No Adoption Celebration

Apparently, where I work no pregnant belly equals no celebration. No card. No balloon. Just a nice verbal, “Congrats” from a few people and back to business as usual. Do you know what this means to a mom like me? How under-valued it makes me feel? How dismissive of my family and my children who were not formed inside of me? By not acknowledging my family, by not celebrating the adoption of my children, my fellow co-workers have basically just told me adoption is not supported in our workplace. I’m not going to lie, it hurts. I really held out hope there would be some form of fanfare, but I don’t even get a fan. Just, nothing. Crickets.

 

Our daycare kindly gifted us two balloons and a card all the staff signed, which made me teary-eyed. The Family Based therapists gifted us a very generous gift card to a local restaurant/arcade, which we used the day of the adoption. Their kindness was very validating and welcomed. These weren’t extravagant gestures, but they were very appreciated because it acknowledged and celebrated our non-traditional family. I’m the kind of person who tries to give others the benefit of the doubt, I try to give reason and explain why someone might do something other than them just being a shitty person. So, I tell myself that my co-workers aren’t heartless anti-adoption folks, they just don’t have a built-in tradition to celebrate adoption, like they have for women birthing babies. I could adopt my children and never have anyone know I’ve done it. I don’t have the evidence of a protruding belly and months away from work to out me. But, really I waited to post this for over two weeks because I honestly thought they might do something, a card or an email or a balloon or an announcement in a staff meeting – something! I understand there are more unknowns in adoption, given our adoption almost didn’t happen with a lot of last minute craziness, but even after the fact – bupkis. Sadly, my official entrance into motherhood for the two little ones was not revered as the three women who were showered with food and gifts, their swollen belly’s admired, their fertility flaunted for all to see. Is it any wonder I hate baby showers?

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

A Baby in Your Tummy

One of the daycare teachers in Love Bug’s classroom is expecting. I’m sure it’s something that has been explained to the kids, in an age-appropriate way. Love Bug has never said anything about it but he has been doing this thing lately where he asks to “be a baby in your tummy” and then he crawls under my shirt and cuddles there for a little while before coming back out. He insists he was once a baby in my tummy, even when I explain to him that he wasn’t. Chica Marie has also made comments about being a baby in my tummy and I know she knows that it isn’t true. Love Bug seems to have baby fever at the moment. He loves looking at the pictures of himself when he was a baby but he also likes seeing Esperanza’s friends baby and the few pictures we have seen of his brand new nephew. He likes playing with baby dolls, calling them his babies. Sometimes, he shoves the baby doll under my shirt to be a baby in my tummy. Most of the time I look at it as just a stepping stone in childhood development, his understanding of familial roles and how families are formed. But, sometimes it’s a gut-punch because not only did Love Bug not grow in my tummy, no baby ever has and (most likely) no baby ever will. On a few occasions I’ve gotten tears in my eyes when Love Bug lifts my shirt to be my baby. It’s hard to imagine Love Bug not being my son, our bond is very strong and he’s such a momma’s boy, but the reality is that he was someone else’s baby before he was mine. Sometimes I try to envision what Love Bug might have been like, had he been my biological son and not had to deal with so many things at such a tender age, but then he wouldn’t be my Love Bug, he would be someone else. Even though I hated seeing him struggle, those obstacles made him stubbornly strong as well as loving and funny. And, at the end of the day, Love Bug is my baby - from my tummy or not.

It Figures

While dealing with the last minute craziness of our finalization, my friend was dealing with a possible, unwanted pregnancy. I felt like I mostly just listened to her talk about it, voicing her anxiety about her missing menses. I didn’t want to voice an opinion because I felt it would be clouded by my angst over never having been pregnant. I wanted to remain supportive because she was very worried and just wanted the ordeal to be over. I found it hard to continue listening to her plans to terminate, even though I understood her reasoning. I always identified as pro-life, but I think that was mostly due to not wanting see abortion used as a form of birth control. My friend told me she realized she made a bad choice during her fling but she shouldn’t have to spend the next 18 years paying for that mistake (meaning, dealing with the fling guy because he would have, in her words, “made her life a living hell.”) She kept hoping her period would arrive as every pregnancy test showed negative. Thankfully, a week late, her period started and the anxiety over making a choice she didn’t want to have to make was alleviated.

