Therapy

I don't go to therapy to find out if I'm a freak
I go and I find the one and only answer every week

And it's just me and all the memories to follow 

Down any course that fits within a fifty minute hour

And we fathom all the mysteries, explicit and inherent

When I hit a rut, she says to try the other parent

And she's so kind, I think she wants to tell me something, 

But she knows that its much better if I get it for myself...

 - What Do You Hear In These Sounds, Dar Williams. 

I went to therapy yesterday. I needed to go, I needed to talk and vent and be understood. It was good, great in fact, until I learned something that literally took my breath away. My therapist is retiring in November. 

After 13 years ( off and on)  of working with her she is leaving me. Yes I know that she is not just leaving me but that is how it feels, I am sure that all of her clients feel the same way.  She is going back to her own world, to her family, her grandkids and her hobbies. I am not sure that I know how I will cope with the loss of her in my life. I mean that. This woman, she saved me, she taught me to value myself and that I was worth it. She taught me to take care of me and ways to process all of the crap that happened in my life.

When I was the most depressed, the most vulnerable she held my hand, she gave me her home number, she talked me down off the virtual ledge more times than I can even count. She believed in me, a stranger who I was paying her to listen to me did much more than what was required in that 50 minute hour. She believed that I was worth all the extra time, the free sessions when I was broke, the reduced rates when I could not afford her, the late night phone calls on holidays from across the country. She made a commitment to me and my my healing. 

She believed in me. Yes that is her job but with a good therapist it is so much more than that. She is good at what she does and it can be really hard to find a person who gets you in the way that she gets me. I have known her longer than many of the people who exist in my world today including my husband. She has seen me through so much, helped me work  through so much and now she going. I am aware of the void this going to leave in my world, aware and scared.

I have the skills, I know how to cope but having her as a support makes it all a little easier. She gets me, she understands my triggers and issues and there is not need to re-explain things to her. I would have start again with another person, not at the beginning but it would take time and work to develop this type of relationship with another therapist. That is the hard part of working with someone for this long, it hurts when it ends. I always knew there would be a time when this would happen but I hoped it would not be so soon.

I will always encourage people to use therapy, it is an excellent way to deal with the crap that goes on in our lives. It helps, it makes a difference to have some support because sometimes just getting out bed in the morning is hard. As hard as this is for me to wrap my mind around her moving on, I must say that I happy she has given me this much notice because it will gives me time to get used to the idea. To decide what is next, to move on on my own or to look for someone to walk with me.

Monday Moments

• I have spent the last number of days in the yard or the garden, I am past tired and really, really dirty. 
• We are working on emptying the freezer of the last of the veggies and such from last year, that meant we had turkey for dinner and strawberry rhubarb crisp. We are trying to use last years rhubarb up as we are already putting this year's in the freezer. 
• Our asparagus is about done for the year, sad but true. 
• It was a holiday today, I am looking forward to school tomorrow, not for me, for the short people.
•  I have therapy for me and oh it has been to long since I was last there. I love my therapist, well not love but value her place in my world and the perspective she provides in all this craziness. 
• Sadly it is only a 3 day week for the boys which mean they are home on Friday to. Whose brilliant idea was that. 
• My dog is snoring really loudly, it is annoying me. 
• Calvin is pushing my buttons today, I have PMS, there were some not pretty Mommy moments. 
• Actually it is not PMS anymore, I am just crampy and bitchy and come to think of it some of those not pretty moments were Fudge's
• I need a hot bath with some muscle soak, ASAP. 
• If you did not see my last post the wonderful Lisa is raising money for a friend in need and is giving away great prizes. 
• Corey is also raising money for Orlando scholarships, that's a really good cause to so if you have some pennies laying around go see what she is planning. Christine is also in on it. 
• If you are thinking about Orlando this year then watch Corey's blog for details.  Registration begins June 1 and I imagine that it is going to fill up fast. If you think that you might want to go but are not sure about how it is all going to come together than you are not alone. I would suggest you cough up the pennies to save yourself a spot and hope that it all works out. That's my plan, although there is also a bit of  - come hell or hight water I am going - in my planning 
• Hey can you here that, shhh, listen closely, yes you can hear the dog snoring and the tub calling my name, see ya., 

For another and another.

