Sisters (please note some parts are graphic in nature)

Of all the losses that I have worried were the most damaging, losing her sister was the one that I felt was the worst. Sweetie idolized her big sister. And for a few years her sister was on a really dangerous path. Sweetie's social workers felt it was best to split the 2 kids so Sweetie wouldn't follow down the same path.
It had been over a year since Sweetie last talked to her big sister. She was missing her awfully.
The last I had heard, her sister (who I will refer to as Sissy) did not want any contact with Sweetie. After being on the run for almost a year Sissy is finally back living with a prospective adoptive family and just had a baby at age 14. Recently I have contacted Sweetie's social worker to try to get any photos and things from Sweetie's childhood to start working on her Life Book. A life book is kind of a scrapbook that tells an adopted child's story. It is very therapeutic for them. When chatting with her social worker I asked her to pass my info onto Sissy's family, so that maybe in the future we could facilitate communication. I was quite surprised when I received a short email the night before last from Sissy.
I shared Sweetie's email with her (Which I completely monitor). The girls started emailing back and forth. Today Sissy called to talk to Sweetie. It was amazing to see Sweetie light up in a way that I normally do not get to see. It seems like this new home is a good fit for her. They have gotten her caught up in school, encouraged her to get a job and are teaching her to be a mom to her baby. Sissy has had to learn to survive living on her own at the age of 13. She has gotten herself into unspeakable situations. She is aged well beyond her 14 years of age. My heart was breaking as she was telling Sweetie that no matter how she feels to never run away. That life is rough and she shared how people she thought she was friends with loured her into an apartment where they tied her up, drugged her with heroine& and then let random men force them selves on her for 3 days straight. The thought of that happening to sweetie scares the death out of me and nauseates me. She soon found herself living with a grown man who said he wanted her to have his baby, so she got pregnant and he is now in jail for sex with a minor. These are things that 13-14 year old girls should never have to deal with. But then again, she should never have had to deal with her stepfather abusing her for years either. Sissy took the brunt of the abuse to protect Sweetie. I still can't wrap my brain around the situations that both girls faced as children. I am sure there is so much more that has happened that I do not know. I may never know.The physical abuse, the squalor they lived in, the neglect they faced. No wonder they can not trust any adult. How could you ever trust anyone, let alone adults?

You can tell how much Sissy cares for Sweetie and doesn't want her to end up on the same road. She was praising her for good grades and lecturing her to wait to have sex until she is married because being a mom is hard work.She talked about not getting tattoos because it is harder to get a job with a visible tattoos.
One of things I found interesting is Sissy being older sees relationships with families differently. Where Sweetie has a very romanticized memory of her biological family, Sissy remembers them, how mean they were and that they were mean because of the drugs they were doing. All in all it was a good call.
A lot of it didn't sink in with Sweetie for an hour or so. I asked her during dinner (with just her and I) how she felt about the call, she said "Great" I said I thought some of the discussion was pretty heavy stuff. Sweetie didn't really know what I was talking about. When I mentioned the being tied up and all that bad stuff, she said  it made her sad, that she really didn't even think anything of it right away until I mentioned that is it was heavy. We talked for a while about the situation and about how good families are there to protect their kids from these situations. It is our job to teach them how to be safe and avoid bad situations.

We will see how communications continue. In the past the girls relationship has been very volatile. I will continue to monitor all conversations. I feel good about this. I think it is so important to have connection to bio family, as long as the relationship is healthy. I am hoping this will be a good thing.

On the PRTF we are still in the waiting stage. They are saying there should be a discharge this coming week. Monday, I need to get her primary psychiatrist to sign off on her admission and the psychiatrist at the center to sign off on it as well and we should be good to go. I am praying we can get her admitted before the end of the month when Cris goes to Ecuador for 10 days. Last time he went to Ecuador was when Sweetie needed to be hospitalized for 2 weeks. I don't know if I can do this on my own.  I surely don't want to be admitting her to the PRTF by myself. But as I always I will do what I have to do, because I have no other choice.
I continue to pray that Sweetie will understand why we are admitting her to the residential program, that she will find healing during this upcoming part of our journey together.

Steady My Heart

Wish it could be easy 

Why is life so messy 

Why is pain a part of us 

There are days I feel like 

 Nothing ever goes right 

Sometimes it just hurts so much

Steady My Heart~ Keri Jobe

 I can not believe it has been a year since I last saw baby Leah. There are times I just weep for her and for the journey that we were never able to complete with her. What kind of personality would she have if she was still with us? What would her favorite toy be? What would her favorite book or song be? These are things that sadly I will never know. I wonder if this loss will ever become lighter or if I will always carry it with me? Do I even want it to go away? If it does will I forget about her as if she never was? A year later and I can still remember exactly how she felt when I would have her cradled in my arms for her breathing treatments, how she would laugh in the bath tub when she splashed in the water, the mischievous smile she had when she would tug on Oakley's hair. I am so blessed to have the millions of happy memories of her. I hope I never lose them.