 

Primero’s friend was not so lucky. She had to endure a very lengthy procedure, including blood transfusion, because the baby wasn’t viable and her body, due to her health issues, was not going to be able to sustain the pregnancy. It was a very harsh lesson for her, to not be flippant with her health and to be more prepared for a pregnancy, if that is possible for her in the future.

 

We had breakfast with Mini Momma and Grandma the weekend after the adoption. When the kids left the table to go to the bathroom, I asked Grandma about the two older expecting siblings. She informed me it was now the three oldest who were expecting. She shook her head and said, “They’re supposed to be breaking this cycle.” The second oldest brother’s girlfriend is due any day (she had the baby the weekend after our breakfast outing). The twin sister is due sometime in the summer, July maybe? And the oldest brother just found out his girlfriend is expecting. Grandma hopes the twin sister will stay in school, since she is only 16. The brothers might both be out of school, I’m not sure. It’s so crazy that three of them are having babies so close together!

 

Esperanza’s friend had her baby boy the day after our adoption. That Friday I got a frantic call from Esperanza because the baby’s father called CYS telling them her friend is not a fit mother. Sadly, due to an old case the girls mother had on her (so the young woman who had the baby was in foster care at one time), CYS opened a case. They told her she couldn’t live with her mother and had until 4 pm on Friday to find another place to live or she wouldn’t be taking her baby home from the hospital. When Esperanza patched her into our call, she was crying and it just broke my heart. How awful for her to be experiencing this, how awful that she has been made a victim a second time by CYS! Thankfully, they were able to work things out and she was allowed to go home with her son the next day. Still, CYS keeps lurking around, popping in for daily wellness visits. I warned her that she would need be a “perfect” mom. Last week they used the oven/stove to warm the apartment and forgot to turn it off before CYS got there, so it became a point of concern. She was so worried about it and said she feels like they are just trying to find a reason to take her baby. It’s maddening because I think she is doing a great job as a new mom and you can’t help but see how in love she is with her baby. She invited me over to see the baby, so I’m excited to go get some baby snuggles and I plan to take her some diapers because I know she had run out this past week. Anything to keep her baby out of the system!   

Handyman/woman

The amount of yardwork I have to do right now is overwhelming me. The dogs destroyed our grass, so I have to replant it which will be hard because it’s where the dogs like to spend their time outdoors. Additionally, because of the same grass-wrecking dogs, I have to repair/replace a lot of the fencing around the yard. This is all in addition to the usual weeding and cleaning out the flower beds. The weather has been a hamper to getting things done, with so many chilly and rainy days. This weekend was nice, but still on the cool side. Instead of getting my own work done, I was at the farm helping my dad clean leaves out of my mom’s flower beds. It is a source of anxiety for her and, if not done, she will attempt to do it herself when she should be resting and recuperating. So, as I said to my father, “Anything to keep her sitting!” I’ll need to squeeze my yardwork in during the week. Sadly, I think it’s going to rain tomorrow and Wednesday.

 

In addition to the outdoor things, there are inside projects I’ve been too timid to attempt. I’ve had a new bathroom toilet sitting on my porch since last year that I need to get the gumption to install. But, I really wanted to replace the floor before/during the new toilet installation and I’m fearful I won’t be able to manage to correctly install the tile flooring. We have been unable to shower since the beginning of February because the rubber ring in the spout broke and so we are stuck bathing. It’s been ok, but summertime really calls for a shower, not a bath. I could cheaply replace what we have for our clawfoot tub/shower but I found a much nicer option that is very costly but it has a showerhead and a hand shower. I’m fearful of purchasing it because it is costly, not sold in stores only online, and I’m not confident I will be able to install it without calamity. I wish I had the money to pay someone to do these things for me, but I don’t so I’m going to have to work up the nerve to do it on my own. I wish there were some sort of handyman classes I could take to learn how to do home improvement projects. I have such great ideas in my head but next to zero ability to accomplish them. Too bad being handy isn’t hereditary because my father built our family home. I wish he had spent more time teaching my these handyman things, but I suppose it’s one of those cases of the teacher appearing when the student is ready and I just wasn’t ever ready. Is there some skill you wish was hereditary?   

