It wasn’t a secret that I felt closer to my dad growing up than I did my mom. Growing up dad and I used to take road trips back and forth between Calgary and Spokane for various doctor appointments as strange as that may seem I loved the time we spent together and bonding during our travels.
He would sit with me after the various operations I went through and at one time traveled all the way to Spokane to get me after the doctors decided against doing surgery on my left foot to remove a bunion because I couldn’t wiggle my toes which was necessary for it to be successful. My dad always used to say that I was a very entertaining person who kept him on his and mom’s toes.
I think I added a few grey hairs with some of the stunts I pulled resulting in my mother to add medical tape to my leg cast which unfortunately the reason for her doing that escapes me. I just have a vivid memory of sitting on my parent’s bed and watching my mom wrap it up.
There was a time where I think I really scared the crap out of my dad, it was the day before we were to make the trip out to Calgary to get my cast removed from my left arm.
Apparently the swelling went down so much that during the night the cast had slipped off and landed on the floor. I remember picking it off the floor and going to the living room where dad was sitting in his favourite chair reading a book. I had a habit of not talking when I entered a room so when my father looked up and saw me with something in my hand and my arm at my side I think the hair at the back of his neck went up and he jumped when he noticed the cast in my right hand.
The ruckus brought my mom and sister from upstairs to see what had happened, I’m pretty sure I had caused him to have a few grey hairs.
We went to Calgary as scheduled and my parents let me keep my cast as gross as that sounds now that I’m a parent and went through the same thing with Jayson wanting to keep his cast decades later I have to give credit to my mom for not throwing it out sooner than she did.
I can’t remember ever a time where my dad wasn’t penning a new poem. His inspirations came from everywhere mostly life experience. It wasn’t until 9 years ago when he retired and both my parents moved to Grand Forks that he decided to write his first book Stories that Rhyme and Sometimes Amuse.
My father inspired me to write, some have said I have a talent for it and I should publish my stories. I’m not sure about that, most of my stories are child base as that’s where my mind seems to go to maybe some day I would get the courage to do it but for now I am writing stories for when my children have their own babies.
To be honest I haven’t really written a story for a very long time either the ideas haven’t really been there or like most people too busy raising children and making excuses not to do it.
I think it has to change though for there is a story in me that needs to be told I’ve just had a hard time wording it properly.
When the kids were much younger I used to tell them stories at the top of my head most of the time I would remember the exact wording I used for each one, however heaven help me if I forgot a plot in a story because Jayson would be quick to point it out.
I have many stories that need to be told and now perhaps this may be the time to tell these stories, maybe even carry on with my father’s legacy and love of writing.
A few years back when Jayson was younger and had the terrible habit of picking his nose until was raw, so dad wrote him a song.
Sung to the tune of If You’re Happy and You Know It.

BOOGERS 
Ya got a booger in your nose whatta ya do?
Ya got a booger in your nose whatta ya do?
Ya got a booger in your nose, and you know for sure it shows
Ya got a booger in your nose, here’s what you do!
You put your finger in and wiggle around
You put your finger in and wiggle around
You put your finger in and you give a great big grin
Oh you put your finger in and bring it down!
Then you shake it real hard back and forth
Then you shake it real hard back and forth
So you shake it real hard but the booger’s stuck like lard.
So you wipe it on your shoe, and stomp the floor!
So you stomp it on the floor and it smears in,
So you stomp it on the floor and it smears in,
So you stomp it on the floor, and your mother yells, ” NOMORE”!
So you run off to your room with a big grin!

I think of my dad a lot, I feel blessed for the time I had with him even though I wish everyday I had had more time.
Unlike Kevin who’s dad passed away so suddenly from a heart attack in his sleep never really got the chance to spend any time with him or say goodbye.
I talk to dad almost as much as I talk to God, perhaps more.I haven’t kept up with reading the bible like I used to however God still comforts me in my darkest days.
It has really helps that I have a fantastic family who as much as they can drive me crazy I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Until next time

I must have written this entry of my blog a half a dozen times and ripped it apart about 100 times.
It’s been well over a year since my last posting which to be honest was never my intension whatsoever, but here we are a year and some months later.
If it hadn’t been for our pastor and dear friend, who reminded me of my love of writing and the healing power it gave me I would still be struggling and maybe eventually stop writing altogether.

