Paying Attention

This week has been a tough week. Mostly, it’s been my own personal demons hounding me, but the little girl has also had a rough week. Due to the cold weather (and other issues, I’m sure) her bio mom has been missing quite a few visits. Since the little girl is always asking what our schedule is for every day of the week, she knows there is supposed to be a visit. When I arrive to pick her up at daycare instead of a case worker from CHOR, she gets upset knowing she won’t be having a visit. This results in a mega throw-herself-on-the-ground-and-scream temper tantrum for at least 15 minutes. Yet, it was reported to me that during the visits the little girl is generally ignored in favor of her older sister. The baby just screams for most of the visit. I noticed at one of the visits two weeks ago the bio mom looked like she was high. Now, I don’t make that statement lightly and I base it on the three years I worked as an admissions counselor in a drug and alcohol facility, but I could always be wrong. Sometimes lack of sleep or severe depression can mock the same signs of substance abuse. This past week it was more pronounced and more obvious. She was slurring her words and stumbling around like a zombie. It was so sad. Unfortunately, the case workers cannot cancel a visit just because the bio mom appears to be under the influence of something, unless she is also inappropriate with the children. They had been having visits once a week at the local library but one of the case workers told me the library asked that they only come for an hour at a time, not the allotted two hours. Our case worker confessed to me she thought the visits were detrimental to the children, especially the baby and the little girl because he screams the whole time and is clearly uncomfortable and the little girl is ignored and so she acts out behaviorally to get attention. The case worker even mentioned to the bio mom that she should spend more time trying to include the little girl in the activities she does with  the older girl, but the bio mom refused.

I was thinking about it before but now I am determined to do it – I’m going to arrange to spend some time with just me and the little girl to giver he a special time and all my attention without the boys present. She craves attention so bad is nearly oozes off her skin, so while I don’t believe an afternoon with just her and I together will “fix” things at least it will help a little bit for her to realize she is important and deserves positive attention. So now I will have to plan for once a month weekends with Primero and once a month a girly day with the little girl (she’s really not that girly, I mean a day with just us girls). I just feel bad for her because she really just wants a mommy who gives her appropriate, positive attention on a regular basis. I know she has me, but I also know she wants this from her “other mommy” (the term she uses to refer to her bio mom). The other week we were in the car driving home and it was quiet with just the radio playing softly. The little girl asked me in a small voice, “Mommy, am I your daughter?” I didn’t know how to answer her. I didn’t want to say, “well, you’re my foster daughter” because that seemed mean and I didn’t want to just say, “yes” since that’s not technically true (yet). So I asked her, “What do you think? Do you think you’re my daughter?” She said yes. “Well ok then.” And she was onto the next question, “What are we going to eat when we get home?” I was telling this story to the case worker and she suggested, if the little girl asks me again I could say something like, “well, in my heart you’re my daughter” or “I love you like you’re my daughter.” This past Monday night we were at home together sitting on the couch watching TV when the little girl said, “I don’t have a daddy. I told my friends at school I don’t have a daddy.” I asked her, “Does it makes you sad that you don’t have a daddy?” She said, “No. No because I have a foster brother Primero and I love him. I tell all my friends at school I have a foster brother.” She expresses her love to Primero more often than anyone else, so I know she really adores him. I just wish he were a little kinder to her and a little less rough with her. I know she drives him nuts, but so did my little sister when we were growing up. Then we were best friends when we were teenagers. Maybe they will be friends when she is a little older, who knows?

I think I’ve settled down a little with my woe-is-me pity party. I’ve (once again) come to terms with things as they are and not how I want them to be. I just reminded myself to count my blessings and not look at all the troublesome things surrounding me. And, I realized I can only be responsible for my own actions and reactions. I was so stressing about Primero and his girlfriend becoming sexually intimate (she’s already experienced and has had two miscarriages from her previous boyfriend) and even more freaked out when Primero told me his two gay friends at the after school program had a three-some with another boy (OMG!!! They are just CHILDREN! What is wrong with this world? Where were their parents while this was happening?!). But, even if I’m still pretty freaked out by things, I can only offer Primero advise and try to guide him to make good decisions for his life. Do I still think he’s too young? Oh hells yeah I do! Do I really wish he’s wait or that he believed in waiting until marriage? Yes, I do. But, I haven’t been instilling in him these past 15 years the moral guidelines I hope he would follow. I’ve been trying to instill these values in him for just a year now and I’m fighting against all the other (poor) examples he’s lived with and finds acceptable. He didn’t see an problem with a three-some. I can only love him for who he is and be there for him to help pick up the pieces if/when he makes a poor decision. I guess that’s called learning to let go. I really suck at it. But, for my own peace of mind, I need to learn to offer advice then step back and let him make his choice. And pray. Pray a whole lot. For me as much as for him. It sounds petty and stupid, but the thought of him getting some action while I’m desperate and celibate, well it kinda makes me a tiny, little hair jealous. Which is so ridiculous! But, like everyone else, I’m a work-in-progress so I have to just keep on keeping on.