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

That's Your Mom?

The weather this Spring has been all over the place in terms of temperature and precipitation. The tail end of last week we had a few nice days and so the kiddos and I went to the local park to play. Other families were there, taking advantage of the nice weather, so the kids found friends to join in play. For the first time, I heard some of the kids questioning Chica Marie about me. “That’s your mom?” they asked her incredulously. Chica Marie, seemingly oblivious to their confusion, would answer affirmatively. She didn’t seem to catch onto their disbelief and doubt, nor see their eyes move from her to me and back. I try to talk about adoption things when they pop up because it seems to work for the kids to have real-world scenarios to understand. On our walk home from the park, I mentioned to Chica Marie that she doesn’t have to tell everyone she is adopted, it is her story and she can tell who she wants when she wants to tell them. Right now, since it just happened, she seems to want to tell everyone. I find it’s hard to explain to her innocent soul that not everyone will meet her enthusiasm of her adoption status. I don’t want her to feel like she has to hide the fact that she’s adopted, I just don’t want her to think she always needs to explain it, to explain herself. I suppose this is an on-going effort. Right now, the children who expressed skepticism at me being her mom were just looking at how different we appear. I just don’t want Chica Marie to feel like, in order to explain our differences, she has to tell everyone she was adopted. I don’t want to see it become a burden to her. I want, like it was this past weekend, for her to answer affirmative, toss her hair over her shoulder and get on with things – easy breezy.

 

Funny, face-palm moment – On one of our walks down to the park we encountered a black woman, a pre-teen we know from the park, and the woman’s daughter. Love Bug walked right up to the woman and asked, “Are you Mommy V?” meaning his bio-mom. It was awkward for a moment as I quickly explained to Love Bug that it wasn’t Mommy V. We had a brief conversation with the very nice woman and then continued our walk.

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

Guarded but Open

When Primero’s adoption was pending and we were working through his concerns about what our future would look like together, his therapist suggested we view adoption as a marriage. In a marriage the groom does not lose his family, the bride does not lose her family; instead, the groom gains his wife’s family as in-laws and the wife gains the groom’s family as in-laws. She suggested our adoption would be the same; Primero would gain my family and retain his own. I totally understood this looking at it from his perspective, but I don’t think I really saw it that way for me. I didn’t object to being involved with his family, or spending time with them, I just didn’t make it personal, I didn’t seem them as mine. But, over time  I think that has changed.

 

Easter weekend Primero’s mom was looking for a place to stay because she got into an argument with the person she had been staying with and needed to get out. She called Primero while he was out running an errand. So, he called me, putting me on the spot, and asked if his mom could crash at our place for a night or two. I hemmed and hawed about it, but he kept pressing me for an answer so I relented. But, because I was already so stressed about getting things done for the next day (Easter) and that the house was one hot mess, I text him and suggested she stay in a hotel. I offered to put her up for the night. Somehow, Primero didn’t see the one night part and put her up for two nights. I was angry to have to pay for her hotel for a night, let alone two. She’s an adult and she made this mess for herself! Primero and I fought about it and his stance was, well if we have the money why can’t we help my mom, even if it’s a problem of her making?

 

I’m not trying to pat myself on the back, not at all. But, I have done a LOT for his siblings, for his family. This was just one more thing, one more way my family has grown to include people I never thought it would before adoption. Esperanza moved to another state but doesn’t want to stay there. I was looking at a 6 hour drive one-way to pick her up, until her ex-boyfriends mother said she would drive her back next weekend. She isn’t my child, not my responsibility by birth or any such thing, but she knew I’d be a reliable option to get out of a situation she didn’t want to be in anymore. At this point, it’s almost second nature to me.