And now a year later I am waiting on another loss with Sweetie leaving for treatment soon. I know with all of my mind, heart and soul that we are doing the right thing by admitting her into PRTF, but it still hurts. I feel like we will lose so much more time with her. We already missed out on 12 years of her life. I am happy we were able to experience Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas with her. But we will miss out on celebrating her first birthday with us. By the time she comes home she will most likely be 14. But I know if we continued trying to work at home with her each of these big events would be big explosions. We have been on the verge of one of her blow ups all week. You can just feel her tension in the air. She has been holding it together (mostly) because there is a dance at school she wants to go to and she knows that I will not allow her to go if she has a blow up. So instead she is being constantly defiant. She wakes up angry, literally kicking. Every interaction is negatively charged. We walk on eggshells just to keep a major blow up from happening. We are basically prisoners in our house. If Cris and I talk she buts in, if we try to hug she puts herself between us. Every movement is met with a counter move by her. We play this game of crazy chess every day. Just when we are about to win the chess board is thrown across the room into a wall
breaking all the chess pieces. I know it is time pick up the pieces now.

Monday I had a planning meeting for Sweetie's admission to the PRTF. We discussed our initial goals for her treatment, they were so basic. To accept no without a tantrum, to just listen, to trust that we will provide for her and she does not have to control everything. Things that most 3 year old children learn. But no one took the time to teach her. As she evolves in treatment our goals for her will evolve. My number one goal was for her to be able to truly accept love, to let it in, to let it embrace her and become part of her. To truly become our family. In my heart she is our family. I just want that to happen for her, in her heart. For her to deep down know without a shadow of a doubt that I love her unconditionally. I wish for her to just relax and trust that we will meet her needs and she can just be a kid. These are the things we are hoping she can develop in residential. I pray for her heart to begin to heal so that she can accept love.
 Last I heard they are expecting to admit Sweetie mid-month, which is next week. But I have not received an admission date. Which in itself drives me nuts. I am a deadline person. The whole process of adopting and now working the mental health system does not work on deadlines at all. I have to work hard to keep my ocd in check. I try to remain cool and calm, but I am really just a hot mess. But then again, I think we all are.

 

Created for Care Adoptive Mom's Retreat and Transitioning

What a weekend. I just got home from the Created For Care Adoptive Moms Retreat. It was a fabulous weekend. It was busy but good. There were 5 of us moms from the area who met up there. It was so nice to have time for bonding and just being silly. One of the Keynote speakers Carissa Woodwyck was amazing. She is a grown up adoptee. Her intense honesty was so heartfelt that you could not help but be moved by her. As she shared about her feeling of wanting to be heard, not just her words or actions, but her heart. To have her unspoken words be heard. To be there, to be present. I believe that was the biggest thing I was meant to hear this weekend. This weekend was scattered with many moments of encounters that were meant to happen. Some were fun and inspirational like the times I spent bonding with my friends (Kim,Linda, Karen & Cat). And then some were uncomfortable and pushed me to be the better person. One such moment was in a breakout session on adopted older children. The session itself was a bit behind where we are in our journey, but the encounter I feel was meant to happen was right before the class. There were just a handful of us that arrived 30 minutes early (guess we didn't pay too close attention to our agenda). Kim and I are talking to the women present when the woman next to us ask if we had a plan B if it didn't work out. First I was kind of taken aback, thinking you can't give back a bio kid, why would you consider giving back an adopted child? And I shared that we do have a plan B, but it did not involve giving up our child. Our plan B was using an outside facility to help her heal, because we can not do it on our own. As I was speaking I noticed how frazzled she was and it hit me, she is most likely dealing with a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder. I asked if she had been working with an attachment therapist. She had no idea what I was talking about. I was able to pull up an attachment therapist in her area on my Ipad and shared it. I hope it is enough to get her the help she needs and that it may save a family. After that, I spent a lot of time praying about whether sending Sweetie to a PRTF (Psychiatric Residential Therapeutic Facility) is the right thing to do. I still feel that is what we need to do. This past week I went to see the facilities at a local PRTF that specializes is children with Reactive Attachment Disorder. I was encouraged to see how the staff seemed genuine in their caring about the children. They made me feel at peace that there is nothing that Sweetie can do that would surprise them. I felt at peace in their chapel which was draped in prayer chains made from all of the children who have stayed there over the years. Again, I believe God has his hands in getting her the help she needs. Sweetie is right on the cusp of being too old for the program, however they made an exception and accepted her even though she turns 13 in March. They have a discharge on the 31st and should be able to get Sweetie in the following week. I have all her paperwork handed in already. I am hoping to get a date for admission in the next day or so. I want to be able to prepare ourselves for her leaving our house for a while. The sooner we get started with treatment the sooner we can get her to begin healing. It will be sad in our house for a long time. Even though there are many bad times in our home there are also fun times. Times of laughter and silliness. Those are the times I will miss. But those times will hopefully return. Today when I got home she says that she wishes she was going to residential. I wonder whether she says this to try to hurt me or as a defense mechanism? After this weekend away, I was able to look at things more clearly, without the fresh emotion involved. I know now more than ever that this is her best chance at healing. I pray she will see that I am not giving up on her. That I will be there each and every time I am allowed to be there. It may take time for her see that I am still here and I am not going away. But she will see... I am here, I do hear her. I hear her spoken word, I hear the meaning behind the behaviors, I hear her when she is quiet and saying nothing at all. I know what she feels in her heart, I know the pain and I am not scared. I am here. I AM PRESENT. How I am loved I love my daughter...