2019 hasn’t been a very kind year to our family. Jayson was going through a terrible time in his last year of junior high dealing with kids not so kind and trying to work with his hairline anger issues proved to be a full-time job alone.
As a mom, my first thought is to go to the school and start kicking some ass believe me if I was a 13 year old boy you can bet that’s exactly what I would have done.However coming from a teenage boy’s point of view having your mom go to the school to kick ass doesn’t come across very well at all.
Even Grace was up against a mean girl when she was constantly paired up with her during school assignments because everyone refused to have their child work with her. I usually like to give a child the benefit of doubt when I first start to get to know a child, however as the years progressed and the older she got it became more and more difficult.
So the only thing I could do for Grace was to hear about her day and give her the best advise I could give her to empower her.
I made it my mission to be available for all her field trips in hopes to add this girl to my group to keep an eye on her as well as any group assignments they may have were done in our home.
As the school year came to a close and summer just around the corner, little did I know how much worse it was going to be.
in late June. our beloved dog Maddy had to be put down at 16 years old, for awhile her age was showing as her hips started giving her problems with arthritis and eventually it became difficult for her to climb the stairs without assistance.
The day we decided that she had had enough was really sad as she had had 3 Grand Mal seizures and it took her a long while to regain her balance to walk.
So that evening Kevin and I along with the kids took Maddy to the vet, said our goodbyes and laid her to rest.
She was a huge part of our lives and she has been missed dearly every day.
Not 2 weeks later I got a call that had changed my life.
For the past year or so my father was battling a persistent cough that we all assumed was a cold that just wouldn’t go away.
This past July my father went in for tests to determine what was going on, only to find out that there was a mass on his lung.
Further tests confirmed to be stage 4 lung cancer, unbeknownst to me my brother was going through a routine exam when a  cancerous mass was discovered in his kidney.
I felt like the air in my lungs had gone out of me as my father explained his and my brother’s diagnosis.
Words escaped me and I barely could comprehend what was going on as I tried to grasp the words my dad was saying.
As I got off the phone to my dad I was grateful that the kids were out at friends houses so that they didn’t see me break down.
I called Kevin at work,  the words however wouldn’t come except cancer, David and dad were able to come to mind.
I barely remember Kevin rushing home to be by my side, it was then that he held me in his arms and let me fall apart until I was able to pull myself together before the kids came home.
My mind was numb for a long  time after, between my father and brother’s diagnoses I couldn’t get home fast enough.
I booked a flight home so I could be there for my family when my brother went for surgery and father went for further tests in the first weeks of August, however I never made the flight.
Not two weeks before I were to fly out I had a freak accident resulting in me falling down a flight of stairs breaking my left arm.
I suppose you could say this was a blessing in disguise, as weird as that sounds under the circumstances.
First of all I could have very easily broken my right arm with it being my dominant hand and all and the kids could have taken off to friend’s houses leaving me alone in the house.
My first thoughts went to the kids, I wasn’t sure how Jayson would respond in a crisis situation considering how much he hated hospitals.
However he was amazing and took charge of the situation straight away,Kevin was notified, paramedics called and off to the hospital I went.
When I got to the hospital waiting in the hall, it hit me that I wouldn’t be able to make it to Kelowna.
I blew it, I was more upset that I was letting my family down over the fact that I broke my arm I just wanted to cry.
They say bad luck comes in threes, so I suppose you can say I took one for the team.
Kevin arrived after work (there was no point in leaving work in my opinion) as it took awhile for them to take me to x-ray and confirm that yes it was indeed broken.
I went home with a very loopy head from liquid gravol and a prescription for pain meds in my hand.
For the next couple weeks, flights were cancelled, credits were given and for the next 2 months I slept in a seating position which was surprisingly not too bad.
During this time I kept in contact with my family on the progress of my brother and dad’s health.
I was relieved to hear that my brother’s surgery was a success and the cancer was contained in his kidney.
For several months, my sister made the three hour drive every second week from Kelowna to Grand Forks in the meantime keeping me informed on any updates.
I was concerned about her and wanted to let her know that although we had a typical big sister/little sister relationship growing up I wanted to let her know that I was here for her.
I knew that she was going through a lot so I kept asking her “How are you doing”?
