Patience: Social Workers. Judges. Lawyers. And Life.

For those of you following the Lee Family Story, I'm out of town and can't write very easily.  There will be a short pause in the story until I return.  In the meantime, I will post a few things I have written that I have not yet shared.

I was wrong.  Today I realized there is one area in my life in which I am patient.

I’m sitting in the general waiting area of family court, thinking about patience.  I have to think about it because every time I come here I have to BE patient.  This is a place filled with conflict.  A place where troubled moms and dads and parents and new born babies and children all congregate because the parent(s) allegedly did something wrong.  Alcohol. Drugs. Neglect. Anger. Abuse. Abandonment. Poverty. Hopelessness. Lack of Education. And More.

It is also a place where people are trying to get their life together – or thinking that they are trying to get it together --  believing that they are entitled to more.  More time.  More chances.  More help.  More understanding.  More grace.

And sometimes they want less.  Less blame. Less responsibility.  Less accountability.  Less hopelessness.

The people around them have several duties: to protect the child, provide help for parents willing to conform to routine pre-printed court orders, and to try to protect the natural parent-child relationship. Some well-meaning over-worked attorneys try to provide legal help and representation – sometimes spending less than 10 minutes on the case before having to represent their client’s interests in the courtroom.  The nuance is lost.  Attorneys and judges and social workers tend to revert to pre-conceived (and often well-justified) ideas about the particular facts of the case. It is routine.  In part, because the truth is that there are many similarities in the stories that are told in the courtroom. 

But humans (or at least American humans) don’t like to grouped into a category.  They want to be treated as an individual.  Humans don’t want be attacked.  Humans don’t want to be told they aren’t doing it right.  Humans don’t want to have their children taken from them.  It’s natural for there to be a lot of anger and resentment and bitterness on the part of parents and other caregivers when their blood is taken unwillingly. 

But part of the test is the parent’s ability to remain calm.  To sound intelligent and reasonable.  To avoid shouting or name-calling.  To recognize the power of the social workers and the judge and the attorneys and to know that they have seen it all before.  Acting irrational only feeds into the preconceived idea that they aren’t a suitable parent.

It’s a delicate balance. 

Today, the courtroom is crowded with about 200 people.  There are no seats.  Young men don’t offer them to their elders.  Perhaps no one told them about what it means to be a gentlemen.  Maybe they heard it, but that isn’t the most important thing on their mind.  Most are either a parent or a child waiting to hear their fate.  Offering seats to others isn’t the priority.

For my part I have had to learn to wait.  Patiently.  As a former attorney I used to think I had to fight.  To make my position known.  To be loud enough to be heard.  (I still have to do that at home.)  I thought I had to prove my point.  To convince people to follow me.  To persuade them that I was right.  And I still do that to some degree – but more patiently. 

Over the years, I have learned it is more effective to wait on God.  To wait on his timing.  Many times in the past 5 years, I’ve waited or a runaway child to return.  I’ve waited on a kid that hates me and sees me as the enemy to view me as the mom I want to be for them.  I have watched my children and courts make decisions that I knew were bad and wouldn’t last.  But after making my position known, I wait.  I tell the child and the workers that I will be waiting if things didn’t work out as planned.  Then I let it go.

Which causes grief on the part of some of my other children. They verbally question why I am not “fighting” for the baby that they love.  Why I’m not “doing something.”  And all I can tell them is that history has proven to me personally that if I am patient and wait, the right thing will happen.  Sometimes bad things happen in between, but I know that I’m not in control.  Blaming and getting angry does little for anyone. 

Now don’t get me wrong.  This doesn’t mean that I’m not frustrated.  Or angry.  That my concern doesn’t show through in my everyday mood and activities.  I still FEEL the pain.  I have just learned that I can’t act on it.  I don’t need to burn any bridges.  I can only build relationships.  And that takes time.  A lot of time.

So I find myself being more patient that I ever knew capable because God has shown me that he is in control of my life and the lives of the children he places in my path.  And after doing this for the better part of my entire life, that’s a good place to be.

IF only I could only be as patient with my husband!

Part 6 - Lee Family: Our Birth - Foster - Adoption Journey to 20 Children Part 6

Parts 6 and 7 of the story continue with some of the details of our first adopted child's life.  We adopted Heather when she was six years old.  We first met her on January 16, 1999.  She passed away in a car accident - still chasing her dreams - on January 16, 2011.  She lives on through her story.

The Rest of the Middle of the Beginning:  Heather’s Life

When Heather was younger, we spent countless hours having long talks on my bed. She had a huge gaping hole in her heart.  She had this strong, impossible to ignore feeling that she had been abandoned by her birth family and the one failed adoption and all the families in between.  She felt unloved. Unworthy.  Like she was too much trouble for anyone to endure.

She also had questions about whether she had ever been physically or sexually abused.  She had no specific memories, but she was so young she didn’t expect that she would remember anything.  Over the years, lots of experience with other sexually abused children in our family led us to believe that her conduct was consistent with a history of sexual abuse. But the adoption records weren’t clear about the time or circumstances – just vague allegations.  I had read her adoption file and asked lots of questions during the adoption process, but no one had any clear answers.  So we were just left with the thoughts.  These thoughts haunted her for most of her life. 

We did know that she lived with her birth mom and dad for the first 15 months of her life.  Her mom eventually was placed in a mental hospital for the seriously mentally disturbed where she stayed for many years, but the adoption records gave us no diagnosis. Nonetheless, I think it is fairly safe to assume that if Heather’s birth mom was mentally ill enough to be institutionalized for a long period of time, it is unlikely that she was capable of providing for Heather’s basic needs in a way that we could say was normal during those 15 months. 