Holding On by Letting Go... Why We Choose PRTF for our Daughter.

When I last wrote I was so torn about what was the best way to have Sweetie's needs met. I was feeling a huge amount of guilt over even considering placing Sweetie into a residential program. I prayed about it and placed it in God's hands. That same day that I released myself from having to decide, Sweetie made it easy to see what I needed to do to help her. The amazing amount of pain and fear that she feels constantly has become completely overwhelming for her and she can no longer contain it. This past week Sweetie had her largest and worst rage fit to date. It involved throwing tools at me, smashing our large steam cleaner, throwing glasses at Cris and kicking through her bedroom door. This was the first time she escalated this much with someone other than my husband or myself there. This time she did it in front of one of my best friends, who has been watching her. It scared her to death. It took hours to get Sweetie to settle down from this tantrum. We had started the process of admitting her to a PRTF (Psychiatric Residential Treatment Facility) back when she placed Darling over the fence and the neighbors dog mauled Darlings paw. All of the evaluations came back that they recommend residential. The program who evaluated will not accept her into their program because off her needs. The recommended me to one that specializes in Reactive Attachment Disorder. This was not the first time I received this recommendation. The Psychiatric Hospital recommended it in September and our Attachment Therapist has been discussing it since before Sweetie ever came to live with us from her history. We wanted to give her the opportunity to try to work on her issues at home with us. However her awesome defense mechanisms won't allow her to. She is getting sicker and sicker and taking is down with her. If she was a child with Cancer there would be no question of what to do. I would have her in the hospital being treated with chemo and radiation today. Although I know how sick she would be from the treatment, I would do it and I would be at the hospital every day to be with her. Just because we have decided to have Sweetie admitted to a PRTF does not mean that we are washing our hands of her or giving up on her. I will be going to be with her every chance they allow. The programs that I have narrowed down are both Attachment focused programs. This will require us being extremely involved. We will be going through family therapies with her. The programs are designed to help Sweetie attach to us, our participation is crucial. So, my life has become much more complicated. It will consist of getting off work and driving to the other safe of town daily to work with Sweetie on healing.our lives will revolve around her treatment. It will all be worth it if she can find healing. This is the best chance she has at getting to a place that we can begin to work on truly healing her heart.My hopes are that she will be able to see that we are still here to love her and to help her heal. I pray that she can learn to lower her wall in her heart and mind, allowing me to come in and help her face the pain and trauma that she has not been able to access. I hope she can come to a place where she can accept that bad stuff happened and know that it does not define her. That she is still a beautiful soul and she is so very loved. This will be one of the most unselfish things I have ever done. I feel as if I will miss out on so much while she is there. But it will all be worth it if she can find herself under all that anger and fear. I believe this is what we need to do. I have 2 programs I have been looking at. One is here in Charlotte and one is 2 hours away. I am trusting God to help direct us to the right one. It will take a few weeks to get through the admissions process.So for now I am just holding on.