Eventually she was able to confine in me what she was feeling, I knew it wasn’t easy for her to do but I feel honoured that she felt comfortable telling me.
However I felt a sense of guilt being so far away, unable to do my share while my brother and sister took to helping our parents even though being realistic there really wasn’t much I could do considering it was mostly physical thing that needed to be done.
So being my sister’s support had to do for now. Christmas came and went and soon I made arrangements to fly out for a month, this took a lot of planning on mine and Kevin’s part and now that the kids were older I felt confident that things would work out.
Now don’t get me wrong we’re talking about a teen and preteen kids, so yeah there’s always concern.
While I was away Kevin and I kept in contact with each other every single day, even after I had made arrangements ahead of time for appointments and weather conditions I still worried that something would go wrong.
Although we had a couple hiccups things went relatively well, however I can’t see myself ever being away from my family for as long as I was again and wouldn’t want to be.
I arrived in Kelowna January 1 and spent the first week with my sister and brother in law before we made the trip out to Grand Forks, pick up our parents for their various doctor’s appointments and my mom’s upcoming eye surgery.
It was nice to spend that extra time alone with her before we jumped into everything that was going on ahead of us.
The next week we made the trip out to Grand Forks to see mom and dad, I had mentally prepared myself for the drastic change in dad’s appearance. I hadn’t seen my dad since the May long weekend seven months prior so when dad answered the door I was slightly surprised at how much the cancer had aged him. It was a two second reaction but to me he was the same old dad
A few days later we all went to the hospital, my sister taking mom for her eye appointment while I stayed with dad as he went for blood work.
We all met up again to talk with his doctor, for the result’s of dad’s latest tests that he had done the previous month.
The doctors were very pleased with the results and were very optimistic that he would be able to resume with chemotherapy the following week. Another bonus was that they had found that the tumour in his lung had shrunk 50% .
Everyone was ecstatic over this good news including his doctors, even though it had shrunk we knew that he wasn’t out of the woods and still considered terminal.
We were pretty happy that dad could resume his chemo treatments after having to stop due to complications the previous month, this was a win in our books.
A few days later, we made the three hour trip back to Grand Forks and waited for the hospital to call to set up treatment.
Chemo was scheduled for the following week, January 16 dad of course was ecstatic.
He named his tumour “the bastard” much to my mother’s dislike but it suited it perfectly and it was time to deal with it head on after so many delays.
My sister had gone back home after a few days, so it was just mom, dad and I at the house spending time together and getting dad whatever he needed.
I wanted to spend as much time as I could with dad perhaps make up for the time I had wasted in May. I will be the first one to admit that I’ve made so many bad choices for myself in the last few years but I was doing better, despite of making a public ass of myself in front of my family on that particularly long weekend.
I was looking forward to spending the day with dad at the hospital I wanted to spend that time just being by his side talking, maybe play a game or just read a book while he had a nap.
Unfortunately it was never meant to be, on January 15 2020 my father passed away.
Out of respect for my family I won’t go into detail of his passing, instead I will tell you that I had feelings of guilt, and helplessness knowing that if  I hadn’t been downstairs to give mom and dad privacy earlier that evening, maybe I could have been more of a help than I was.
Looking back I knew there wasn’t really much that I could do and the good thing was that mom wasn’t alone at the time however, I was not the daughter she wanted at that moment.
To clarify, my sister is the take charge type, and has always had the ability to know exactly what to say to our mom to calm her, much like our father however mom and I share the same type of personality and like most times I never know what to say.
Perhaps it’s why writing comes so naturally to me because I can express myself better with the written word.
My sister and brother in law arrived the following day as the roads were too bad to make the trip out the previous night.
The relief I felt to see them was overwhelming to say the least, she was here and would know what to do.
Over the next few days things started to move like a blur I was trying to find a way to help in anyway I could but didn’t know how to really fit in as my siblings who had known the routine of the house much more than I did so trying to do whatever I could wasn’t as easy as they made it look like.
I have always been the quiet and very much the awkward one in the family unfortunately even as an adult those tendencies never really go away.
Since moving to Edmonton 20 years ago I focused most of my energy on my marriage and my desire to start a family of our own, so I suppose I had disconnected somewhat from the rest of the family.

