Holiday Troubles

It was actually going to go down as a really good family holiday celebration until the very end- grandma Meme always gives the gift of money and one of my niece’s discovered that hers was missing. As everyone frantically searched the area she knew she had left it I went to Lynn, held out my hand and told her to give me hers. Of course she denied she took her cousin’s and complained that she now had no gift, my gut (and 12 years of experience) told me that my hunch was correct- but there is still always that shade of doubt, right?! and the damage was done. The cousin swore there was more money taken, my sister, whose daughter it was and who had opened her home for the celebration, felt violated. Again....and the rest of the night was tense- not only in the immediate family but in my relationship with my sister. Reminded once again of the insidiousness of the effects of early trauma. ☹️

A Bit Surreal

So Cheyann came home for Thanksgiving for the first time in almost three and a half years. It was all a bit surreal. In hindsight I'm grateful I was busy with all of the activities that come along with hosting such an event because the whole situation just felt odd. Cheyann was low-key and subdued. At first she felt overwhelmed because there were too many family members and then she was uncomfortable because it was too quiet when they all went home. She went outside a lot and continued to ask to take a walk. For whatever reason I asked her not to go out alone. She is 18. I'm not sure where that discomfort came from but it was real. We did manage to play some games and she was able to collect some of her belongings that had been in storage and then chatted quietly with her sister but honestly we were all relieved when her ride came to collect her. I don't know what I was expecting...

Made For TV Movie

I feel like I’m living a “made-for-tv movie.” You know that fear we all have about what might happen someday when our adopted kiddos get older? It’s really happening!! Lynn ran away from home on Friday and ended up at the home of her bio mom with whom she has been in increasingly greater contact over the last few years. Bio mom is still a mess according to her own biological relatives, who have been blowing up my phone all weekend to tell me AD is not in a good place. But in the meantime she continues to refuse to come home and although Bio mom is making some kind of effort to keep in contact with me it is becoming increasingly clear that she is not being honest about her intentions. Yes- I’ve contacted all the “authorities, and yes it’s all being documented but what a nightmare. 😧

Vicarious Trauma

I have been reading the book Tribe lately and scarily relating all too well. How sad is it that the role of foster/adoptive parent feels similar to that of a war veteran?!? The "hits" we take on a regular basis that cut to our very souls. The hypervigilance - just waiting for the next shoe to fall. The sense of despondency and the chronic fear that our children are just never going to make it through. And that sense of just being so tired. I am tired. This journey is exhausting.

Just Muddling Through

The question posted on the support group web page: "Are you currently surviving or thriving?"  My mind turned this question over and over in my head as I reviewed the current status of my family and could just not land on one side or another. On some days and in some ways we are thriving, but on other days and in other ways we are just surviving. As I continues to ponder how best to answer the question I noted one differing comment in the sea of  "just barely surviving" comments with a smattering of "thrivings" - stating, "we are just muddling through". Yes. That. For the most part, we are muddling through.

She Kinda has It Coming

Lynn shared with me yesterday that she had to report a peer for sexually harassing her over Snapchat. For "normally-developing" teens with no trauma history or 'baggage', the responses of most of the adults in their world given this kind of event are generally comments full of concern and maybe even anger towards the aggressor. For Lynn, given her complicated history and challenged behavioral choices, the responses were more along the lines of the following, "well, the way she acts and dresses she kinda had it coming."  My first instinct was to immediately recoil and push back on the blame-the-victim mentality, but I admit I had second thoughts as well that looked scarily similar to those of the other adults who commented. Just another example of the kind of cognitive shifting that happens in the world of raising traumatized children.  In the end though,  in the words of her brother, "it still isn't right".

