Biography Anna Potapova

She told how she decided to take such a step as she overcome the difficulties of adaptation and built a life with five children. Now the family of Potapovs is five children. We have not discussed this topic for a long time. I just suggested once, he did not agree, and three years later said “yes”. A few months before meeting the future children, the accident happened so strong and terrible that after it our car was not subject to restoration.

Three of us - I and my two sons - remained alive. When I saw a photo of three girls who later became our daughters, I felt that it was a sign and my gratitude to the universe. I went to the forum of volunteers, saw a photo of three sisters and ... closed the laptop. At night they dreamed of me. The next day I was already flying to Perm to meet girls.

Ten minutes after acquaintance, phoned her husband and mother, she signed her consent. Nothing shouted to me - I just saw two funny girls with large bows. I looked at the babies and went to get acquainted with the eldest - Leroy - to the orphanage. Girls in an orphanage, October G. Eight -year -old Lera chose me herself. She took my phone while I was talking with a psychologist, she did a lot of selfie.

In fact, she did not want to go to her family, she waited for her mother to return. However, when I went to the corridor to call my husband, Lera already told the educators that her mother from Moscow had come for her. The first days were difficult and passed, as if in a fog, in solving household issues: buying beds, cabinets, the device of Lera to school ... It was difficult.

Three children came to the family at once, each of whom had his own character and had his own background. The grinding and addiction to each other began. The younger girls slept very poorly. Polina woke up every hour and screamed, Dasha woke up less often, but also cried. I did not have time for sleep, and in the morning I had to wake up, prepare breakfast and lunch, while doing my sons.

For the first five days my mother was with us, I did not have time and was very tired. As soon as my mother left, I pulled myself together and realized that no one would do anything for me. Probably, during the first three weeks, we managed to build our lives in a new way. Sometimes it was so difficult that I could not talk, did not answer the calls and was just silent.

My husband was all day at work, I was all on me, but I was very happy. In general, it seems to me to adapt exclusively to parents. As soon as the child is accepted as he is, it is almost finished. Sometimes it was very difficult with children, Anna admits. But at the same time adds that she was happy. The acute period with tantrums began in Lera a week later. She managed to demonstrate to us precisely the adaptation that was told in the Spr, in practice.

The adaptation of Dasha came in six months, and the youngest Polina passed this stage most easily. How did you solve conflicts? At first, you are dealing with a kind of robot, similar to ideal children in which there is almost no life. Then this stupor transfers to hysteria. These transitions from the extreme to the extreme continued for us for two and a half years. During adaptation, the elder did not want to live, rushed into hysteria, hated everyone around.

The average was like a robot, quiet, intimidated, so it was difficult to understand what was inside it. The baby was easiest, but her bad night sleep knocked me out of life completely. The first days of the eldest Lera were calm, everything seemed new and interesting to her, but as soon as we went to school, something unimaginable began. Lera protested, fell to the floor and hysterical, hid under the table, screamed like a wild.

All my attempts to gently explain that this cannot be done, came down to zero. Neither my calm nor my increased tone gave results. I, having no experience, did not understand what to do when an eight -year -old child shouts: “I do not want to live, I hate everyone, I'm scary! Then I hugged her and said: “You are now our daughter, we will not give you to anyone and will not let you go anywhere.” She cried on my shoulder and calmed down.

It is from this moment that hysteria began to go to naught. The adaptation lasted more than two years. The adaptation of Paul, the youngest, was unnoticed by the fact that it was very small and very cheerful. She did not swing in the crib, and the only followed by stay in the system was to suck a finger from which we weaned it with a bitter varnish. When we met her, at three years she did not talk yet, and her first word was “thank you”.

Now she is chatting with might and main. The dream was getting better, but still sometimes she comes to our room at night and quietly lays down nearby.

With all this, I really like her independence. When Dasha, my middle daughter, fell into our family, she was the most trouble -free child. Lera seized all of us with her behavior, Polina, by virtue of her age, also made me spin around her, and Dasha simply lived quietly and calmly, interrupting in small tantrums. When Dasha gradually began to thaw, her emotions also began to emerge out of the shores.

She pushed and was afraid to hug me.Her body was terribly clamped. She was like a small robot that followed a clear instruction. Sometimes she began to limp, and this also affected the clamp from the feeling of loss, fear, loneliness, but after the massage it passed. Psychosomatics manifested itself in her food: she ate everything that would give. At first we allowed her to have as much as she wanted, then they began to limit.

I love, when Dasha gives emotions, not hysteria, but live emotions: scolds someone, defends something, is surprised. And how affectionate she is, how she hugs, what words she speaks - I just melt! Each of the sisters teaches mom to something new. Soon after the adoption, we gave Dasha and Pauline to a kindergarten for half a day, and I often heard from the educators: “Your girls eat everything,” so I asked not to give them bread, since they ate it without stopping.

Now the situation with food has improved, but the alarming state, when we limit the girls in food, remains. Despite this, now we understand that everything was for the better, because the boys no longer remember life without sisters. If honestly, after the girls appeared in our family, the boys were slightly pushed into the background. Now the balance is restored, but in a good way, this cannot be allowed, so if you think about adoption, first of all, think about how you will distribute your attention between children.

When adaptation, my girls were no less difficult than my husband and I. At some moments, I could not stand it, broke and screamed, they once talked. Despite this, they are just well done. They are completely different in character, so if you take each separately, then I would learn from Lera, from Dasha, wisdom, and Polina’s ability to love life in all its manifestations.

I am writing about all this on my blog. All children are different in nature. But all together is a family. It is very difficult for me to imagine how we lived before them. It happens that I recall some kind of incident from the infancy of one of the sons and immediately calculate how many years were Lere, it becomes interesting: what happened to her this year?

I remember our vacation with the boys and sorting out in my head what my girls did at this time, how they lived without us ... I think: why didn’t we take them before? But I understand that in life everything happens on time. How grateful I am to God for them ... All photos are from the Family Archive of the Potapovs. To the favorites.