New Life on the Homestead

Posted on by kimnjed

Yesterday we had the most amazing opportunity to witness the birth of our new foal! Gloria, one of our horses who we unexpectedly found out was already pregnant when we purchased her in October, gave birth to a sweet baby boy. New life never ceases to amaze me. It was an incredible day!

We always assumed that Gloria would give birth during the night or in the very early hours. And since we didn’t even know she was pregnant for most of the pregnancy, we didn’t know exactly when to expect the new arrival. Every morning I would look out my bedroom window to see if Gloria was waiting for her breakfast at the fence. If she was ever absent in those morning hours I would eagerly check to see if we had a baby. But…she decided to do it right smack in the middle of the day…and in the middle of the mud!

Jed and I were inside clipping our weiner dog’s nails (I promise we don’t only take care of animals here…😆) when Tonya, one of our team members ran into the house screaming our names. My heart about stopped- something terrible must have happened! We ran down the stairs “What? What happened?” “She’s giving birth!!!!!!” “Who?” (We also have a pregnant goat) “Gloria!!! Come quick!” Apparently, a neighbor was walking past our back fence on her way home from the little village store, saw a horse in the middle of the birthing process, and began screaming her lungs out to get someone’s attention. Tonya heard and we all started running to the barn. It was quite dramatic. 😁 We arrived on the scene to see a freshly born foal lying in the mud, still partially in the amniotic sac! Its legs were stuck in the sack so Jed pulled it away and then we all just watched Gloria and her mothering instincts take over. Ahhhhh it was so beautiful and special. We got to see our new colt stand for the first time on his stick-skinny, looooooooong legs, we saw how Gloria guided him to learn to nurse, and how she protected him from the curiosity of the other horses. All of us who live with the boys here on the Homestead just stayed with them for hours, watching the new life unfold. So much fun. Dajana, our resident “horse person”, is actually in Germany right now and was so upset to miss the birth! We were sending videos, Facetiming, and wishing so badly that she was with us on the special day. We miss you, Dajana!

Once we established that he is actually a “he”, we started the name convo. We hadn’t discussed names at all and I’ll tell you what, two Ukrainians, a German, and a few Americans all agreeing on a name is a great “experience” in honesty, team building, compromise, and kindness… and is about as easy as herding cats. Ha! We had to agree on a name that sounds good in all three languages (German, Ukrainian, and English) and with all three accents. In the end, at 11:00pm, we decided to use rank-order voting in order to make a fair choice. Thankfully, Christiana was once a voting official and was able to guide us through the process. 😂 We each submitted two name ideas and then we each ranked them according to our likes and dislikes. For your amusement, here is the list of names we were voting on:

The List (in no particular order)

  1. Ryan Gosling
  2. Horse Named Sioux (inspired by the Johnny Cash song “A Boy Named Sue”)
  3. Bjorn
  4. Johnny Cash
  5. Marty
  6. Kev
  7. Uhtred
  8. Josh of the Woods (inspired by our board chairman and US Director of Operations- Josh Woods)
  9. Carl
  10. Keanu Reaves
  11. Clint
  12. Woody
  13. Seastar
  14. Chandler
  15. Johnny Go Lightly

And the winning name is….”Horse Named Sioux”!! He will affectionately be referred to as “Horse”. We think it’s absolutely hilarious that that name won. But, in a country where English is not the commonly spoken language, it’s actually quite cute and funny to hear Ukrainians calling him “Horse”. I love it so much. It makes me laugh.

Anyway, we wanted to introduce you to our sweet Horse, the newest member of the Wide Awake Family. He is already and will be well-loved. Welcome to the world, Horse Named Sioux! ❤️

Here is a beautiful intro from our team’s Instagram

How’s Ruslan?

Posted on by kimnjed

Happy Friday, Friends! Today is officially the first day of spring here in Ukraine and we are hoping spring is actually here, and here to stay. I’m not sure how much snow and ice and melt and rain and snow and ice and melt and rain this soul can handle. We are all aching for spring and will be welcoming it with open arms. Yesterday we fired up the fire pit (see what I did there…) and enjoyed time together in the sun after horse time and it was a glorious glimpse of the spring and summer ahead of us.