Until next time my story continues

Post Script 3 months later
During my time in Grand Forks there were many times where I had felt judged, trapped and attacked.
Everything from the way I raise my children to the choices I made for myself to even my disability which wasn’t a new thing for me. I had known growing up it was a sense of embarrassment to one family member whom I had tried for a very long time to get their approval.
It only took me 42 years to accept that I no longer wanted nor needed it and I’m ok with it.
As siblings we all have different memories on how we were raised overall it was a good childhood but there was a lot of pain along the way as well.

 We’ve all been there at one point or another, when that cute little person who stolen your heart when they were  a newborn up to the age of middle school (pushing the envelope at middle school).
I’m talking about that right of passage stage of teenage hormones.
Lets face it our parents were lucky to survive our own teen years the extra grey hairs on their head as we tested the boundaries they put in place for us, not to mention that annoying part where we knew it all and our parents had no clue what they were talking about because the thought of them being in their teens was a foreign concept to us.
It isn’t until we’ve had children of our own that we discover that our parents were right about a lot of things after all.
I have incorporated some tactics that my mother used on us when we were growing up one of them has been passed down from my mother, to sister and now to me.
How to get your teenager up in the mornings so they’re not late for school.
1. As you walk into their room turn the light on this will temporarily stun them
2. In your most annoying voice you can muster start singing the Good Morning Song
the more annoying you sound the better
3. If that doesn’t get a rise out of them rip the blankets off their bodies while continuing to sing, sometimes if you sound like an annoying cartoon character this usually gets a pillow thrown  at you and a reluctant roll out of bed just to get you to stop singing.

As my teen stumbles out of bed I have to guide him out the door as so he doesn’t slam into the wall on the way out after he leaves his room he’s on his own.
It’s like watching a little drunk stumping through the house after an all night bender it’s really quite funny to witness if you’re lucky to see it first hand.

Karma Thy Name Is Daughter 
My parents always told me that they hoped I have a child just like me when I grew up ….. well guess what it’s happened to me.
When I was younger, sometimes before I go to bed at night I’d casually mention to my mom that I needed a dozen or so cupcakes or some form of baked good for the next morning.
After my mother I imagined silently cursed our name she would spend the next several hours creating a masterpiece that wowed the class.
As my sister and I became parents my mother so smartly gave each of her children handed down recipes from our grandparents and some of her own.
There was one page dedicated to us in the form of emergency baked goods if our own darlings pull the same stunts we did.
Needless those recipes have come in handy for me along with a few of my own that I’ve added a few times in my life.
I’ve managed to come up with a couple batches of cake pops thanks to a little baking machine that will cook a dozen little balls of cake in a matter of minutes.
Over the years I’d see them at second-hand stores and have discovered that the more machines I bought the more cake pops I can produce in no time at all.
Last week however my daughter decided to up her game and decided one Sunday night to mention that she needed a purple dress for a school production the next morning.
Now mind you she’s known about this for a week but decided to tell her father and I at 6 pm when all that’s opened is your local Wal-Mart.
So like any good parent I run down to my local Wal-Mart in hopes to find a suitable purple dress for a dance routine.
Cursing to myself knowing full well that she had several dance costumes in her closet but not one of them was the desired purple.
You would think that a store like Wal-Mart would have something suitable however I have learned to keep my expectations low.
The funny thing as I arrived determined to get a dress, I noticed several other parents wandering around trying to find a specific item swell to no avail.
The girls dept was pretty much slim pickings as I hunted high and low as they were focused on the winter season ahead.
Finally after much debate I found something that would possibly work for her yet be suitable for other outings as well.
Needless she was happy with the choice I made and the performance went off without a hitch.

So until next time I bid you all a farewell

So many things have happened over the summer compared to last, first the neighbourhood drama queen no longer makes her presence known around our home anymore.
Theres been a sense of peace and calmness since I made it perfectly clear to her mom that it would be best if our kids didn’t play together considering it’s like the Wild West of all friendships and the toxic environment that developed over time.
As a parent I feel bad for this girl, as much as I tried to take her under my wing and give her all the chances in the world she still chose to be disrespectful, bitter, and angry towards the kids.

