I have another great kid, pictured here with me; he’s 13 years old, the oldest of his sibling group of five. They’ve been with me for five years now.

A very challenging group with severe emotional issues. He’s had his own, has demonstrated some disturbed behavior at times, but he has responded in therapy and decided that I must be the real deal. He’s open and affectionate, polite and even grateful at times.

He’s the older brother of a 12 year old here. This twelve year old, Jose, is either somewhat autistic or it is Asperger’s Syndrome. He disrupted my daughter’s graduation yesterday, even got the county police involved, much to our chagrin.

Back in Texas, both his psychiatrist and his caseworker intimated it might be best if Jose were split off from the sibling group, it might be helpful in enabling the other four to heal properly.

That went against my grain; it’s not the way our family functions. I had to weigh that possibility against the knowledge that I have, knowing that members of each group appear to play a specific role in their healing. If we had to factor in the grief of a left behind sibling, I believe that it’d cost us all.

On the flip side of that, Jose has successfully taught his younger two siblings how to rage out-of-control at times. He’s very angry now that Javy has launched himself into normal ranges of behaviors; he perceives it as a threat to their brotherly bond, a strangulation of their former united front against me.

They have another brother who is miraculously in the gifted program here. He too is an interesting delight to parent.

I’d told Javy I was going to blog about him and his face was immediately wreathed in smiles. He’s a good looking boy, large for a thirteen year old, pleasant to his teachers and the Bubbas here, my other sons, rarely squabble with him as he’s simply good natured.

How unusual is that in the adoption of older children? A rhetorical question certainly as I hear the guffaws from cyberspace at the thought.

We took this picture this morning before church, before his brother Jose, again melted down over an imaginary insult that had no relevance to anything at all. An accidental glance at him can send him to LaLaLand where nothing computes, where we can’t reach him.

But I still feel strongly that Mr. Gifted and Mr. Pleasant would not be who they are without short-fused Mr. Unpredictable.