I thought it was about time to give you all an update on our brave Ruslan. It’s been 4 months since Jed and Ruslan arrived back in Ukraine from their big American adventure, and almost 7 months since Ruslan’s life-changing surgery. He has put a lot of hard work into his recovery since then and you should hear all about it!

The main concern we had about doing such a major operation on Ruslan was whether we would have the ability to support his recovery once he came back to Ukraine. In the past, we haven’t had the best luck finding quality physical therapy for our boys. In fact, we’ve had no luck at all. PT in Ukraine is mostly passive and we knew needed to find a therapist here who could imagine and dream of a future for Ruslan in which he would thrive, physically, and be willing to join arms with us in making that happen. Also, Ruslan has a very specific, unique personality. He won’t just accept anyone. The PT would need to be willing to form a friendship with Ruslan first, in order for Ruslan to have the motivation to push himself to grow and heal. Everything is relational with our boys, and Rus is no exception to that. He has no interest in hearing from an expert, but he will do anything for a friend. ❤️

So, the biggest miracle I have to report is that we have found the most wonderful, kind, encouraging, gentle, and wise physical therapist. His name is Ilya and he is God’s gift to our boys. Ilya is a peaceful, joyful presence here on the Homestead and most importantly, Ruslan adores him. Ilya comes to the Homestead three times a week and does therapy with Ruslan, and twice a week he also does therapy with Boris. In the future, we hope he will be available to work with all of our boys, but he also works at our regional hospital so he doesn’t have loads of time. But we’ll gladly take what we can get!

When Ilya comes Rus is eager to see him and eager to please him. When he knows it’s a therapy day he waits impatiently all day for Ilya to arrive. They do their work together and then they drink coffee together as friends. It’s a special time for Rus and he is making great strides in his healing! He now walks more consistently on his whole foot (not just on his toes, like before) and Ilya has begun working with him on walking more upright instead of leaning forward so much when he walks. He still very much needs the support of his orthotic and he needs reminders to use his whole foot, but he is getting better and better. When he came home from the US he was still using a walker! We are really proud of him. His healing journey will be a long one, considering the damage done to his hips and spine from years of adapting to his deformed foot, but we are ready for that and feel enormously thankful for the gift of the operation done in California.

I’m also happy to report to you that Ruslan has resumed his work at a local electrical shop! Last year he worked there for a bit but it didn’t go great. He wasn’t emotionally ready at that time. But he is ready now. The trip to the US helped him to grow, emotionally. Our teacher, Inna, goes with Rus to work twice a week for a couple of hours and so far he is doing great!

And the most fun news I saved for last.

Yesterday Ruslan RODE A HORSE. Ruslan. Our Ruslan. The Ruslan who is afraid of everything. The Ruslan who won’t get in a pool or even put his feet in a lake. The Ruslan who absolutely hates trying new things, especially if they involve using his body in a new way. That Ruslan. He rode one of our horses!!!! I never ever imagined Ruslan would ride one of the horses. Drink coffee next to the horses, sure. Brush the horses, why not? But taking a ride? Never in a million years. But he did! And boy was he proud of himself. The great crowd of Ruslan fans watching him from the sidelines was also very proud.

Our Ruslan is a fighter and he is thriving right now in every way. This has been a huge year for him and he has exceeded our expectations. Thank God for his kindness and care for Rusik. Thank you all for your prayers. And finally, a huge shout-out and MASSIVE thank you to Steve, Debbie, Diane, Jasmine, Dr. Nicholas Abidi, and the staff at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz for helping to change Ruslan’s life. We will never forget your kindness and generosity.

Two Years

Posted on by kimnjed

Tomorrow marks two years of Russia’s all out war against Ukraine. Technically, Russia invaded Ukraine 10 years ago this month, but tomorrow marks two years since we woke to bombs exploding and our house shaking. Tomorrow marks two years of a new way of life. Tomorrow marks two years of great pain and sorrow in our land. We now think of our lives in terms of “before” and “after” and tomorrow marks two years of “after”. We will never be the same because now we know so many things that we never knew before. We have endured tragedy and fear and indecision like never before. We’ll never be who we were “before” so now we learn how to live with who we have become “after”.

