Adoption Journey Part 2 - Training

I've debated going into graphic detail about what we learned in the trainings.  But then I realized that we've taken this step into the fostering/adoption world because we could handle the information.  The rest of the world hasn't asked for this information, so I'm not going to go into detailed details.

But please be aware, you won't like hearing some of the things in this post.  I need to write this for me.  I also need to write this for others to fully understand what kind of a commitment we've made.  Saving souls isn't always pretty.  

April 2011
After requesting information about the 18 yr old girl, K and the 14 yr old boy, A, we got an email asking us if we'd completed our home study.  Nope, not yet.  Then we were sent information in the mail on how to register for classes.  In the Indiana CPS system(child protective services), you have to take 20 hours of training for fostering and another 10 for adoption.  I don't know what other states require.  We were told that the classes were 3 Saturdays, back to back for the fostering and that the May classes were  going to be the last ones before the system changed in July.   So we hurried up and registered, got a sitter for each week and headed to Ft. Wayne (a 60 min drive).

We met other couples and singles that would be taking the class with us.  Only 4 out of the 20+ were doing what we were doing - going straight to adoption.  The rest were fostering or trying to get certified to get the foster money to take care of family members.  Ages ranged from just out of college to grandparents trying to adopt a grandchild and everywhere in between.

I have to brag on the class.  After the first weekend, no one dropped out.  Let me explain how important this is.  The first weekend is the weekend you need the entire box of kleenex.  It's the weekend they show you the video of the children talking about what they've gone through.  Hearing an adult explain something, then hearing the same explanation from a child's voice is heartbreaking.  No, heart crushing.  I've put the script from this one at the bottom.  Then we were shown the video of what burns look like on a child.  Not from fires, but from things.  We heard about smearing (taking the poop & smearing it on walls & carpet).  The constant bed wetting (even as teenagers).  We saw the video of the kid who'd been in the foster system since he was 4 and had gone through 26 homes, had slept on a mattress on a basement floor that had an inch of water on it, had been taken from his 7 siblings, gone through severe abuses and committed suicide at 19.  Or the girl in jail who told why she ended up there and what a brother had done to her and what she'd done to someone else and how awful she felt and how she felt like she'd never be ok again.  All the unthinkable things that happen on a daily basis to children.  All the hells they live in.   Shock and Awe doesn't even cover it.

IF you can survive this weekend, IF you have the courage to show up again, then the state knows you're willing to fight for a child, you're willing to take all their mess and reshape it into something good.  Or at least try.  And that's all the state asks - is for you to try.  And try again.  And again.

We left that first training asking each other if this is what we really wanted to do.  Yep.  Crazy as it sounds, this is where we were being led.  Heavenly Father knows what we can handle.  We HAVE to have faith in Him or we won't survive the first day.  Faith is faith - blind or otherwise.

Side note - during this time we also called LDS Social Services.  Being members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a natural route to go would be through them.  We called the Indianapolis office and talked to the director.  LDS Soc Serv is a private agency and we were told the state rarely goes through private agencies.  If we wanted to have children from the foster system, then we needed to go through the states channels.  Plus LDS Soc Serv catered more to the couple who couldn't have children or hadn't been able to yet.  We have 4 biological and technically I could get pregnant again.  We didn't qualify.  And LDS Soc Serv rarely had children.  They were almost exclusively baby driven.  We didn't want a baby.  We wanted a toddler, child or teen.

So we went back for 2 more Saturdays.  Day's filled with parenting techniques, how to not compare your current children with incoming ones, how to connect with school teachers, councilors, clergy, social workers and the dozens and dozens of other people out there that can help you raise this child.  We learned that our 4 children, although very similar in looks, were 4 very different children and that we parented them 4 different ways.  This we knew, but we learned it wasn't common.  That many parents can't figure out why one technique won't work when "it always has."  Another blessing - Heavenly Father blessed us to learn how to parent different ways so we wouldn't be the ones going "it's always worked before."

As the end of May came, I realized that 18 yr old K wouldn't be part of our lives.  We weren't finished with adoption training or our home study.  And 14 yr old A was already placed with a family.  So we continued to look at the children on the state website.  But I was sad.  I'd mentally gone through phone calls from college with K - "Mom, can you wire me $50 to cover rent this month."  "Guess what!?  I got my first job!"  "Dad, theres this boy I want to bring home at Thanksgiving.  Are you going to shoot him?"  I'd already imagined what life would be like with A - sports, high school activities, college prep classes, hormones, dating.  And then they weren't an option anymore.  K graduated and moved into the adult world.  Whether she was ready or not.  I was sad for her.  I was sad for me.  A was placed in a home.  I was happy for him!  Truly.  And I still hope he's doing well.  He'll be a junior this year.