In between, Heather lived with at least five other families –mostly family members who attempted to keep her in the family.  But in each home, there was a problem.  Another child was too jealous of her.  The family wasn’t really prepared emotionally or financially to raise another child for the long-term.  Heather was too challenging. Her grandmother adored her but she was too old to raise her.  Family conflict in the extended family was disruptive.  It wasn’t a lack of love for Heather that caused the problems, but nothing was ever quite right.

Heather’s memories of those moves from house to house are conflicted.  She had some very specific memories of certain incidents that she attributed to her leaving.  In every case, regardless of the actual reason, Heather somehow believed that she was abandoned and unloved because she did something really bad that caused her to be sent away. 

           

Heather was not a model child and it’s natural for her to assume she was to blame.  Having talked to most of her family over the years, no one ever said it was because Heather was a bad kid.  But that’s what Heather always thought - she was bad and they didn’t love her enough to keep her.  Those thoughts consumed her most of her life – until her 18^th birthday, when she and I took a trip to visit her birth family – primarily so that she could ask the tough questions she had always needed answers to. That was the first trip back for a visit that seemed to give her some much-needed resolution to her internal conflict. She discovered that she was loved and there was a place for her in her birth family.

We also know a little about the first adoption, which was disrupted following a psychiatric evaluation after a few short weeks.  I never spoke to the psychiatrist, but the first adoptive mom told me that he had diagnosed Heather with Attachment Disorder, which is the diagnosis given for children who are so abused or neglected in their first three years of life that they fail to form a human bond with anyone.  They never learn to trust.  And for many, that failure to trust lasts a lifetime. 

The psychiatrist’s prognosis was grim.  He said that children with Attachment Disorder are the kind of kids that grow up setting fires, hurting people and animals, and eventually committing murder. He was serious.  His words were compounded by a made for television movie called “Child of Rage” based on a true story of a six-year-old girl with Attachment Disorder that did horrible things to her adoptive family without remorse or the appearance of a conscious.  The movie was also about the then new idea of “holding therapy” which was designed to recreate the child’s early life and teach the child to trust.  His recommendation to the adoptive parents was to get rid of Heather as soon as possible. 

And they did.  I don’t blame them for following the advice of the psychiatrist.  They were young and inexperienced.  They had no children.  They were taking the advice of a seemingly well-meaning professional.  It seemed logical to listen to a man who told you that if you kept this child, your world would become a living hell.

I doubt that when they decided to adopt, they thought they were signing up for that.  They were looking for a child to love and lavish.  I’m guessing they thought love would be enough.  They were enamored by this adorable little blue-eyed girl who knew exactly what to do and say to make someone fall in love with her. 

Often, kids with Attachment Disorder develop wonderful coping skills and appear on the surface to be loving, lovable, happy children that will seemingly go to anyone – even a total stranger. But this is simply a tool for survival.  A way to meet their immediate needs for food, clothing, shelter and human contact without actually being in relationship with anyone.

The reality is that these kids believe that the only people that can be trusted are themselves.  But many don’t even trust themselves over time. Without trust, there can be no real relationship. And that becomes the core of all future manifestations of the problems in their lives.  

We most often hear about Attachment Disorder because of International Adoptions.  Before people really understood this Disorder, foreign orphanages had so little money and so many children that babies were rarely held.  Bottles were attached to ropes strung across the bed.  Cries went unanswered by human touch.  Babies were left to themselves.  God said it wasn’t good for humans to be without others of their kind.  And you can see the truth in that when you see the consequences that occur when innocent, precious little babies are left alone. 

It seems like the solution would be simple.  Place that same little child into the loving arms of a mom and dad who desperately want to be this child’s parents and all will be well. And for some, that is possible – especially if they are still in the life-stage where they are formulating their beliefs about trust and human relationships.  Experts say that this happens before age 3, but I really don’t know.  God is bigger than an age limit.  But he did create us in a certain way and so many times, the outcomes are predictable.

If only love were enough. But it usually isn’t.  The love of parents is not enough.  Can never be enough.  Because this child doesn’t know how to accept love.  This child doesn’t know how to give real love.  Everything is a façade.  A way to “act” to get needs met.  In a weird sort of way – kids like Heather learn to do and say and be whoever they need to be at any given moment – but it is for the purpose of getting something.  Not for the sake of the relationship.

I’m not an expert in Attachment Disorder.  I’m not here to give you a clinical definition and clinical answers.  I speak simply as a parent of an adopted child who was said to have suffered from it.  Over the years, I read and learned what I could.  But mostly, I just engaged in life with my child, knowing that an inability to trust was at the core of all her problems  - regardless of the cause. 

So, this couples’ dreams was turned upside down by her prognosis.  They contacted the adoption agency that placed Heather and told the agency they couldn’t keep her.  They wanted her out of their house immediately.  After all, they had already seen signs that the psychiatrist was right.  Heather held their beloved cat too tightly.  She wasn’t gentle enough.  She screamed from nightmares.  They had caught her in lies.  She intentionally destroyed things that were important to the adoptive mom and then pretended to have no idea how it happened.  Heather remembered all that and told me about it many times.

The truth is, Heather was not the right child for this family.  And God knew that.  But that didn’t stop Heather from feeling abandoned once again.  From feeling like one more family couldn’t handle her and didn’t love her enough to keep trying. 

I didn’t tell Heather what the psychiatrist said about her until she was about 15 and we began reading her adoption records, which contained some of her psychiatric evaluation.  She knew the diagnosis when she was six, but not what the psychiatrist said she would do.  Truthfully, I didn’t think it would help and I didn’t want to give her any ideas or expectations!

Looking back, the first night Heather was at our house, we let all four girls sleep on our bedroom floor so that we could all be together.  The next morning, we woke to find that our entire front yard had been burned in a brush fire.  Apparently, the fire trucks had even come and put it out.  None of us woke up through any of it. 