Hearts a Mess

When all you know from the time you are born is adults hurt you, how do you ever trust anyone? Could you live 12 years, 144 months, 4380 days of not having your basic needs met, being abused, being lied to, being tossed around, not being loved? The trauma of Sweetie's past is so hardwired into her brain that it is a part of her. At her core she is stuck in fight or flight mode. I can't blame her. It is because of this that she is alive today. But the same defense mechanisms that she has been using to survive are now destroying her. These mechanisms will not allow her to really attach. She is doing what she is capable right now. But the trauma of her past is so awful that it her mind will not even let her access the memories of many events. She can say my dad abused me. But when asked to talk about it, she simply can not. She becomes agitated and angry. My little girl has a million ways to distract herself and anyone else from seeing the mess that is locked in her heart. Until she can trust and be able to process that pain she will keep everyone locked out and use any means that she needs to in order to protect herself. 2 months ago when we had the Darling incident (where she put my mini schnauzer over a fence to be attacked by an aggressive dog, we started the process of having Sweetie evaluated for additional service. These services could be one of the following: 1. Intensive Home Therapy, where they have a team of 3 come into our home 3-5 times a week to work with Sweetie and us as a family. 2. Day Treatment, where she would go to school at a special school for kids with emotional/behavioral issues. 3. Residential Care, where she would move basically a boarding school for children with emotional/behavioral issues. We would only get to talk to her and visit her when they said we could. We would attend therapy with her weekly. Sweetie's evaluation was this past Friday. It is times like this that I can see how truly sick she is. A mentally healthy child would be on their best behavior during a visit like this. But not my Sweetie. She was acting out more than normal. The evaluation was a 3 hour interview, that could have been done in an hour if we could just answer the questions. But each time I was asked a question and I would start to respond, Sweetie would cut me off, argue and say I was lying. That was over the minor stuff. Like dates of events. According to Sweetie, Darlings incident was over the summer and that is why we sent her the hospital. She does not remember the events that sent her to the hospital. The fact is she was in the hospital in September and Darling was attacked in November. She showed no remorse and said she doesn't understand what the big deal was. At one point she picked up her chair and was lifting it up over her head. The psychologist seemed most interested in Sweetie's response when the psychologist asked me if we planned on adopting any other children. My response was yes, when either Sweetie is old enough to live on her own or healthy enough to handle it. Sweetie blurted out "Well then, I will just stay sick". The psychologist asked if she would stay sick even if that meant hurting us and she said yes. She then asked if Sweetie would stay sick if that meant hurting herself and her future and she again said yes. Soon after that the psychologist wrapped up the testing and gave us her opinion of what she was recommending and that was residential treatment. Her feeling was that Sweetie has been in therapy for so long and has not benefited from it, she felt she needed more intense therapy than what can be offered outpatient. I want her to talk to Ms. Dana our attachment therapist. Up until last week we had been discussing the need for residential but have been doing everything we can to avoid it. Last week she said she didn't feel it would work for Sweetie and that going to see Dr. Gregory Keck in Ohio would be the best thing for her. He is one of the leading authorities on attachment. However we would be looking at $10,000 for 10 days. That doesn't count the money lost from time out of work. So unfortunately this is not an option. My husband is completely checked out of parenting Sweetie. He lets her do what she wants and eat what she wants because it is easier than fighting with her. So that leaves everything on my shoulders. I really do not want to send Sweetie to residential. I worked so hard for so long to have a child and now they expect me to send her away for 9 months-a year. Is it my own issues that are stopping me from sending her? Am I being selfish? I do worry that she could learn worse things there. I worry she could be mistreated. But mostly I feel she will feel we have abandoned her as well. That we are indeed like everyone else, we couldn't handle her and we sent her away. It is not like she has been with us for years. Do I wait for another big incident? But how big of an incident is too big? What can the next thing be? Each big incident seems to get more intense. Even though Ms. Dana is not a fan of Intensive Home Therapy, I want to try that before we consider residential. She does not qualify for the day program, because she holds it together in school. I will wait until I talk to our attachment therapist Ms. Dana on Saturday before I decide on anything .I pray I make the right decision. The wrong decision could jeopardize her metal health for the rest of her life. I wish I knew in my heart and mind what the best thing to do was. What I think is right changes several times a day. I cannot put her there if there is any doubt in my mind and right now there is doubt. I wish I knew how to help fix her heart.

Christmas Eve With You

When you are waiting for your child to come home you have plenty of time to fantasize about the holidays with them. And like so many of our children, we have these unrealistic visions of what our first Christmas should be. You might tell yourself over and over again that your child is not capable of appreciating the gifts being showered upon her. You prepare for tantrums as best you can. You think you are ready, but then the excitement takes over and you start to anticipate that this Christmas might just turn out how you dreamed and then it all comes crashing down. Sweetie, like so many other children coming home from foster care is having huge issues during the holidays. We have been dealing with daily defiance on just about anything. I am trying to create as many moments of joy as I can. Even if it is just for a minute, we need these moments! Sweetie had another rough day yesterday. So I decided we should do a little baking therapy and made some gingerbread cookies. There is always a way to make a mess and a get a good laugh while making cookies! While we were decorating our gingerbread cookies I dabbed frosting on my nose and then Sweetie's nose. This turned into a frosting fight! Sweetie was laughing so hard she pee'd herself. It was awesome to chase her around the house trying to rub frosting in her hair and on her face! It was really awesome to see her so happy. She really is like a toddler when she drops her guard. I love to spend time with this Sweetie. She is the one who yells "Mommy and comes running to my bedroom door the minute she hears me up in the am". Now the "controlling Sweetie" is the one that was slamming the bathroom door repeatedly to wake me up just 2 minutes earlier. But at this stage of development emotionally she does not realize that 2 Sweeties are one in the same. And developmentally this is right on target for a toddler. It's called Permanency. To believe something exist even when you can't see it. It is the most basic of developmental benchmarks and so many children in foster care have a weak version of it or non at all. I do not believe Sweetie has it at all. Out of sight is truly out of mind. As if it never existed at all. I could go into her room any day and remove half her toys and she would not even know that anything was missing. I know because I have done this. When she was in the hospital, Shelli came over and we cleaned up and purged so many toys and clothing. Sh has never even asked about it. Even when she was at Shelli's house and was playing with one of the toys we cleaned out that I gave to Shelli to have at her house for her nephew to play with, she just said "I used to have one of these". This is really important because when she can't see me, it is almost as if I don't exist or as if I am not coming back. She is genuinely excited every time I do come home. She cheers and has a genuine sense of relief. Can you imagine feeling in your core that every time your loved one walked out the door they were not returning. Take that one step further and now imagine that it has happened so much that you are not upset by the fact that that person may never come back. Everyone else goes away and doesn't come back, so why expect that loved one to? That must be a scary place to live. We have been giving a gift or two a day to limit the number of gifts under the tree. Having a ton be here on Christmas morning would completely throw her into a tantrum. She will either love everything, feel unworthy of the gifts and sabotage the or she will feel she didn't get enough and will be mad about that. So either way we are sitting on top of a ticking time bomb. This really was not how I envisioned Christmas at all! These are the real things that adoptive parents face that you don't hear about. We had a wonderful service at church tonight. It was so nice to share that time with Sweetie, to sit with my arm wrapped around her, her head on my shoulder as we sang various Christmas songs. That has been the highlight of my Christmas season. I was so proud of her for sitting through the whole service. She grabbed a program and asked if we could scrapbook about it. My hope and prayer this Christmas is that the seeds that were planted in service tonight will grow and blossom in her. That she will know her worthiness. That she will come to know true unconditional love.That her heart will fully heal from the trauma and be filled with love and compassion for others. It is almost midnight on Christmas Eve and all the presents are wrapped and under the tree. I am sitting here in the glow of the Christmas tree and I reflect upon the crazy year that has passed. What a year it has been. It started as the most incredible year, followed by the greatest heartbreak of my life. But tonight I sit here a mom. Our family may be broken in ways that may never be fixed, but we are a family. We are a family full of love and laughter. That is all I could ever ask for any Christmas.

