Twinsies

Have you ever met someone who seems to be living your same life? Their experiences seem so mirrored in your own that you feel like the second half of a whole, even if you just met? I had this odd sensation at work last week. One of the tasks I perform as part of my job duties is meeting one-on-one with customers after they attend an orientation to hear all about the services provided in my workplace. These are individuals who have been requested to attend because they are collecting unemployment compensation benefits. So, after one such session last week a man only a few decades older than me sat down with me for a meeting. I don’t remember which mundane question I asked him that opened the floodgates, but I was soon swimming in a deluge of information about his 9 year old grandson who had been abused by his mother, father and step-father. He had taken kinship custody of his grandson but they were struggling with the boys traumatic past. When he lamented having issues getting services and I whole-heartedly agreed with him, he understood I was a kindred spirit. I briefly explained I am a foster parent and so I know the fight he is making for his grandson, as I have done the same thing for children in my care. To even further our uncanny connection, he described being divorced and finding it hard to introduce someone to the life he is currently living. Once again, I confirmed a similar life experience and gave him some information about a book about childhood trauma I found somewhat helpful. I had to remain professional and not really share too much of my own personal story, but it gave me goosebumps to realize just how similar our lives were, barring gender and a few decades in age. We probably could have sat and talked for hours, if I wasn’t on the clock.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

Trip to DC

Last weekend I went to Washington DC for my sister’s graduation ceremony. She received her MBA from George Washington University and the ceremony was held as the base of the Washington Monument. We could see the White House directly behind where we were sitting. It was a very DC event. I travelled down to my sister’s place in Arlington Virginia with my parents and grandmother. The kids stayed home with Primero, Esperanza and my cousin on stand-by in case they needed help. Everything went smoothly and I had a really nice time with my sister. I was glad to finally see her new home that they bought last fall. I know they have been working slowly on getting it to their liking. Now that she is done with school (she has one more brief summer class), they are thinking about getting a dog. She likes to jog and her husband wants a big dog, so it seems like it will work out well, even with their postage stamp back yard (which, by DC metro standards is actually rather spacious). The ceremony was nice, although long. I found the commencement speakers to be amazing people. The first speaker was a prize-winning journalist partially responsible for revealing the Catholic priest cover-up scandal. I found him to be the least inspiring because he seemed so sure of himself. The next speaker was a 3 star General named Nadja West. She was the 12^th child in her family and she was adopted! She was a physician and the highest ranking woman to graduate from West Point. In addition to her rank, she is the first black woman to become Surgeon General for the US Army. Her accolades were probably a mile long, it was incredible! Yet, when she spoke, she seemed very humble and down-to-earth. I wished she had spoken longer, but I enjoyed what she shared. The main speaker was Senator Tammy Duckworth from Illinois. Her story was amazing, but hard to hear. After graduating from college, she joined the Army and flew Blackhawk helicopters in Iraq. During one of her missions their helicopter was shot and she was critically injured, immediately losing both her legs and part of her right arm. Because one of her comrades refused medical attention following their crash landing, she survived and returned to the US to become a US Senator. I thought her speech was a little too political for a college graduation, but it’s DC, everything is political! My parents weren’t as impressed and dismissed her for her political views. Politics aside, she was a good speaker and had an amazing story to tell and I appreciated what she shared.

 

After the ceremony we walked to the White House, so my grandmother could see it and get a few pictures. We then took the metro back to Arlington where we had a nice lunch and relaxed at my sister’s place a bit, viewing pictures of their recent trip to Copenhagen and Sweden, before driving the nearly 3 hours home. I thought we had a lovely time, there was no squabbling, no passive-aggressive snarkiness, just a nice time together. That is, until my mom made some comments about my sister on our drive home. I really had no idea what she was talking about because my sister could not have been more pleasant. There was a brief moment when she and her husband were hotly discussing the route we should walk to the White House, but they never got angry and none of us were really involved. I left wishing I had a more reliable vehicle so I could more regularly visit my sister and brother-in-law. They now have the space for me and my crew , with an extra bedroom and a cot, so we could totally spend a weekend with them, if I trusted my van to get us there and back. I’m very glad I decided to go, I was on the fence about it just due to the tetras logistics of childcare and now doggie care, but it all worked out and nothing felt better than coming home to a big warm hug from my Love Bug (Chica Marie was already in bed by the time I got home, so I got my hug from her the next morning). It’s funny how driving 3 hours takes it out of you!