Brownies and Beyond
We said goodbye to our Sparks in May with a graduation cake for those that were moving up the ladder to Brownies.
The ceremony went off without a hitch and I was happy to end it on a positive note as it was my last year as a leader although I didn’t know it at the time.

 sleepover
For Grace’s 10th birthday we caved to her desire to have a sleepover with her friends.
What can I say we’re a glutton for punishment, after surviving two sleepover  with a bunch of boys how bad could a few girls be?
Well let me tell you ….. we were totally clueless.
The difference between a boy’s sleepover and a girl’s, the boys were content to play Nerf wars with each other until they got hungry then all I had to worry about is making sure I had enough food to feed the savage beasts.
Also stick a few horror movies their way and sooner or later they will fall asleep.
Girls are completely totally different, I supplied the girls with every type of craft I could think of including making their own special pillow cases for them to bring home with them after the party.
Even the goodie bags were sleep over themed thanks to the Dollar store.
I really thought that if we kept the girls busy and occupied they would fall asleep ……
boy was I wrong.
THEY DIDN’T SLEEP AT ALL
They weren’t too interested in watching movies at all even at 3 am they were wide awake and ready for action.
So at 4am they were outside jumping on the trampoline, needless I felt bad for our neighbour that had to get ready for work after Midnight.
So yes I know we’re a real glutton for punishment needless one child is more than enough for a sleepover.
The next day we ended up taking the girl’s home early and Grace slept for 8 hours after the party.

July

From July 1 to July 6th Jayson was in camp, the second to last day of camp I received a call from the camp asking permission to baptize Jayson.
I was thrilled and of course gave Jayson my full support.
Something happened to him while he was in camp that made him want to be baptized, despite the embarrassment he felt over my baptism I cried when I saw his video I was so very proud of him so much so cried tears of joy.
His whole attitude changed and he was much more calmer than he was last year not to mention he was more willing to help he without any arguments.
Throughout the months of both July and August we had a houseful of kids playing in the backyard, I felt like I was in Heaven the kids really had a great time.
Seeing all these kids in the backyard felt so good it truly brought me greatest joy there was nothing like it.

Class Reunion
I end the summer with this 
On August 17 I flew to Kelowna BC for my 30th Grad reunion.
I absolutely loved seeing all the classmates that showed up for the reunion, those that I felt intimidated in high school were absolutely sweet hearts and felt bad after I told them tat I was kinda freaked out about them 30 years ago.
Loved reconnecting with everyone and was especially excited to spend some much-needed time with my best friend in the whole wide world, she’s more like a sister to me than anything else.
The most shocking part of the evening was the amount of people who had passed away over the years, it made me  feel so sad inside especially the way they passed away I wish that there was something I could have done to help them.

Regardless I had a wonderful time, I was so happy to see everyone there having fun and catching up  with those that I haven’t seen in years.
Life has been good to them, I was happy to see that they were living  fulfilling lives and were relatively happy about their choices.
As I end this segment I am the most blessed person for all the people in my life I love each and every one of you.
Until next time I bid you farewell .

Mothers are not the nameless, faceless stereotypes who appear once a year on a greeting card with their virtues set to prose, but women who have been dealt a hand for life and play each card one at a time the best way they know how. No mother is all good or all bad, all laughing or all serious, all loving or all angry. Ambivalence rushes through their veins.