Baseball Caps and Eye Pencils

Sometimes it's the everyday "stuff"  that really gets to you. Things seem to be going along just fine with no major issues and once again you are lulled into thinking that maybe this time the healing really has happened and your child really has become "normally developing." And then.. .the ball cap shows up missing and you know exactly where you left it, and you finally figure out how to get into the new Powerschool Portal and lo and behold the child who has continuously reassured you that they have no homework is failing history, and as the frustration level really begins to climb again you discover that the one eye pencil you use every day; the one that has lived in the same drawer in the vanity for years is all of a sudden missing, and you are thrown right back into it. Maybe you really did misplace that item this time? Yeah, you know better.

Making Lemonade

I am so excited to not only announce the publication of my first book -Laugh Before You Cry  -Creative Strategies for Parenting Attachment-Challenged Children, but also to report that it has now being read and reviewed. A bit nerve-wracking for sure, but I was honored to receive the following very special review from a fellow adoption-writer, Susan Badeau:

"So this came in the mail today and I read it in one sitting! Excellent job providing clear, concrete, useful tips and tools for parents! I'll write my Amazon review shortly - bravo Michele Courville Feiner"


It certainly doesn't make the journey any less difficult, but I am so happy to be able to share some of the many ideas and strategies I have learned along the way with others on a similar path. Now - on to work on book two!

Choosing My Sister or My Husband

It's been a rocky end to Sophomore year for Lynn. Lots of 'hands-on' at school. Her teachers really still do not get trauma behaviors at all and are at a loss in regards to both how to understand the behavior and how to address it. That email about the hands-on situation was quickly followed by another from one of the teens in our church youth group letting me know that Lynn  decided to take a provocative picture of herself in a sports bra and send it to a boy she is interested in getting to know better. The picture was not at all welcomed by the boy who is a friend of this young woman. Lynn swears she just wants to be his friend and everyone sends scantily-clad pix of themselves to others. She did, however, actually break down completely when she realized that her actions might very well mean the end of her relationship with the guy she has been dating for three months. She really did feel that fear and sorrow intensely and I have some hope that it means that maybe, just maybe, that pre-frontal cause and effect cortex may be kicking in at least a little. I thought that was enough stress for one week but no. Just a few days after those two incidents she opted to lie about being given permission to take her brother's  and father's fishing gear to a school trip, and then the cherry to top off the week was when it was discovered that her brother-in-law's good knife, which had been missing for a year, was in the tackle box. As Lynn continues to swear that she knows nothing about how that knife could have come to be found there, her sister has been put in that incredibly difficult position that I know well. Does she choose to support her husband, who is absolutely furious that Lynn would steal his knife, or her sister who she well knows struggles immensely with this challenge. It would be easy to say that she doesn't have to choose - but just accept and love them both, but in real-time, that is not how it feels. I know. It is a conundrum I wrestle with daily.

And on other notes - no, I mean no movement on Cheyann. Still in Savannah. Still treading water. She will be 18 in November. That terrifies me.

Well.. This One Has a Happy Ending

For the last week or so we have been the landing pad for a 12 year old boy. There is a lot of 'he said she said' going on in the situation, and we have only just met him, so who knows the real truth of what happened, but whatever that might look like it was nice to have his energy in our home. He was almost always cheerful, usually helpful and became a fast friend to both Lynn and my grandson. We kept him with us until his mom could drive up from her home in Maryland and after spending some time with DCF and the court system, she was awarded custody and she and her mom worked with us to make a good transition back to them. This is how it looks when foster care is working and it clearly made an impact on Lynn for the better as she said to me as he drove away this morning, reunited with his mom and grandmother,  "well, this one has a happy ending."

Life is Like a Water Snake Fidget Toy

I have decided that my life is like a water snake fidget toy. Just when I think I get a handle on one side of it, everything busts out on the other! This morning we had a great phone meeting with Cheyann's school folks in Savannah. She is doing very well in her classes right now - even getting A's with very few behavior problems. They are looking at moving her to a new classroom so they can raise the bar for her a bit and give her some challenge. Wow. Just wow. Of course they will have to monitor that closely to make sure they don't loosen the reins so much she can't manage, but I'll take it for now. And she is status quo in her residential placement. Of course she is being held very tightly, isn't engaging in therapy and isn't able to have a lot of contact with home and family, so there are lots of factors likely affecting why she is managing, but maybe, just maybe, some skills are transferring and she is maturing just a bit. We remain hopeful that we can bring her back to VT in the summer - hopefully a group home in Montpelier. So I let myself ride that wave for a while just to be hit on the other side by an email from Lynn's school where she had a terrible day full of opposition, refusals and shut down behaviors.  Squish.. out the other end we go! I have to go  respond to that email.

