An Update and a Quandry

Man, it has been a hot minute since I last posted. We’ve just been doing our thing all summer, and now the kiddos are back in school and things have been getting…interesting.

RB just turned 13 (!!!) and seems to really be struggling with teenager-hood. We have had a resurgence of rage episodes and tantrums, and a whole lot of treating me like dirt because he is angry at his bio mom. But life goes on, and he has still come a long way from where he used to be.

Little S isn’t so little any more, she’s starting 3rd grade! She’s sassy, quick witted, and vacillates between a ton of fun and a holy terror.

A and A2 have both been getting closer to moving out. A2 actually went back and finished high school (woot!) and A just got a job at a bank. It’s cool to see how far they have both come.

In the midst of all this Life Happening, it appears that Life has just Happened. A2 just told us today that her little 10 year old half sister KL, was pulled into care. Even worse, she was pulled into care the night the investigator first showed up, which speaks to just how bad things were. We love KL, and we’ve had her over for weekends fairly often, so now I feel like we are a bit stuck.

I don’t think we can take her. Especially with how moody and angry RB has been, it feels like there is just too much going on to be able to balance everything. But I WANT to. I really love this kid, and since non related kinship placement is a thing we wouldn’t even have to go through the trouble of relicensing in the foster care system. But how could we? I don’t know that we could make it work. But how can we not? What happens to this kid who has been through so much if we don’t step up?

It really feels like an impossible situation. I’m praying about it a lot. I just wish I knew what the right thing to do was.

House Rule

We have a set of house rules, as many families do, but our number 1 rule is definitely our most stated. “This house is a safe place.” It’s our guiding principle, the thing we’ve built our family culture on.

And it works.

Not perfectly, not always, but enough to make a difference. All of our children know the rule, all our friends know the rule, and pretty much anyone who is in our house for more than five minutes knows the rule. We have created an intentional space of safety and love, and they know it.

I know our kids know the rule because they follow it, but I also know they have internalized it because they bring people home to it. RB had a friend who was an immigrant and scared of his own shadow, and RB brought him in and kept reassuring him that he didn’t have to be scared because our house is safe. A brought home a very hurting young person struggling with their gender identity and with mental illness, and that friend now calls us their “side family”. We’ve had our kids bring in friends who were victims of abuse, knowing we would shelter them.

I probably sound like I’m bragging, and maybe I am a little bit. I’m not proud of much in life, but I am so very proud of the household of love and safety that R and I have worked to create. Seeing our kids feel safe and want to share that safety with other vulnerable kids makes me feels like I’ve done something truly worthwhile. It’s not all my work, not by a long shot, but I have had a hand in making something beautiful.

Overreacting

RB has a curious habit that I’ve seen in kids before, but I am at a loss as to how to deal with it. Being an extremely active preteen boy, he has a tendency to get minor injuries on a regular basis. Scraped knees, stubbed toes, occasional headache, that sort of thing. However, he will take that minor injury and overreact more than I would have thought possible.

We’re talking the screaming, sobbing, no-holds-barred reaction you might get from someone who just cut off their own leg with a lawnmower. If you heard it, you’d think he was dying in agony, and I’m never quite sure what to do with it. What is the appropriate parental response? Does he want attention, so I should just roll with it? Does he want attention, so I shouldn’t reward a manipulative behavior? Does he need boundaries, so I should calmly tell him to stop overreacting? Is he so disconnected from his own sensations that he truly believes he’s in that much pain?

My standard practice is to administer whatever first aid I can (bandaid, ice pack, Advil, etc), validate that it hurts, and leave it at that. However, that doesn’t always work. At the moment he is in his room SOBBING because he has a headache. I had him drink water and gave him medicine and then told him to lay down quietly for a bit, but he’s straight up caterwauling. Which will probably not help his headache.

My current theory is that because he never got basic care when he was young, he believes he needs to be completely over the top to get his needs met. But aside from just continuing to meet his needs that we try our best to meet anyway, I don’t know what to do here.

In Which RB is Hilarious

And now, for a brief anecdote.

RB was saying something and used a double negative, “nobody can do nothing about it”. So naturally I corrected him and said “that’s a double negative, you just said that somebody can do something about it”.

He then hits me with “Did you just reverse psychology me?!?”

ML Heartbreak

I am absolutely gutted and in shock. ML has always been one of the kids I really worry for, but tonight my worries came true. She’s safe now and with her mom, but it’s still awful.

ML was walking to a friend’s house. She accepted a ride from a strange man. She was sexually assaulted.

It’s so common a story that it’s practically a trope, but I desperately wanted to spare ML from having that story be hers. She’s only 16. I’m so heartbroken.

I encouraged her to call the police, and I let her know I’m here if she wants to talk. But this is one of those times when what I can offer to one of my beautiful kids is totally, woefully inadequate.

It just isn’t fair.

Festive Trauma

I’m beating a dead horse at this point writing about Christmas being complicated for my kiddos, but every year it’s yet another reminder that holidays do not look the same through a lens of trauma.

A has always enjoyed Christmas, but it can still bring up some rough memories for her. She was the scapegoat in her bio family, so she’s very sensitive about things like whether or not she’s getting as much attention or as many gifts as everyone else. It looks selfish on the surface sometimes, but it’s really rooted in a deep fear of not belonging and not feeling like ‘enough’.