Dog vs. Human

I wrote about how we have been taking care of a foster dog named Mocha. Coming from a foster background, I was struck by the differences and similarities of fostering pets versus children.

 

1. Just like children come into a new home and need time to adjust, so did Mocha. He came into the house like a hurricane and while he is still full of boundless energy, each day he seems to settle just a bit more. Sadly, he did not seem to have a honeymoon period, although I suppose that’s simply because as a dog expectations are lost on him.
2. More often than not a child first coming into care has very little with him, generally just the clothing he was wearing and whatever he could grab without a moment’s notice. I’ve had children come to me without a winter jacket in November. Mocha, on the other hand, came with everything that was his – toys, food, treats, and kennel. His owner wanted him to feel at home as much as possible. Nothing came in a trash bag.
3. When you get a call regarding a placement things can happen very quickly. I remember being at work one day and getting a call about two young girls. After they called back asking if I would take the newborn sister they told me the county was on their way to my place. I literally had to drop everything and race home to accept the placement. I agreed to take Mocha late Monday afternoon and he was deposited at our place just after dinner that same day.
4. For a foster care placement, the county reaches out to CHOR when they are unable to place the child(ren) within their own foster homes. CHOR takes the information and tries to determine what foster home is a) open, b) able to handle whatever needs the child or sibling group might have, and c) potentially willing to take the placement. They call, give what little information they have and then leave the ultimate decision to the county. Many times a simple phone call does not materialize into an actual placement. Conversely, for the doggie foster care, they post a dog in need of a foster home on a private Facebook page. The open foster home responds and the intake form is emailed. We are often times asked to go to the home and pick up the animal ourselves, which is not something done in foster care. Yes, I have picked children up, but that was at CHOR not their home. I did not pick up Mocha, another volunteer was extremely helpful in bringing him to me, but I was initially asked to do it.
5. We don’t have a case worker for Mocha, but there are two volunteers who have been checking in on him. They don’t come to the house, but they text me frequently to see how we all are doing and to get a better idea of Mocha’s personality.
6. Mocha has already been matched to a potential adoptive home. He will visit them on June 3^rd and if all goes well he could move in that day or the next day. That means Mocha will only have spent 3 weeks in foster care before finding a permanent home. In contrast, Love Bug will be 3 the end of June and his adoption is still pending, TPR just happened the end of March.

 

 

For some of the differences, there are obvious reasons. Mocha’s owner willingly released him due to financial struggles. For the most part, children are not willingly placed into foster care, they are removed for their safety. Once Mocha’s owner decided to relinquish him, there was no going back, no case plan to follow and umpteen chances to do the bare minimum to get Mocha back. Another major difference is the agency discouraged visits because they would confuse Mocha. I had actually offered to keep in touch with the owner, to let her know how things were going or allow for visits. One of the volunteers I worked with suggested that I send pictures for updates (the owner has not taken me up on my offer) rather than in-person visits so Mocha could get settled and not be confused.

 

In speaking with Chica Marie about Mocha, it seemed to help her understand her own situation a little more. She had asked if we were keeping Mocha and I explained he was only staying a short time as a foster dog and he would move when he found a new forever home. She got a little upset and said she didn’t want Mocha to leave. I explained that we could love Mocha while he was with us, but he needed a bigger home with space to run around and play, like my parents lab on the farm. She agreed but said she would be sad and miss him. I acknowledged we would be sad and we would miss Mocha, but we would also be happy for him, knowing he found a new loving family. Then, Chica Marie asked about our dog Prancer. “Is she leaving?” she asked, worriedly. I explained that we adopted Prancer so she is part of our family now and we are her forever home. I could tell Chica Marie was mulling this all over and examining it against her own situation. I think it sort of helped her to see things a little differently when she projected herself onto the dogs.  