I never suspected Heather because she was in our room with us and I usually hear everything and everyone in my mommy sleep.  Not to mention, she had only been in the house for a few hours before going to bed and didn’t know where anything was kept.  We certainly didn’t have matches accessible to her.  But there was never any explanation for the fire.

It didn’t occur to me until just a few years ago that Heather could have done that.  Fire starting can be a problem in children with Attachment Disorder.  I never asked her and I will never know now.  But thinking back, I wonder if I had thought she started that fire, would I have fallen into the trap of believing she was too dangerous to be around my other kids?  I think God protected me from that thought.  It seems so obvious now to believe that Heather was the logical person to blame, but it totally evaded me then. Thanks God.

Come to think of it, God always protected our family from what we didn’t need to know.  I don’t know how, but the kids especially, knew nothing they didn’t need to know – even if they were sitting in the room while it happened or while we were talking about it. 

So, I’m not here to cast blame on Heather’s birth family or the first family that tried to adopt Heather or any of the families in between.  That isn’t my job and it won’t make one bit of difference in the outcome.  My only job was to try to understand what might have happened so that we could try to figure out how Heather could learn to trust.  I’m not sure we ever fully succeeded in that quest.

Sometimes, our long conversations led to short-term relief from her misery, but nothing permanent.  I knew that her only hope was in her relationship with God.  As she got older, I knew that relationship needed to be with Him.  Directly. I frequently told her that the hole in her heart could only be filled by Him, but she kept trying to fill it with me or some other person.  And we weren’t good enough.  We would never be good enough to make her truly happy.  She hated when I said that.

When I realized that I didn’t have many more answers for Heather. When I knew that I had filled her with Truth – even though she couldn’t quite grasp it all.  I knew it was time.  I had nothing new left to offer, so I urged her to engage more fully in her relationship with God.

Part 7 continues Heather's story.  I will post it immediately following this entry.

Part 5 - Lee Family: Our Birth - Foster - Adoptive Journey to 20 Children

(This is Part 5 of our story.  It is the beginning of our move into the adoption world.  It is also a story of commitment and endurance.)

The Middle of the Beginning –Adopting Heather

In 1999, at almost exactly the same time that Heather was placed in her first adoptive home, weird things were happening at the Lee home. We were still a respite home for Gail – although she spent almost as much time at our house as she did at the Group Home.  We had wanted to adopt Gail, but she didn’t want to separate from her twin sister and her twin wasn’t interested in adoption. 

Anyway, we didn’t have any specific plans for more children and we had not completed any paperwork or a home study that would allow us to adopt a child. 

Nonetheless, right before Christmas in 1998, Alan came up to me in what I now know is his “God is telling me something really important and I need you to listen” voice and said something totally irrational and crazy – considering he had had a vasectomy after our third child!  He announced in a rather rushed and hurried tone, “Anna.  I can’t shake this feeling that we are supposed to be preparing for another child!”  I knew I wasn’t pregnant, but he couldn’t offer me any more information about how we were supposed to go about getting another child!  And believe me – I asked lots of questions.  

It wasn’t normal for my husband to suddenly blurt out that God was talking to him directly about anything – let alone another child! God doesn’t speak so directly and clearly to me or my husband very often.  And my husband is a man of few words, but the sense of urgency in his voice made me take him seriously. 

So, without any idea of what I was preparing for - I started nesting like I was nine-months pregnant!  I cleaned closets, rearranged rooms, made phone calls inquiring about the adoption process (I couldn’t imagine any other way to get a child), and who knows what else over the next few weeks.

Three weeks later, while I was sitting in my law office working, I got what I thought was a sales call.  I almost hung up, but two words caught my attention – adoption agency!  The call was from a California adoption agency who said that they had heard about us from a person in Texas, who heard about us from someone in who knows where, who said that we might be willing to adopt a school-age girl.  Needless to say, I didn’t hang up.

The private California adoption agency was searching for an adoptive home for a six-year-old first grader whose adoption was disrupting and needed to be placed immediately.  We were given sketchy information about her history – including her psychological issues.  After taking some notes and getting callback numbers, I called my husband.

I had barely gotten the words out of my mouth when he said, “This is it! This is what God was trying to tell me!  Yes.  We will take her.” 

She was still in her adoptive home in Missouri and we had to travel there to meet her.  Fortunately, my husband had always wanted to visit New York City and I had saved up money and surprised him with a trip for our 10^th Anniversary in June.  So we turned in our round trip tickets to New York City. Even though Alan was giving up a dream trip – including our seats to the David Letterman show - he didn’t think twice about the choice.  The next day we were on our way to a small town in Missouri to meet our new daughter. 

On January 16, 1999, we spent the day with Heather and her adoptive family – getting to know her.  She was adorable and precocious and we fell in love – knowing that we were about to enter into something big.  Really big. But even we didn’t realize how big “Really Big” was going to be.

As it turns out, we were Heather’s 7^th placement.  She had been passed around between multiple family members, but for a variety of reasons, no one kept her for very long.   Her biological Aunt had her the longest – for 2 ½ years – and she ultimately placed her for adoption with a private agency.  Heather was matched with a youngish couple from Missouri who visited her a few times before she was placed in their home for adoption.  The adoption disrupted due to her psychological issues – including the diagnosis of Attachment Disorder - and that’s when we got the call from the California adoption agency.

Two weeks later, in what can only be described as a God-assisted adoption – Heather was placed in our home for adoption by an Ohio magistrate.  We went from having no home study and no idea that we were about to adopt - to having a new child in our home – all in two weeks. 

And did I mention that this adoption involved 4 states – all of which had to coordinate their paperwork?  That can’t happen without God.

Or that the magistrate in Ohio was going to transfer the case to Missouri rather than deal with another failed adoption.  But because I was an attorney and understood the legal issues – as well as being familiar with the foster/adoptive process – she talked to me by phone for almost 2 hours and agreed to retain jurisdiction so that we could adopt Heather?