I pretty much stopped writing about the war here on the blog and in our newsletters. Partly because, what do I even say? “Yes, it’s still happening…and please don’t stop praying”?? Partly because I just don’t want to talk about it online. Partly (or a lot) because I’m afraid you don’t want to hear about it. But mostly because talking about it, writing about it, forces me to confront my own thoughts about it and I usually just don’t want to go there. All the war-related pieces of my heart are out-of-bounds, a pandora’s box that I’d rather not open, a painful wound that I don’t want to touch. The war is always there, in the background or in the foreground, lingering on the sidelines or shouting in our faces. It is the backdrop of our lives. It has changed us as people and as an organization, and diving into the hows, the whats, and the whys requires a level of introspection that I rarely have the gumption to rise to.

We often have days here on the Homestead when the war seems a world away. We continue on with our work, loving and caring for our boys, our Homestead like a bubble of safety that the world dares not penetrate. We ride the horses, play with the puppies, enjoy coffee and celebrations with our boys, sing together, cook together, pray together. Our life here with our boys is not easy and has its own special (ever-changing) set of challenges, but what we have here is special and despite everything, we feel safe here on our property. We don’t live in a constant state of fear and worry. We press on because we know that God has called us to press on, to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Our mission has never been more important than it is now and we are committed to it with all of our hearts. I thank God for the peace He has given us and the blessing He has poured out on our family, our team, and this place. After fleeing and living as refugees in a foreign land, I will never again take this Homestead for granted. It is truly God’s gift to everyone who steps foot inside the gates.

So, we don’t live in constant fear, but it would be dishonest and unrealistic to say we do not have moments of fear and uncertainty. The current news is extremely disheartening, to say the least. We are outmanned and our ammunition is quickly being depleted. The current political climate in the US, my native country, is impossible to comprehend and the consequences of political decisions being made (or not made) there are super frightening for us living here in Ukraine. I remember a Youtube video I made during the first few days of the war when I just couldn’t believe that the world wasn’t rushing in to help. We were in shock that the world just stood by and watched, expecting Kyiv to fall within days. It was the most vulnerable, scary feeling ever. I don’t want to feel that again, but the feelings are creeping back to haunt us. Please world, please USA, please Europe, please NATO, please don’t give up on us. Please don’t let the madman win. Please don’t believe the Russian propaganda. Please believe Ukraine is worth saving. Please don’t stop caring. Please don’t get tired of this. Our lives and the lives of so many we love depend on it.

The first year anniversary of this war was highly emotional for us all. We were haunted by memories of those first few weeks. Now, this year, we don’t look so much at the past, but think more about the future. I feel “safe” today on my wonderful Homestead. But what about tomorrow? What about 6 months from now? If things continue on the current trajectory we are in for a world of hurt this coming year. Yet we know that God promises to be with us. He doesn’t promise us safety, but he promises to never leave us or forsake us. He has called us to this work and so we press on.

Would you pray with us on this anniversary for our precious Ukraine? Will you pray that God’s will would be done in this land? Would you pray with us for a miraculous victory that only God can provide? At this point we realize that we can not lift our eyes to politicians or countries or governments for our rescue. God is our rescuer and our lives are in his hands.

I lift up my eyes to the hills– where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. Psalm 121:1-2

Thank you for your continued love, support, and prayer. Please don’t forget Ukraine.

BeLOVE[d]

The Heart of Deinstitutionalization

Posted on by kimnjed

From Jed:

“You can take the girl out of the trailer park, but you can’t take the trailer park out of the girl.”

Whenever Kim does something silly I like to remind her of her roots.

It’s all light-hearted but the adage makes me think of what it means to work toward the deinstitutionalization of people with disabilities in Ukraine… or anywhere for that matter.

Our dream is to help our friends find the love of a family and the support of their community as they work toward becoming fully human.

We have worked for many years, creating a beautiful space for them to flourish. They now have gardens, classes, coffee with friends, house parents, therapy, church community, fun time, work time, horses, yoga, their own bedrooms, holidays, birthdays, and countless other experiences. What full lives our dear friends now live, together with us in community.