Doggie Foster Care

We became a doggie foster family. Partially because I miss my Canela but I’m not ready for another dog (permanently) and partially because I’m sad about not being a foster family once the little ones are adopted. Also, I’m insane. So, we became approved and last Monday we took in our first foster dog. He is a one year old 75 pound chocolate Lab named Mocha. When I read his description I somehow missed the part about him being a puppy (Labs stay puppies forever!). He is a giant, loveable ball of energy that just doesn’t stop ever! I can’t walk him because he nearly pulls my arms out of their sockets and trying to get his attention long enough to train him is fairly useless. It’s not like the walks made him tired or calm down anyway. Because he is a young, healthy beautiful dog, he has already found a potential forever home and will visit with them the first time on June 3^rd. If all goes well, it will be his new home and we will be ready for our next foster dog. We’re hoping for an older, calmer dog.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

On the Fence Fostering

First, we would like to know what drew you to foster parenting? 

 

What age child or children were you originally interested in fostering? 

 

Can you talk to us about how you decided to take an older child into your home?   

 

What did you find were the rewards and challenges of parenting an older youth?

 

You have also parented young children, how do the rewards and challenges differ?

 

What about the decision to adopt an older youth?  Was this difficult?

 

Above are the questions that were emailed to me for the television slot I was taping with CHOR. The only question I was asked was to explain how I became a foster parent, the rest of the session was adlibbed. It was fine, except I was asked a question I wasn’t really ready to answer. “If there is someone out there in the audience on the fence about fostering what would you tell them?” I hate my answer. My answer was some slop about children with breaking hearts and if you don’t do it who will – drivel and nonsense. Had I been better at thinking on my feet or had the luxury of formulating a coherent answer ahead of time it would have been less unicorns and rainbows and more realistic. Because, in all honesty, if someone was on the fence about fostering what I would tell them is don’t. Fostering is not the kind of thing to enter into lightly. I should know because that is sort of what I did. I was terribly ill-informed when I became a foster parent. Yes, even after the training classes. The classes could only penetrate so far into my brain, I had to live it to get it.

 

In order to be a good foster parent you have to be willing to sacrifice a lot – your time, your freedom, your home, your peace, your sovereignty over decision-making for your own home, your heart. You have to be willing to endure a lot – epic temper-tantrums by any age child, being the whipping boy for the child’s anger as well as the biological family’s anger, court proceedings that never accomplish anything, constantly delayed decisions or hurried unplanned ones, some societal distain, the pain of sending a child back into an unhealthy situation. You must have the patience of a saint, nerves of steel, and stamina of the Energizer Bunny. You must learn when to bite your tongue and when to speak up. You must learn to be the keeper of gobs of information because high turnover means things fall through the cracks. You must stubbornly push for services and keep talking until you are heard. You must remain professional even if a family member is berating you for things out of your control. And, above all, you must keep your heart open and compassionate for everyone the system churns through your presence.

 

If you are sitting on the fence, thinking this is a nice hobby you could take on to pass the time, do yourself a favor and take up knitting. When I was in the Peace Corps their logo was it’s “The Toughest Job You’ll Love.” Fostering is a much tougher job and while I can’t say I love fostering in and of itself, I do love the children. So, if you think you have what it takes, give your local foster agency a call. Trust me, no one will blame you for changing your mind….

Worthless Mother's Day

I wish I were writing this to say how beautiful our Mother’s Day was, but I’m not. It was an all-round horrid day. I spent most of the day crying, for one reason or another and when I wasn’t wallowing in destructive self-pity, I was doing household chores. The only thing I asked for was a break; not having to do everything for one day, not stressing that I won’t get it all done before heading back to the grind of the work week. It didn’t happen. If I had to sum up Mother’s Day in one word it would be worthless. That is how I felt.

 

The night before Mother’s Day I went to see a movie and then went grocery shopping afterwards because A) it hadn’t gotten done earlier in the day, B) we needed things, and C) it is such a luxury to not have to grocery shop with little people yelling, tantrum-ing, touching things or demanding various items. While browsing the meat department, my phone rang with a name I don’t usually see. It was Primero’s aunt. She called to beg me to allow her to pick up Primero so she could take him to her house to be with his mom and siblings on Mother’s Day. I expressed annoyance in the poor planning, only calling me at 10:30 the night before and the presumption that we had no plans for Mother’s Day. I told her we had plans to go to brunch with my parents and I would have Primero call her when I got home and we could discuss it.