Or that our doctors did our medical exam and filled out the paperwork the same day we called?

Or that we found a private social worker that came to our house within two days, contacted all our references and stayed up until 3 a.m. writing our report?

Or that our fingerprint report came back almost immediately?

Or that my husband’s Child Abuse & Neglect (CAN) report came back with a problem?  Turns out there is another man with his exact name in a nearby county with an abuse problem.  The miracle is that the social worker was able to definitively establish that it wasn’t my husband – all within the same few days?

So, as you will hear me say frequently… We never really questioned whether Heather was our child.  God had made that pretty clear to us before we even knew she existed.  Whenever things got really challenging with Heather, we always went back to the fact that God had given her to us and we couldn’t really reject His gift.


Part 6 continues with some of the details of Heather's short life and her impact on our family.  Because she is now in Heaven, I feel I can share her story in full -- unlike some of my other kids whose privacy I  want to protect.  

Part 4 - Lee Family: Our Birth - Foster - Adoptive Journey to 20 Children: Part 4

(This is Part 4 of our story.  If you missed Parts 1-3, you might want to start at the beginning!)

The Almost Middle of the Beginning – The First Children

We got pregnant on our honeymoon and I gave birth to our oldest biological daughter Rebecca almost exactly nine months later.  (And no, we weren’t pregnant when we eloped, although it wasn’t technically impossible if you know what I mean!)  We must have been quite the fertile couple because two more girls quickly followed.  When our third daughter Amy was born, Rebecca was 2-years-old and Kathryn was still only one. 

Because of Fini - my special needs sister that my parents adopted when they were about 50 - my husband knew a little about fostering and adopting kids.  It was part of my everyday conversation.  But he had no interest whatsoever.  He wouldn’t even talk about it.  He just listened to me talk about the possibilities for us as a couple.  It was my passion – but not yet his.

I was still practicing law and my husband was a Certified Public Accountant.  Life was busy and full to say the least. But we adored our children and made our careers fit around raising our girls.

When the girls were 2, 3 and 4, my husband and I went on an overnight camping trip for our anniversary.  At that point, two of our three children were conceived during the same week - so we often joked about not taking any more trips for our anniversary unless we wanted another child!  That year, my husband had a vasectomy, so we thought we were safe.  Little did we know.

While we were there, we saw a group of girls playing at the lake.  A very outgoing, talkative girl from the group named Nikki approached my husband and insisted that she knew him from somewhere.  He had no idea who she was and although he’s not the most talkative man around, he engaged her in lively conversation.  

After she walked away, my husband became curious and asked the couple at a nearby table about the girls. He learned that the girls were on an outing with their group foster home.  The couple went on to explain that the girls lived in the group home, but some had respite homes where they could visit for weekends and holidays so they didn't have to stay at the group home all the time.  One of the girls, Gail, had not had a respite home in many years. 

My husband was intrigued.  He asked questions and found out how to become a respite foster home. It was surprisingly simple. Up to that point, he was convinced he could never love a child that wasn’t his own and he didn’t want to have anything to do with foster care or adoption. 

When we were alone, he asked me if these were the kind of kids I had been talking about.  I told him this was exactly what I meant. After five years, he changed his mind and I didn’t have to do anything!  I sat back and watched as Alan made phone calls, obtained the paperwork, arranged to have us fingerprinted and did all that was necessary for Gail to start visiting our house.

About six weeks later, she came for what was supposed to be a week- long visit – and stayed for almost 6 weeks!  We fell in love with her immediately.  Our relationship flourished and she began coming to our house every chance she got.

That was the beginning of our foster/adoptive journey as a couple.


Part 5 of the story continues with our journey to adopt Heather.  As some of you know, our spirited, troubled, smiling, talented daughter Heather joined our family on January 16, 1999.  She was killed in a car accident on January 16, 2011.  We miss her every day.

Part 1 - Lee Family: Our Birth - Foster - Adoptive Journey to 20 Children

I am asked to tell this story a few times every day.  The story I tell standing in the grocery line with 3 carts of groceries and a load of kids is far more abbreviated.  This is the full story, written for my children and for those who keep asking me to write it. In the interest of time (yours, not mine) - I will post the story in parts!


The Very Beginning...

I distinctly remember the social worker standing in the breezeway between the main school building and the annex at my catholic school.  I don’t recall why I was with her in that particular spot, but I remember the feeling that my life was about to change.  Ironically, she wasn’t coming to take me away from my parents and place me in the home of strangers.  Rather, she was there to explain foster care to a group of fifth graders, who - up to that point - had more than likely never encountered anyone that they knew to be a foster child. 

I actually have no other recollection of the social worker visit or what she might have said that changed my thinking for a lifetime, but it must have impacted me because standing in that breezeway looking at what was probably a nun dressed in street cloths - a new concept in the 1970’s -  I knew something big was about to happen.  Likewise, I have no recollection of going home with a flier recruiting foster parents, but my parents tell me that my sister and I brought it to them and told them that we had to do something about these kids who had no home. 

The only other memory I cannot erase has to do with moving out of our tiny two-bedroom home where all four children shared one room, to a four bedroom mansion -- or so it seemed to me - that my architect father and incredibly frugal mother had just built alongside a few professionals and their four motley kids.  After the move, kids at school started to call us “rich.”  I don’t understand why that word was so profoundly negative to me, but it created an overwhelming sense of shame that made me recognize that I was exceptionally fortunate, but that it was useless if I didn’t do something good.

And so the story began.  For reasons I have never fully explored, my parents agreed that we needed to become a foster family.  So we did. 

