The only tears were mine…
It was a great day – no drama, no angst, no tempers, nothing thrown, nothing smashed, no holes in any walls, no police, nothing stolen,…..it was amazing. So why the tears? Well, at Christmas dinner I wanted to tell each person how much he or she contributed to the day and to my life. I just couldn’t believe all the wonderful things that were coming to mind – I felt a mixture of relief that the violent years are behind us, and such gratitude that some of us can share good times now. When I got to #6 – one who had been so challenging to raise and is doing very well now- I had such positive things to say – and then he replied and he strongly affirmed his sense of belonging to this family. That was one of those moments when I wished I had actually said “yes” to those reality show producers! Of course, they would have also recorded Jason’s calls and his ongoing issues as he continues his downward spiral with alcoholism – but at least in my home it was a joy and I’ve learned to focus on the positive and not to let the negative step out of it’s own moment.
Today we’ll get ourselves ready to head out to #10′s hockey tournament in Victoria for two days, then back home for #13′s hockey tournament – then back to real life. This was such a delightful respite – I feel so strengthened to start the new year. I’ve even taken on a new challenge – I’m taking a diploma course in Technical Writing – learning how to be a professional editor, how to write manuals (which I have done many times but this will move me up the technology ladder with such projects) and other things that I’m not sure of yet. I really needed to exercise my neurons while I still have some.
I know for many of you that yesterday and the entire holiday is still it’s own walk through hell – you still have violent kids at home and you still live with kids who can’t get through the day without making sure you know how much they hate you, and you still have to hide your wallet….and so forth. I just truly want to let you know that it will end – and it may even end happily.
Have you best day possible.
The big day is nearing and I’m actually ready for it – at least I’m ready in terms that everything is bought and wrapped. I wasn’t anticipating any drama this year but recent info has me wonder if we’re going to have yet another drama moment with one. I really just don’t have time for this stuff anymore. I sure don’t intend to let myself get drawn in so we’ll see how it goes. Honestly, I know that early trauma, fasd, and all that other stuff doesn’t just magically disappear at a certain age – but I can’t help but wish that it did. Oh well, we’ve lived through this stuff before and can do so again. My own reactions to it will be very different than in the past when I would try to resolve the conflict or attempt to calm the emotional state of the one who was escalating. I’m more likely now to just walk away due to lack of interest. That’s the problem with being farther along in the birh/adoption order – I’ve been through it all enough before so I know that it’s just a phase and that nothing I say or do will in the moment will alter the outcome – and, I’m tired of it.
Well, I do hate to be negative at this happy time of year so I’m done with that and on to the positive. My 5 littles have saved part of their well earned allowance all year and will be putting all of their money together to buy goats and chickens for families in 3rd world countries. They have been planning this since last year and are so excited. They also spent this month’s allowance at the dollar store buying gifts for all of our family members. I have never spoken to them about giving to others at Christmas – it’s just part of who they are. So, I will be focused on the joy and love they offer to all, and I will immediately move on emotionally from anything less.
I want to wish all of you the best in your seasonal celebrations and I good luck in the coming year.
Have your best day possible, friends.
Changing my perspective…
Last night we attended a neighborhood party. We have never, ever, been invited to one before. The difference in this neighborhood? You can guess – this is the first one we’ve lived in where we haven’t had police at our door, or worse yet, three police cars with sirens blaring followed by an ambulance and one of our sons being taken out in handcuffs. Funny how a little thing like that can put neighbors off, eh.
Now that I live this somewhat calm life - at least calm to me, although I guess not so calm to others who find 5 kids with adhd, fasd, and ocd a little hectic, -still with no violence and no mental illness, I find our lives very pleasant nowadays. Anyway, my point was that now that I am not so self absorbed in my own life, I have time to observe the lives of neurotypicals and sometimes I find I don’t like them so much. Just last night at the party we were playing that gift exchange game where you can take each others gifts. It’s a fun way to get know each other and to engage in grown up play. So, the game started and one of the guests didn’t agree with how it was being played – the fact that people were laughing and having fun didn’t matter to her – she kept saying “I’ve never played it this way, this way is wrong.” So what? Who cares? Well, we switched to her way. I mean really, who cares? and this lady clearly had some control issues that needed that needed to be catered to in order to reduce her anxiety. That was just another example of how I’ve come to realize that neurotypicals have very complicated lives. Sometimes of their own making, sometimes just what fate or their own neurobiology has handed them.