How Do You Hug A Porcupine?

I know the cartoon above is cute, but it represents our life. Anyone that gets close enough for Sweetie to begin to love is struck down with quills. I have a child who craves love and affection, but only when she wants it. When she wants it she demands it. Just like a 4 year old,she will interrupt you in the middle of making meatballs (you know hands covered in goo). But then when you want to give her a hug she rejects you and turns her back and says I don't have to hug you, I don't have to love you. Holidays are rough for kids coming out of foster care. And just like all the rest, Sweetie is no exception. Her behaviors are starting to regress. She is at war with herself. I believe that at times Sweetie wants to do the right thing, but it is just so much easier to just do what she wants. During therapy yesterday she is yelling at us that we can not control her, she can do what she wants. She doesn't care what we think and she doesn't need a family. We are stupid and we are liars. All great stuff to hear, right? She continued to try to get a rise out of us in the car on the way home and was unsuccessful. I just turned on my Christian music and sang poorly. Then Sweetie began sobbing and saying that she hates herself, that she an awful human being , that she does not deserve to have us as a family and does not deserve to live. Luckily we were a minute from a gas station, so Cris pulled over and he went in to get a drink so I could work with Sweetie. The rage and the sadness is just her fear coming out. She is so scared I will leave her. So she tries to push away so that she can control when it happens. The thing is, we are not going anywhere. We will always be her family whether she is home or in residential care. We will always love her. Our attachment therapist has prepared us for another potential hospitalization. She actually will be more surprised if she can hold it together and does not have to be admitted again. Sweetie's behaviors have been escalating to involve incidents at school of throwing things, pulling a girls hair and yelling at a teacher in after school care. I am praying that she can hold on to just get through the holidays. I know if she can, she will level out again. So for now we are having to be on top of her for everything. It really sucks, she is beginning to say things like " I can't do anything right". I make a point to praise her for everything I can. Little things like saying "thank you for listening, you did a good job". This form of parenting is exhausting. But we do not have a choice. She needs this to succeed. I have reflected a lot about the tragedy in Newtown,Connecticut. Like most people, I was deeply saddened by the news of all of those innocent children losing their lives in such an awful event. I cried many times for them. But unlike the majority, I wept for the gunman as well. Here was a young man,who obviously had mental issues that were known. The few things i have read about him make him sound as if he had Reactive Attachment Disorder. Especially the symptom of not feeling pain. Sweetie is like that. She will act like she lost a limb if she bumps her arm, but if there is major pain, her body does not even register it. This is a sign of significant RAD. I found myself wondering what his home life was really like. Not the picture perfect picture that the mom was trying to convey. These kids do not just develop RAD, it is the product of not having their basic needs met. Just the fact that a single mom had these weapons sends up red flags to me. Please do not get me wrong, what this guy did was absolutely insane. I can not help but feel if we had not come into Sweetie's life that she could escalate to such acts of violence. However, I do not live in fear. We did come into her life before it was too late. We most importantly have God to navigate us to her recovery. We have safe guards in place. We do not own guns, I do a knife count every night, I keep cleaning products and lighters locked up. We are aggressively treating Sweetie's RAD with medication as well as intense attachment therapy. She is beginning to see right from wrong. She doesn't have it mastered yet, but she at least cares if I am disappointed or not. For that, I am grateful. Do I think my child is capable of such a horrific event? Now that we are involved in her life I can say no. If we had not come into her life, there would have been potential for Sweetie to do similar horrific things. But we did come into her life. Yes, we have our issues with her, but she is developing some empathy for people. She showed some empathy for the families of the children that were killed. She could recognize that their Christmas was going to be awful. But there was no real sorrow for the lost lives. She was business as usual. So tonight like every night, I pray that Sweetie can feel our love for her. That it will make a difference in her heart and she will heal! Here is an article of another mom dealing with the same things we are...http://anarchistsoccermom.blogspot.com/2012/12/thinking-unthinkable.html I pray for all moms like me out there, that felt that twinge of anxiety of thinking if only for a second that our children could do something so horrific. I am glad God erased that doubt quickly from my heart. I feel awful for feeling it in the first place. But I am not one of those moms with my head up my bum. I know what the situation is with my daughter and I am doing everything humanly possible to help her. A song from the perspective of someone with Attachment Disorder.

