I fell off my well-worn horse so to speak. I’m usually galloping along with my annoyingly positive attitude but the hits seem to have kept on coming lately, knocking me to the ground every time I stood back up. So I simply crouched low for awhile, whimpering and fussing and realizing that I was boring myself to bits.

So I hopped back on the horse, am trying again to maintain my sunny disposition; to name it, claim it and frame it.

Yesterday I’d had an agency that is usually helpful make me cry. Someone who wasn’t in charge prevented... more

I have a fifteen year old RAD daughter with just about the least range of emotions that I’ve ever seen on a human being. Zero concern for her birth brothers, 100% concern for other people’s stuff, as in she takes what she wants with absolutely no regard for anyone or their feelings. Does not compute.

We’ve spent close to a year in Intensive Family Intervention counseling with a very good team, headed up by an insightful, on-target woman who cannot be manipulated in any way, shape or form, although my daughter has certainly tried.

In... more

I have four pregnant daughters right now. All four are married to men who’ve elected to provide well for them, so all four are stay-at-home mothers. It is only the first baby for one of them; the other three already have children.

In a family like ours, this isn’t the first time that I’ve been expecting four grandchildren at one time, it happened two years ago also. So far we’ve learned from the ultrasounds that three of these new babies will be girls. I already have a dozen grandchildren, by the time my own youngest child turns five in Pre-K, she’ll be an aunt to 16 nieces and nephews. Lord knows how many she’ll have by the time she finishes high school.

That’s what happens... more

Tonight we have to get the six kids packed up for their youth group trip; they’re even missing a day of school because this is WinterFest. My church is sponsoring my children, I’ve budgeted for their meals, and tonight they get a math lesson in making their money last…don’t buy sodas, do order ice water, yada yada yada.

The girls want to pack hair dryers, hair straighteners and enough hair gear for two months it seems. The guys hardly want to even grab a clean pair of underwear for three days.

Our... more

I have six teenagers going away this weekend, on a church youth group retreat, up in Tennessee. Only the 14 younger children will be home, plus some older kids, but they have jobs and busy social lives, so it’ll be just me and the younger 14…how weird is that for me?

I might take those 14 to the Dollar Movie Theater, something we do as a family maybe once a year, I might order a couple of pizzas, or allow cereal for supper. It hardly seems worth it to drag out all the big pots and cook for so few people. This is an odd state of affairs for a large... more

Today, at the orthodontist office, a lady wanted to know if she could ask me some questions about her 13 year old grandson that she now has custody of. I obliged for a few minutes, she’s bumfuddled by the behaviors that she sees. It’s not like he came out of foster care where these behaviors are explained in a MAPP class to prospective parents.

She’s seen this young boy all his life, she’s been his grandmother, and they’ve enjoyed a close relationship. Now that she is the disciplinarian in his life, he resents her. He’s simply angry that his own mother, for... more

All the advice I’ve ever given my children, all the support, the opinions and the help has seemed old-fashioned. I make every thought and decision based on my personal Spiritual beliefs. I truly believe that one can’t go wrong following the Word of God.

I’ve never used situational ethics to advise my children, knowing that potential consequences could be devastating to them. There seems to be few grey areas to me, everything seems to have fairly clear cut solutions. Here’s what needs to be done.

I’m not going to dumb down what I stand for so that... more

There is a great deal of daily physical work to do when one has 39 children. Although I’m down to 23 at home, which now seems easy compared to some other years, there is still the laundry, the paperwork, the housework and the meals.

One older daughter pointed out to me yesterday that no matter how many other problems are happening around me, all the work still has to be done. I still have to cook, maintain stability, and a sense of normalcy, make sure the clothes are washed and the trash is taken out.

I just spun through the house after getting... more

I need to put some positive posts up, to remember that my job is to encourage families in the adoption of older children, even when I’m in the midst of wondering why I’ve even tried.

Norman Vincent Peale suggests that we, “formulate and stamp indelibly on your mind a mental picture of yourself as succeeding. Hold this picture tenaciously. Never permit it to fade. Your mind will seek to develop the picture...Do not build up obstacles in your imagination.”

I’ll buy that, and I agree wholeheartedly. I lose that thought at times, when I have someone behind bars or failing in school…just sitting there and refusing to do their work. I sound like every... more

At what point does a child’s attitude toward a parent become emotional abuse of that parent, at what point is their too much toxicity? Too much bile poured out upon the only person who ever tried to care for them? To love them, feed them, educate them and continue to live with them all through the venom, the destruction, the thefts, the deceit and the unmitigated fury.

I do not have the answer to this question. I just know that in the real world I would never subject myself to the unwarranted hatred, I’d so take a hike. I would never be in... more