For Haley
Lisa is having a contest to raise money for her neighbour Haley who is battling for her life after a very serious car accident. She has a great list of prizes over on her blog so head on over and donate a minium of $10 to get an entry to win.

For Lisa
Lisa who is one of the bravest and most beautiful people that I know has had a really challenging couple of months. When you head over to donate leave a comment there as well and remind her that she is fabulous and loved because she really needs to hear it right now.

Thanks a million! I am off to get dirty in my garden, if the rapture happens I'll be filthy but I am ok with that.

Otherwise engaged

I am still being a mom, still trying to be therapeutic and empathtic and all that jazz but every free minute I have is spent playing the dirt. Yes dirt, why dirt, well

because these have been in my bedroom for the last 12 weeks and they ( and their friends who have already left) need to find new homes in my garden. 

First they spend a little time on the front porch and come in at night. While they were waiting to be planted I tried to get the strawberry, rhubarb, blueberry, raspberry and asparagus patch in order, it is not done yet though this is just the finished part, you can see all the weeds to the left, 

The tomatoes will be planted with their friends here in my garden. They have a lot of friends - broccoli, cucumber, brussel sprouts, beans, carrots, beets, lettuce, potatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, onions, garlic, chives, oregano, fennel, corn, zuchinni. peas, eggplant, basil, snow peas, peppers and squash. 

Not that we are very serious about growing our own food or anything, The weather is supposed to to be good between now and Monday so I'll be in the yard till then, well that is when I am not teaching or trying not to yell at my kids. Don't do anything to exciting while I am busy. 

Monday Moments

• The fallout from mothers day and my time away came late this week. It was sly and sneaky, it caught me off guard. We dealt with it, we have moved on. 
• Well mostly. 
• I had a busy day but I feel like I got little accomplished unless you count getting my goggle reader to say that I now have less than 100 unread posts as opposed to hundreds I had before this morning. 
• I also bought milk and made risotto for dinner. I made risotto last night too, Calvin had a tantrum over eating it so I made it again tonight - 2 can play at that game. 
• We went to a great wedding and i was told by more than one parent that I was to strict, this was after my child got caught sneaking/stealing food 3 times after he had been told not to and was sitting at his table till he was ready to apologise. Luckily for the do-gooder parents ( all of whom are friends of mine) they backed off when I said too and I did not have to get all mean.
• Ukrainian weddings are long but they are tons of fun and I danced the night away with my friends and throughly enjoyed myself except for when my kids where misbehaving. 
• It is freezing here, I had to turn the heat back on. 
• It is also raining, lots and lots of rain which makes it harder to plant. If it is warm I will plant in the rain but raining and cold is miserable. 
• I missed a call from the Dr. office, they were calling to discuss Calvin last test results which probably means that he still has roundworm, oh joy, oh bliss. Hopefully I will actually get to speak to her tomorrow. 
• It's time to go to bed, I am tired. 
• I am so happy that there are only 2 more weeks of cubs, I love the lack of evening things in the summer. 

Please excuse me for a moment...

while I scream.

I am a tad frustrated with my children. They are being sneaky and manipulative and I am so not wanting to play their games.

That being said they are going to spend a lot of time working in the garden with me this morning and we will get a lot planted and that is a really good thing. Then we are going to a wedding this afternoon where I will have to pretend that we are happy, go-lucky family because I am so not willing to let my kids ruin it. Tomorrow I can go back to being frustrated by them and their choices.

When blogger went down on Wednesday it ate my comments on my last post, I know there were some but I never got to read them. If you said something profound, or fantastic, or thought provoking can you say it again so I can know what you said. Thanks.

I am off to plant and rake and work in the rain.

Attachment and Therapeutic Parenting

It has been almost 3 years since we agreed to adopt the boys, to be precise it was the end of May when we formally agreed. We jumped in with 2 feet and there was no looking back, putting our running shoes on before we jumped ( so we could hit the ground running so to speak) would of been advisable but hindsight is 20/20.

