Would I do it again?

I was reading the blog of an amazing single adoptive mom I felt inspired to talk a bit about the question of whether I would adopt a child like my Alex again. I have been doodling about other things but I thought I should take a break and share my perspective.


I understand about not giving advice concerning the decision to adopt. I too tell people to search their hearts and think about it. I also tell them that everyone breaks when parenting this kind of child; the difference is in how you respond and what you decide to make of it. I became a different person because of my son. I like to think I became more human.


Someone asked me recently if I would do it again. It just happened to be a day when I was tired of it being an extra effort week. I first thought no, I wouldn’t do it again. It was so hard. It takes so much. I’d rather go to the gym than sit in yet another school meeting. I’d rather read one of my favorite ancient Greek authors than push reading with long “o” and long “i”. I am so tired of playing the adding game with Alex every spare moment in between doctor visits, etc.


Then I look at my son and I see the dramatic difference I have made in his life. A child lost was saved. A child thrown away has a place in the world now. I gave a human being a chance. He can do with it what he will. I hope for the best of course but I will live with the rest. He is my son.


I do believe that my son hardened my position about adoption. Yet, I cannot say I would persuade anyone to my position because it is simply the one I believe I am meant to take. I would be reluctant to try and persuade anyone to the path because it takes such a personal expenditure of strength and dedication. It also requires the destruction of your prior life to some extent. I also hope that my children would think twice about making such a choice. But then I remember how wonderful Alex was with traumatized foster children in my home. He literally helped them heal before my eyes. His history has given him such empathy for another child who has been in harms way, so I don’t know. The choice would be his.


Then, I remember that when I adopted my daughter I specifically looked for a kid that needed a special kind of Mom. I often joked about it but it is true – I did it again just to let people know the first time wasn’t an accident. It wasn’t a mistake. I meant to be their Mom.


And then, despite all the dire prognostications, she came home a normal little girl. No drama. No nightmares. Nothing. She may be ODD but she does in such a charming, passive aggressive way, it is like a breath of fresh air. It makes me laugh. It is also part of her survival tool arsenal so I work at redirecting her life and let it ride just a bit. Unlike a lot of adoptive parents I walked down the hallway saw, heard and smelled the living hell of her life. Me and another were severely worried about our safety. I am still at a loss as to how to talk about that place. Having been there gives me a bit of an intimate perspective as to why she does some of what she does. I just hope she lets up on torturing her teachers soon.


I think part of the reason I adopted, and would do it again is because I have seen the difference I make. I wrote last week about a van driver for Alex’s school hitting him. I would like to point out that the little boy I once knew would have hit back and/or escalated to such an extent he would have literally torn the inside of the van apart. He would have become a screaming monster, uncontrollable in the extreme. He would have opened doors and attempted to jump into oncoming traffic. It has happened in the past.


Instead, last week he came off the van went to his grandmother’s vehicle (because they were to go meet me) and just sobbed uncontrollably. He did not know I was there. When I opened that door he reached out to me and held on tight. We then tried to get the school to stop the problem. The director’s office of the special ed department said they would not stop the situation. They said nothing happened despite witnesses and evidence.


Tonight we filed a police report about the assault on Alex. He told the police officer what happened. He got to tell. What a miracle for Alex. Not only was he able to talk about it, but someone listened. A police officer would not let a man hit him. All trauma kids should get a chance to experience their trauma in a healing way. Alex learned that it is not OKAY for someone to hurt you. He got back a bit of his faith in humanity.


I have never met this van driver, the one the school district will not reassign, but I do not feel the least bit kindly toward him. I need to keep at least fifty feet away from him because I am so mad that he hit Alex. Actually I am so beyond rage at this person. I think of all the stuff that Alex has done, blah, blah, blah in addition to all the thousands of hours he raged and generally tried to destroy the house, myself, himself or anything else within reach and I never once raised a hand to him. I think about all many, many, many hours spent with trauma therapists, psychologists and head docs trying to get this one little boy stable and I find myself less than happy with one man who felt it was okay to yell and hit my son during a less than five minute ride home.

So we filed the police report. And I watched the police officer get Alex to tell her things I hadn’t thought about. I saw my very wonderfully honest son tell her about his experience. He made me so proud. He did a good job of explaining himself.

Yeah, I would do it again. My son was thrown away and lost. He has been found. Here, close to my heart he will remain. My son does okay. We all do okay.

Have a great Friday, Mama Sarah

Thought about the Adoption Wars this weekend and stripped wallpaper

The boy wonder helped for most of the weekend when he was not doing homework or reading. Daria has continued her refusal to do work at school so she spent much of the weekend also doing homework as well has her school work sent home while I stripped wallpaper off by hand.

