Poker face...

For our “lesson” today I decided to teach my kiddos poker! They are 9,6,and 5 and all have varying issues that make comprehension and retaining information more difficult. However it was fun and my little one got a little ruthless! Poker was always very important in my family. My grandpa was truly the center of our family and he LOVED poker. All nine of his grandkids learned at a young age and it was a major part of all family get-togethers and it was serious, real money was involved! My grandpa died sadly and too soon shortly after I started my fostering journey. He was crotchety and old school. He would make brash statements that would sometimes embarrass me and came from an old school way of thinking when it came to mixed race relationships. He lived long enough to meet my youngest adopted son (who was the first of my three placed with me) He made some smart alec comment about my baby’s beautiful bushy afro but then later when it was just me and him he told me how proud he was of me and how cute my kid was. Today when I was teaching them to play poker I thought my grandpa’s biggest complaint wouldn’t be about their race, or their special needs, it would be that I waited this long to teach them! Love you grandpa.

5 years....

5 years. In 5 years one would assume that a person would be accustomed to the world around them. In five years a person should know the expectations and routines. In five years a person should be comfortable. 5 years is nothing! Nothing when your first five years were traumatic, unpredictable, and horrifying. My two older adopted children have been with me for five years and still my daughter, who is now nine, fears there won’t be food, fears that there won’t be shelter, fears bad men, and worst of all fears that she will not be allowed to stay with me, that she will be alone. She has not been able to be fully comfortable. As much as she wants to be here in the present but her past rules her. Don’t get me wrong, she has healed some, but five years of being safe is no competition to the five years of hell she has been through! I made a comment when looking in the fridge that we had no food (meaning that I wanted to make for dinner.) When it came time for dinner, her thanks was: “I am thankful that my mommy found us food and has her grocery list to remember to get more.” She loves looking at the grocery list, if there is nothing on it she writes stuff just so we don’t forget to go to the store. She enjoys knowing that I have money in the bank even though her FASD makes her understanding of the value of money hard. She is always afraid when I leave even though I have countlessly shown her I come back. She becomes aggressive and animalistic when she feels threatened. She desperately wants to be so close to me, but reacts when she feels herself being vulnerable. She lives in a perceived reality that is frustrating for those around her but not near as frustrating as it is for her that we don’t understand her. She challenges my life and parenting daily. I have realized that she may never change to who the world expects her to be but that my job is instead to give her a world that works best for her.

quick catch up...

I enjoy writing on here, even if no one ever reads it. I like to read others blog and feel the similarities and challenge myself when I feel that others have a better way than I do. I also, being a single mom, enjoy sharing my childrens life. It has been so long since I blogged last or even connected to my fostercare/adoption people. We have had many short term placements come and go, we have had upheavels in our support system, and we have had many many ups and downs. Most importantly we also had our adoption! My dear children had to wait four and a half years for permancy, four and a half years! They are MINE now, all mine! I love every ounce of them no matter how much they push me away. The adoption did cause some regression, but that was expected. We also had a med change that led to an extreme psychotic reaction, which sadly led to a hospitilization. If you have never had to do that be thankful, if you have you know it is increadibly hard. I would never have done it if my child wasn't an danger to herself and others. When my eight year old gave me a detailed plan of how she planed on ending our entire family's lives, I had no other choice. Then to try to parent your child when they are away from home is amazingly hard. The staff felt they knew my child more than I do. my daughter gets aggressive, super aggressive when she feels unsafe. So obviously when she is away from home in a new environment she felt very unsafe and became aggressive. I told them this would happen. I only wanted her there long enough to detox from the med that gave her the reaction, the aggression I can handle. They told me that they couldn't release her until she was safe for 72 hours in a row! HA! Then they told me that the female staff couldn't handle her so the placed her with a male one on one aid. Really!? Um... could someone look back into her files... um PTSD- triggers 1. men (specifically black men)!!!! The CEO of that place knows my name now and I had my baby back on Monday morning. She has had no more suicidal/homicidal ideations since the med change. My point is I advocate for these children in my sleep, seriously! Somedays when I am up against a RAD/FASD wall advocating for the world to change is all I can do.