 

As it turned out, I wasn’t able to get reservations for the brunch we wanted. My parents had gotten new phones which made communication exceptionally difficult because they didn’t have their new phones set up and their old phones weren’t really working. After Primero revealed he was leaving a little after 11 and not coming back all day, I tried to salvage something with my mom. When I finally got her on the phone she told me she didn’t want to go to dinner, she didn’t want me to come up and make anything and basically she didn’t want to see me. Me, being the stubborn cuss I am, decided to order food from Panera’s and take it to the farm in the afternoon, sans Primero.

 

When I got to the farm with two children who did not nap long enough, I discovered my brother was there. Apparently, he wanted to do some work out in the woods, clearing the invasive stuff out or something like that, but it kept raining off and on, thus preventing him from working at a steady pace. While waiting out the showers, he dominated all conversation making it hard for me to even get my parents to sit down and eat the expensive food that was still hot but cooling quickly. After we ate, I helped my mom download an ap on her phone to find ringtones and went to check on my honey bees, discovering one hive died less than a week after I brought them home. I gave my mom the scarf and gift card I bought her and left her to listen to all the funny ringtones on her phone.

 

When I got home Primero had left a card and little glass knick-knack sitting in the living room for me. I wish I could say I accepted his card and gift graciously, but I didn’t. I had spent the whole day feeling worthless. I felt so unimportant to Primero. Not only did he leave, but he didn’t say anything to me in the morning, other than that he was leaving. No hug. No I love you. Nothing. I’m so worthless I don’t even deserve a hug. Then, because I didn’t just make reservations and hope my parents were amenable to them, I’m a worthless daughter. My efforts to see my mom and spend time with her were rebuffed. I’m not good enough. It’s not good enough to just see me on Mother’s Day. My feelings were raw, ravaged and aching just like my puffy red eyes. I felt like nothing, like less than nothing. Seeing the gift at the end of the day, it felt like a sad, little consolation prize. Adding salt to my festering wounds, the card was addressed “To [my name] the other mother.” I sobbed as I bathed the little ones and Primero bristled at my Snapchat post, pointing out how painful it was to be ignored all day and then called “other.”

 

Eventually, we talked. After we shouted. But, at the moment, I feel like a little bit of me is broken. Primero was angry that it didn’t seem like I accepted his apology Sunday night. I explained it like this: If I punch you in the face, it will still hurt even after I apologize for punching you. I feel like every Mother’s Day is worse, with this one taking the entire cake. If you’ve ever heard of The Five Love Languages, mine is spending time with me or doing something for me. I think that is fairly evident in what I’ve written about the day. It means more to me than some little trinket or flowery prose or even some big gesture (which I would never expect). Wow, you took the time to be with me – that means something! So, to have Primero do the total opposite, well it just hurt and hurt and hurt some more.

 

I’m glad the day is behind us. With Primero, I have hope we can repair the damage done to our relationship. With my mother, hope is fleeting because somehow I’ve become a bad daughter in her mind. She fell over herself praising my brother for fixing her computer, after months of complaining it isn’t working. She even wrote a long post of praise on Facebook. Bringing her dinner, a scarf, and Target gift card couldn’t hold a candle to fixing her computer and therefore got no mention, honorable or otherwise. Somehow, my black sheep mostly-estranged brother has become my mother’s golden child, her surprising current favorite. Usually, it is between my sister and I, depending on who has done what, but apparently we are such horrible children she had to go with my brother. The same brother who made her cry every year for Christmas (for YEARS) because he obstinately refused to show up.

 

The only highlight to my day on Sunday was talking to my sister. We spoke briefly and I outlined the issue with Mother’s Day and specifically with mom that day. We both guessed she wanted to brush me off so she could have our father take her somewhere for dinner so when someone wished her a happy Mother’s Day she could bemoan the fact that her awful children couldn’t find it in their hearts to spend time with her. She never bothered to thank me or make any acknowledgement of the food I brought for dinner. My father thanked me. But, it proved my sister was right when she told me, “You have to go we both know you do. Just know it will suck and she won’t be grateful. I’m sorry you have to take one for the team, but I thank you.” The solidarity in knowing she gets it helped me drag myself through the motions. My sister isn’t a mother and has no plans to be a mother, but she has compassion and that is a beautiful thing.