Christina Perri "Arms" from Nicole Olson on Vimeo.

We are not going to lose Christmas!

One of my favorite adoptive moms out there is Christine Moers. She is amazing in her zany therapeutic parenting skills. Her videos have grounded me more than anything. I can't tell you how many times I have used her technique to "out crazy the crazy!"
Again God has used her to message to me. I am sure there are other adoptive mommas out there who need this message too. It is easy in the heat of the moment to take away things like the holidays. I know I was considering toning Christmas down this year out of fear of what will happen. For every good event we have something equally bad happen. But I can't let my fear get in the way of creating good holidays. If I cancel all of my plans out, we lose Christmas! So what,Christmas may be a chaotic mess? We will still have it! A real Christmas!

Here is the blog entry by Christine, found at
http://www.welcometomybrain.net/2012/12/you-still-cant-lose-christmas-ralphie.html.
You Can't Lost Christmas, Ralphie!

We have a law in our home. It applies to all persons, regardless of their history of trauma and endless list of survival behaviors. It was created by dictators with no democratic hope for change or removal. It goes a little something like this:

You can't lose Christmas.

That's it. No details. No exceptions. Period. Finito. That's that.

The same goes for birthdays.

I have literally said to my children, "You can burn the house down. We will move into a hotel until the house is rebuilt. We will collect insurance money, rebuy gifts and still have Christmas. Because you can't lose Christmas."

"But what if they broke their brother's DS?"

You can't lose Christmas.

"Wait. There is not an inch of our house NOT covered in urine and/or feces!"

You can't lose Christmas.

"My son called me a b****!"

Yup. One of my kids called my husband that last night (um, yeah - we couldn't help chuckling). You can't lose Christmas.

"You don't get it. My kid actually poisoned the dog."

It is horrific. Yes. Their trauma is horrific. And repair work can and should be done for the sake of their hearts. Part of that? It goes like this:

You can't lose Christmas.

Of course, this goes for whatever your major celebration is: Hanakah, Kwanza, Solstice, birthday, fill-in-the-blank.

Before I go any further, let me state that for you as a parent it is going to rip your guts inside out. You are going to hear a voice echoing in your head from some family member (or yourself) that says, "If I had ever done something like that, I wouldn't have been able to sit down for a week or would've been grounded for a month of Sundays!" You are going to feel like you are letting your child get away with something.

In those moments there are a few things I keep in mind to help me calm and remember what is truly going on.

Trauma has jacked with the brains of our kids. In a stressful moment/week/season they get stuck in a part of their brain that was meant to only be visited on occasion, in extreme circumstances. Our kids also find themselves regressed emotionally and developmentally in those times. They can be, quite literally, a three-year-old in a 12-year-old body.

Imagine a three year old kicking and biting and hitting two days before Christmas. Throwing toys and scratching up the family dining room set. Having a massive tantrum. Would we take Christmas away? Nope. That's crazy talk. A three year old cannot understand the magnitude of what they're doing when they feel out of control. We would redirect in the moment. When they are calm, we would reconnect with them and give them an opportunity to do the same. That is how we heal and guide young children. Our kids need the exact same thing. There is a reason they do these crazy things that are just so beyond description. They are camped in a part of their brain that wanted to kick them out long ago.

Family celebrations and holidays are an opportunity to imprint into their minds and hearts: you are a part of this family. Period. Finito. You can never lose that.

Personally, this makes me angry. If anger is a miscue for what is really going on inside of me, then I have to admit that it makes me feel ... hmmm ... powerless? As though I lack authority in my own home? I have this overwhelming desire to make sure that my kids know just how BAD their behavior was. So (in my head), my reaction to cursing should be somewhat extreme. My reaction to destruction of property or violence should be over-the-top. That is my default. That feels like the right thing to do.

You can't behave this way and cause such utter havoc in a home and still get Christmas? Right?

RIGHT?

It's the way almost all of us were raised. It's the way our parents were raised. It didn't cause more damage to many of us, because we received and maintained that vital nurturing and connection in the earliest years. We could handle some very authoritarian and militant responses from parents, because we had a trust in them. We believed we would be taken care of. We were functioning on top of a base that had been built years before.

Our children are trying to function on quick sand.

They don't believe they deserve celebrations. They don't believe they deserve a family and stability and genuine love. They assume, all the time, that the bottom is going to drop out again. So, they take what little control they do have. They go ahead and try to sabotage the good. At least they can decide when it happens. In their minds, that's something.

"But if we do this, we aren't teaching our kids right from wrong. They'll think what they did was okay."

Really? When was the last time your child became dysregulated and gave you a back rub because they didn't know right from wrong? They have got the right-from-wrong thing down to a SCIENCE!

"But they'll think I'm okay with it!"