The first call we got was for a pregnant teenager named Mary Grace.   This was the 1970’s and back then, pregnant girls didn’t live with their families.  Especially Catholic girls. They were whisked away to have the baby quietly so that the baby could be placed for adoption without humiliating the girl’s family.  In this case, the parents didn’t want her grandmother to find out she was pregnant.  Mary Grace was apparently feisty and she told her parents to send the grandmother away if they didn’t want her to know.  And they did. For some reason, I remember thinking she was brave to stand up to her family and not hide in shame. I thought it was bad to be pregnant, but worse to be fake. She never came to live with us.

The first foster child that actually came to live with us was a 16-year-old girl named Beverly.  She lived with us for about a month, but she really didn’t want to be there and tried to make everyone’s life miserable.  While skating she broke her arm and through an odd set of circumstances - eventually went back to live with her family. At that point, my parents decided to foster younger children instead of teens – thinking that might be a better fit given that my siblings and I were between 5 and 10 at that point.

For the next several years, my life became an emotional rollercoaster for me as babies moved in and out of our lives. But this was definitely a family affair.  When my parents received a call for a child, they gathered the family together to discuss our options. From the moment we decided to foster a child, we all seemed to fall deeply and incredibly in love.  Whether the baby stayed for days or months or years didn’t seem to matter.  God seemed to give us all the ability to bond and attach instantly, which made the leaving part especially challenging.  Fortunately, my parents created a unique family ritual that helped us cope.

Up through the 1970’s, adoptions were closed and foster parents had no contact with the adoptive parents.  Essentially, the adoptive parents were told to pretend like the day that they received their child was the first day of the child’s life – no matter the age.  That left no room for relationships, comfort items, familiar objects, or even pictures of the time before adoption.

But my parents were far ahead of their time and understood the importance of this information for both the child and his new parents.  My mom kept a daily journal of the baby’s activities.  She made photo albums to send to the new parents.  She sent the baby’s favorite toys and blankets.  But we were at the mercy of the social worker.  She could give all this to the adoptive parents as some record of the baby’s early life - or toss it carelessly into the trash.  We would never know. 

When it was time for a child to leave, our family would begin the ritual of what I can best describe as grieving. We all understood that our role was to love this child for as long as she or he was with our family.  Nothing more.  But that didn’t make the goodbye easy.  In fact, if we did our job well, leaving felt incredibly hard. 

As soon as we received word that a baby was leaving, we began collecting items, packing belongings, writing notes, telling stories, giving extra kisses and love as we prepared for the final moments when the social worker would come to our home to take the baby to his new home.

When she came, she arrived to our family ritual.  All of us kids stayed home from school and we all sat in our adult-only living room crying as we passed the baby around for our final goodbyes.  We remembered.  We talked.  We laughed.  We would tell the social worker all the things that we thought were important for the new parents to know.  And then the baby walked out of our life, never to be heard from again.

When I was about 17, my mother was contacted about fostering a very special little boy named Timothy, who was medically fragile.  He was 8-months-old and had been labeled a vegetable by the medical staff. Born with serious medical problems to a 16-year-old mother, the doctors had done all they could do for him.  If he had any chance at life, the doctors felt he needed to be in a home.

My mom and our family had absolutely no experience with medically fragile children.  We had no idea how to do anything. My mom, who would bear most of the burden of providing for his medical needs, simply didn’t feel qualified to handle such serious medical issues.

But that has never stopped my mom and dad – and now their kids – from doing anything.  She and my father went to visit Timothy in the hospital and they decided almost immediately that they were willing to sacrifice to take on his enormous challenges -- but they wanted my siblings and me to agree because it would impact us too.

 

Shortly after meeting Timothy in the hospital, my mom was in the car with my 15-year-old brother on the way home from football practice.  My mom said to my brother, “Chris, I don’t know if we can handle this kind of child.” 

Much to my mom’s surprise, Chris responded, “Mom, all the other kids have been easy.  Maybe God is asking us to do something hard.”  My mom later said that clinched the deal for her and my father.

After that conversation, there was no turning back.  This tiny helpless infant - who was purportedly blind and unresponsive to humans. This baby - who had never smiled or laughed.  This child - who was fed through a tube in his stomach and had never even sucked a pacifier.  This child was the one my parents fell in love with. 

We brought Timothy home and he lived and inspired more love in our household than one could imagine.  People from all walks of life fell in love with this little boy that supposedly had nothing to offer this world.  We were supposed to help him.  We fed him.  We held him.  We clothed him. We gave him medicine.  We cleaned his tubing.  My mom worked tirelessly to develop his sucking reflex.  We did everything for this helpless baby.  But the truth is - he helped us. 

When he was 15-months old, Timothy died in the home of another foster family that had been preparing for weeks to take care of Timothy  – just so my parents could have a few days of respite from his 24-hour care. My dad sensed that Timothy’s time on earth was nearing an end and he was trying to give my mom a short break to re-energize -  but he had no way of knowing it would happen the one night they took for rest. 

My parents, who were both raised as devout Catholics, were also a product of the 1960’s and – my dad especially – was never one to follow the crowd.  Mom and dad chose a plain pine casket and had Timothy brought to our home for the wake and funeral.  They couldn’t bear the thought of allowing his tiny little body to be alone in some refrigerator at a strange place.

I was older by then, but it didn’t seem strange to me that the cold, lifeless body of our precious Timothy was upstairs in our living room while I tried to sleep in the room directly below.  I remember going upstairs once during the night to check on him and I saw my mom sitting beside the casket, crying. 

There were probably 200 people crammed into our house for the funeral.  There was music and poetry.  My siblings and I were teenagers and all our friends were grieving with us.  Timothy had impacted their lives too.  It was beautiful. 

Looking back, I thank my parents for breaking modern taboos and opening my heart up to the unexpected.  I had no way of knowing that 30 years later, I would bury my own child and that my views on her memorial would be so significantly impacted by my parents’ choices. 