What does all of this have to do with me and adoption? Well, it’s just that lately I’ve had to accept that as I said earlier, I’ve been self absorbed and self pitying for many years. I’ve been so concerned with my own bizarre family life that I’ve failed to realize that there are lives and worlds beyond adoption and that it isn’t only adoptive parents who have problems. Since you’re a better person than I, I’m sure you already knew that, and truth be told, I had some vague realization of that – but not any real respect for it. It’s like I had this mind set of “Oh, you think you’ve got problems!” and of course, for anything others could say, I could say worse ( I didn’t but I knew I could have).
I really hate it when I have to come to terms with my own failings, and this is clearly one of them. Time to raise my head above my gopher hole perspective and start showing, or maybe feeling, some respect for the lives of others – I mean really, no one gets out of this life without problems…I just had problems that were more obvious and public than those of others.
Okay, now you know yet another icky thing about me. Well, this is my time of life to begin looking inward and deciding what needs to change before it’s too late ie I die. However, please don’t feel the need to add to my list of needed personality changes – I’d rather figure them out for myself!
Have yourself your best day possible.
Ahh, the week before Christmas and the kids are out of school and total hysteria abounds at my house. Well, that’s what you get when you have 4 girls between the ages of 9 and 13 – lots of pre-pubescent and pubescent girl hormones resulting in tempers and loud play and constant motion. Actually, it’s really fun, but very loud from morning till night.
I took # 10 and Party Boy with me to visit Jason and his family last week. Every so often I take one or two of the kids and do a little road trip, just to have some uninterrupted time and fun. We stay in good hotels and swim a lot in the hotel pool and eat in fun restaurants and go to movies – no stress and lots of good memories. This time I needed to see Jason and get the Christmas presents to his children – they are very poor despite being hard workers so they mostly have what we give and I like to make sure they have a good Christmas. They are stabilized after their recent distress and doing okay for the moment and we enjoyed a short visit with them. Also on this trip I had been in contact with the dog pound in that community and we stopped and picked up a very sweet little yorkie poo for #10. As I ‘ve mentioned before, #10 was being bullied this year, but #2 supported him at school and Party Boy supported him at home and between them he came through this terrible time quite well – but, there were some left over wounds, and my solution to most things in life is to get a dog. We have two, but we have a big house and a large yard so I felt we could handle one more little 4 legged family member. # 10 was overwhelmed with joy and he and the dog bonded right off the bat and they’ve been inseparable since we got back home. Nice feeling to actually be able to do something that makes my child feel better. So many years when nothing I did helped the older ones- you all know how that is.
Also on a positive note – it seems like #7 is doing very well. He is in a relationship and working full time and really getting his life going. I”m so happy and so relieved – the best Christmas news I could have.
Today is Saturday and we’ve got a couple of hockey games and some dance classes as well as lots of presents to wrap and regular house cleaning and a neighborhood party to attend this evening. I know you are all as busy or more so. I wish you the best as you try to get everything done that the season requires.
Have your best day possible.
I haven’t posted in a while because I was having trouble accessing my admin page. It just wouldn’t let me in. However, it seems to be in a better mood today so here I am.
Things are going so well at home – doesn’t seem like it could be my house. #5 and #6 are still here. They’re helpful and easy to live with. Not something I would have anticipated a few years ago. It’s so nice to have this time to develop a better relationship with them. As I rant about frequently – that’s one of the main differences between adoption and foster care – if these two had simply aged out of foster care they would have had no where to go when they needed shelter from life’s adult storms – and, there wouldn’t have been any opportunity to heal the secondary wounds that accumulated while they were growing up.
I’m close to my final shopping for Christmas. I was musing about how friendly people are on the street at this time of year and how everyone smiles and says hello when normally they would just walk past. Then, I hit the mall and realized that it’s a shark fest there – everyone circling for the few available parking spots and willing to drive over anyone to get to a newly vacated spot.
It’s also Christmas party time – all of the littles activities have parties so they are sugured up daily and we certainly live with them bouncing off the walls in the evening. Oh well, that’s part of the fun for them and I’m so grateful that their fasd, adhd, ocd, and anxiety disorder haven’t killed their social skills and they are still able to be full participants in the things that make childhood fun.