That being said since then P and I have not left the boys alone for more than an evening in all that time. We have a patched together network of friends who will watch our kids but we have never ever asked anyone to do it for more than a few hours, until last week. When we left for 2 nights and went to Toronto to go to the first annual conference of the Attachment Association of Canada with Daniel Hughes, MaryJo Land ( she doesn't have a website of her own but she is also the president of ATTACh), Candee Forest and Arthur Becker-Weideman. It was fantastic, I wish it had been longer. My children survived and I must say that the payback was minimal which has me really excited that this could happen again at some point in the future.

All that being said, people have asked what I learned, a lot, I learned a lot but to keep it straight forward I am going to give you the highlights and in case you did not already know this I would kidnap Dan Hughes(DH) and hide him in closet in my house if I could, he totally gets this and he does it so well. He makes it sound easy even though I know it is not but it is good and useful and the reminders and new learning were so great to hear.

• PLACE - Playfulness, Love, Acceptance, Curousity, Empathy - this is how DH describes the attitude you need to have when working with these kids, our kids, the kind of kids that we have and parent each and everyday. It means being playful with them ( or silly as Christine does so very well), it means matching their voice and tone and being emphatic to how they are feeling in that moment even though you really want to yell at them, it means asking questions to get at the root of the emotion behind the behaviour and it means letting them know that you will continue to love them even though in this moment things seems really overwhelming. 
• Our kids do not just have PTSD, PTSD is from an event ( or sometimes repeated or multiple events), a car accident, a shooting, etc, it is the result of trauma and it can be the result of traumas that happen more than once. But in the case of our kids they were often repeatedly exposed to trauma/abuse/neglect by the people who were supposed to love and nurture them. In many cases it went on for years and what has happened to them and the effects of that are so much more complicated than what we refer to as PTSD
• Keep Calm - this is integral, yelling triggers our kids. If you are a yeller, STOP IT, I know it's hard, trust me I know. I am a yeller, a really loud one and I have to make a really conscious effort not to be, I fail most days but I am trying. A calm parent with a empathetic tone gets a lot further with a disregulated kid than an yelling one. 
• Learn about your own triggers around your attachment issues and do the work you need to do. You might be able to do this on your own or you might need a therapist to help you. If you do the work around your own issues you will be better able to help your child. 
• Childhood is an apprenticeship for adulthood, our kids are lacking skills to be successful, we need to teach them those skills not expect that they are just going to know them. We teach our infants to self soothe, we teach toddlers to share, we teach preschoolers to talk instead of hit - our kids missed those lessons, we need to actually teach them how to do these things not just expect that they are going to figure it out on thier own. We do not expect adults to be skilled at a new skill after one lesson, our kids are the same, it may take two hundred lessons before they understand but they can get there. 
• We (as a society)  are constantly evaluating children, good work, good tying your shoes, I am disappointed, you made a bad choice and so on, this is really hard for our kids to hear and process. Much of it ( good and bad)  causes shame which triggers them and then we get behaviour as a result of the shame, you need to validate your child without attaching any self-worth to the comment - wow Calvin thank you for setting the table when I asked you to, rather than good job, or good boy. It hurts me when you call me names rather than I am disappointed that you are choosing to hurt me by calling me names. 
• Keep your kids world small. No big parties, no disneyland, no huge events until they learn to integrate the excitement and stimulation in an acceptable way. Our kids will sabotage events because they can not handle the thought of feeling that good for that long. It overwhelms them and scares them and they will do whatever they can to stop those feelings from creeping in. Do expect them to be successful at these things right away, they simply can not do it. Wait, it will happen but you need to be patient. 

The sun is shining and I need to get outside and work in the garden but there will be more, I really, really, really ( I'll stop at 3 really's)  want to share more specifically around our kids being successful in school - there was lots of good stuff. If you have not read Daniel Hughes I would suggest you start with Attachment Focussed Parenting - it's great. 