Last year, I described these experiences to a new friend, who said to me quite sympathetically, “Wow.  You must have suffered a lot of loss in your childhood.”  Based on the look on this man’s face, my reaction was anything but expected.  I burst into tears as I tried to gather my thoughts and respond. 

Loss?  The word brought on a flood of emotions.  I thought for a moment, “ Did I suffer because these children came and went from my life?”  Through hiccupping tears that must have made this new friend think he had opened some terrible wound of my past, I said, “No.  It wasn’t loss at all.  For me, it was all gain.”

My tears were those of joy.  Not sadness.  Even now it make me cry to realize how blessed my life was by these children.  "No sir, it was not loss.  In my mind, it was all gain."


Up until that moment, I never realized that I thought of my role as foster sibling that way.  It was a profound moment.  


Enough for now... barring disaster - or another trip to the emergency room for the staph infection that finally presented itself like a unicorn on the forehead of my baby -  the story continues tomorrow.  

Quantity versus Quality

No question about it.  We have a butt load of kids.  Sorry.  We use the word butt a lot in our house.  And a few other words that aren’t polite or allowed in public school.  Like SHUT UP. And sometimes SHUT THE *%$#)# UP NOW! But that is reserved for special occasions. I’m not proud of this.  Just honest.

Anyway, when I went to bed last night, we not only had the usual 16, but we still had company.  At least 4 extras were still hanging around.  Mostly unannounced.  At 10:30 p.m., my husband asks when everyone should leave.  I tell him that no one is here that should prevent us from going to sleep.  Sometimes, that isn’t the case.  We turn out the lights with the sound of people awake all around us. Most are over the age of 13.

When I awake.  I sleepily turn on Jake and the Never land Pirates for a few minutes while we are trying to get everything ready.  Change or help change 4 diapers/pull-ups.  Check.  Remind each preschooler to throw dirty bottom wear in the back porch trash – not on the porch itself.  Check.  5 sippy cups of milk.  Check. 2 bottles of formula. Check.  Bacon, Eggs and Pancakes for my husband and whoever shows up to eat.  Check. Star Bucks Bold coffee for my husband. Check. Diet Dr. Pepper for me.  Check.

Everywhere I turn, there are people. My husband gets up earlier than me to clean out the sink and sweep and mop the floor so I can make breakfast.  He knows I can’t cook a new meal when the old one is still around and he wants me to cook. Food is critical to his manhood.

Our newborn is in a bouncy seat with a zipper cover to prevent the little ones from touching him.  My 4-month old grandson, who was prematurely booted from the bouncy seat because the newborn arrived, has moved up to the swirly seat with toys all around it.  His legs are too short and don’t touch the ground.  The one, three and four-year olds are all hovering - waiting for my lap. One per leg and one tucked in the middle against my chest.  When they were smaller I could fit four.  Our 6-year-old is lying across the couch.  The other 4-year-old is playing something on the computer.  And the 2-year-old is wandering from place to place silently creating havoc. 

The 8-year-old is on the other computer trying to create new recipes for a smoothie and taco dip.  The 12 and 13- year-olds are still in bed.  Three of the semi-adult kids have already left for work. The last one is packing her lunch, eating and talking to me while I cook and she prepares to leave for work.  The teen mamma and daddy of the newborn baby are sleeping (separately for those of you who are wondering).  The baby schedule is still upside down.  They have been staying up all night with the newborn because they are afraid to sleep when he is awake.  They sleep in when one of the big kids or me takes over for a few hours in the morning.  So far, they have been doing a good job with their son.   

My married daughter texts me about choosing paint colors for her new house.

And it is only 8 something a.m.

Within a few minutes, one of the semi-adult kids comes back home with the two she is babysitting.  They planned to go to the pool but it was too cold so they came over.  There are still a few places on the main level not fully saturated with people so they stay to hang with the crowd.  Figures.

There are two 3-foot-tall piles of laundry to be put away on the coffee table. There is no dirty laundry, but I HATE putting the clean stuff away.  Since last night, I’ve sorted through buckets of newborn clothes and washed them for the newbie.  The kitchen is now a mess again from breakfast.

A friend calls to ask for advice about a psychiatrist.  The 1-½ year-old starts crying while I’m on the phone.  He has dumped all the syrup onto the counter and himself and is crying because he is literally stuck to his seat and he has diaper rash from his antibiotic! I have had to resort to one of the babies holding his own bottle in the bouncy seat at my feet.  Not ideal.  I know.  But it’s either that or he must wait even longer! 

So, in the middle of all of this I keep thinking.  By our definition this is not chaos.  Just very busy and full.  Sometimes, all hell breaks loose and it takes me shouting at the top of my lungs – louder than all the rest – to break the cycle and get their attention.  I find that acting like a crazed lunatic is an effective tool for getting them to listen.  

I’m wondering if the quantity of kids affects my performance.  Wait.  That is a ridiculous question.  Of course it affects my performance.  Often, I don’t have the time or energy to meet every individual need.  Someone usually fills the gap, but not always.  We can’t afford to allow each child to pursue every activity he can dream up.  We have limited funds for college tuition and depend on scholarships, grants and work.  All of our children can’t be enrolled in private school at the same time.  We don’t buy new clothes or the latest fashions unless it positively affects the emotional or mental health of a particular child or they purchase it with their own money. Allowance is a thing of the past.   

We used to have individual dates with each child each week.  We are far too outnumbered for that now and dates tend to be with whoever is most in need of attention. Again, the older kids step up for some quality time with the little ones and they support each other quite well.  Up to about 10 children, we took the family out to dinner on each birthday.  With 21 birthdays between Mother’s Day and August 9, we would now have to spend our annual salary to accomplish that. 

