We had just met the doctor, then we were taken to a playroom on the second floor of the orphanage where we waited, trying to be patient.

Then the door opened and in walked one of the caretakers holding a little boy in her arms. "Eta Yura," she said. This is Yura.

He came right to us. He wasn't shy at all. Now I know that he had attachment issues but then it was wonderful. After a minute or two the caretaker and our translator left and we were alone with him. I felt really excited and nervous. Was this our son?

Our video from that first visit focuses on him. We needed to send something back to our adoption doctor so that he could evaluate our son for possible issues. Yura smiled and played and we tried to walk him around the room even though he wasn't walking yet. He enjoyed that, and he hit the ball back and forth with his and tried to climb into the wooden crate that held the ball. Now that I know him I can see his current personality in things that he did at that first meeting, but then I wasn't sure what I was seeing.

Our excitement and affection for this stranger-child were also tinged with an enormous amount of anxiety. He crawled really strangely, with one foot up and under him and dragging the second foot along. Was there something wrong with his legs? His brain? (We could handle the legs but were worried about his brain).He also didn't talk at all. Not in Russian and not even in babbling sounds. He could make two noises: "Hooooo" (do this with an intake of breath), and "Ruhruhruh," which he did when he saw the stray cats outside. It sounded a bit like growling. We had been warned that no babbling could be a sign of serious problems.

He hugged us. I can still feel what those cold little arms felt like around my neck. Depsite all my worried and concerns, I was in love.

Part 1 of our story is here.
Part 2 is here.
Part 3 is here.
Part 4 is here.
Part 5 is here.
Part 6 is here.
Part 7 is here. "The Train to Voronezh"
Part 8 is here.
Part 9 is here. "The Orphanage"
Part 10 is here. "Voronezh Regional Specialized Children's Home"
Part 11 is here: The Doctor.
This is part 12.
Part 13 is here.