Again ... why do you think they did it in the first place? They KNOW that most humans are not okay with it. When you stay therapeutic, stay calm and in control, continue to create a space where they can be heard even when speaking through behaviors ... you are finally teaching them the thing they don't believe. Some adults can be trusted. Some love can be safe. THAT is where the magic happens.

Otherwise, when we enter that battle and begin the snowball of consequences, we are feeding the shame. You are not a bad person for doing that. You are HUMAN for doing that. I've done it a gazillion times, myself. Because I'm human, too.

And do you know what makes it even harder? We don't see the shame. We don't see the hurt many times. We see anger and narcissism on crack. It looks like our children don't care. They don't care what we give them. They don't care what is taken away. Or we see rage. Manipulation. Sass. Or we see ALL of that, depending on the day!

The more aloof your child appears, the more they are trying to hide their pain. The more angry your child appears, the more they are trying to hide their fear. The things your child yells at others is a direct reflection of the very things they believe about themselves. Sit with that. For your own sake, and to keep breathing right now, just sit with it. Do not beat yourself up. Just sit. Absorb. Take a moment to take care of yourself before you move forward, even in your reading and thinking.

When we know better, we do better. And messing up in parenting is like GOLD! Sometimes it does more good than if you'd rocked it in the first place. No ... really.

If you have already told your kid they have lost Christmas, just fix it. Walk in and say, "Ya' know, I've been thinking. I realize that you have been feeling stressed. You're actually trying to talk to me with how you are behaving, and I have been stressed too - so I wasn't listening! Geeez. What a mess, huh? Well, I'm sorry. I totally messed up. Did you know grown-ups mess up? Well, you do now. Cause I blew it. Could I have a do-over? When I said you lost Christmas, I made a mistake. In fact, I would like to make a law in our home: you can't lose Christmas. Is it cool with you if we make that law?"

When you mess up and fix it and reconnect, you do amazing things toward healing in your child. It. is. gold.

Okay, okay, okay. I say all of that to also say this:

I get it.

This sucks.

So, what are you doing for you? "Do not focus on your child's behavior all the time. Do not become obsessed." Find you again. Take care of you. Keep Christmas in place, and find a way to love on your own heart and your own mind. Step away from the trauma. Let it carry on while you carry yourself. Five minutes here and there.

Minutes well spent.

Make sure everyone has their Christmas, everyone has their family ... even if it doesn't look like what we always dreamed.

Let me love you...

One of the hardest parts of loving a hurt child is when the can't receive love. I mean really accept it and take it into their hearts. There are times when I doubt that I am really getting through to Sweetie's heart and there are other times when I believe that I am. I have to believe that I am! There is no other option. 

I know so many adoptive moms. And each has such different obstacles to overcome to be able to have their child accept that they are without a shadow of a doubt loved. Sweetie has been here for almost 6 months and we have been communicating with her almost 8 months. It seems so short and yet it feels like forever.

Even with being here day in and day out, through everything Sweetie still believes we will leave her, that I will leave her. No matter what I say or what my actions are, there is still a deep seeded fear that I will abandon her. Sweetie is bonding to me. I can see it. It scares her to death. She has begun to open up in therapy about the horrors of her life. When she does share things she always looks at me and says " I thought you wouldn't love me if you knew". It really saddens me that she feels afraid to tell me things because she believes I will not love her. That must be such a scary place to live. I will continue to love her as I have. I continue to have a very structured routine with her, but I also try to have fun and laugh. She has the most wonderful laugh when she really does laugh. There are many tears in our house lately. Sweetie is really starting to process the many events of her life that landed her in foster care. With each new secret she is met with more love, more understanding and absolutely no judgement. I love her all the same. Part of why she can start to move on is they found a home for Sweetie's sister Angie in Florida. Someone willing to take her and the baby she is carrying. This has taken a load off of Sweetie's shoulders. She is very happy about this. She understands it is what is for the best. She says she is happy now that Angie has a family too. 

Now we can really work on healing. Thanks to a friend sharing her awesome experiences with EMDR I discussed it with Sweetie's therapist and we are going to add that to her therapy. Sweetie seems really interested in this process as well. She wants to be able to get the flashes of memories out of her head. She has them several times a day. The best way for us to understand  is to imagine a movie of the worst events of your life replaying in your mind over and over again. I do not doubt that this is what causes children like Sweetie to seem like they have ADHD. They are trying to keep the movie from playing, and as long they are moving or talking (Singing) the movie stops for that moment. But the minute quiet settles in they are left with their thoughts and the movie starts up again. I am praying that this will be a key to her healing. If she can stop the movie from replaying and reopening old deep wound then she will have a better chance of absorbing all the love I pour into her. 

I always hear music that is so appropriate for what is going on in this moment in our lives. God really has a way of messaging through the arts. Even though this song is not original made for a relationship between a mother and daughter, it is perfect for us. 

Great article ...

Combatting the Holiday "Gimme Gimmes" with Foster & Adopted Kids - Part I

Do the holidays transform your foster or adopted child into Veruca Salt?