 

But, open adoption looks so differently from Primero and his family, to the little ones. With Chica Marie and Love Bug, I have limited contact with their maternal grandmother and only one of their 7 siblings. Sadly, my relationship with the little one’s grandmother has soured and while I would never not allow the children to spent time with her, I am definitely more guarded. My hope is that someday we can feel more comfortable interacting with one another. I had such high hopes from the sibling picnic this past summer but it didn’t seem to bring us any kumbaya moments. It makes me sad because I’d like to have more involvement for the children, but it is what it is. I really regret the things that happened with Grandma and Mini Momma because we do see them fairly regularly and now I feel squirrely about it, but I can’t undo what’s been done. My hope is that a few years from now things are going well and these feelings will be a distant memory. Fingers crossed.

Finally Forever!

I didn’t want to write anything until after the fact because I feared another last minute change of heart. Thankfully, that did not happen and so Wednesday afternoon the four of us officially became a family. I didn’t find out until Tuesday afternoon that the county changed their stance from “regrettable I was given a date” to, the adoption is ON. I held my breath, barely daring to believe it to be true. Apparently, when I spoke to the county case worker on Friday and suggested she speak to the other therapeutic staff who know Chica Marie to get a real feel on how she’s processing all of this, she took me up on the offer. The Family Based therapist wrote a note, stating they felt it was the limbo and lack of permanency that pushed Chica Marie to feeling desperate about the adoption. They processed the event with her (and me) and determined a lot of her feelings had to do with her fear of losing her sister. Once we talked about not letting that happen, she seemed to settle back into looking forward to the adoption. And Wednesday? This girl was nothing but excited and happy and beaming. And, she was very interested and involved in her adoption. She sat, unflinching, in the opposing counsel seat, facing the judge head on, listening intently to all the proceedings. She went along with me up the stand, and stood by me as I choked back tears when I explained why I wanted to adopt her and her brother. Her only disappointment was that her sister was unable to attend (PSSA testing at school, according to Grandma) and that the judge didn’t bang his gavel when he announced the adoption complete. Love Bug, on the other hand, was blissfully oblivious, sitting on Primero’s lap listening to music. As we walked out of the County Services Building Love Bug announced, “Back to normal!” and I think that’s how he felt about the whole thing – this was just the final step to getting his life “back to normal” with no legal/CYS interruption.

 

Before we went to the adoption, Chica Marie, Love Bug and I painted some rocks. We have a local group that does something similar to this and asks people to post the rocks on their group Facebook page. I thought it might be a nice idea for the kids to paint a rock for other kids and families dealing with the foster care system. My rock said “Family,” Chica Marie wrote, “I Love You Mom,” and Love Bug lost interest after painting half of his rock a light teal, so I made it a beach theme and wrote, “Life is better at the beach.” We each stashed our rocks near the courthouse and discovered Love Bug’s rock was gone by the time we came back out. Later, on the Facebook page, I discovered Chica Marie’s rock was also found and posted. Chica Marie and I decided to paint one for her teacher, which we plan to do this weekend and I think we will be painting more and hiding them around because it’s fun but also, hopefully, someone having a bad day or a hard time will find the rock and smile, even if just for a moment.

 

Later in the day, we went to a local restaurant/video arcade made possible by the generous gift card from our Family Based therapists. We had dinner and then played games until we needed to go home to get the kiddos to bed. Love Bug really enjoyed the car games, even if he couldn’t reach the pedals. Primero or I would put our feet on the pedals and he would steer and try to honk the horn. It was hard keeping the two kids together, but thankfully it wasn’t too full since it was a week night.

 

Almost as if to prove us all right, Chica Marie had an amazing day at school the day after the adoption and has really been doing well since that day. Of course, we could be back in a honeymoon period, but I think she is finally feeling settled and the fear and anxiety of foster care seems to be sloughing off her, letting her shine. All I can say is - Hallelujah! I’m so glad we finally made it to forever!