As idyllic as this all sounds, to make this dream a reality we have a team of assistants, house parents, office staff, builders, teachers, cleaners, volunteers, managers, accountants… The organization of all this requires HR manuals, team meetings, performance evaluations, process improvement plans, goal setting, shift scheduling, training, retraining… you get the idea.

The most effective way to manage all of these details is to make institutional decisions so everyone is on the same page, they know what is expected of them, and they can perform their job functions effectively, timely, and measurably. Ok, this is sounding a bit too institutional for an organization focused on deinstitutionalization.

So, how do we keep from falling into the trap of systematizing the lives of our friends with disabilities, because it is more stable, easier to manage, and makes life all-around predictable? How do we not just create mini-institutions?

The truth: sometimes we do start making our friends’ lives more institutional. We catch ourselves bringing our hands to work, but leaving our hearts at home.

Boris is constantly teaching me to slow down and be present with him. Yes, he wants his needs met. But he also wants relationship and I can get so busy solving problems that I forget Boris is a person, longing for relationship, reaching out with whatever communication tools he has, “Know me, help me… give me a #$%^ cookie!”

When I treat Boris like a problem to be solved, my decisions and my relationship with him become institutional. I’ve done all this work to get him out of an institution and then I re-institutionalize him with my heart.

I use an analogy with my team that I learned from a dear friend years ago. He would talk about sending our stunt double to work, so we wouldn’t have to bring our real selves in that day. The stunt double takes all the hits, and never gets hurt, so we can keep on acting like everything is ok.

But with our kind of work, we don’t have the luxury of sending in the stunt double. This a work of the heart, from the heart, and each moment with our friends must be processed through our hearts. Now, we use a lot of thinking and strategizing, but that is only so we can be full-hearted and completely available when we are with our friends.

Another way we work towards keeping our organization leaning forward, open, and leading with the heart is to analyze what we are doing, with our vision in mind. “Why are we here?” When we build our job descriptions and work policies, we try to have a “skeleton of rules” that supports the body (our vision). No extra bones (rules) in the skeleton.

This year we are working on a community covenant that will represent the heart of what we are trying to accomplish and the ways we all agree to work together to further our vision of deinstitutionalization.

For analyzing our work, we use a team-wide process called Appreciative Inquiry. I’ve used this approach for more than 15 years now in my professional work. Instead of going with the old classic, problem-solving model, we sit back and ask ourselves, “What is working well here?” “How do we do more of what we do well and spend less time on the areas where we struggle?” “How do we apply the ways we do things well to all areas of our work?”

I like this approach because it uses everyone’s experience and perspective as we look ahead. Our work is cross-cultural and ultimately effective if our local staff is leading the analysis, development, and implementation processes.

Another way we seek to avoid recreating mini-institutions is by remaining small. Small is beautiful. There are more than 100,000 people with disabilities institutionalized throughout Ukraine. It would be foolish to think we can solve this enormous social issue.

But, we can be a sign of hope, a candle in the darkness, a piece of the puzzle as Ukrainians change the future reality for people with disabilities in their country. By remaining small we can stay close to the heart of what we are trying to accomplish- the deinstitutionalization of people with disabilities. Not just removing them from a physical institution, but fighting to keep our hearts at the forefront of this work, remaining open to the cry of each of our boys to know and be known, to love and be loved.

Over the next three years, we plan to take four more people into our care and complete the final building on the homestead. After that, all our growth will be through partnerships and supporting the replication of this model of deinstitutionalization and family-centered care.

By remaining small, we can put our energy into helping other organizations and people to deinstitutionalize in their communities.

We strive to keep a simple approach that has the support of essential rules needed to function, with our focus on the heart of each person. We are creating a place where our values are not just applied to the work with our boys, but also to our coworkers and community members. Everyone is worthy of Dignity, Love, and Hope.

Staying close to this vision and not getting too big for a britches is how we plan to not only take more of our friends out of institutions but also to keep from re-institutionalizing them with our model of care.

Now, while I can’t get Kim to stop making tater-tot casseroles and listening to Joe Diffie, we haven’t been driving by that double-wide for sale down the road for a few weeks… so there’s hope. (I’m joking!)