Monday Moments

• I have lots of great things and thoughts to share with you from my time in Toronto, but not tonight. 
• My children not only survived in my absence but there has been no payback yet... a piece of me is waiting for the other shoe to drop. 
• Calvin was back at Children's today for a follow-up after his last MRI, the fluid in his joints is gone ( as we suspected) but he still has pain so we are going to treat him awhile longer and then try weaning him off the meds and see what happens. Arthritis can be viral ( as my very bright sister pointed out to me ages ago) and the dr. thinks that might be what we are dealing with which means that it will end but sadly the chances are good that it will come back later. 
• I am still in awe of the fact that we made it through Mother's Day and the day after without any major incidents, there has been behaviour but nothing extreme
• In fact much of today's behaviour was at school although I got to pick up the pieces. 
• Spring has finally sprung here and I am thrilled to be up to my elbows in dirt, I love dirt. 
• I also love asparagus and we have lots of it. 
• I hate weeding though, like with a passion. 
• I replaced the breaks on one of the bikes today I was rather proud of myself. 
• I have a meeting tomorrow that I do not want to go to but after the meeting I have plans to buy plants, that will make it all better. 

Mothering

It's Mother's Day today,  a fact that would be difficult to miss by anyone who lives in North America. It's the day when we celebrate the woman who gave us life, the women who care for us, the women who we trust to meet our needs. That being said, celebrating this day is really challenging for some people. Not all of us had mothers who met our needs or loved us or cherished our every moment, many of us mourn the losses of the women who took care of and some of us were not privileged enough to have mother's who noticed us or cared about our achievements. For others this day is hard because they are not the mother they thought they would be or they are not yet mothers even though they long to be. 

In our family we have our own sets of challenges today because my kids are adopted from foster care and I am their 5th mother.

I have been dreading this day for weeks because I know it will be hard. We keep things pretty low key and try hard to keep our routines as close to normal as we can. My husband took the children to buy a gift yesterday, nothing huge, nothing that states that I am the world's best mother, just a little gift to acknowledge the day and all that I do as their Mom. They make me cards and we celebrate my role in their lives but it's a fine balance between celebrating me and acknowledging that there were others before me and that they mourn the loss of those mothers too. 

The rest is at Hopeful Parents, head on over there to read it. 

The System

I am frustrated by the system. We want more kids. We want to adopt more kids from foster care, (I also want a baby but that is a different post for a different day) we believe that kids need forever families and we want to adopt again. We are ready,our homestudy is updated, we are hoping and dreaming, but we are waiting.

There are a number of reasons that we still do not have a placement and all of them suck. Most of them have to do with stereotypes and problems with the system rather than a lack of kids who need homes.

You see P and I are not your typical couple,  he is older than I am and a lot of people have a really hard time with that. I don't care, our kids, our families and friends all accept it, but many, many social workers are just not willing to get it. They are not willing to understand how a young woman meets and falls in love with a widowed man who already has a teenager who is not much younger than she is at the time. They are not willing to understand that it was about love and not about money or crazy fetishes or other strange things. We know that I will most likely live a whole other life after P (unless something horrible happens to me), he will die before me, there is really no way around it. I know that, I knew that the day he asked me to marry him and although it is not something that I think about all the time it is something that I am aware of. I also know that my children are going to lose their father before they are ready but he will of been a great father to them. A strong, patient man who will taught them about what matters in life and why it is important to follow your dreams. It's not morbid, it's not sad, it is just our reality. I'm ok with the fact that others don't get it, although I must admit I wish they would open their eyes a little wider.

Then this unconventional couple adopted two very broken kids. Two brothers who really had very little hope of being adopted together until we came along. They were older, they had attachment issues and some serious behaviour problems. If you have been reading here awhile you know that it has not been all roses, rainbows and unicorns. Adopting kids with attachment issues is hard but when my kids are having good days or when I see how much they have grown and changed I don't mind the hard work as much. Adopting our boys made it even harder for social workers to understand us, most simply do not understand why we would want to do this again. Many workers also seem to have issues with big families, thinking that there is not enough of us to go around and that new kids will not get enough. Clearly we disagree and I know plenty of large families who do an excellent job at raising multiple kids with attachment issues and they do it with grace. The bias that a big family is an unsuccessful family really bothers me and is wrong in all sorts of ways.

We want to help other kids find happiness again. Foster care is tough, termination of parental rights is tough, bouncing from home to home is horrible and we want to make it so that a few less kids are in that situation. But convincing a worker that placing kids here is the best thing for them is way harder than it needs to be. I think we are dismissed or looked over because workers judge us based on our choices before they even get to know us.

