation. No need to go in to that here. But it was also firmly based on our conscious, social choice to value a child already IN this world.

It's as simple as that. I believe, as we in FRUA have so strongly asserted, that all children in this world have a right to grow up in a family that loves and values them and tries to get them the help they need to be the most successful they can be. It is heartening to know that our government and the governments of so many nations believe that too. While barriers remain, we look forward to a time when all involved in adoption focus on what is best for the children. It is not wrong to remind ourselves of the over-used “They are our future.” They are.

Today – hug your kids – and help them find the words, with you, to tell others about what adoption has meant for you, for them, and for your family. This month, in your regional FRUA chapters, do something as simple as get together for an Adoption Appreciation Coffee and just share your thoughts with each other. Together, we can all do these simple thing to raise awareness of the power of adoption to change our world.

Jan Johnson Wondra
Vice Chair
National board of Directors
Familes for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption

How far we've come

2010-05-19T16:21:00.000-07:00

I got to spend Mother's Day with my daughter. That hasn't happened in three years.

Two years ago I flew home on crutches (having just broken my leg in two places and ripped up my shoulder) to spend what turned out to be my Mother's last Mother's Day with her. Last year I spent Mother's Day with my son in Iowa, going to my future daughter-in-law's college graduation and helping move her out of her college apartment.

To spend Mother's Day with my daughter, we drove to Colorado State University, where Katie is finishing her freshman year, helped load much of her dorm room into our Jeep and went to lunch. Just as we finished, my cell phone rang. It was our son and new daughter-in-law, calling from the Republic of Georgia where Nic is doing Fulbright Scholar research.

This day was not a sure thing 15--nearly 16--years ago. I don't know what I expected, but it surely wasn't this wonderful future. In fact, the only thing I did know was that I was supposed to be her Mother.

In hind sight, I didn't know then what I didn't know. I knew how to be a mother; our bio son was seven when we three left for Russia. But I didn't know how to parent a tiny girl who had been relinquished at birth, suffered life-threatening illness, a hospital stay of 16 months, followed by a year and a half in an orphanage and hip casts that were left on for more than a year. Too long, as we later learned. All I knew was that the same dream kept waking me up at night. The one where a little girl in green was running toward me calling “Mama, Mama, Mama....” She always disappeared before she reached my arms and I would wake up. The day we adopted her in 1994, our small son swung open the playground gate in the dirt courtyard of the Baby House, and she ran toward me. And the dream happened. On that day, crying out “Mama, Mama, Mama...” she reached my arms. And yes – she was dressed in green.

I thought about that as I sat next to her eating my Veal Marsala last Sunday. Listening to her talk, she worried about final exams and enthused about her summer swim-coaching job and living in the sorority house next year. I realized that she has become a whole and healthy person. As much as I knew she was meant to be ours, we had all the early trauma issues to work through, the developmental delays, the back-tracking to do every single emotional and developmental hurtle. We had the attachment issues, the comprehension skill gaps. We had the middle school identity crisis, including experimentation with cutting and traumatic friend crises. Then in high school, just when we thought she was flying, doing well in classes and swimming varsity, we learned the awful truth about her hips. So began the past two and a half years of major hip reconstruction surgery and therapy. And she is flying again.

Looking back, we were incredibly naïve and untrained. Adoption in Russia had not been open that long – and closed for several months the day after we adopted her, for some much-needed logistical organization. FRUA didn't exist until three weeks after we arrived home. To use Katie's favorite word, which she learned to spell when she was only five, we practiced perseverance. We never gave up on her and she never gave up either; even though her trying sometimes looked like the opposite of the word. We grew as FRUA grew and the support of other adoptive families, who understood this adoptive parent experience, has been priceless.

I love my daughter--completely. Forever. And I am eternally grateful that her 17-year-old birth mother was brave enough in 1991 to give her up to get the medical care she needed, so she could walk, swim – and fly.

What does More Hope...More Help...More Community look like?