A Season of Hope

Posted on by kimnjed

It’s the day after Christmas and we all feel like we need at least a day to recover from the festivities. Ha! Are you with me?

For real though, we had a wonderful time together here on the Homestead. We started the day each in our own homes; our family celebrated at home with cinnamon rolls, stockings, and gifts. Then all of us on the Homestead gathered in Side A of the ol’ duplex to spend the day together. There was so.much.food. We cooked together, gave our boys gifts, and had a few moments of relaxation. Mostly we just enjoyed being together with nowhere to be and no meetings or plans to attend to. Then in the evening, we had the crazy idea to take the boys caroling. We loaded everyone up in the vans and drove around the city for three hours, loading the boys in and out of the vans, singing, managing emotions and toileting, and giving gifts. It was a little bit insane and a lot special. I’m hesitant to say it’ll be our new tradition, but I know it meant a great deal to our team. If we’ve recovered from it by next year we might give it another go. 😂

There’s a simmering happening here in Ukraine. I definitely can’t speak for the rest of the country, but in our little corner of Ukraine, there is a palpable feeling of unrest rising. We know we lack the funding to win the war at this point. There are differing views of what a “win” would even mean and a building uncertainty that the win we are hoping for and dreaming of will ever be a reality. Air raids have once again become a daily event and the hits on Kyiv and in our region increase our vigilance once more. But the bigger stress comes from the President’s declaration that 500,000 more Ukrainian men will be conscripted into the military. Summons are being given anywhere and everywhere and the city feels tense, like everyone is holding their breath…waiting for the shoe to drop. We are all painfully aware that there are simply not enough men to fight this war. We know so, so many are dying every day to keep us safe, and many more still will. Each and every one of us knows more men must join the fight, but we hold the ones we love close to us, hoping anyone but them will be chosen.

In this moment of new uncertainty, our Ukrainian family’s faith is being tested in a new way. The question of who our lives belong to has never been more real and actual. The priorities of our hearts are being uncovered once again. What does it truly mean to entrust our lives and the lives of our family to God? What does it truly mean to hand over our whole selves to God? Each man has to decide if he will entrust his life and the life of his family to God, or if he will take matters into his own hands and try to make his own way. And each has to again come to the understanding that God never promised us physical safety. He never promised us that we would not walk through hard times. He never promised us lives of peace. But He did promise that He would never leave us or forsake us. He did promise that when we walked through the fire – He would be there with us. The invitation to surrender our lives to God is not an easy one to accept, but Jed and I have learned over the years (and are still learning) that the safest and most peaceful place to be is exactly where God has asked us to be. The best life for our children is in the place where God has called their parents. We will never ever understand the decision that Ukrainian men are making at this moment in history, and we won’t pretend to understand. But we can understand what it is to walk forward with Jesus, even when it doesn’t make sense, even when the way is unclear. God has not always called us to an easy life. These past 10 years have been filled with much heartache and many moments of pain and uncertainty, but God has never once left our sides. Again, we know we don’t understand what it feels like to be Ukrainian right now, but God’s promises do not change. So all we can do is remind our family here of what God has promised and remain close to them during this most difficult time.

In this Christmas season, when it feels that in some areas of life, hope is lost, we choose to lift our heads.

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
    where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
    the Maker of heaven and earth.

Psalm 121:1,2

Friends, if we are followers of Jesus our lives are not our own. Everything we have, all that we are, we can give to Him. He is faithful. We can place our hope and our faith in Him- not because He is safe, but because He is good. Comfort and safety are not the final goal. He is our goal. He is our prize. A life given to Him is the only life truly worth living.

If you lack hope this Christmas season, lift up your head. Just look at how much God loves our boys, that He would gather this whole team here on the Homestead to pluck them out of obscurity and bring them into the love of a family. Not because they did anything special, but just because he loves them so very much. His love for you is the same. You can count on Him.

Merry Christmas from Ukraine. Thank you for supporting us and loving us along this journey. Thank you for continuing to stand with us and for praying for us. We appreciate you and pray the hope of Jesus fills your heart this day. ❤️