Teenage Adoption

CHOR has asked me to join their staff on a local TV channel to discuss teen foster-adoption. This will be the third time I’m on the show, but for some reason this topic has given me pause and some jitters. Part of me wishes I could just start tossing out the unicorns and rainbows and pontificate on how amazing and wonderful it is to adopt a teenager. But, the realist in me just won’t wear the rose-colored glasses. I’m sure CHOR would like me to be positive and I know I will be, but I also want to tell it like it is – I want to be real with anyone contemplating adopting a teenager. First, I need everyone to know that my son is exceptional. Given the choices his siblings have made with their lives it is downright amazing my son did not follow that path. Surely, if he had, our relationship would be vastly different if existent at all. Second, it took finding just the right kid for me to truly contemplate adopting a teenager. I, sadly, did not wake up one morning with an epiphany that teen adoption was for me. It took meeting a kid through respite and falling in love with him and his quirky ways to open me up to adopting a teenager. He wasn’t just any kid! He was special. And yes, all children and teens are special in their own way but I don’t think things would have gone the way they did if it had been a different teen needing a permanent family. I could be wrong, but I guess there’s really no way of knowing. The third thing I would mention is that the success of creating a family with a teenager is based on two things – the teens attitude and willingness to join a new family and the flexibility of the parents on meeting the teen where he/she is at in that moment. My son had walls up around him and he would push me away enough to see if I’d stay gone or stick around. Superficially, he trusted me, but it took him longer and it took various things happening for him to really trust me, to trust I was there for him no matter what. It hasn’t been easy, becoming the parent of a teenager. But, there are many rewards too. My son made the honor roll for the first time this year – such a huge improvement and accomplishment for him! It is gratifying seeing him make good choices and come to me for advice. It is fulfilling to hear him, so confident and secure in his life with me, offer my help to his friends or siblings in need. It is a joy watching him mature into an amazing young man, so loving to his family and friends and respectful at school. I was once worried about not celebrating the firsts with my son, but we have still had plenty of firsts – including the upcoming driver’s license test, which is a pretty big first. Still, with all that being said, there are some prickly spots. It will forever hurt me to hear my son call me by my first name and not some version of mom. It is has been hard incorporating his family into ours and there have been some less-than-stellar moments there. And, I will always feel a loss when I think of all the years I didn’t know my son and what he had to endure to become my child. I guess I’m struggling because I don’t know how to boil all of this down into concise answers fit for TV viewers. It’s all so much greater than that.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

Important Decisions

My CHOR family case worker sent me an email asking to meet up with me and also if I would be on the local TV programming to talk about foster care since May is the Foster Care Awareness month. I agreed to both but I was perplexed why she was asking to meet with me. Her response was, “As to meeting, the end of the day is fine but this week I would only have Wednesday available  - and it would only last as long as you wanted it to – It just seems that you may have some important decisions to make that you may want to bounce off of your family worker??” Important decisions I need to bounce off my family worker? I can only guess she was referring to Chica Marie and the impending adoption.

 

Maybe it’s fear of a disruption or worry that I can’t handle it all, maybe they just want to cover all their bases, but I feel like I have made the decision to adopt Chica Marie at least three times by now. When she first moved in Chica Marie’s case worker (who is still with CHOR but not the case worker we have now) mentioned she was also considered a legal risk placement like her brother and asked me to think about being a permanent resource (that’s foster care speak for adoptive family). I contemplated the possibility and eventually came to the conclusion I would be considered a permanent resource for both siblings. Then, a year later, I was expressing my frustrations to my then family worker (not the same one I have now) and she posed the question of adopting Chica Marie knowing how hard things were with her. Once again, I did some soul searching and hard thinking and came to the same conclusion. More recently, Chica Marie’s previous mobile therapist suggested I seek counsel to persuade the courts to split up the children, keeping Love Bug with me. She went as far as to ask our CHOR case worker about it, who in turn asked the county worker who replied it would really be up to the judge on how the whole thing would play out and I’m not a betting person, so I didn’t want to gamble with those odds. My assumption is my family worker got wind of this transaction and now wants to talk to me a fourth time about my decision. I could be wrong, but I’m probably not. No one has ever batted an eye at me adopting Love Bug. I think sometimes they forget he isn’t already my son.

