"Cleaning" windows

I was so excited to find the time and energy to polish off the window cleaning spring chore over Spring Break. I love the way the the windows look and smell right after the wash and the fresh air and birdsong blowing in is an added bonus. This spring, however, will ever be remembered as the 'windows year' not because I was able to enjoy my annual freshening up of thewindows, but because our Rager From Texas opted to do his own windows cleaning and smashed out five of them in a particularly poignant rage. Not one of my happier memories.

The Rager From Texas

"My other children, pre-adoption back in Texas, with multiple caretakers, constantly changing homes, major and very painful breaks in parental relationships, and some of my children lost other birth siblings into the wind, well it's no wonder that many of them raged.

They had no other way to express their profound and very deep emotional pain."

Quoted from one of my favorite bloggers, Big Mama Hollers    and completely describing what is happening with our newest addition - our rager from Texas.   He fits this bill completely. Mind you, understanding where the rages come from doesn't make it easier for any of us who are in the middle of it... but it does provide a perspective.. And this is the child who just found out his therapist passed away unexpectedly yesterday? How do you add that piece to the already vastly unmanageable emotional soup already brewing in his body? I guess we are about to find out...

Messed-up Parenting

I got a call from Cheyanne's caseworker last night. She had noticed some new cuts and thought they were bleeding. That prompted a call from the agency's crisis worker and then again this morning from the case manager. I guess we were at a different agency the last time she amped up... because I don't remember quite so much attention the last time around. I followed the protocol we have set up with the therapists who work work with and have worked with her.. We didn't pay a whole lot of attention to it. Asked the school nurse to check the cuts for infection (which C refused this time around.. a whole new twist..).. but really just kept going about our day and tried to dial up the positive supports and connections. Such a good example of how something that would have greatly concerned, even scared me, if it had happened earlier in my career of parenting truamatized children now barely even registers on the "worried-o-meter"   Is there something wrong with me that the fact that one of my children collects and hoards pieces of glass and other sharp object with which to carve scarlet ribbons in their skin doesn't even really bother me anymore? Wow. Thank goodness for her therapist who reassures me that not only am I ok, but she is grateful for my level response. She will let me know if I need to become 'less numb'. Hm.. Also a perfect example of how messed-up parenting these children can look to the 'outside world'. It really is a completely new game.

Attitude Adjustment Needed

One of the benefits I enjoy as an employee of a public school is that for the most part I get summer vacations off. This was actually one of the reasons I chose the career I did. I knew early on that if I had to return to the world of work, I wanted to be on my children's schedule so I could be sure to have a lot of time with them. So now that we are on the cusp of Spring Break, why do I find myself actually dreading the upcoming summer break? It gives me a lot to think about. Clearly a lot of it is because, let's face it, parenting my truamatized kiddos 24/7 without the benefit of their added support network is absolutely exhausting. Probably not a lot more is needed to be said in this regard. If you parent children from trama.. you know what I'm talking about. But I think for me this year, it's more complicated. As I prepare myself to say some "goodbyes" to my birth children - my oldest getting married in one short month and my son heading off for two years to serve his mission for our church, I realize that my biological clock is confused. It is sensing that if not for the younger three children added late to our family mix, my summers would now be looking like this:

 

But instead.. my summer will probably look more like this:

 

 

I know.. I need an attitude adjustment. I know.. there are so many positive things about having youngers around. I know..I signed on for this and I know.. most likely I would be really bored and lonely if not for them.. but my heart just isn't feeling it today.  It might have something to do with the fact that it is snowing and sleeting outside.. in mid April.  I could use a "just hang in there, I hear you!"   Uggh.

Connecting on the mountain

It was a bit of a ride to our Easter celebration this year  (We opted to spend it with the family of my oldest daughter's fiance so we can all get to know one another better...) and I was able to really enjoy the majestic beauty of the still snow-topped mountains. A long drive sends the mind wandering and speaking of mountains, I realized I had not yet blogged about a really critical event that happened earlier this winter: One day, over winter break, I decided to go downhill skiing. It had been a number of years since I had gone, and it isn't something I am really all that good at, but I just wanted to go. At first, it was going to be a date -day with my husband, but when our newest foster son blew out of vacation camp, that was not going to happen... so I had the surprising idea to invite Cheyanne to ski with me instead. (Dad got to stay at home to be the new vacation camp.. but that's another story...)  Now.. if you have read my Blogs to this point, you are saying to yourself, "what.. is she crazy? " and there were moments when I would have replied with agreement. It did indeed appear to be a crazy move. But the invitation went out,  I was committed.. so I went with it.

 Now, I prepared myself for the worst. Cheyanne had taken ski lessons with the rest of the family for a few years as well, so she had some experience, but it had also been 3-4 years since she had been on the mountain, so who knew what this would look like... Is skiing like riding a bike? Does it all come back to you even after years away? Who knew... We began on the bunny mountain just to get our 'sea-legs' .. and that went surprisingly well. I only got a little attitude so we moved on to the real mountain. Half-way up was our next mark and we navigated the lift well and even managed to get off in one piece.. but then things started crumbling. Cheyanne panicked a bit and was not able to control her skis on this steeper mountain and was spending more time on the ground tangled up in a heap than she was skiing. The pleasant mood was disintegrating as her angry curses flew through the air. I was thinking.. hard.. a lot.... looking for ways to navigate through.. Amazingly I was able to stay level and connected myself as I skiied over to her. I managed to spit out a couple of simple corrections that I thought might help her (dodging the verbal barrage that was the response to assistance) and then informed her that I thought it would be better if I skiied down alone this run so she would have a chance to re-learn her skis without an audience. I told her I would get off halfway again and come back to see how she was doing. She was not happy. It was a risk. It worked. I practice my own skills of self-regulation as I skiied down the hill and then went back up the lift. I saw her from my aerial perch.. sitting there in the same heap I had left her in.. watching for me.. I got off and as I skiied back down to her I saw her still in the same heap.. watching me. As I got closer I noted that she was working on standing again, and as I approached, she stood up and skiied down to me, staying upright the rest of the way down the hill without falling. Neither of us said anything. When we got to the bottom successfully I softly suggested that she might want to stop for the day and head to the lodge and was shocked when she responded that she wanted to try it again. I hesitated.. a million scenarios running through my head.. but again I trusted my gut and relented. Going up in the chairlift together the second time, Cheyanne cheerfully bantered back and forth,  positively connecting in many ways. We joked about falling off the lift. We commented about other skiiers. We remarked on the beauty of the mountain. As we neared the halfway point, we decided to get off together and successfully skiied down the mountain with no falls. The rest of the day was a success with many other incidents of positive connectin and regard. At the end of the day we decided to make it a tradition. Just Cheyanne and I.. downhill skiing and connecting together. Phew.... a success.