Erma Bombeck

May 4 2018 will forever be ingrained in my brain as that was the day my children met with their birth family for the first time in 10 years.
Some people would not understand why we would choose to do this and I don’t expect them to even try except that I had to give Jayson a sense of closer to his past.
Unless you have adopted an older child through trauma you can’t begin to really understand the choices some parents make and this was one of those times when others would think “Whoa” .
We were invited to a family conference to decide what would be in the best interest of bio’s child until or if she were able to take care of him on her own.
The agency involved thought it would be a good idea for us to take part even though we had never really met the little one we were simply there because the kids had a biological connection.
When I first told about what our plan was, people closest to us thought we had gone mad and frankly I can’t say I blame them.
But like I mentioned earlier I did this for pretty selfish reasons.
I never really had to worry about Grace’s reaction to seeing bio mom, she was only 9 months old when she was apprehended and had very little memory of her except for what I was able to tell her with the little information I had.
We were more concerned about Jay if seeing her would trigger old memories and in the back of my mind I had a plan to get him away to decompress if it got to be too much.
There were several kids joining the group not only our’s  but other bio family as well, it was pre arranged though that  during the most critical times the kids were to be taken out of the room.
Kevin and I sat on the sidelines observing everything that was going on.
The sad thing was that even after 11 years of trying to get the supports bio mom needed to keep her kids she was in an even worst situation than she was with little to no desire to change.
Don’t get me wrong she said all the right things to the social workers and other professionals there but I knew that it was a way for her to gain their sympathy.
For someone to be in this big of a funk for almost 12 years and offered many programs to make a better life for herself and for her children, I knew that her chances of cleaning up her act were slim to none.
As hard as this may sound I still have  compassion for her after all she gave birth to my children how could I not.
Shortly after lunch everyone started taking pictures of the 3 kids together with bio mom and then just of Jayson and Grace together.
There was one point that nearly killed me inside as Jayson put his head on her shoulder and a sense of peace and adoration came over him.
I had never seen that in Jayson and I felt uncertain, insecure and sheer sadness because he had never looked at me that way ever and even more surprising I had tears running down my cheeks.
I suppose it was because it took me off guard but it was really hard to watch that 5 seconds of affection that he showed.
I stepped into the lobby to pull myself together and remind myself that things were ok, he’s still my son and he still loved me, but that persistent little voice of doubt was still nattering in the back of my mind.
We gathered once again in the conference room after the kids were settled upstairs but nothing really got resolved as far as a plan for bio to commit to.
So I exchanged numbers with auntie so that she knew she could rely on me to give her any support she needed whether it was to talk about her day or any concerns she had about the whole process.

I have a soft spot for this family mostly for bio and auntie whom I want to keep an open communication with, the rest of the bio family we have no interest in forming any kind of relationship as there is still some unhealthy choices they are making.
Until next time I bid you goodbye

If there’s anything I’ve learned over years as first a foster parent and now an adoptive one, is that it helps to be a little crazy.
For several years now I’ve wanted to hunt down the kid’s birth mom or better yet had wished for an open adoption.
As Jayson gets older though the urgency of wanting to talk to her gets stronger, it’s weird I know but I have questions that only she can answer.
Perhaps I’m obsessed with wanting to know everything, but as a woman who has never birthed before maybe it’s not so crazy.
This meeting next month to discuss a plan for the baby is really getting to me.
I’m not backing out of course but knowing that “J” will be there alone with our children I needed to know what we were going to be walking into.
This is all so new and different for us I never thought I’d be going through a placement plan for a half sibling.
So as crazy as this sounds I agreed to meet “J” for lunch at a public venue after she initially made contact.
There was no awkwardness between us when we first met after all these years she was the same old “J” but due to her hard lifestyle she looked older than her 30 years.
It was sad, instead of feeling angry or indifferent my feelings were of protective and sympathy.
I had greeted her with a warm hug and told her how happy I was to see her after so many years.
I spoke about how well the kids were doing how Grace was in Dance, Sparks and Brownies for the past few years.
I told her about Jay’s love of soccer and how he enjoys being a part of our church’s youth group.
She spoke about the unfairness of the system itself, how was it that her sisters were able to keep their babies but hers were taken away.
As she is talking the whole concept of her actions and life choices are completely lost to her.
She feels like the world is against her and she spoke several times of wanting more children but understands that they too could be taken away.
I sat there listening to her talk about the injustice of the world watching as she fidgeted and squirmed in her seat unable to sit still.
I did let her know that Jayson has had a few medical issues and wanted to know if she could clarify some things that only she could answer.
One of the things I needed to know was if she drank, she did admit that know was if she drank while she was pregnant with him?
As I asked this I prayed she would put my mind at ease and not walk away from me, to my surprise she admitted to drinking heavily in the first 8 weeks of her pregnancy.
Because of this admission we are now able to get other supports for him for school.
We are still scheduled for Jay to get an MRI next month but my hope is that the test will confirm a fetal alcohol spectrum diagnoses.
Normally this would be a bad thing and no parent would want this for their child, however it would explain so much for us not to mention it would help to understand his tantrums and behaviours.
The visit was a successful one in my mind, because she was able to answer all my questions.
We parted ways knowing that the next time we see each other will be in a matter of weeks and her knowing that we  will be there as a support system for her if she chooses.
Now I can only imagine what you as the reader are thinking why in the world would we want to have anything to do with her after all these years?
The truth is that adoption has changed over the past 45 years from absolutely no contact of bio family to partial contact, each case is different but the end results are the same whatever is in the child’s best interest.
I don’t expect our family or friends to understand this because this is still new to us even after all these years.
I pray that the MRI will come back as a partial spectrum disorder so until next time

