Category Archives: Lessons Learned

January 26, 2015

Looking Forward, Looking Back

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Last week Hope and I celebrated her placement with me one year ago.  I read other blogs in which I was cautioned to not expect her to want to celebrate what was a rough transition for us.  I started to let it ride, but then thought better of it.  I mentioned it.  She smiled.  Hope was surprised a year had passed already.

So, we did dinner at the fancy burger place nearby and settled in watching tv.  Nice low key and easy.  Maybe we’ll do something special to observe our finalization date, maybe, maybe not.

Adoption is tough.  Adoption of older kids who have lived a lifetime before meeting you is rough, tough and awesome.  It’s all awesome, really, somewhere in there, but make no mistake, it’s rough and it’s tough too.

Since the new year, I’ve been working on getting some of my parenting swagger back.  I’ve learned a lot this last year, but I have so much more to learn.  Parenting Hope is…sigh…well, I suppose it depends on the day.

We have come so far, but the tentacles of that previous life are always threatening to pull her back in and drag me with it.

I see the impact of neglect in how she engages me sometimes.  I see her easing in to this life with me evidenced by her low desire to care for herself in some ways; she wants me to take care of her, almost baby-like at times.  I see her joy in having a mom to talk girly stuff with.  I see the social struggles that come with a lower emotional age and her Saraha-like thirst for attention, accepting negative attention in lieu of positive reinforcement of more mature behaviors. I listen to her abuse disclosures, stuff that never made it into the files or were so epically understated that they could be characterized as nearly lies. I see developmental delays revealing themselves as her hard shell softens, and I try to figure out how to balance them with my own academic expectations. I work with her through lingering legal issues from her life before me; decisions that make me question all kinds of things I’ve said believed about the criminal justice system for all of my adult life.  I sometimes feel the effects of all the trauma just rolling off of her likes waves in an ocean.

Yeah, my therapist says it’s secondary trauma.  Nice…not really.  It sucks.

Sometimes all of the messy is so clear and evident; other times I’m just hanging on for dear life moving from one crisis to another.

I don’t cry so much now, but I do cry.  I fell out of praying for a few weeks not long ago; I just was tired, I was (am) still pissed about how my church treated us..  Didn’t really lose my way, but just really couldn’t say anything to the Holy Homeboy without being furious that the space I felt safe in was no longer safe.

As we mark a year together, it’s a strange time, trying to figure out what the future looks like.  Older child adoption is special; there’s something really, really different about showing up with a teenager who is taller than you when just last week you didn’t have one.  To some degree we are open about our story; sometimes less so.  Hope and I appreciate the ability and choice to just blend in and be mistaken for biological family.  We like to give each other knowing looks when it happens.

We’re considered a success story.  I’m not sure I know what that means or how I feel about it.  We constantly get requests to use our image on adoption awareness and promotional items.  On the one hand, it’s flattering, on the other hand, it makes me wonder if we will be able to maintain our ability to hide in plain sight.  We’re comfortable with disclosure now, but what about 6 months or more from now?

Aside from that, I don’t feel like a poster family.  We have struggled this year.  We’re still standing and we love one another, but success?  I guess.  We finalized…so there’s that.  We haven’t killed each other…so there’s that.  My vocal cords from the epic NY’s day meltdown seem to not have sustained permanent damage…so there’s that.

The parenting counselor from my agency told me recently that now that we’ve been together a year, ish is about to get really, real.  Dear Holy Homeboy help me.

I worry about my own attachment with my daughter.  I wonder (full of guilt just thinking it) if I made the right choices.  I ponder what my life would be like, now, 2 years in to this adoption journey if I had made different choices.  I wonder what new trauma will surface next week, and whether my mouth guard will survive the pressure when I am grinding my teeth trying to maintain my composure.

It’s crazy that it’s been a year already. I look forward to many more years, but that anticipation is mixed with some fear and anxiety probably from both of us.  This ain’t easy, but she is worth it.  We’re worth it.