We are a great family, we are a super family who think that we have room for more dirty socks, raging tantrums, hugs, toothbrushes and lego to step on. But because we are committed to adopting from foster care we are waiting, It's been over a year since we first expressed interest in a sibling group, they were placed with a half brother and it was a good ending for them. After that we decided we really did want more kids, it took us a long time to get all our new paperwork in order but we have and yet we are waiting.

The other side of the problem is the way that the system works. Canada does not have a national adoption program, children are rarely placed inter-provincially, it happens but not as often as it could. Even within the province of Ontario, where we reside, placing children outside the boundaries of each Children's Aid Society is no easy feat. We do not have a provincially mandated adoption system and although programs like Adopt Ontario exist not all the agencies use them or are willing to post children's profiles on them. So once we get past the stero-types that people have about our family we have to find kids who are younger than our kids who are available to be placed outside of their city.

It really should not be this hard to be able to adopt kids from foster care. I always encourage others to adopt, I talk about how wonderful it is and I will continue to do that but I am pretty frustrated by the process and by the inability of "the system" to get it together.

Monday Moments

• In less than 3 days I am leaving my children, actually P and I are leaving our children for 2 nights with sitters so that we can go hear Daniel Hughes in Toronto - yes we are creating attachment issues so we can go learn about attachment. 
• I am ok with creating attachment issues for my kids. Actually I think it is good for them for us to go and come back and this is the first time in 3 years we have both gone anywhere for more than a few hours.
• I am trying to stay awake long enough to see if the conservative government has been defeated, I have my fingers crossed, yes I lean left, way left, in every way. You do not have to agree with my politics, it's ok, we can still be friends.  
• I have to write for Hopeful Parents on Mother's Day, that's a pretty hard day around here, no idea what to write - suggestions, I am open to suggestions. 
• Calvin's glasses are ready, we need to go pick them up, Fudge is jealous. 
• We spent our weekend collecting stool samples from Calvin, good times. There is no chapter in any parenting books anywhere about collecting stool samples from your children. 
• I spent my whole day running errands today, well except for the hour I spent at a friends house talking and visiting and enjoying a glass of red just because we could. 
• Fudge thought it would be fun to play with matches on Saturday. P's head just about exploded, it will be interesting to see if he tries it again. 
• Fudge also has "forgotten" his coat at school for almost a week, perhaps when he waits for the bus in his T-shirt tomorrow he will remember to locate it in the lost and found. 
• I am going to watch TV with P now, we'll see how long I manage to stay awake. 

It's not their fault.

I had begun to write this post yesterday, then the power went out because of tornado force ( 119km) winds and all hell broke loose as I tried in vain to find a way to keep the water in the cellar from reaching the furnace. Long story short I ended up buying a generator, last one in the store, got it running, pumped the basement and then after 12 hours the power came back. Needless to say finshing this post was not at the top of the list, but this morning I have time and power and so here it is.

"Hey Mom, sorry I had such a bad morning, I love you, have a good day" said Fudge as he was rushing out the door this morning.
"That's okay buddy, it happens and it wasn't so bad" I said, keeping the grouchy mama voice inside my head.
"Nope, your right, I didn't spill anything, that would of made it worse" he replied and as he skipped off down the path he turned and signed I love you to me.
 My heart melted in that moment.

He had a bad morning, nothing new, what is new is that he saw that and moved on from it without yelling or arguing or blaming me for his mistakes. That is progress, it is also attachment.

Fudge is moving forward in his attachment to me, he has been for awhile. That in and of itself it a WONDERFUL thing but  it is hard because I have been so hurt by the way he has treated me that sometimes I still feel as though it is all a carefully constructed facade.  Here he is moving along, making loving comments, looking for touch and reassurance from me because he is learning to trust me, learning to love me and there are times when I do not want him to. I don't want to be touched, or loved or spend time with him. I want to be hurt and bitter and angry because of the way he has treated me.

Don't worry, I am not playing favourites. It's not just Fudge, sometimes I feel the same way about Calvin.