Well, that’s it for today – have your best day possible and don’t forget to check out my other blogs if you have the time.
There’s another new study that indicates that the brains of children who have experienced abuse are the same as the brains of soldiers who have been in combat. This is just one more of many studies that show that our brains are structurally harmed by trauma – so why do people keep trying to tell me, and trying to train me to believe, that my children and my clients have *emotional* problems. They don’t- they have physical problems that are located in the brain! Their brains are damaged, they require specific help to recover, and you and I require specific help to parent them.
Of course, it’s going to be a while before policy makers really accept this because then they might feel called upon to pay for some of the treatment just as they now pay for broken bones and such. They might also feel some pressure to be more proactive about child abuse if they accept that the brain is structurally changed – I can’t wait till some kids start suing the governments and agencies for allowing their brains to be physically and structurally changed (for the worse) because the policies at the time didn’t allow enough money for adequate child protection services.
I’m sure I’m coming across as bitter and twisted today – I guess I am a little. I had some interaction lately with a number of really spectacular parents who are now doubting their skills and their ability to raise children – even though they’ve done more and done better at it than most of us could have – yet the child or youth ultimately rejects them, or targets them with verbal and even physical assaults for years, or is so terribly damaged that recovery and a normal life are not likely to happen. Of course, the parents’ self esteem is trashed. sometimes beyond repair, as they wonder why they gave up the last few years of their lives. They ask if it was all for nothing, or there is anything more they could have done to change the outcome. The answer is no to both questions, it was not for nothing, but the meaning may take some time to discover; and, there was nothing else they could have done. There are so few effective resources, and so little acknowledgment of how severely harmed our children are by the time they are adopted – oh well, no point in ranting on…..I can only say that my heart goes out to those who feel this way.
Have your best day possible, and don’t forget to check out my other blogs.
Here’s a thing that bugs me in my role as a therapist. That is: social workers who refer the newly placed children for therapy but leave the new adoptive parents to flail around as they try to figure out how to meet the overt and covert needs of a child they barely know. The parents are expected to read books (and aren’t even give them much direction on which books might be useful) and to attend a support group and the occasional conference (if they can afford to and if they can find sitters or even risk leaving their ), and that’s supposed to be enough. Well, hell no it isn’t! Adoptive parents today have to acquire a great deal of knowledge in the area of neuroscience if they are to understand and effectively parent their children who have atypical neurodevelopment.
The other thing that bugs me is that the social workers keep stressing attachment – well, okay, I agree that’s important, but the child can’t attach until his brain manages to develop or activate more parts, and that is triggered by the relationship with the adoptive parents which takes time. And, while I”m at it, why doesn’t anyone ever tell new adoptive parents that their child doesn’t have most of the social skills that other kids their age have – our kids have spent their pre-adoption years developing survival skills, not social skills, so along with brain development and attachment, parents also have to learn how to assess what’s missing and then teach age appropriate social skills to a child whose likely to view this as just another set of criticisms about who they are ; yet, the truth is they have to be socialized and learn how to belong. Those are really big things – and while therapy can facilitate them, it’s all dependent on how effectively the new parents can parent – so again, I get back to my original bug about adoptive parents not being given the opportunity to learn what they need to know.
Okay, that’s off my chest. Have your best day possible and take care of yourself. Don’t forget to check out my writing blog and my wheat free blog, if you have the time and the inclination.
Am I the last person to notice that Christmas is coming? I’m kind of amazed that there are Christmas trees all over the stores already, even though I should be used to that by now. I love Christmas. I love the lights and the bling and I don’t even resent the commercialism. I figure it’s up to me to make sure that the kids get the spiritual part, and our church related activities helps with that. I love the shopping and the wrapping and the secrets and the food – even though my wheat free food plan means I can’t eat much of it – it’s still fun to bake with the kids and decorate the house. So, I’m in a good mood.
Good thing I’ve got the pending Yule season to boost my up because there is, always, aspects of life that aren’t great. #11 is being bullied at school – the teacher and principal are involved, as is #2 who is overtly supporting him by dropping her own kids off at school and then coming to pick up #11 and take him to school while prepping him with things to say when he’s teased. I tell him the same things but it seems to take hold when he hears it from #2. Her own kids, his nieces, are his age, so he and #2 haven’t exactly “hung out” over the years, and while bullying is tragic and awful, her choice to be involved has certainly given them a bond they wouldn’t have had otherwise. One of the greatest benefits of a large family is that there is always someone to help you when you’re down.