Shattered

The adoption was all set for this week. I was a little nervous because there was a small hiccup with the lawyers office, but it was smoothed over and so I was feeling more optimistic. Until late Friday afternoon. My phone rang and the lawyer’s paralegal called to inform me that CYS cancelled the adoption for this week and so it won’t be until next month. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. At the midnight hour, CYS threw their weight around to stop the court processes and block our adoption. The greatest question is why? The answer is, because Chica Marie made the comment she did at therapy and so CYS feels it is “inappropriate” to move forward with the adoption at this time. When I spoke to our county case worker on Friday she told me it was “regrettable” that I was told a date for the adoption and that I had shared that information with everyone, including the children. The saddest part of this whole story is that earlier in the day on Friday Chica Marie’s TSS worker text me to let me know Chica Marie was happily telling everyone at school that she was getting adopted the following week. She was grinning from ear to ear. When I shared with Chica Marie what had happened, she asked me if it meant she was going to have to live with another family. We are shattered at the moment. Love Bug doesn’t understand what is going on, but he is the one being the most unjustly affected. Personally, I think it is criminal what CYS has done. Supposedly, they want to talk to the Filial therapist to get her professional take on what happened and if it would be ok to proceed with the adoption. Funny thing is, technically I am her client, not Chica Marie. And she doesn’t really know Chica Marie, she’s only seen her a handful of times. I recommended talking to the TSS worker or the Family Based therapists because they know her longer and better. Not only that, there’s my whole issue with the Filial therapist so I really don’t trust she will give the most glowing report. I don’t know what has taken so long for the county case worker to make the calls, why she never reached out to me, why they waited until just 5 days before the adoption to put the kibosh on the whole deal, but I’m outraged. I reported the incident on 3/20 a full week and 2 days before I was given the date for the adoption, which was just under 2 weeks out. You mean to tell me in that 3 week period, CYS didn’t know what they were doing? I had to find out from the paralegal that our adoption was being stopped? I have zero respect for this case worker, just none. How does no one take into consideration how this little child will feel, how this insane world of limbo is affecting her and contributing to the behaviors and feelings? Oh, right, it was regrettable that I was given a date. Way to take any tiny grain of responsibility. Even for CYS, that’s low.

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

Don't *Just* Do Anything

Last week I saw the nutritionist again for a follow up appointment. Prior to the meeting I had my thyroid levels tested and hey guess what? My thyroid has not tipped into hypo territory, in fact the nutritionist said it has stabilized. She has me trying (very expensive!) CDB oil to help me sleep and fight inflammation in my body. I asked her if she ever thought I would be able to stop taking the progesterone supplement, if my body would ever manage to make it on its own. She didn’t mince words when she thought for a moment and replied, “No.” She felt I needed to be taking the progesterone as a preventive to ovarian cancer, which she attributed to the wonky hormone levels due to PCOS. She said she would recommend I stay on the progesterone until I hit menopause. That is many, many moons from now, but I don’t disagree with her, but it made me mad to think my gynecologist just wanted to put me on birth control and to hell with my hormones. How is that ok? Why didn’t the infertility doctor try to help me with my wonky hormones? Couldn’t that have ultimately led to the desired outcome? What is wrong with the way our medical system works that no traditional doctor looked at my labs, looked at me a whole person and didn’t do something to help me? Oh sure, they told me to *just* lose weight because losing weight would help my symptoms. But, they didn’t take into consideration how hard it is for my body to *just* lose weight. Honestly, if anyone tells you to *just* do anything you should not take them seriously because they don’t have a clue. Still, if I hadn’t found the help I need all on my own I would probably be considering taking the band-aid solution just because my symptoms were so miserable and affecting my quality of life. Instead, the progesterone has been helping. Not miraculously, but (tmi moment here) I was able to use a tampon instead of a tampon AND an over-night heavy-duty pad during my heavy days. For me, that’s freaking amazing! And, now I find out it might actually be helping prevent a future cancer diagnosis? What’s the point in going to my gyno again? I was told there were no herbal supplements that help heavy periods. My only solution was the birth control pill or an IUD. That is just plain wrong. I’m going to keep taking the progesterone as I have been and, when my current supplement runs out, I will try the CBD oil. I have a lot of work to do, in cleaning up my eating and trying to get all the processed “fake” foods out of my life, but I hope in the end it will help. The hardest part will be getting the kiddos on board. I’ll just have to pull the mom card….