The thing is even though sometimes I feel that way I need to keep those very real and very normal feelings in check, I need to put on my happy face and fake it. It is not as hard to fake it as it was awhile ago. Some days are easier than others.

I need to fake it because it is not my children's fault that they are still attaching to me. It is not my children's fault that they do not trust adults to meet their needs. It is most certainly not their fault that they are in this situation, it is the fault of other adults, adults who did not meet their needs.

Lately when I ready to blow at one of them, when I do not want to be touched by them, when I am so far past frustrated with a rage or and tantrum or an argument, I hang on to that, I hang on to - it's not their fault, they did not ask for this. They have been shaped and formed and changed by what happened to them as young children.

I am not justifying all of their behaviour, but their past matters, it makes a difference, it changes things.

Yes they make choices, they do stuff that make things worse, they act like children and sometimes that drives me crazy. But at the end of the day some of it is not their fault and that it is very important thing to remember when parenting them.

Monday Moments

• Our weekend was great, 3 days of reasonably well-regulated boys.
• Lots of friends and good food.
• This morning there was a huge water fight after church - lots of fun.
• Then Calvin decided to tell Fudge that the Easter Bunny and Santa were not real.
• All hell broke loose.
• My afternoon was spent dealing with Calvin's anger and rage.
• It took 6 hours.
• Then Fudge had a meltdown and cried as though he was the star in operatic tragedy.
• I only had 2 glasses of wine.
• I did eat the rest of the lindt Easter eggs though and that helped.
• I am looking forward to a nice hot bath.
• Sadly our week will continue to be a bit chaotic as Calvin has a MRI scheduled for Wednesday.
• Oh the joy of holidays.
• I must say that I am happy that all tantrums were saved till this afternoon, it was easier that way and we all know that my kids are all about making my life easier - right - wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

Mind If I Rant

It's been a long week. I need to rant a bit. If you are having a great day and don't want to listen to ranting go visit Maggie, she just had a beautiful baby girl.

Still here, thanks for being willing to read my ramblings.

In July the boys will of been with us for 3 years. That a few months longer than the amount of time that they spent in foster care. It is a long time. In my life a year no longer seems like a long time but in the life of a child it is an eternity. So if they have been forever ( or what feels like forever) why the hell can they not figure out that we will love them no matter and that the pushing and arguing and testing and creating chaos on purpose can stop anytime now.

Yesterday Calvin brought home a failed math test. He left huge portions of it blank not because he did not know the answers but simply because he was not interested in doing it.
Last night he cut things up and generally made a mess in the bathroom because rather than come upstairs with him while he was getting ready I dared to spend time talking to P who had just gotten home.
Fudge just about knocked a boiling pot of water off the stove the other day in his crazy attempt to get me to pay attention to him rather than to the dinner I was trying to make.
Fudge also can no longer remember how to set the table, clear the table, stack dishes, get dressed, chew with his mouth closed, feed the cat or bring his homework home.
Neither of them can remember that the kitchen is not a self serve take out bar and they need to ask before they help themselves to whatever it is that they feel like eating in that moment.
Calvin has decided that I can not go anywhere without him, if I do all hell breaks loose and his Father who is home with gets the brunt of the behaviour.

We could be done with this anytime now, yesterday would of been a good day to start, tomorrow is equally good.... what do you think my chances are.

stop laughing

I know it's not going to change anytime soon but a girl can dream can't she.

I am going to white chocolate mocha now because that will solve all my problems.

