There is almost no way possible way to adopt from the foster care system, to adopt older children and/or sibling groups, and not become a naïve parent to “troubled children.”

Adjustment Conduct Disorder seems to be the new catchphrase and I had a caseworker tell me this week that it encompasses all kids from the system. It’s a big DUH since these children were removed from families that perpetuated criminal abuse and neglect, then were bounced through the foster care system, experiencing multiple moves and sometimes residential treatment center placements, they are bound to be somewhat distraught over the way they’ve been treated by life.

So us unassuming, big-hearted, clueless parents decided that we have so much love to give…why not adopt a child who needs a family? Then we’ll all live happily ever after and no one will ever tell you, “It’s your fault that your child is killing the neighborhood cats or has pushed a teacher into the blackboard, right?”

On this blog, or on my other, people have commended me for sharing our many struggles. Our life is mainly one big struggle overall.

There’s no other way to incorporate troubled children into our families without exploding issues.

Early this morning I drove 104 miles round trip to visit a locked-up child of mine that I have not even begun to write about as I’ve been deeply heartsick and troubled about it for five long months. I really love this kid and I busted out crying today when I saw him.

I cannot, nor will not describe his circumstances at the moment, but we had an hour together that was wonderful.

My son introduced me to a handsome sergeant that he really liked, and I thanked this kind man for being good to my son. I briefly explained that I had a few troubled kids and this sergeant’s floodgates opened.

He too is an adoptive parent; he adopted a fifteen month old boy from the foster care system. Once a darling little child, he’s now a full-blown RAD, FAE, ODD wild child and is giving their family hell with charges already against him at age eleven.

We talked about the huge lack of mental health resources now not available to us adoptive parents, and I was reminded this morning in the news of several reporters bellyaching that folks should have seen this last shooting coming in Cleveland.

I rudely yelled back at my TV, “And who the heck would have listened?”

I’ve told judges, probation officers, social workers and therapists for about eight long years that one particular child of mine was abnormally violent. She busted a policeman’s nose this week and is in an Atlanta jail now with 6 charges, some of them felonies.

I’m believing that this is a blessing in disguise as I plan to politely, yet very firmly, demand or petition the judge to order her into an adult care facility where she can receive the help that she so desperately needs.

Will I be listened to in that big old city court system? I don’t know, but I’m fairly certain the policeman with the broken nose will back me up, as will her many therapists and staff members that she has regularly attacked.