The house my Mom used to live in before joining us two blocks away has lath and plaster walls so it was unclear what I would face when peeling decades of wallpaper so I did the job by hand. For the most part it was much better than expected. I got enough done to do a test of the texturing I will apply once it is all gone. Pretty nice but it sure smells awful. I probably need to break out the summer fans and make sure the kids do not come over when I do that part.

Other than that and a few other minor things, the house will be good to go. I remain conflicted about what to do about it so for the interim I will set up my doll house projects there. I have a millenary that is built, has most of the stuff bought to fill it and still needs to be wired. It is four feet long by 2 ½ wide so it needs some room. I also need to finish wiring the outside street lamp that came with it and figure out something for the landscaping. Yikes, and I thought I could exhibit it by May. Probably not.

There is also the Beacon house with mansard roofs and three stories. There are at least two other 1 inch scale doll houses in partial states of being built that were moved to the garage when my house started filling with toddlers. Of course boy wonder and princess have their own doll houses complete with individualized furniture. Alex has been going to local doll house conventions with me for a couple of years so he already has a “collection” going.

That reminds me; a relative of my last pre-adoptive foster child sent me a picture of the toddler a week into her new placement. It is a picture to hurt the heart of any mama. The little girl is smiling for the camera and is sitting on a rocking horse but her eyes are so sad. It is clear that she has been crying so much that her face and eyes are raw and puffy. The happy and sweet little girl I knew is not in that picture. The joy she was once filled with is gone. I pray for that child every day. I pray that God hears her heart and finds what is best for that child.

So the state did what all of us hoped would not happen – they did not do what was best for that child. She will be the third generation of her birth family (on both sides) lost to the state system of determining what is best for children. She is another child is lost to hope.

That is one of the lessons learned in the adoption wars. Children are lost all the time. Children are abused by the bureaucratic systems charged with their care. The feelings, hopes and preferences of children are disregarded. They are not given a choice. People who do not know them decide their fate. People who do not know them scar these children in harms’ way for life. They break the hearts of children.

The adoption wars are not for the faint of heart. People with gentle souls need to get out of the field because there is a lot of heart ache to go around.

The children that come home to us are so much more precious given that reality. I have learned that through my kids.

Doing the right thing for kids is hard. Every day, I do what I think I need to do and then I hope. Alex for sure is a difficult case given all the abuse and prior in-country adoptive disruption he suffered. We are attached but who knows. Given his particulars I was tearfully prepared to be the one that adopted him but had to disrupt so that he could attach to a second family. I have heard about that reality so many times and my heart simply hurts for the parents faced with that choice. I remain convinced it is a choice forced by the child for a variety of reasons. I remain a lucky girl that Alex decided to attached and remain with me. At the end of the day it was his choice.

Anyway, anyway, anyway. I still have way too many doll house kits. I am currently working in quarter scale at the house because it is smaller and easier to manage but I am now dreaming of setting up all the one inch scale unfinished projects and working on them. I have just stacks and stacks and stacks of unbuilt houses. The joy of it all! Right now I need to stop thinking about the adoption wars and go build something before I go to bed.

The kids are bringing their trains, cars, baby dolls and fairies to play in amongst my houses. We have balance. Life is good. Have a wonderful day, Mama Sarah

Back to the Boy Wonder - My Miracle

I thought the next blog I would be posting would be about the fact that his first round of braces came off yesterday and he was a champ. He is my hero, but the story of his awesomeness at the orthodonist's office took a second chair to his trauma of today.

Living with PTSD does get better. We also learn how to navigate life so as to minimize exposing the trauma person to triggers but life is life and sometimes PTSD heals enough that a person can function again in the face of violence even it seeks them out again. I had a great example of that today.

First, Alex had an awesome day at school. Finally the teachers listened to me about the fact that he had been transferred at the wrong grade level, allowed him to move down into the next room and he did amazing. Absolutely amazing.

Then, Alex got in the van to come home. We live less that ten minutes away but he
is transported to and from school because that is what my school district does for the kids in a B-room or better. I just happened to be home today dropping off Daria before I headed back to work and my Mom told me my son had just been dropped off sobbing. My kid was just short of hysterical. I asked what happened and the driver not only had yelled at him but he had punched him in the knee so hard he was limping. And sobbing. Alex had been punched so hard there was a red mark on his knee cap when the contract transport company told me to check for it. (They told me they thought Alex was lying even though they could hear him sobbing and telling me what was said in the background.)