A2 is the one who has the hardest time with it. Her main abuser’s birthday is on Christmas, so it brings up a LOT of feelings. She is doing her best to keep ahead of the ptsd responses, but it really is tough. She’s joining us for most of the festivities, but sitting others out.

RB was the big surprise this year. He did pretty well with Christmas last year and he says he’s been looking forward to it, but he’s been an absolute beastie this past week. When questioned about it, he revealed that he’s remembering a lot of really terrible Christmases he had in the past. For example, being sent to his room when everyone else was opening gifts because he was the only one who “didn’t deserve Christmas”. He was seven. So that’ll stick with a person.

However RB apparently really does enjoy the day. He made me cry when he told me that he was excited for this year because last year was the first time he had ever had a good Christmas, and that he knows this year will be good too.

Little S of course hasn’t experienced holiday trauma and, as a mostly normal 7yo, she loves Christmas.

If I am being entirely honest (which I try to be), I sometimes grieve the kind of Christmases my crew will never have. Our family will never have an uncomplicated hallmark-esque holiday, and our Christmas will always be bittersweet. It makes me sad for my kids, and a tiny, shameful bit wistful for what could have been if we had never opened our doors to the beautiful mess that is my three oldest children. I would never trade them, not for a million perfect Christmases, but sometimes it stings a little. Still, I just do the best I can and keep moving forward. Because our Christmases are messy, but so was the very first Christmas. The baby born in a barn 2000 years ago didn’t come to make things easy, He came to make them right. My job is to remember why we celebrate, and to do my best to show my kids the love and grace that is given to me every single day.

Adopted!

We did the thing, and RB is officially a part of our family! 🎉 😁 🥳

Everything went smoothly with our “virtual court”, the judge was very laidback and congratulated us all, and several family members who live out of state were able to join the video call and see it all go down. My mother may or may not have cried….also A and I both may have been guilty of tearing up. Now we’re having celebratory grilled cheese (RB requested) and spamming friends with pictures. It’s a good day.

Out of the Airplane

Our court date for RB’s adoption is less than a week away! R and I are very excited, but we’re also acutely aware of the distress that it is causing RB. It isn’t that he doesn’t want to be adopted, he does. However, adoption is as much of a loss as it is a gain for the child, and RB is still struggling to process that.

We see a lot of back-and-forth. One second it’s “I love you guys” and “I love our family”, and the next second it’s “You’re not my REAL mom” and “Why should I have to do chores? I’m not actually a part of your family.” I know that he wants to be adopted, but misses his bios. He loves us, but wishes his bios could have loved him better and resents us for not being them.

I think it was a bit easier with A when we adopted her. She was almost 18, so she had a much better grasp on what adoption was and had dealt much more with her own trauma. With RB though, we’re just trying to validate his feelings as much as possible and allow him whatever space he needs to process. After court, we are going to do a private little ceremony to try and honor the grief he must be feeling.

If I’m being honest, I have mixed feelings as well. While we love RB, adoption isn’t easy, and RB is not an easy kid. We’re signing on legally for a lot of complications and hurt, and there is no escape plan. I wouldn’t want there to be, of course, but…what if? In addition, there is a lot of guilt placed upon adoptive parents both by society, by adoptees, and by other adoptive parents. We are ‘supposed to’ feel certain ways and never question this decision, otherwise we are terrible and should never have adopted in the first place. Bull crap. Telling adoptive parents not to have doubts is like telling someone about to jump from an airplane that their nerves are silly. “After all, you wanted this!” Yes, I did and I still do. That doesn’t change the fact that it is a big humongous deal. We are very high up, and if our parachute doesn’t work our entire family goes splat.

So yeah, that’s where we’re at. A stomach churning joy/fear/excitement/doubt/love mix. Out of the airplane we go!

A Quandary

RB has presented me with an interesting quandary, and it’s right up there with some of ML’s old antics.

I was doing laundry today when somehow, our kitten got herself stuck inside the couch. Not under, inside. I discovered this when S ran into the room in a tizzy saying “The kitten got stuck and RB cut a hole in the couch to get her out!”

Oh. Oh no.

I hurry downstairs to the living room and see a triumphant RB holding a steak knife amidst tufts of couch stuffing, next to scattered cushions and a very ruffled kitten. He informed me that the kitten had gotten stuck, so he heroically leaped into action by grabbing a knife from the kitchen and cutting an extremely large hole in the bottom of the couch.

He was quite proud.

I stood there shocked for a moment. I then tried to very gently acknowledge that yes, he did ‘rescue’ the kitten, but that a much better choice would have been to come get me instead. I told him I wasn’t angry, but that if cutting the furniture needed to happen he needed to leave it to the adults.

After I said this, RB got VERY upset, told me not to talk to him anymore, and ran to his room in tears.

I’m not sure what kind of trauma trigger I unintentionally hit, but clearly I hit something. My quandary then, is what I’m supposed to do with that. I don’t want him feeling like he’s the worst kid ever or that he’s in trouble, but I also don’t want him feeling like going all vigilante-slasher on the furniture is an acceptable course of action.

I need a solution that involves preserving both his self esteem AND the couch.

A2 Makes Progress

This kid, man. I love this kid. She has certainly had her ups and downs, but I cannot stress enough how hard she has worked and how much progress she has made. When I texted to check on her today and she sent me this, I cried.