June - more training in Adoption.  I'm not sure who was leading the class.  We had a volunteer coordinator who tried to keep us on track, but the majority of the time was listening to the parents in there that had already adopted and were going through it again.  What a vast source of knowledge!  And the patience some of these parents had!  I had a long way to go.

CPR on a dummy is just weird.  It always had been for me as a child, but I figured I'm an adult, this should be ok now.  Nope.  Still weird.  Another day was spent in CPR class, first aid training and universal precautions.  Want to know what I really took away from this??  My children are SO accident prone.  No wonder a broken arm doesn't phase me.  A scrapped knee is nothing.

End of June - all trainings complete and certificates in hand!  Woo hoo!  Now it's time for the home study.  Let's get going, there are children to adopt.

Sitting and waiting is Not a strength of mine.  I prefer to dart in and out of traffic and go through my day full steam ahead.  The state has other plans.  We waited 2 months to be contacted for our home study.  It was agony waiting for someone to call us to schedule a time to come out.  When Doug finally did call, it was to verify our address so he could send us the paper work to fill out before he came.  WOW!  The paper work!

Reading this last part is optional and a part of your innocence could be taken away by reading this.  But I want to tell you of the deep faith and commitment I have to children.  Reading this alone is helping me to be a better mom.  Just because a child has gone through this, doesn't mean the children who don't need you any less.  Read this if you choose.  

 Then go hug a child and read them a story.  And tell a good mom and dad what a great job they are doing.  You'll feel better when you do.

**There are graphic things written here.  Pleased be advised, this is at least PG-13.**

The script from "A Young Child's Point of View."  

In the video, the following script is delivered without the presence or voices of any adult.  The words are displayed on the screen, with a child saying them.

I want to talk to you about what it feels like getting ready to be adopted, when you are a little kid who has already had about a hundred mothers. 

When you can barely remember what your first mother smelled like. 

When everyone spoke a different language in the place where you were born than in the place you are now. 

When some of the people who took care of you were called "foster parents" and you didn't know what that meant except something about they weren't going to stick around. 

When, in the process of being moved all over the place, you lost some of your brothers and your sisters and a particular pair of shoes that felt just right and your absolutely most favorite cuddly, and a certain place on the inside of your last crib where you used to scratch with your fingernail to help yourself go to sleep. 

Kids like me, see, don't have families of our own. 

Because there's something wrong about us. (I guess) Or because there aren't enough to go around. Or something. 

And I probably won't get one, either. 

Or if I do, will it be too late for me to believe that they love me, and are going to stay with me? 

So I want to talk to you, Big People, about these things, even though I am not sure you are real interested. 

Are you the same Big People who keep doing these things to me in the first place? (Please don't get offended if I talk to all of you at once: caseworkers, foster parents, judges, adoptive parents. I just need to say how it all feels to me, and sometimes I can't get the cast of characters straight.) 

Some people say that my first parents shook me until my eyeballs got loosened up, or they left me alone, or they gave me away, or they just ran away. 

I guess you think, because of that, I am supposed to not miss them? (Because if I did it would sure make me lots more cooperative with all the plans you keep making for me.) 

Should I just say, "They did the best they could" so I am not so ticked off and lonely and worried all the time about what the Big People are going to do next? 

The truth is, I can't do any of these things: I can't forget. (Even when my brain does, my body won't.) I can't stop myself from yearning (even though later I will get quite good at playing games about this). 

I'm not saying I was some cherished treasure or anything in my family. But what were you thinking when you sent big men in uniforms to grab me out of my screaming father's arms at eleven o'clock at night, scaring me to death? Or when you sent me to a foster home without telling them about the special ways I needed to be handled because I had never stayed anywhere long enough to get attached to anybody? 

Or when you then took me from those people who were so disappointed in me after a few weeks that they said I would have to be "disrupted" (whatever that means). 
So you sent me to a family with an older foster child who was mean to little kids because they were weak and small. And so he punched me a lot in secret. And pulled real hard on my penis in the middle of the night. 

And when that family got rid of me, and the next, and the next, did you think I was going to take it all lying down? Did you think I was supposed to just be sweet and adorable and ready to connect to yet another family who were going to throw me away? (Could you have done that?) 

After a while, I had just lost too many people that I might have cared about. I had been with too many "parents" who really weren't, because they couldn't hold me tightly in their hearts at all. 

None of you got how I was being changed by all these losses, (in my heart and in my behavior). 