I’m not so happy with a choice that one of my YA’s is making, but it’s not my business once they reach adulthood so I made one comment to that YA and will say no more. On the other hand, it looks like #7 is really getting his life going – full time job and a girlfriend – both things he always wanted and was afraid he would never have – he’s happy and productive in life – so I’m happy too. I always think of him at Christmas because when he was about 9, I was very depressed – stressed from work and travelling too much, and depressed regarding the behaviors of some of my kids – I didn’t have either the parenting skills or the coping skills that I have now – anyway, he and I went for a long walk around our neighborhood which was very well decorated for the holiday season. He expressed such joy at each set of lights and lawn and house decorations. He stopped and looked at each one and had comments and thoughts about the artistry involved. That walk lifted my depression and filled me with Christmas joy, which has never again left. I am so thankful to him for that.
Well friends, have your best day possible. If you have the time and the inclination, please check out my writing blog as well as my newest blog regarding my wheat allergy food plan.
This article is about the use of anti psychotic drugs with kids in foster care. Clearly, its a terrible problem that these vulnerable children and youth are over and wrongly medicated. I can’t imagine what that does to their brains in the long term. I also hate what it does when they are placed for adoption because during the years that they are wrongly medicated in foster care, they were not learning age appropriate social or behavioral skills, so when we adopt them, we not only have to help them heal from the original traumas that put them into foster care, we also have to help their brains heal from the damage done by the anti psychotics as well as help them learn to cope and actually manage some frustration.
Typically, we adopt a child who is 6 or 10 or 15 who has been wrongly medicated with respirdal or other drugs for years and who simply never had any opportunity or support in learning to self regulate. Of course, to the child, our attempts to help them learn this challenging task feel like rejection because none of their survival skills are acceptable to the adoptive family; and ,then everyone gets on the attachment bandwagon and single focuses on that aspect without any thought to what it’s like for the kid to be learning to cope with life without hard core meds or finding out if there is residual brain damage from the unneeded use of antipsychotics.
Don’t take my post as a rant against foster parents or even the psychiatrists who prescribe the meds. And, I know that some children and youth really do need the meds. But this is about the kids who didn’t need them. Often, kids move from one to another before there is any chance to stabilize them and see what their behaviors are really about. And, I don’t know about where you live, but in my province, there’s very little likelihood that a child in foster care is going to get the thorough neuropscyh assessment that would provide the information necessary for caregivers to know what the problem is or for anyone to devise an appropriate and effective behavioral support program.
This is just one more way that foster children are abused and neglected by society/us.
Boomerang lives…
We’re a week or so into the return home of young adult #6 and so far – what a great guy! He seems determined to be a super big brother to the littles and he’s helping them with piano practice, guitar, and getting them to clean the kitchen before I come home from work so I have a nice and orderly scene when I arrive. I’ve learned to really like the boomerang phase because it give us a chance to develop relationships that couldn’t happen during the years while the brains are developing and healing from the early trauma. #6 has boomeranged back before and things started great but deteriorated, still, it moved us ahead in our relationship and wasn’t destructive. Maybe I’m naive, but I don’t think the deterioration will happen this time – he just seems so *grown up* now.
#5 also continues to be a delight – and very determined to get Party Boy (who really isn’t much of a partier anymore) employed. They are genetic sibs and any care he received when he was an infant was from her – only 4 at the time and functioning as a single mom to her two little brothers. She still assumes that role with him and he lets her. I love to watch the dynamic because part of our goal in having a large family was to give the kids each other – more people to turn to when things are tough, more people to hang out with those who really care. Lots of my goals as a mom to many have yet to be achieved, so I revel in the ones that I can observe.
I am waiting to hear if I got a part time job as a writer for a web site. I still have my clinical practice, but I need to broaden my scope and the only other talent I have is writing so I’m seeking work I can do at 5:30 in the morning before the kids get up and I leave for my office. I need to stretch my neurons while I still have them and I need to be excited by different directions and different input. So, wish me luck on this. At least I was short listed from a large pile of applications so that’s a first step.
Have your best day possible.