“And unto him a child is born”

I must have written and deleted this post at least a thousand times in my head over the past several months.
On the last week of January I received a call from the Dept of Children Services, this has been a call I’ve been waiting for nearly 9 years.
The case worker wanted to inform me that our children’s bio mom had given birth last year and he was now in care.
Despite the fact I had known about the baby for about a year due to my spying on her through Facebook, it still was a shock to hear about him.
My first instinct was YES of course we would take him even though it had been close to 10 years since we had a baby in the house, not to mention we were also 10 years younger.
Of course I always shoot first and ask questions later, a REALLY hard habit that I have, that has gotten me in hot water in the past and if it weren’t for my girl friends and husband to actually think about what I was getting into I’d be making the same mistakes over again.
Contrary to what you may think I don’t go into anything lightly, it has been almost 7 years since we were in the system and yet it feels like I never really left.
That phone call brought back all the excitement, fear and uncertainly when we were fostering not to mention the high I would get when ever the phone rang about a new placement.
It’s funny though, it wasn’t until a few days, weeks later that  suddenly I was reminded how the system works against the child per say and favours the natural parents no matter how many times they abuse the system.
As a foster parent this was so damn frustrating for me I felt completely helpless not being able to  advocate fully for the children that were under our care.
Even after being away from it for 7 years the system really hasn’t changed a lot, if any thing it’s gotten worse .
Going into the classes required of us we are made to believe that we are on the same team as the people who are responsible to protect them, but the truth is we aren’t.
Foster parents in the eyes of the dept are nothing but glorified babysitters who receive no respect from most case workers.
We have no say in a child’s care our natural instincts are questioned until we are left doubting our abilities to parent leaving me to think that I was going completely crazy.
I remember the case worker talking to me as these random thoughts swam in my brain, feeling completely gobsmacked and doing an excellent impression of Elmer Fudd.
At the time all I could think about is having a baby in the house and how fun it would be.
Fast forward a month the baby’s case worker gave me the name of his auntie/guardian a very nice woman whom I bonded with immediately.
She was so sweet and welcoming to any type of advice and support I offered her all I wanted to be was a support system for this family.
Unfortunately though within a matter of weeks the family, unable to meet his special needs was forced to hand him over to a new foster home.
This was not what they had wanted they were very willing to have baby be a part of their family but they did not know how to help him due to the lack of “training” or experience they needed to meet his needs.
It sucks, it really does the way some case workers build families hopes up by saying that all the child needs is to be loved, held and rocked at least this is what I was told last week when I received a call saying that they needed to move baby due to placement breakdown.
They were very willing to make the family look as bad as they could make.
However I was fortunate enough to have met the auntie and knew how heart-broken she felt along with her husband and that this was not an easy choice they made.
I had to admire this family. even despite the pain they were in they knew he needed more help than they could give.
What makes me feel angry is that case workers are willing to down play a child’s needs instead they will go straight to a person’s heart-strings not really giving you a full back ground of the child.
It was last Thursday that this same worker who I spoke to a month earlier reminded me that I was willing to be “plan B” if placement broke down.
She pulled every trick in the book to make me feel guilty for not backing down not to mention extremely offended when I suggested he be placed in a level 3 foster home  (a home equipped to deal with medically fragile babies and children).
The sad thing is I really had high hopes for bio mom I really wanted her to succeed  and clean up her act in hopes that maybe one day she could be a part our lives, common in adoptions today.
Unfortunately due to our age and our life plan we decided that “H” would not be a good fit for our family we just don’t have the energy required to have him full-time.
I knew that I could not be the mother I wanted to be to all 3 kids due to the chaos that was sure to follow.
It’s kind of selfish I suppose, but it seems like the older Jay gets more and more issues about his birth still keep popping up.
In the next month or two we will be meeting with specialists from bio family to ours to see the kind of supports we can give this little guy.
I don’t understand why our family needs to be involved but I suppose I’ll learn more in the weeks to come either way what harm could it do?
Inquire minds what to know until then see you next time with an update.