Setting aside all the people who have heard from me and are going to hear from me; my first concern was for my son. In that other country he lived in before he came home there was a failed adoption wherein the abuse by the adoptive father was so horrific my brain still has a hard time thinking about all the things Alex had to say about it. My son also carries PTSD memories of abuse by older boys. Needless to say I was in a bit of a panic when my sobbing son told me what had happened.

Then amazing thing happened. He did not go into PTSD mode. Then, at some point I realized he has been coping with icky things for awhile. I am not saying he did not still cry and hurt, but he saw me wade in and start to take care of it. I called all the people and made the complaints and demands. I let him tell what he thought they needed to hear about it all. I held him on my lap and gave him comfort. We made a plan if that man showed up again. We made a second plan. And then he calmed down.

He told me to go back to work and then the gym and I did. He told me I needed to go the pool because it made me happy and that he would be okay. He told me he could call if things got bad for him. He got over it. I got home and things were fine. I have the sound monitors on high tonight but I do not think any of the PTSD will trigger.

Alex and I got to this point by hanging on together. We are the lucky ones - we found each other and were allowed to hang on and become a family together. Today Alex dealt with an issue that would have set him back months and months in the beginning. I think I am having a worse time than he is – who knew. It must be a mama thing.


So, I was orginally going to have this post be about Alex being a hero.
He got his latest round of braces off yesterday and given his special cleft situation, we took mold, after mold of his mouth. Towards the end he struck a beautiful yogi pose complete with the complicated leg folding and everything and endured.

My son – the Zen master of orthodontia. I wish I had taken a picture instead of simply being enchanted by the beauty and endurance of my son’s soul.

My son - the Zen master of surviving sucessfully. He is my hero.

Rumor is that, the braces I put on years ago to help him deal with his mouth issues, will come off next week. I hate them and cannot wait for them to be gone. My son has told me he will come and hold my hand because I will probably cry a lot. He is right. I may have taught him the pose and mentality but I totally hate people touching my teeth more than I love peaceful space.

I am blessed to have such a wonderful little boy.

Just a quick note on my being told I will never adopt through my State because I am single

It isn't because of anything I did and/or didn't do. It isn't because of anything Alex did and/or didn't do. They had us under a microscope for 26 months and found nothing in even the most trying of circumstances. They even acknowledge that fact.

They just will not let me adopt because I am single. That is not an okay reason. That is not a legally defensible reason. I have been trying to work with my state's Governor's advocacy office but while they are nice, it does not look promising. I have also filed with the federal agency that oversees state agencies concerning adoption. That agency openly publishes their decisions that reverse state actions that are happening to me with less evidentiary grounds.

I wonder how many people out there did not know their state was not the last word on this issue. I wonder how many potentially awesome parents are turned away by such state activities. I wonder how many mama hearts have been broken.

That being said, I am in the process of getting another blog up about this issue because I think it is timely. There are lots of kids that need a home. I suspect there are a lot of parents out there that simply are being denied the opportunity to offer their home to these kids in need for no good reason.

Kind of makes me weep.

Wow - what a day!

Wow. I am still reading the blog of what may be my new hero. And I thought my day went a bit south. At least do not have teenagers – yet. Yikes. I am already bracing for when Alex is driving age. He is so not going to be okay with me hiding the car keys until he is twenty. But I will unless I see his emotional age come up to meet his intellectual and physical age. There are two schools of thought on this issue of course. Some say he will and some say he won’t make the emotional leap forward. I plan for the worst and hope for the best. Alex has a way of surprising people.

Anyway, I finished putting everyone to bed and had a bit of a hissy fit complete with yelling and a few stomps that only my Mom saw. Today has SO not been my day.

I had a couple of those special ed meetings today for two different kids. At one meeting I had to be nice to a teacher that has made it so much more difficult for my little one home from Russia for only nine months. I so wanted to tell her all about it in Russian which I studied for my kids. That teacher speaks Russian so communication is not an issue. I so am not happy with people who treated cleft kids differently. Of course I was the adult and let it go. But I was not happy.

I then was the treat fairy to my kid’s classrooms and watched my nine-year-old disengage from reading time. No wonder he gets marked down for his behavior during that time of the day. I have never seen such poor, yet still complying with the rules, behavior. Wow. I am so incredibly impressed that he can behave so poorly while keeping the classroom rules. Surely such genius can be channeled for the greater good. He does take a person to the edge of sanity though – I feel for his teacher who is awesome but has thrown in the towel so we are going to try a different room.

Sometimes, as the daughter of a Marine, I think I should just hand out at mental helmets and flack jackets to my son’s teachers. That kid can really break a person down.

