I think today I will write about the isolation that adoptive parents face. As Julie steeled herself for remarks that were sure to come, so too do we find ourselves figuratively battening down the hatches with each new onslaught of issues that seem to slam us at regular intervals, sometimes wave after wave of them.

Yesterday when our therapist arrived I had so many different examples to tell her that I forced myself to narrow it down only to the few children that she’d get to see that day, even though in a family like ours it is so often intertwined. Dr. Mandy needs to know at least the framework of our week as she tends to address the glaring issues and to help the children make sense of everything. Also, you better believe, she is a strong voice of reason for me as well.

I have several educated and experienced adults that I can go to help me untangle the events we live through so that I can step back and see the issues for what they really are, no matter the breadth of smoke screens that are also pumped throughout the words that I hear from out-of-control children.

One adoptive mother in particular right now is reeling from similar issues that we also recently faced that I still have not written about, so freshly painful is it, so unresolved and so devastating. I tried to reassure her that this was sadly, all too common and that other mothers who’ve adopted older children have also had to deal with this particularly heinous crime that can tear a family apart.

I can’t tell her, nor anyone else about the many other moms who’ve cried to me about this, it has taken a very strong act of my will just for me to be able to deal with the fallout of what all has happened and this is just one of the many issues lately here at my home. I’m also guarding the confidences of others, yet I know she knows these women as we’ve all been in adoption internet groups together.

Years ago, before the internet, I’d eagerly await the monthly issues of a few adoptive magazines that would arrive in the mail. Nowadays I am gratified by the instant publication of studies, ideas, thoughts and ruminations of many very professional folks that are involved in the adoption arena. Possibly the best result has been the way that mamas have been able to connect with each other and offer support and understanding when others in more normal families might recoil in horror. These other regular mothers have never witnessed the fury that results in broken windows and destroyed cars, they fortunately do not have long lines of feces smears decorating their walls nor turds under chairs that cannot be attributed to a dog. That is uniquely our world.

As my emails indicate to me every single day, this is very hard, deeply trying, and I’ll still remind everyone (even myself when I’m in the throes of self-doubt) that it can be, and is, ultimately rewarding on an intrinsic level that many human beings will never experience.

I still count myself blessed, even through my very deep frustration and all-too-often despair.