Those of us who parent adopted or fostered younguns have all probably been exposed to this commonly held idea that somehow our children should be "grateful" to us for "saving" them from a life of [insert something awful here - poverty, addiction, homelessness, abuse, neglect, etc.] Most of us who have taken the time to learn more about foster care and adoption roll our eyes at people who tell us how lucky our kids are. We either tell them "No, we're the lucky ones", or we regale them with a lecture about how even though adoption or foster care can be positive things they are also rife with grief and loss. Or we grit our teeth and just move on. We certainly do not expect our kids to be grateful towards us for "saving" them, we don't expect them not to feel grief or resentment about their being with us instead of their birth family, and we try not to expect them to be any more grateful than a non-adopted child would be. But what about when our foster or adopted children actually act the exact opposite of this myth of the grateful adoptee? What about when they act downright spoiled and entitled?

I have noticed with my older foster son that the holidays bring up all kinds of issues. One challenge for us is that he starts to get the "gimme gimmes" (also known as the "I wants") and seems more than a little like Veruca Salt from Charlie & the Chocolate Factory:

No matter what we buy him, it isn't enough. It's not the right thing. It's not as much or as good as what he should have gotten. In fact, a full two months before Christmas and Chanukah, he was telling us that he already knew we weren't going to get him anything and that the holidays were going to suck. He even tried to tell us we didn't get him anything last year (um, yeah, right!)

It's early November and I can see the selfishness rising, rising, rising like a tide that is about to attempt to flood our family life emotionally. But is it really selfishness? Sure, it's bratty, spoiled, and entitled behavior... but I have some suspicions about why this is the case with so many foster and adopted kids:

Kids who really did not have enough when they were with their birth families, whether they were short on food or were not able to celebrate the holidays due to poverty, have anxiety about scarcity. Even though part of them knows things are different now, they are trying to prepare themselves ahead of time for the massive disappointment of going without. The holidays were always a let-down, so it's better to prepare themselves for another let-down than to let themselves be hopeful. Therefore, they start to focus on all the things they want but that their parents won't get them.
Foster children or children adopted at an older age may worry that they are not going to get treated equally to biological family members when it comes time for the holidays.
Kids who had scarcity in their previous lives may have a really obsessive relationship with the few things their birth family did provide (such as presents at holidays, or having nice clothes even if they went without meals). Kids who had scarcity before but in their adoptive or foster homes have since gotten used to having lots of "things" may have developed an unhealthy level of investment in material things, combined with lack of confidence that they will always have their needs met. Their self-esteem may be greatly based on what they own.
Foster kids and kids who live in group homes or orphanages rarely get to own much of anything that belongs exclusively to them and that they can trust will remain with them. If this is part of your kid's history it may cause them to seem over-attached or under-attached to belongings.
Children may miss what they remember of their birth family's holiday traditions, even those that have nothing to do with gifts. Perhaps a child who's acting like an entitled brat about what they expect to get as gifts at the holidays is actually a child who is simply mourning the loss of the smells, sights, tastes, and feelings of holiday celebrations with their birth family and hoping to get some solace through extra attention from you or from material comforts like toys or candy.
I've been told many times that kids who have been through a lot of loss and trauma often get what is dismissively referred to as a "victim complex." As they enter puberty and beyond they start to feel like the world owes them something - Maybe a lot of somethings. They may feel like having money or material things they want can help provide restitution for the ways in which they have suffered in their life.
Those of us whose foster or adopted kids have behavioral and emotional issues may be more than a little tempted to help quell the child's outbursts with material rewards (toys, treats, etc). This may lead them to expect that an outburst or causing a scene at the store will result in them getting what they want. Also, some kids may have had birth parents who were unable to set limits with them, resulting in kids experiencing that the way to get their desires met is to act demanding.
Foster kids, in particular, may be very aware of the ways in which their lives are different than the lives of their peers. Having the toys and clothing their peers have, or even more and better things, may help them feel like they'll fit in better or be able to override any stigma that comes from being a foster child.
Let's face it, we may bring some of this "gimme gimme" awfulness on ourselves by overdoing holidays and buying too many toys when our kids first arrive, as a way of making up for not having a lot in the house for them yet, or as a way of helping them not feel as sad about not being without their birth families for the holidays. We may unconsciously buy them more than they need in order to make them like us, inadvertently teaching them that the holidays are all about their every want being fulfille.
And let's not forget, foster and adopted kids are children first and foremost. Most kids just get crazy around holiday times, just ask any parent you know. Selfishness is a trait all parents have to teach their children to overcome because children are inherently ego-driven creatures and most of us are raising them in a very consumerist culture. This is not exclusive to children from trauma backgrounds or who are fostered or adopted. But there are many ways to teach children to question consumerism, to feel empathy for others, and to engage in acts of charity.

An upcoming post will focus on how our families can find meaning in the holidays beyond gift-giving. You can help me build that post by answering these questions and encouraging your friends to do the same!

How do you battle the "gimme gimmes" around the holidays?

How do you instill in your children, whether biological or non-biological, a sense of holiday meaning that goes beyond gifts?

How do you teach altruism, charity and sharing to children whose histories have led them to have a fear of scarcity?