Since the beginning of the year I had written two blog entries only to cut them before I tried for a third attempt on this one.
It wasn’t because they weren’t any good there’s just so much going on in our life now that I wanted to keep some things on the down low.
As a parent of a 13-year-old boy and a soon to be 10-year-old girl there’s only so much you can do to protect your kids from the terrible world-wide web.
We’ve all been there with our own parents, but as a first time mother of a teen age boy we’ve now been regarded as  the uncool parents who do not know anything.
Unfortunately kids were born without a manual for parents to look through when things started getting sticky, because when raising a teen in this time and age it would come in super handy now.
Looking back to when the kids were babies it seemed so much simpler back then than it is now.
All we had to do was make sure they survived their toddler years without killing themselves.
Now we’re dealing with hormones, reckless choices, and the sheer desire of independence from the parents, not to mention as a parent you don’t want to screw up the kids to the point where they will need therapy for the rest of their natural adult lives.
Seriously, its hard being a parent with  all these temptations floating around.
I swore to myself that I would never be one of those “helicopter parents”, that’s just not who I am.
I am finding though that I have a hard time letting Jayson go and making his own “mistakes ” but I guess this is something I have to work on.
Something  I’ve learned about parenting over the years  is there is a lot of guess-work and faking it till you make it moments.
I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing 3/4 of the time so I look back to when I was a kid and imagine what my mom would do, or just go with the gut.
I can’t always be there for them and will have to sit by and watch them make mistakes no matter how much the control freak in me wants to jump in and rescue them.

If there was any issues I had about the foster care system was the amount of social workers we went through in the years we fostered.
We went through so many  in the span of 8 years that I have seriously lost count.
I guess you could say that I’m pretty leery where social workers are, just because our track record hasn’t been the greatest and have gotten some pretty questionable workers in the past.
Well the other day we received notice that after 6 years of having one of the best workers she was transferring our file on to another worker.
That old feeling of dread started to creep inside as I thought back to all of our support workers we’ve had in the past good and bad, it was awful.
I have to admit my imagination can get the best of me and so when things change suddenly I go into fight or flight mode, even after 6 1/2 years I still can’t handle any sudden changes quite the annoying quark I must admit.
Over the summer I made the choice to take some courses that are available to all adoptive parents, just to get some perspective on why I was having so many issues with Jay.
This weekend was the first out of the three classes I had signed up for, thinking I would get some sort of guidance or assurance, unfortunately the weekend was a total bust, at least I know that I’m not losing my mind and any doubts I had in my parenting were gone.
So after sitting in a classroom for 9 hours over the course of the weekend, getting nothing out of it while any questions I had were ignored or glossed over I did what anyone with kids did and faked a family emergency and walked out.
Funny thing is that even after walking out on the class I still got the credit.

The year is almost over, as I look back on the challenges 2017 has brought me it hasn’t beat me.
There’s a reason God sent me on this particular journey I don’t know why really but I do know it is part of his plan for me.
As I say goodbye to 2017,  I welcome 2018 with a sense of hope, joy and happiness and any challenges waiting for me.
Until next time

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone

I was surfing through Facebook when one of my school mates (who is the same age as me) announced that she will become a grandma in the new year.
To be honest at 48 years old I never really thought of myself to be in this stage of life, I still consider myself as young, my body however tells me different.
Maybe because we started later than my peers although I look back on my family such as my sister who had her first child at the age of 29, 22 years ago then her second at 31 it seemed to me like that’s the perfect time to start.
My parents grew up in a different time, at the ages of 18 and 19 years old they were already married with a child of their own on the way.
I know for myself, when I look back at that age I could not even fathom being married much less pregnant as I was extremely irresponsible and clueless.
I’ve worked with small children practically my whole adult life, like I was meant to follow this path even from a very young age I knew this was the case.
Perhaps this is why I never really thought about anything else except being inside my own personal little bubble.
Next year will be my 30th high school class reunion and yet it still hasn’t hit me, my children are still relatively young at 9 and 13 years old so I’m at the stage in my life where most of my class had been 10 or 15 years ago.
Not that I’m comparing myself to anyone, I love where I am in our life even despite the issues we’ve had with Jay my life is very fulfilling.
This is the path that God has chosen for me, I’ve known this for my whole life in a sense.
I’m looking forward to seeing what 2018 will bring us and say goodbye to a very difficult 2017