My semi-adult and adult children still need my time and attention, but I’m often so busy with a young child that I can’t give them my undivided self.  Often, I’m having a serious conversation with an adult child about their marriage or some serious major life issue. Or one of my college students needs mommy during final exam stress.  Or a teenager runs away and I’m on the phone with the sheriff.  Again. And while we are talking, I interrupt the conversation with shouts, “Jennifer, you can’t ride the bike down the steps.” 

“Shawn, stop screaming.  It doesn’t hurt that bad.” 

When I'm on the phone I close my eyes so I can concentrate.  It's a dangerous habit.  A little boy places his cupped hands directly in front of my face. My eyes fly open.  “Sam!   UGGGHHH.  What is that?"  I jump out of my seat. "Sweetie. I told you no more frogs in the house.  Take him outside.  Now go!  ... I said go! ... NOW! Are you deaf? ...  Catch the dang frog and get it outside.  Then wash your hands.  We don't need salmonella in the house!”

The older child must pause in mid-sentence or mid-cry and wait for me to finish. They have learned a great deal of patience  - though I doubt they like it.

I could go on with illustrations, but I think I’ve made my point. Perhaps I could have avoided all this discussion because the answer seems obvious.  But I can’t stop there. It occurs to me that the real question is not whether the quantity of kids affects my performance.  Rather, I must question whether we are a better option than the alternative.  Or like the standard in the physician’s Hippocratic oath, I ask if we are “doing no harm.” 

Ultimately, all we really have to offer is a commitment to endure through thick and thin.  A willingness to allow other seriously imperfect people to join the multitude of imperfect people who are already members of our family – including my husband, our birth kids, and myself.  That’s it.  We offer a permanent place to call home.  And a large group of people who will call you a family member – even when you aren’t very likable. 

It’s not the best.  Best would be for each family unit to stay together as God intended. 

It’s not ideal. Ideal would be for another biological family member to be able and willing to take the responsibility so the children can still be part of the extended family.

But it is good.  It does offer hope and a future.  And by definition, we are only an option when we are the best choice among the possibilities. Of course I wish I could be more to more people.  I wish I could meet every need.  But ultimately, that isn’t my responsibility.  Or my husband’s.  It is for God.  And I trust he will make it all good.  

A Big Fat Zero in Parenting 101!

Today is a day when I get a big fat ZERO for my parenting skills.  Today is the kind of day when I need Nanny 911 or SuperNanny or CrazyLady# 346 to come to my rescue instead of other people asking me for parenting advice.  Today is the kind of day I wish didn’t exist.

I’m tired.  It has been an eventful week and one of my babies has been sick on and off for months with a staph infection.  Last night he woke up at 12:55 a.m. and he spent the rest of the night kicking, screaming, hitting and throwing fits by dropping to the floor while simultaneously reaching out for me. Talk about irony.  As he reached up over the side of the bed for me to pick him up – AGAIN - because he voluntarily squirmed down only moments before – a new fit begins and he hits his mouth on the bottom of the bed rail and it starts bleeding – not once - but twice.  He screams “owie” when I sit him on the counter to make his milk cup.  He screams bloody murder when I try to change his poopy diaper.  He falls to the ground if his feet hit the floor.

But even with 6 prior events and lots of practice, I can’t find any early signs of a new infection and the frustration in my voice is evident.  I’m part exhausted.  Part frustrated at the thought that he might be sick again – when he hasn’t even finished this round of antibiotics.  Part unemotional – even when he hurts himself – because I usually ignore fits and tantrums.  Part trying to keep him quiet enough so that he won’t wake up every other person in the house. 

Finally, at 5:30 a.m., after I tried everything and I know that I am too tired and frustrated to cope any more, I put him back to his bed in the room next to mine and let him scream loud enough to wake the dead from the safety of his bed.  He and I finally fell asleep about 6:30.  Everyone else in the house began waking up about 7:30. 

Waking up after a night like that.  After a week like this.  After a lifetime of dealing with never ending problems, I sympathize with those who have found themselves in similar positions and don’t have the support system or coping skills or knowledge to push through the pain and get through a problem without hurting their child.  It seems odd that I would feel that way about the people who hurt the children I take care of – but I empathize because I can see how it easy it would be for me to go completely over the edge and hurt another person.  There, but for the grace of God, go I.  Those words play over and over in my head. 

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not condoning hurting your children or anyone else. And I’m not excusing it. I’m simply stating what other people might recognize but not admit.  We all have that innate capacity for evil and we are all selfish to some degree and those qualities, left unchecked and without God, can yield some horrific results. 

So, my child listened to a frustrated mom rather than the sweet voice of his caretaker soothing his apparent pain.  My child, who I’m pretty sure wasn’t intentionally trying to make me mad or hurt me, had to experience distance from me rather than a reassuring hug even when he was pushing me away.  My child, who deserves better, got me.  I'm still just a human.  I’m sorry.  I will try to do better tomorrow.

Big Decisions. Huge Decisions. Super-size Decisions.

I’m standing in the shower semi- alone parenting from afar. I am diligently trying to organize my thoughts.  I know.  TMI.  But it’s one of the few places I can block out some of the distractions and try to think clearly.  I stand under the warm water a long time – between shouts to my 2-year-old asking him what he is doing – and reminders to my 3, 4 and 6- year-old that I just told them “No balls in the living room!”  (It’s amazing how much you can tell from the vibrations on the shower wall.) 

Anyway, I’m praying and trying to ask for clarity for a very important decision our family must make.  Do we grow again from super-size to unfathomable?  Are we willing to take the risks associated with taking in yet another older teen and her baby – knowing that her child’s father will also need to be integrated into the home at some level.  Knowing what I know.  Doing this as many times as I already have.  Recognizing that it takes many years of a committed relationship with both mom and child to transform lives.  Experiencing - first hand - that success (at least in worldly terms) is not guaranteed.

