Keeping My Sense of Humor

“Foster/adoptive parents of difficult or emotionally disturbed children are often subjected to community scrutiny and suspicion that biological families do not experience. Foster/adoptive families are sometimes highly visible in their communities due to their size or composition. Many people do not understand why someone would chose to adopt/foster older children, large numbers of children, and children with handicapping conditions or negative histories. Hence, they are suspicious of the parents’ motives.” (From An Unlit Path)

I’d never quite thought of it that way. Maybe I’m totally egocentric, but I’ve often thought it was obvious why I chose to parent 39 kids, mainly because it is love and fun all rolled together.

Yes, we’ve had painfully bad times, but if the bad outweighed the good, why would I have continued to adopt for 20 years?

It certainly involves a great deal of work, it’s a life full of challenges, and it’s not for the faint hearted.

But the rewards win out, hands down, no question about it. I also would choose to do this again in a heartbeat. I would have done a lot of things differently. There’s no way to not make mistakes in parenting; this foster/adoptive parenting is even trickier due to the massively demanding emotional needs of each child.

I now am better able to ignore the more awful behaviors, I deal with it after the fact, when tempers have cooled, and a discussion is more viable and productive. I’m more patient now, able to understand that the bitterness is not directed at me. It’s not me they are mad at; I’m just here, the one they learn they can safely rage against, that I’ll forgive them and that we can move forward again and again.

And I keep a much lower profile now in our community. People don’t see me shopping at the mall, the times one sees me out and about is at my kid’s ballgames, plays, musicals and other school and church events.

I finally understand that other people don’t understand why anyone would choose to live like this.

Right now, as I type, my nine year old is raging in time-out, screaming that he hates everyone, banging his arms, legs, fists and feet against the wall, and when anyone attempts to intervene so that he won’t hurt himself, he escalates. This started because he said a bad word, but that really wasn’t the issue once again. It would have been a quick five minute time-out but he chose to extend it over an hour due to his raging. He needed to vent and this is the only way he knows how to do it.

He yelled that he wished he was still on the street. Years ago I’d have tried to explain why that wouldn’t be a safe option. Now I wait it out, he’ll snuggle with me later, he’ll apologize and his words will literally be, “Mama, I’m sorry I threw a fit.”

An understatement perhaps, this cracked the sheetrock, but I get it. He doesn’t like when he’s out of control, it scares him too, but he’s getting better now, 65 months after joining our family, the youngest of a sibling group of 7 children. I was fortunate enough to get the entire group and they’ve been a blessing…even though one is now in a juvenile facility…my mind’s eye is able to still see even his future potential.

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