After a while, I began to get some pretty bad ideas about how things work. And mostly those ideas said that I was, by that time, in deep doo-doo. 

I wasn't going to let anybody like me. Not even me. 

And so, now, I won't let you imagine even for a minute that I like you. That I need you, desperately. That I might ever grow to trust you. I am not, after all, a complete moron. 

Are you ready to have me not believe you? 

Are you ready for me to fight you for control? 

Are you ready to hold me, and then hold me some more (when all the time I act like I don't want you to at all?) 

Are you ready to really stay with me, through a battle that might last almost my whole growing up? Are you willing to feel as powerless as I do? 

What will you think when I say I don't care a bit whether you go on vacation and leave me with Aunt Harriet, who I hardly know at all? Then, when you come back, are you ready to deal with me taking a dump in front of your bedroom door every single day for three whole weeks?

You see, it is like this, Big People: I'm not stupid. I was not blind. I do pay attention, because it matters lots to me.

And so when my first parents knocked me around or acted like I was invisible, or gave me to someone else to raise, or stood there screaming while you took me away from them, I noticed.

And when no one came to take their place, I noticed that too. 

And when the orphanage didn't last, and the first half-dozen foster families didn't last, something started happening to me.

A little bit of my spirit started to die. 

For some reason, then, I started pulling out my eyebrows. (I'm not sure what that has to do with my spirit dying.) I agree that it doesn't make much sense for me to join in with all the other people that have hurt me, by hurting myself. But I do it anyway. 

So I bite on my hand, or dig at my face, or make a real bad sore on the top of my head from scratching myself. 

I pull out clumps of my hair, and so the kids at preschool laugh, and Big People have an odd look on their faces when they see me.

I masturbate a lot to comfort myself. (I even let a dog lick me down there.) They say that sometimes I try to touch other kids down there.

Sometimes I run into the arms of strangers, like I have known them forever, and like I don't actually care anymore who I am safe with or not.

(Am I safe with anybody? Does it matter any more?)

Did I mention how much I am growing to hate smallness, and weakness and defenselessness? It's getting so the only thing I know how to do is to just be as tough as I can, and to try to rub out smallness and weakness wherever I see them:

In the kittens that get hung by the clothesline in the backyard and squished with a tennis racquet.

In the babies in my recent foster homes who turned up scratched. 

In my own Self, which I attack, particularly when I am feeling small or scared, and I need to beat myself into more toughness.

And as little parts of my spirit keep dying, will it surprise you that I'm not exactly going to be overjoyed when you finally say you have permanent parents for me? Do you honestly think I am going to say, "Oh, I get it. You were just kidding all those other times, but this time you really mean it"? 

And, so, do you want to hear something funny? Just about the time I am ready to get what everybody thought I needed (parents who are actually never going to leave me) I'm going to get just a tad weird. I'm going to start banging my head more than I did before. I might start acting like a baby again and, even if I had gotten a little bit comfortable with my latest "parents" I'm going to go back to stiffening my body, and screaming at night, and doing everything I can to tell you that I don't want you to love me.

I can't stand all this talk about "permanence" and "adoption". 

I will make you sorry you ever thought about trying to get close to me. I will make you feel almost as helpless and small as I have usually felt.

So are you wondering what I need? Are you wondering what I would do about all of this if I had the power?

First of all, it would help a lot if you would start with one simple, clear commandment to yourself:

Never forget that I am watching. Never forget that every single thing you do matters immensely to me (even when I work like crazy to make you think that it does not). And I will remember.

You may be able to get away with treating me as if I am invisible for a while (perhaps long enough to "disrupt" me or move yourself to a different casework job). I was there, watching, I was having deep feelings about what was happening to me and I needed someone to act as if it mattered, hugely.


Second, don't imagine that I will ever stop yearning for my birthfamily (even though, as in other things, I will pretend otherwise). Help me find some way to keep a connection with them, even if I never see them again. Bring out pictures, or a Life Book and hold me while I rage or sob or stare, or all of these at once. And understand that none of this is a reflection on you. 

Don't be surprised when I come back from a visit with them peeing my pants or throwing tantrums in the bath that night.

I told you: things matter to me. So I am going to have feelings about things that matter to me.

Third, it would help a lot if you would make the decisions that you need to make and stick with them.

Some days I think my mind is going to explode because I know something is going on in my life but I can't tell what it is; later I'll learn that there was a court hearing that day and everybody in my life was wrought up and then it was "continued" (whatever that means - except mostly that nothing is getting decided, and I still don't have a family).

I don't get to make the decisions. You do. So have the courage to make them. So that I can get a life. 