Monday Moments

• Because things can never be dull in my world it became apparent to me on Friday afternoon that I could add to Calvin's list of medical mysteries an intestinal parasite. I think I know what it might be but I am not a doctor and we need to wait on lab results. I will spare you the details cause I am good like that but lets just say that dealing with an intestinal parasite is not in the mom handbook. If you really want to know about what it is, or at least what I think it is you can go look here.
• I called GI at the children hospital as this is kind of significant but they have not yet returned my call, they are horrible at returning calls in a timely fashion, other departments are way better about it.
• I am hoping that dealing with this might help us get rid of a variety of other issues, it might not but then again maybe it will, positive thinking right.
• I really need to write a blog post about faking it till you make when it comes to loving your kids, there has been much faking it around here and much oh my goodness I do not want to spend another minute in the same room as you.
• The boys are at school today, that makes me happy. I am not sure that I should be sending Calvin but I figure the sanity break will do me good and it's not like he hasn't had this nasty little issue for some time and has been at school and if it is the one that I think it is, it's not easily spread with casual contact.
• It is Easter this weekend, a big deal when you are Ukrainian Catholic or Orthodox, I am looking forward to it but it means a disruption in routine for the boys and I am not looking forward to the fallout from that.
• April is one of many traumaversary months for us... we might all survive
• My basement is flooding, again, still, however you describe it it is annoying to say the very least and the spring showers could stop coming anytime now so that the ground can have a chance to dry out.
• Should be putting away laundry because I finally got the clean laundry pile on the bed in the guest room down to a reasonable size but now all those folded clothes have to go somewhere.

You know you are a therapeutic parent...

You know you are a therapeutic parent when you are confronting your son about his stealing, in the midst of the conversation a nugget of truth starts to emerge. Your partner pursues the questioning as he did  not really catch the nugget of truth, you interrupt and take over the questioning while holding on finger up to your husband and say...

Daniel Hughes

He gets where you are going immediately and lets you go there.

Your son admits he was trying to get your attention, he is understands how he could of done it differently and he moves into remorse without rage. Everyone goes to bed and no one is angry at anyone else any longer.

Read Daniel Hughes, it works.

Adoption Magazine

Adoption Magazine, a Canadian resource for Adoption posted on of my pieces today, Would You Adopt Again? In a Hearbeat! If you haven't read it head on over, it is one of my favourites.

In other news I am now taking myself to the nearest couch with a cup of tea, a box of kleenex, Sex in the City 2 and my knitting becaue P very generously shared his cold with me. So sweet of him wasn't it.

Ontario Adoption Issues

I tend not to talk politics here, I tend to keep my opinions to myself about the "sometimes lacking" adoption system that exists in this province I live in. However, given the news yesterday I feel sort of obligated to comment - so I am.

Yesterday in the province of Ontario a bill was introduced, if it was passed it will do the following:

• The proposed act would, if passed, remove legal barriers so that more kids in the care of children's aid societies (CASs) could be adopted. Currently, 75 per cent of these kids have legally-binding court orders preventing them from being adopted.
• The legislation would also, if passed, allow 16- and 17-year-olds who have left care to return to the CAS and be eligible for financial and other supports until the age of 21. Currently, this only applies to youth who remain in care until age 18.
• Reducing the waitlist for homestudies and establishing standard timelines
• Making it easier for youth to attend college or university by exempting CAS financial support from OSAP applications, meaning it would not count as income
• Doubling the number of Adoption Resource Exchanges -- forums that match adoptive families with children needing adoption -- across Ontario
• Making it easier to find comprehensive information online about public, private and international adoptions
• Working with CASs and First Nations so Aboriginal children and youth in care remain connected to their communities and cultural traditions through more frequent use of customary care arrangements.

These highlights were taken directly from the Ontario News Briefing that was posted yesterday.You can read the Statement to the Legislature here.

I need to say that this is a move in the right direction, it creates some much needed changes to a system that currently moves at the speed of dark but it does nothing to address a variety of other issues such as:

• The lack of a provincial body to match all waiting kids with a waiting families regardless of their location within the province
• The lack of post adoption support for families in the months and years after adoptions are finalized
• The lack of standardization around adoption subsidies especially for families who need to have a parent stay home in order to successfully parent their adopted children.
• The neglecting of the fact that all children, regardless of age need families, families are not just for babies and toddlers.
• The lack of main stream advertising and programs to encourage families from all walks of life to adopt.

There are a few other huge issues but given the way that the system works they are not issues that can be addressed by the ministry.  Each Children's Aid Society (CAS) deals with these things differently and given that some workers understand more than others it varies, but they are all issues affecting adoption in Ontario

• There is a misguided belief that the majority adopted kids need to be the only or youngest children in a family ( albeit in some cases necessary)  and that families that have adopted kids should not create large families through adoption
• The fears and racism that exist around creating multi-racial families.
• The lack of honesty about attachment issues and what those can mean for families.
• The lack of therapy and education services pre and post adoption.
• The continued flexibility of the laws around the timelines for kids in care because a social worker feels that the biological parent will get it together this time even though they have not before. When does the childs need for stability come first?
• The breaking up of sibling groups in an attempt to get younger children adopted while older children remain in foster care.