 

So, here’s the thing. For whatever reason my motherhood is not and will never be easy. Not to say being a mother is always easy, because it isn’t, but there is an extra lay of ish added to being an adoptive mother. There just is. I didn’t necessarily choose the easy path when I agreed to adopt Primero. Adopting a teenager is not an easy thing. And, I’ve written plenty about the emotional hardships that I’ve overcome and the ones that still slay me to this day. Learning to be open with extended bio family and the yo-yoing contact with his biological mother have not been easy. I’ve done a lot of hard things – like taking him to his brother’s baby shower 90 minutes away, sharing all our holidays with his extended family, spending the day at the mall with his mother, helping his siblings in the ways I can. I don’t think I could be accused of shying away from the hard things. My point in saying this is, why should it be any different with Chica Marie? She has been with me for nearly three years and I never asked to have her removed from my home. Just because she has challenging behaviors, does that mean she should be tossed to the side, left to flounder from home-to-home like her sister was until she moved in with their grandmother? No one deserves to feel unwanted, least of all a child. Might Chica Marie be better off in a home as the only child with a stay-at-home parent who can dote on her night and day? I don’t know. No one could really answer that question and who defines “better off” to begin with? There are no guarantees in life. I could very well struggle with Chica Marie until she legally becomes an adult. But, I could have that same struggle with Love Bug. My parents endured many years of turmoil from my brother, who was their biological child. The teenage years are rough on everybody, I know I wasn’t always a peach with my parents and I consider myself a pretty straight-laced “good kid” who stayed out of trouble. As long as we are both drawing breath there is hope for me and Chica Marie to improve our relationship. If anything, I think she deserves someone who can see her at her worst and still say, “I choose you.” Sending her away from the most stable home she’s ever had would further damage her emotionally and add to the trauma driving her behaviors. Our story probably won’t be an easy one but it will be ours together. And, I will keep making this same decision as many times as necessary to make it happen.

From 0 to 3

During my pink eye down time I reminisced about many things, but one thing that was rolling around in my brain was how I went from alone to three kids in the span of 6 months. It’s funny how, when you are in the midst of a thing it just seems to flow but when you look back you see the general insanity of it all. Primero moved in with me the end of February 2014, ending my 4 month empty home dry spell. I had a brief weekend-long placement in May but it was just me and Primero for four months before Love Bug was born and came home on June 30^th. His older sister, Chica Marie, had spent several weekends with us in respite, including a long weekend when Love Bug was just a week old, but she didn’t officially move in until the beginning of August. I’ve noted the struggle some parents feel, going from one child to two but I didn’t really have time to think much about it when it was happening. Of course it helps that the ages of my children are significantly staggered and Primero is a very helpful big brother. Still, there are plenty of times where I feel like I’m being tugged in multiple directions simultaneously. My life often feels like the Jenga game, where pulling one wrong peg could cause the whole structure to come tumbling down into a messy heap. I contemplated if that was happening as my eyes were stuck shut with gross sticky pink eye goop. Is this it? Is it all going to come tumbling down? Thankfully, it didn’t but I’m still questioning my tendency to push myself to “get stuff done” and keep moving even when I really just want a break. The contrast between my day home alone and my day home with the two little kids last week was indicative of this tendency. When I was home alone I managed to nap and rest for most of the day, after getting everyone where they needed to go, that is. When the kids were home, there was a lot less rest and a lot more “getting stuff done” going on, which might explain why my eyes are still red a week after starting treatment (they are getting better, much less red today, but still not completely healed).

