July 30th

So today started out not so great but ended good.

We had to go to a family reunion and it was a little much for Vadym. I had got them dressed in nice clothes and Vadym asked me where we were going. I told him to a family party and he was ok with it. Trying to get all three kids ready and out the door was crazy and it didn't stop. Vadym was fine but Grego decided this was the day the "honeymoon" between him and Vadym was completely over and they were to now act like rival brothers. These signs have been showing the last few days but today was the day it was going to hit the fan.

It took us an hour to get there and Grego was just pushing all buttons. When we got there we met Zio George and Noni in the hall of the building and we did our hellos and hugs, all good. Then we walked in and saw all Gary's family and you could see Vadym was not happy. Then Noni and George tried to take him to get a drink and Vadym basically shut down. I was watching this happen as I was giving hugs and greeting. I had to make my way to him and save him but by that time he had completely shut down. It was way too much for him all at once. Everyone was trying to greet him and it was not going well. I took him over to the food and grabbed a bunch of stuff for him and brought him and the kids to our table at the end of the room. This was definately a  security for him to be far away from everyone. He would not talk or smile and Gary tried to call him over for pictures and he turned his back. I need to mention it was also overwhelming for my kids and they were not happy at first either. It was overwhelming for them so maybe this is just a natural thing but I am just more sensative toward Vadym.

So he ate but would not move from the chair much for a while. He would go a outside to check out what the kids were doing and then come back in. He sat down after we ate and he told me "Home!". I told him not yet and explained this was Papa's family that he had not seen in a very long time. He was pretty upset for not getting his was and got up from the table and went and sat by himself in the corner of the large dining area and turned his back to me. I let him have his space and didn't want to give his behavior a lot of attention. At this point everyone had left him alone and he was just mad because we weren't leaving when he told me he was ready to go. He then would go outside and go sit behind a pole where I couldn't see him but he would peek around to see what I was doing then come back in. He did this a couple time and then stopped.

All of a sudden he noticed all the older kids playing volley ball in a circle and "vwa la", he was happy. He ran over and Grego also joined. They played until we left. He was fine once he was doing something he wanted to do.

One the way home Grego was back to pushing buttons.