Fourth, it would mean a lot to me if you would take good care of my foster family. They have their hands full. Sometimes they don't know what to do with me. So make sure someone is there to answer their questions, to encourage them, to help them understand me better. You won't like what will happen if I keep getting disrupted, and the only way I can think of to prevent that is to take extra good care of the people that are taking care of me.

So have I told you anything that you wanted to know? Have I helped you to understand how we feel - all of us kids who fell into the world of foster care and adoption? 

I know it is a burden for you to think so carefully about me, and I know you might get a little nervous to realize that I am watching, and affected by all that you do.

But you won't be sorry if you take me seriously. Someday, see, I will be Big People. 

GIVE THAT A THOUGHT.

Adoption Journey Part 1 - Deciding to Start

I need to document my journey for me.  I thought others might like to know the process we've gone through as well.  Each family has different stories, different children, different lives.  This is our journey.  Enjoy. :)

When Scott and I were dating, one of the questions we asked each other was "Are you willing to adopt?"  Each of us said yes.  We married and almost 2 years later, baby girl came along.  Almost 3 years later (miscarriage in here, too), baby boy followed.  Two more years, baby boy 2 and two more years baby boy 3.  When baby boy 3 was 18 months old, I realized that we weren't pregnant.  It was strange hitting that mark.  I'd been pregnant or thinking about pregnancy for so long that having an 18 month old and not being pregnant was strange.  But I was overwhelmed with the 4 I had.  We'd moved away from family and had managed to survive a New York winter - all 6 months of it.  So we decided to pray about getting pregnant.  Heavenly Father would know if it was the right time for us and if I could handle another pregnancy.  Because baby 4 had been the most difficult pregnancy.  I was sick the entire time and the labor was awful and my doctor was less than helpful.  Did I really want to get pregnant again?  Would my body survive?  The answers to our prayers were "not right now."  I was a little relieved, but sad, too. Would I ever give birth again?  A part of me then and now wants to have a better 'last child' labor story.  A part of me wonders if I'll survive.  So now what?  The next question presented to the Lord, was "Do we adopt?"  Again, "Not right now."

So we dug in and focused on raising the four children we had.  Not an easy task, but we seemed to manage through a move back to Texas, then a year later a move to Indiana.   All this time, we continued to pray about adoption and whether it was right the right time for us.  Also during this time, we decided that my body shouldn't go through another pregnancy.  I'm a highly independent women and Scott is a wonderfully easy going man.  If he's worried about me being pregnant again, then pregnancy really isn't an option.  We're grateful that we have that 'option' as many many couples don't.  We ache for them and pray for them.

Once we were settled in Indiana, I googled 'Indiana adoptions' and the state website was at the top of the list.  So I started looking around.  When you start seeing pictures, your heart starts to yearn to help them.  I researched what needed to be done, but didn't do anything.  For 2 years, on and off, I'd look at the almost 100 children listed on the state website that were legally ready and waiting for adoption.  I'd rejoice as a child disappeared, knowing that they'd found a home!  It would make me sad, when month after month after month the same children were still on there.  It was heartbreaking to watch the older ones age out. Would they ever find a forever family?  One of my best friends in high school didn't find her forever family til she was in college.  I have hope for these children that they will find a home to call home.  Maybe one day with us.  Maybe. :)

The Chicago Temple is our closest temple (currently).  Since Scott and I don't know anyone in Chicago to watch our kids and we didn't want to leave them with a sitter in Warsaw, we brought them along and traded time in the temple.  I decided to do sealings that day and was sitting in a beautiful room waiting for another couple to finish before I joined them.  I received some very poignant and very beautiful revelation that day.   After my time in the Temple,  I knew it was time to adopt.

Shortly after, we were at home watching the April 2011 General Conference and talk after talk after talk was about welfare, family, sealings, Christ and eternity.  The feelings I'd had in the temple were magnified.  "Scott, it's time to pray about adoption."

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/sessions/2011/04?lang=eng

 It's not uncommon for one spouse to be more onboard than the other.  Where my answers were very strong, his were a little more luke warm.  But he agreed to start the process (and no I didn't badger him to do it.  This is eternity we're talking about.  If my eternal companion isn't onboard, we're sunk.)

We looked at the profiles of children on the state website and picked two that looked like they could be part of our family.  One was a girl born in Russia that had had a terrible life in the states and needed a forever family.  She was 18 and would graduate out of the system as soon as she graduated from high school in May 2011.  Our time was short if we were going to have her in our home.  The other was a 14 year old young man who was a great kid!  He'd just been dealt a terrible hand.

We requested information on both children and our journey began.





http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/04/sacrifice?lang=eng&query=adopt