 

The past two weekends I have worked hard at home, after working a full-time job all week. I really want to finish purging the whole house and the end is in sight, at least for the upper floor (the basement was recently purged but certainly more can be done there). But, I’m feeling discouraged because, despite my hard work and umpteen trips to drop off donations at Goodwill, our house does not feel any less stuffed. I still struggle with where to put things (like the wreaths I keep making to hang on our front door – a wonderful idea but good Lord where am I going to put them all?!) and not having to dig to find something when I want to use it. I know, from reading blogs about going minimalist, that it is never a task where you are totally done for good, but one that you must keep on top of, but I was still hoping to get to a point where I can say, “Good job! The house feels much less cluttered now that you’ve purged it all!” I bought bunk beds for Chica Marie’s bedroom, thinking they would fit into the room a certain way. I measured, more than once, and it seemed according to the dimensions online, they would fit. Alas, the bunk beds are more hulking than streamlined and they only fit in the room in a way that makes it feel claustrophobically small and leaves little room for things like a dresser and toys. If I were handy, I’d make bunk beds to fit the space because I’m fairly certain it can be done. But, I’m not handy and I wouldn’t trust letting my child sleep on the top bunk of a bed I constructed. I keep telling myself things are better now with less items, but every time I need to dig a pot or pan out of the cabinet I see all my work as being futile. Our house is just very small. Probably too small for all the inhabitants. When I watch the Tiny House Living show on TV it makes my skin crawl because that is our reality (although, I guess at 520 square feet our house is huge compared to the houses half that size) and it is not as easy as those fools on TV would have you believe. Maybe they have most of their junk in storage? I don’t know. But, from my personal experience, I would never recommend trying to squish more than 2 people into a house our size.

Pink Eye

I wear my sunglasses at work, so I can, so I can... see because I have pink eye. True story. People keep asking me how I got it, like I saw some come hither sign and figured I might as well…. I don’t know how I got it, but it started last Tuesday and my eyes are still red and bloodshot and they alternate hurting and itching. I wore my sunglasses all day at work on Friday, my first day back since leaving mid-day on Tuesday, and no one complained. The only thing more painful than my eyes is looking at them. Luckily, I managed to only pass the infection off to Chica Marie. But, she seems to be having a much milder reaction and was allowed back to school Friday after seeing the doctor the day before.

 

So, since I had a lot of down time, trying to rest my eyes last week and I’m not one to listen to books on tape (I get distracted too easily), I had a lot of time to just think. I was home alone on Wednesday, having had Primero help me escort Love Bug to daycare before driving himself to school, where I resumed the control for the short jaunt home. I thought about how different my life was a mere three years ago, before Primero had moved in. He wasn’t my first placement or my first respite placement that became permanent. But, he was the first child that stayed, the first one who is not being moved or going home because he is home. I know it is not a unique experience for parents to look back on their lives B.C. (before children) and wonder how on earth they managed to fill all that free time. But, it is semi-unique to think I’ve done that – gone from a full home to an empty one – four times. It’s jolting on both ends; to wake up one morning to the demands of a child and once they are gone, to wake up to complete silence (well, almost – cats and dogs can be noisy). Probably until sometime last year, I was still internally holding my breath for the echoing silence to prevail once the kids had moved on. It took me telling myself over and over again that this was my new reality to have it truly sink in – and not in a bad way! Just different from what I had previously experienced.

 

During one of eye resting spells I thought about all of the things I did in my life while Primero was growing up as someone else’s son. He was born when I was 18, a senior in high school wrestling with decisions regarding college and majors and how to pack up all of my shoes and fit them into a dorm room. I graduated college the spring before Primero turned 5 and got married the spring before his ninth birthday. Not long after Primero turned double digits I began trying to have a baby with my ex. In 2012, the year before Primero came into foster care, I had my first foster-adopt placement. When Primero was placed in his first foster home, I was caring for the two little ones who were my longest foster care placement (until Chica Marie and Love Bug). I didn’t know my son until a few months after his 14^th birthday. A lot happened in both of our lives when we weren't together. It seems almost impossible to imagine the many twists and turns, where had anything gone differently for either one of us, we would have never met let alone become a family. There is a Rascal Flatts song that goes, “God blessed the broken road that lead me straight to you.” They are talking about romantic love, but I think this line applies to our story as well.

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