It wasn’t even 10 am when I hit the office at work and that was a crazy, crazy, crazy day there. I also got a call from the Governor’s office concerning the adoption issue on the home front that just meant I spent the night gathering papers, scanning them and then sending them by email. Apparently it was okay for state case workers to basically refuse to address the complaint - that is until the Governor's office heard I had already filed the discrimination complaint with the federal government.

Then, only then, did my Governor's office, charged with investigating discrimination begin to move. They kicked their state law obligations to the county level and they are out of time. I think I am sad. I do not know what to do to help them be better. I want them to be better because children and parents are desperately looking to them to help everyone. Frankly, if my super liberal county workers find a single woman with a strong support system and an excellent job unacceptable, what about all the others? I have a good parenting track record - what happens to the others?

I like the person I talk to there but my heart wonders - how many awesome parents are lost for kids that need them. I know I am awesome parent. I do it every day. I have done this for the state kids too.

Opportunities in life are like windows in time. Building families in time takes windows of opportunity. The windows of the parents need to line up with the windows of the kid(s) – those are the moments of opportunity - and then we all need to leap. We trust those who help line it all up. I do not yet know what to say about when the people we trust to hold our hands as we leap fail us.

I sought the state adoption option because their website described such a robust post-adoption support system. Given I had such little agency support in my first adoption I found that description to be so amazingly wonderful. Little did I know that the people touting their post-adoption support system would one day tell me I could never adopt because I was single. That was unexpected.

So I was nice to the Governor's office person and said I would send all that I had. Then my email server crashed partway through. Goodness it has been a day.

Anyway, the kids were in high gear – deregulation everywhere. I think I did go into the kitchen and cry a bit just so that I would not totally lose it. Calmness is the only path through it all. I used to say at work – fake it until you make it. That approach kind of works for the kids too. Even when I am so not calm, as long as the kids think I am, it all eventually evens out. Of course my hair is turning white at an amazing rate. Good thing I am blond. ;)

This day used to be one of my favorites. I love hearts, the color pink and I am kind of a sappy girl – sometimes. Now I see my kids struggle with this message of love and what it means in their lives. The kids try so hard. They misbehave and still hope for the box of chocolate. I was so close to eating their lovely candy last night – they just do not know how much I love them and want to give them more than they think they deserve.

I think this holiday will be hard for them until that feeling of love seems like something they can have – forever. And maybe they will never know for sure. I can be okay with that too. I will still try to make sure they know I love them – no matter what.

My son made me a bracelet made of hearts strung on a pipe cleaner. That is my new favorite piece of jewelry – if I can just stop stomping out the emotional brush fires long enough to put it on.

I still love pink though – and hearts. Maybe someday my kids will trust in my love enough to not make it such a difficult day. I still think I should have gotten a Valentine Day family portrait. We do it for Christmas, why not for the day of love? I told you I was a sap. :)

This too Shall Pass (a must see!)

I have been a bit of a missing person the past while. I apologize. I hope to rectify. I have been reading the words of the most amazing woman. I will explain later. Anyway, in addition to Alex having life changing reconstructive surgery he became a child that can be considered for a mainstream classroom. We are not there but it will happen - eventually - when he wants it more than he wants to test the world. Also, he is worried because his classmates like his mom and he does not want to share. :)

So the last couple years I have adopted his sister and was a foster-to-adopt parent in my state. I have been on quite a ride. Getting Daria out of a pysciatric ward in Russia was a breeze compared to what I have lived through domestically. The foster story is a story for another day.

Getting back to the most amazing woman - she is single and is the Mom to 39 kids. No kidding! And she warms my heart everyday. Her oldest daugther posted a link to this marching band from Notre Dame - it is called This Too Shall Pass. Here is the link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJKythlXAIY&feature=player_embedded#! You simply have to see it. It warms my heart and makes me glad to endure. Also I marched in my school days so it has a sense of home for me.

This most amazing woman makes me want to talk to the world again. I keep saying things on her blog and I finally realized, I am ready to talk again. The best of life - the good and the not so great.

And I want to talk about when the morning comes - and it does. As for the video I cannot decide which position I play in life. I would prefer to be the snare or acordian but I may be the voice.

oh yeah - my state told me Janaury 2012 they would never recommend me for adoption because I am single. After a dozen foster kids and two adoptive children, such words were unexpected. They also violate state and federal law.

I am ready to talk.

I filed a compliant with the federal agency that oversees state adoption operations.

I think I have found my voice again.

If you struggle with difficult children or are a trauma parent, check out the champion at: http://thebodiebunch.blogspot.com/

This woman is awesome.

Finally, on a personal note - no surgeries for Alex this year!!!!!!!!! And I will post pictures soon - I promise.