Baby Home 13 {... and the kids}

The kids at Addison's baby home are split into family units, for lack of a better term. When you walk down the hallways of the baby home, all you see are a lot of closed doors. Behind each of those doors are family units. Addison's family unit has three rooms {one room with cribs and two play rooms with tables and chairs for eating ... oh, and a bathroom}. Within those three rooms the family unit is split once more, I believe into two groups of four kids, mostly just for meal time, from what I can tell. The kids in Addison's family unit range from a few months old to four years of age. After the kids turn four, they are transferred to homes for older kids or if they are incapacitated, they are transferred to institutions.

We have spent a lot of time with Addison's family unit. All of the kids call us mama and papa ... it is so heartbreaking! However, at the same time, all of the kids know that we are there for Nika {short for Veronika}, as they so affectionately call her. This morning when we got to the baby home, we saw some of the kids from Addison's family unit going out to play. Every single one of them told our translator in Russian that Nika was upstairs ... they knew who we were and they knew we were coming for her. That just breaks my heart that these two and three year olds know that there are mommies and daddies that come for some of the kids, but that their parents have yet to come. They absolutely crave your attention and if you pay them attention, it is hard to break away because they crave it so badly. I wish there was more that I could do ... what can you do to help? ;)