Older Child Adoption

I am so very frustrated with my seventeen-year-old son. Ever since we adopted him nine years ago, he pulls the same stunt a dozen times a school year. He lies, says he doesn't have homework, ends up with multiple missing assignments which he must then make up, and digs himself a deep dark hole of no TV, no Playstation, and no friends while he catches up. In nine years, he has had only two or three real holiday breaks from school because he usually has to spend all that time catching up. We've tried counseling, heavy structure, essays to help him connect with the feelings that drive this behavior, meetings with teachers, positive rewards when he stays caught up, and negative consequences… [more]

I'm a little late posting this week because we had a tragic death of a thirteen-year-old girl in our neighborhood, a friend of my daughter's. We won't know what happened until they finish investigating, but her parents found  her dead in the bathtub last Monday  morning. Our close-knit community folded in around the family who still has one adopted and four biological siblings. I had the honor of sitting with the mother two days after her daughter's death, the day she went into her daughter's bedroom for the first time since the drowning. I say it was an honor because it felt like a sacred space to be there as she unleashed her agony and to be able to hold some of… [more]

My daughter is on fire. First she punched the boy that was kicking her. Now she's handled two girls that keep trying to get her in trouble. Kaylyn has stars in her eyes, she's so proud of herself. I'm pretty proud of her myself. Two girls--who claim to love Kaylyn and be her best friends--are forever trying to get her in trouble just for fun. Until recently, Kaylyn fell for it every time. On Monday, they tried it again. This time, Kaylyn was ready. She used humor in a way we had role-played and came home higher than a kite because it worked! The girls left her alone! We spent half an hour in girl-talk on my bed enjoying her triumph. I had… [more]

Kaylyn did it! She told the boy that her mom gave her permission to punch him in the stomach if he kicked her again. First he told her that her mom was mean (I take that as a compliment). Then he kicked her. So...dear, sweet, no-longer-a-wounded-deer Kaylyn hauled off and punched him as hard as she could in the stomach. Do you know what happened? He quit kicking her. Now he just gives her dirty looks in the hallway, but he doesn't bully her anymore. I asked Kaylyn how she felt, and she said, "triumphant." I am so proud of her for protecting herself. This is a huge turning point for her. Now if we could only teach her to stand up… [more]

Does that sound like bad parenting advice? Don't write me if it does. It might be, but my husband and I already agree that in this case, we stand behind it. Let me set the stage. My sweet, delicate, passive, fourteen-year-old daughter is being bullied at school. A fourteen-year-old boy is kicking the backs of her feet and legs as she walks down the hall. I asked her if she had told any adults and she said, "Yes, Mr. T talked to him but it didn't stop." So being something of a tiger personality myself, and recognizing that my daughter is more a wounded deer personality (most of which is not her fault but comes from her early life), I know that… [more]

I’ve mostly seen adoption from the other side--from the perspective of the child. I’ll never forget the look in Boipelo’s eye when we told her. Boipelo, who had waited so long and so patiently. Boipelo who had asked almost every day for a year when she was getting her “new” family. Boipelo who dreamed about the princess bedroom her new parents would prepare for her. Boipelo, seven going on eight, who was classified as mentally retarded with no clear diagnosis. Boipelo who had seen her other children adopted into families before her. Boipelo who was deemed by almost everyone as “unadoptable.” Boipelo who waited. Amy laid a book before her. A book with wonderful pictures inside and a little story her adoptive family had… [more]

The invitation came in a small and sweet baby pink envelope. Our adoption attorney had set the date with the County Clerk for our finalization hearing, meaning we could start the official countdown — the countdown to being an official family. We made signs on bright pink paper displaying the “days until Gotcha Day” so we could rip one down each day until the hearing. Our girl, 11 years old at the time, had been through this before but didn’t remember her previous adoption day. This time had to be memorable. The finalization date was the new beginning we had prayed for, but also seemed like an end to something – no more social workers checking on us constantly, no more mandatory family counseling… [more]

Welcome to my blog post! I’m glad you are here, and I hope you visit often. To give you a little background on our situation, my husband and I have been married for 13+ years. We got married when we were both 30, and we never really thought we wanted children. We lived a good life, thinking only of ourselves, we lived in a big house on a lake and drove expensive cars, had a big boat and spent money like we would have it forever, traveling and partying with friends, we thought we had it all! We owned a business, and when the recession hit, we struggled, to put it mildly. About 3 years ago we had to file bankruptcy and… [more]

My dear sister-in-law was a chiropractor, and she was one of the smartest people I ever met.  I remember her once talking to one of my nephews who had recently suffered an ankle injury and telling him about the scar tissue that develops around the site of the wound.  She talked about how vulnerable and inflexible the surrounding muscles are even after the original wound heals because they have to adapt to the inflexible scar tissue.  She was telling my nephew that he was going to have to be extra careful because that ankle was now going to be more prone to future injuries because of different tissues. My sister-in-law's lesson on injuries led me to think about that primal wound of… [more]

The hardest decision my husband and I have had to make in the seven years since we got our kids is whether to allow contact between them and their birthparents. We first fostered, then adopted, a sibling group (ages 8, 5 and 16 months) who were taken away from their birthparents for substance abuse, domestic violence and mental illness. For the first two foster care years, the  birthmother had one visit with my daughter and no visits with either son. The birthfather had a handful of visits with all three kids as a group, but he missed many more than he kept. By the time the kids were freed for adoption, the birthparents had lied to them, stood them up for visits, and promised… [more]