Non-Compliant Parents

Dear new therapist,
 

I just finished a phone call with our MH advocate who has been fielding concerns from you that we, C's parents, are continuing to be uninvolved and noncompliant with her current RC treatment plan.  MH has asked me to reach out to you to make sure we have the same information as related to C, her current connection with family and where we go from here.

As her current Clinician I first want to share with you my insights into why I think she is showing as much success as she is at her present placement right now.

1) she is wrapped very tightly there, from what I know,  with a lot of supervision and a lot of monitoring

2) she does not have a lot of contact with family to trigger her emotional reactivity

3) she is not engaging in extensive trauma therapy which also really triggers her emotional reactivity and

 

4) she is not taking a Prozac product (which I am convinced triggers rage episodes and SI thinking in her.)

I wonder if you can imagine how difficult it is to admit that for my child - connecting to family and processing family memories triggers in her episodes of reactivity so severe that she can then not manage except to self-harm? It is a tough pill to swallow. But we have been at this for a long time now and I can tell you that I know all four of the above to be true for her.

So, when I say to you that I am not interested in engaging in family therapy right now it is not because I am uninvolved, don't care enough about my child, or just can't carve out enough time for her. It is because I desperately want to avoid triggering her in a way that makes her seek for a method to hurt herself. She has come close to doing serious damage way too many times already, and I simply do not know you well enough, or honestly have enough of a therapeutic trust in your skill level with her yet, to be able to take that risk again. 

I really need for you to understand that C is our daughter. And though she did not come to us by birth, and did come to us with a great deal of traumatic baggage,  we love her and care deeply about her future. I need you to understand that because I need you to help her understand that. When she says to you that she believes we never should have adopted her if we were just going to throw her away, I wish you could help her shift that perspective. When she says to you that she isn't worth anyone's time, I wish you could help her to remember the many positive connections she has with home and family. When she says she has no family because what kind of family leaves their child in residential for three years, I wish you could help her to understand how much we want her to heal and how hard this has been on everyone.  I know your primary job as her therapist is to empathize with her, take her perspective and be her advocate, but I am asking you to really try to take a leap here and help her to understand that she is and always will be a beloved member of our family, and that although she will not be returning to the family home to live, because this just isn't the best place for her right now, the family home will always be her family home. This is not new news for C. We began this conversation when she was in her last placement and made it very clear when she was hospitalized over the summer getting ready to head to you that the most likely path for her would be to transition from you to a group- home setting closer to home and then on to transitional living towards adulthood. She was not able to hear that plan last summer. As is her pattern, she was too triggered and became reactive before she could grasp any of the big picture. In my opinion, this is the healthiest, most logical next treatment plan goal for her - to help her remember, believe in and maintain her grasp of herself as a member of a family even as she takes the next critical step towards transitional living and adulthood. If you can help her to do that, and she can stay regulated in the process, we stand a chance at helping her to continue to heal. I am hopeful that we can pull together to do just that.

 I apologize if my words came out in any way accusatory or judgmental. My goal in sharing is to attempt to find some common ground. Let me know what you think after taking some time to digest it all.                 

From a Friend

The challenges with stealing continue.. and continue...and continue. After the situation with the stolen Iphone and then the stolen IPod (and pants), next up, over Christmas,  was a stolen Fitbit.  When questioned, Lynn's response to all three, "I got them from a friend." Well, seeing as how all three pieces of electronics have now been returned to their rightful owners, her friend pool is dwindling. Sadly, as much as we understand where the stealing behaviors stem from, those friends do not, and will not. Friends can flex so much.