2010-03-23T12:27:00.000-07:00

It looks like you – as a new or renewing member in FRUA! This month marks the launch of the first, official membership drive that FRUA has ever held. We're excited about the special offers we've developed - one for renewing members and another for new/non-members - coordinated with our affiliate partner, Tapestry Books.

This means that in addition to all the benefits you receive as members, now you'll receive a thank you gift just for joining FRUA or renewing/extending your membership another year. There's one special gift for renewing members, and another for folks who are brand new to FRUA. To qualify for these offers, you have to join or renew online. So just click the links below and you'll get right where you need to go to

MEMBERSHIP RENEWAL OFFER

NEW MEMBER OFFER

Membership Means More Hope, More Help, More Community

There are so many benefits of belonging to FRUA, but most of all you'll gain community with families formed through adoption in Eastern European and central Asian countries. Here are two benefits you may not know about:

You'll get discounted prices to both local events and national programs, like the FRUA National Education Conference, held October 15-16 this year in Philadelphia. It can gives you front-line access to internationally known experts working with and developing therapies for our children.

Your membership includes receiving The Family Focus©, our award-winning, quarterly journal that includes profiles of geographic regions, medical and developmental information from professional sources, parenting news, book and movie reviews, news of FRUA’s orphanage support activities, cultural connections: food, holidays, traditions, regional chapter news, and many other resources.

So welcome to FRUA -- or welcome back – this is where hope, help and community can be yours.

Sue Gainor
Chair
FRUA National board of Directors

P.S Do join or renew right now. These offers are only good through April 30th and are good only online. We don't want you to miss out!

©2010 Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption

Extending Hope, Help and Community to Adoptive Families

2010-03-16T16:25:00.000-07:00

FRUA NATIONAL VOICE

If you're reading this, you've probably already discovered that FRUA has a lot going on these days! From regional chapter activities to national orphanage support projects, to the FRUA Scholarship and expanding support for our teens, FRUA is on the move.

Having launched our new website at the dawn of 2010, this blog initiates a closer dialog between national leadership and you - our membership! While our organizational structure includes regional chapter leadership, FRUA's new focus on community means that we at the national level will be working harder than ever to understand your needs and to find and develop resources to help FRUA families. Over time, you'll hear from each of us on the national board as we talk about the various committees and projects on which we work.

For those who have simply discovered this blog, or just typed in www.frua.org , the initials “F-R-U-A” stand for Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption and, as we are so careful to add, that includes neighboring countries. We were born as a 501(c)(3) parent support group in 1994, the year that adoptions in the former Soviet bloc countries began to take off. Within two weeks of beginning as a group in the DC area, we added our first regional chapter. Nearly 16 years later, we are members of the Joint Council on International Adoption Services, new chapters continue to form, your all-volunteer, national leadership is geographically dispersed throughout North America, and our website receives traffic from 84 countries around the world.

While our trusty FRUA Chatroom continues to be extremely popular, new avenues of electronic communication are opening. The FRUA FaceBook page, launched this past winter, provides adults a place to discuss their needs and post chapter or local events. Our new FRUA Teen FaceBook (strictly for our FRUA teens) allows them to share experiences as they process their own identities and meet their challenges. As always, our excellent membership journal, The Family Focus, continues to be mailed quarterly to FRUA members.

Many more exciting things are yet to come as the year progresses. We invite you to explore the new website, join in the FaceBook conversations, and send us your thoughts and suggestions on ways we can help your family and your chapters.

Of FRUA members – we ask two things. First, get involved at your chapter level. FRUA works because our volunteers work. You'll make life-long connections that will bring you help and hope and make you a part of community. Second, if you know people who have adopted in Russia, or Moldova, or Kazakhstan or other former Soviet bloc countries -- and they aren't FRUA members -- invite them to JOIN FRUA NOW! Membership is important because without the small membership dues, our family resource work and FRUA's orphanage support work cannot happen!

Jan Johnson Wondra
Vice Chair
FRUA National Board of Directors

©2010 Families for Russian and Ukrainian Adoption