It breaks my heart that there are over 9000 children waiting for families in this province. 9000 kids who need permanent homes with parents who will love them no matter what. There are also countless families like ours who want more children, who are approved to have more children and are waiting because there is not a system in this province that matches children with families across the borders of each privately run CAS agency. I must say that there are efforts being made but as hard as the people at Adopt Ontario work it is only a drop in the bucket and because each CAS can choose whether or not to use the service it is under utilized as a method for matching kids and families. 

Changing the laws to allow more children to be adopted is a fabulous step but if they cannot easily be matched with adopt ready families what would be the point?  What if this bill does not pass before the next election, what if it gets hung up in debate, what if nothing changes, then where will we be?

My kids are here, in a home, loved and cherished, is it so much to ask that all kids have the same right...

Monday Moments

• I went to Toronto yesterday for 2.5 hours. I arrived at at 10:30 and left by 1pm, it was a long day.
• I drove all the way to Toronto to go the to Adoption Resource Exchange which is put on twice a year in attempt to match children and families together. It is photos and workers, no kids. It is heart breaking to go, it is hard to see so many people crowded around the tables that have babies available while those who only have older children sit idle.
• I have mixed feelings about the process but if it means we get matched with more kids than I guess it is worth it.I know that the process does work and that it does help match kids up with waiting families.
• I got to meet and talk to Noelle from Adopt Ontario and that was great. It is always nice to meet people who get it and who understand our desire for more kids.
• I came home to a full blown Wango Tango from Calvin, we talked before I left, I promised him I would be home in time for dinner and he would be ok with his Dad but it did not help. He did not hold it together, he raged and assaulted P. It was not pretty. Once I got home and read him the riot act as calmly as I could (considering what had happened) we talked through his choices and he apologised to Dad and to Fudge.
• His choices in my absence sucked but once I was back he managed to pick up the pieces which a huge step forward for him.
• Calvin no longer owns any belts. He will also be vacuuming his fathers car on Saturday morning.
• Calvin and I are heading back to the Children's Hospital today, hopefully we get him some better pain medication because the poor kids body hurts all the time.
• I bought 3 new attachment parenting books yesterday, I would tell you about them but I am to lazy to get up and go get them from the bedroom so that I can get the titles correct. You will have to wait.
• My cellar is flooding, again. I have turned the furnace off altogether in attempt to save a us few hundred bucks when it gets wet. The pump is worth it's weight in gold today, let's hope it does not die while I am not here for the whole day.
• And for the those of you who have been asking, my BIL is slowly getting better, it will be a long, long road and although he is not out of the woods we are cautiously optimistic.

High Tops

I cried buying shoes for my son the other day. I was standing there in the department store looking at the display of sandals and spring shoes and the tears welled up and rolled down my face. There was nothing I could do but let it happen, I needed to have that cry as I bought shoes for my boy.

Let me explain.

In September I bought new shoes for my boys. Calvin wanted high top basketball shoes with laces. I agreed, he loved those shoes. He wore them constantly even on the hottest days of fall, he took the time to tie and untie them and gave up wearing his sandals all together. Then winter came and the runners went away and the snow boots came out. They made an occasional appearance for cub meetings and such but really, in much of Canada in the winter it is all boots all the time. We pulled the much coveted high tops back out last week and he was excited to see them again. He talked about his love for his shoes and how they made run faster and jump higher. He wore them one day and then commented the next day that they he needed new shoes. I said don't be silly and had him put them on again. He and I had a few arguments back and forth about them and he kept saying they were old and dumb and he needed new shoes. He would not wear them and went to school in his rubber boots for a few days.

I was at a bit of a loss as to why the coveted shoes sucked so badly all of a sudden and then the penny dropped...
 
The rest is at Hopeful Parents, head on over to read it there.