So, the questions remain:

Am I prepared to guide yet another young woman into her role as mother to her child – acting as part mom to the teen and part mom to the baby – instructing, teaching, leading and sometimes yelling, demanding and ordering?

Can I offer enough to everyone?   In the past three days I have driven 3 hours each direction to bring 3 of our kids to the wedding celebration of their biological aunt – so that they can continue their relationship with the members of their biological family who want and deserve to know these children.  Arriving home at midnight, I am awakened at 6:30 a.m. by a phone call from the biological sibling of two of our adopted children, asking me to rush to the hospital for her delivery.  This could have been exciting, BUT this day had been set-aside for the graduation party of my current high school senior.  The phone call disrupted the well-made plans and meant that everyone had to pitch in to clean and cook and get ready for the party so that I could stay at the hospital.  I left the hospital when she was 7 cm -- just in time to help my mother and older daughters find the necessary dishes, sweep the floors and clean up the children.  I never changed out of the clothes I threw on in a rush at 6:30 a.m.  I never got to put on make-up so that I wouldn’t look like a freak of nature in pictures with my daughter.  I never got to brush my teeth.  I was sweaty from the last minute rushing around. But I tried to stay fully focused on her celebration – enjoying the company.   I didn’t want to short-change the graduate by focusing on the baby that was likely being delivered while I was at the party.

As the last guests left the party, I grabbed a toothbrush and a clean shirt and raced out the door to return to the hospital – hoping I would make it in time for the baby.  I missed it by about 15 minutes.  I was okay with that, but I didn’t want to short-change my child in labor either.  I didn’t want her to feel less important than the graduating child.  All I could do was tell her that her baby “broke in line and he and I needed to have a long talk. “ He was due the next day and my plans depended on him coming on schedule.  He didn’t.  Which is the story of my life.

And then there is the question of the rest of the family.  How did they feel?  Many times.  In fact, most times, the question is really what “I” can handle as mom.  Unless my husband has a very strong indicator otherwise, he always defers to my saturation level.  If I can’t handle one more, then he certainly can’t do it.  Sometimes I tell him that I can’t do it without his help so I have to know that he fully agrees – even if he doesn’t always want to make the sacrifice.  But, in a few situations, circumstances demand that we involve the entire family in decision-making.  This is one of those times.  Because it is clear I am already overwhelmed.  It is clear I already have too much on my plate.  It is clear that I am only one person and that I can’t do this alone.  So I need to know whether they are willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make this work.  We hold a family meeting.

Two hours later, we have hashed out many of the issues.  We talked about the importance of the biological links to this child and her new baby.  We talked about the positives and negatives. We prayed together.  Tried to determine our likelihood of success.  Discussed balancing our mission as a family verses the needs of our kids to find their own path and do whatever it is God is calling them to individually.  We talked about how hard these choices are.  About how we need God to be direct and tell us what to do. 

And while these thoughts swirl in my head, I think about how I would persuade a judge that our family deserves a chance to offer this young mother and her new baby a chance to make up for past mistakes.  Lots of past mistakes.  How would I convince the welfare agency or the family court judge that in spite of our super-size nature, that we have nothing worldly to gain from this endeavor except the gratification of knowing that we were willing to try -- knowing that success is not inevitable.  How could I explain that we understand that this teen mom has the potential to disrupt the entire family – but that she isn’t the first person with that potential and we have survived thus far.

And then our 2011 Christmas picture came to mind.  It contains 20 people – which is most of our kids, some of their spouses, and most of the grandkids.  But when I start counting I realize that 10 people are still missing!  One was in Japan working Tsunami relief.  Two were on their honeymoon.  Two were in New Orleans. Three were at another family gathering. One can’t be seen because he wasn’t born yet and the last one passed away last year in a car accident.

And this image made me think about a few weeks ago when my husband and me took our three biological children to a wedding.  At about the same time, we all realized that it was one of the few times we had been in this particular combination in years.  We have been raising other people’s children for so long that it is rare for the original five of us to be separate from ALL the other kids.  It was remarkable enough that it lead to a “what if” conversation about how our lives would have been so different if we hadn’t accepted our mission.  Although we enjoyed that night together immensely, none of us wished that our lives had turned out differently.  We laughed at the possibilities.

And in the shower, under the warm water, while shouting to one of the big kids to check on all the little ones so I could think for just a few more minutes – I realized that our super-size family Christmas picture represented not just numbers, but lives that were different because we had been willing to take risks and sacrifices.  Because we had been willing to make a lifetime commitment, in spite of less than stellar conduct.  That if we had taken the easier road, we would have been able to fit our charming little family on a single greeting card – but we wouldn’t have had the honor of joining others through this journey called life. 

I still don’t have a clear answer.  But I know that it is worth it.  Even when I feel like a failure.

Post Script 1.

It keeps occurring to me that we can’t make any promises of success. And that isn’t very reassuring. Especially to lawyers and judges. And we have problems and issues much like the rest of the world – just condensed in time and space.  And while I can’t ensure that this teen mom will overcome all of her obstacles and successfully parent her child, I can say that we traditionally work through the issues in the context of our family and our community – not through the state welfare agency.  The state exists for those that cannot manage through their own support networks.  Our children are safe.  Our children are loved.  All of our children face many difficulties and challenges – even my biological children and the ones who came as newborns – but we are working together.  Helping each other.  Learning from each other.  Supporting each other. In the context of family.  And that is the way it should be.

Post Script 2.

We made our decision as a family.  It will be hard.  Very hard.  It will require sacrifices – including changing rooms – again.  It will require team work.  But we are willing to try to do it.  We are willing to take mother and baby.  Now lets see if we can convince the attorneys, social worker and the judge. Praying as I sit in court.

Post Script 3.

Mom and baby are home.  They are ours.