10 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , | posted in Finalization Life, Lessons Learned

January 22, 2015

Big Fun

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Hope recently asked me, in her most exasperated, working on getting it perfect, teen tone: “Mom, ugh…..how did you ever get through being a teenager? It’s sooooooooo hard. It’s so confusing, all these emotions, I just can’t.”

I waited for her to throw herself to the floor and writhe around as that seemed to be the next logical step in this drama-filled confab we were having. She didn’t, and for that I am grateful.

“Yeah, sweetie, I dunno. It’s hard. I guess I muddled through…just like you will muddle through. No one gets a pass on the horror that is the teen years.”

Hope had just spent the last #ikidyounot 2+ hours telling me blow-by-blow about a conversation she had with her crush after school the previous day. You know that time that she left the after school program because the crush said it was ok, and that he could sneak her back into school, and no one would be the wiser, but that’s not what happened, and I found her on the side of the road freezing to death alone when I picked her up?

#recordscratch

#recordscratch

This kid is going to be the death of me. It’s a wonder I even saw her!

I didn’t even yell at her at the time; I couldn’t. I mean…I was so stunned that I found her on the ROADSIDE, with no damn coat on in 30 degree weather. I didn’t even ask her the whole story at the time. I was just so glad Hope was ok, and I was busy blasting the heat so that she didn’t continue to freeze to death ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD. #lawd #ranmypressureup

So yesterday we spent a relaxed evening with her telling me the whole story of how she ended up on the side of the road.

Honestly if it wasn’t so dang absurd and scary, it would be hysterical. The things we do for a crush…smh! As she spilled the tea, I found myself shaking my head.

oprah-smh-o

Hope would respond, “Yeah, mom, I know. It was dumb. I was really dumb.”

And I still couldn’t yell at her. Lord knows I wanted to raise hell, but I couldn’t because I started remembering the time my dad came to fetch me from a location where I KNEW I wasn’t supposed to be, doing something I KNEW was stupid. I remember the fresh hell I felt waiting for him to yell at me, waiting for the inevitable punishment, waiting to be in so much trouble. Oh I got in trouble. I remember losing my TV and being grounded for a long time, but I don’t remember a lot of yelling. I’ve probably just blocked it out, because I’m sure there was some yelling. But I remember the punishment, and more so, I remembered the self-conviction I felt because I knew I was in the wrong, so, so very wrong. I don’t even know if I really hung out with those kids, who I followed in my dumb moment of peer pressure, ever again. I remember the gravity of letting my parents down and just doing something so absurdly dumb and how it made me feel.

I could tell Hope was feeling pretty low. With every, “And then he said…. And then I said….and then we went so and so and then person X stopped to take a selfie…,” I knew how she felt about her shady shenanigans. I also kinda wanted to stab myself with a fork because the conversation pattern was annoying as all get out. #totally #literally

So, I decided to show her how I felt. As she was still prattling on, I pulled up a clip of Claire Huxtable GOING THE HELL OFF on Vanessa in the episode called The Night of the Wretched. I told Hope to hush and that this was what I was feeling right now, but that I would not yell at her. She could feel free to imagine Claire yelling at her for having Big Fun with her crush while wandering around the neighborhood two miles away from home.

She laughed and afterward said she got it. I took over the conversation by asking what I really wanted to know—specifically what happened (in 90 seconds or less) and how she now felt about her crush and his shenanigans.

I’m glad I could take some time to breathe, to remember how hard it is being Hope’s age, to remember what it was like getting caught doing stupid ish.  I’m glad that for once I could practice a little grace with her. I’m glad that she can talk to me and tell me what’s going on, even if it takes forever to tell the story. I’m glad we are learning not to blow up.

I’m counting this as my first parenting win for 2015.

5 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Lessons Learned, Teen parenting

December 14, 2014

Parenting Trials

By AdoptiveBlackMom

I haven’t been in much of a writing mood lately, which is admittedly odd for me.  I’ve had a lot on my mind and heart but really, no desire to try to put words around it.  As the year draws to a close I find myself in my usual reflective cocoon, trying to make sense of the last year and creating a vision for the next.  I looked up today and realized that December is nearly half over and wondered if I could muster the umph to initiate my annual yoga challenge.  I usually challenge myself to 30 days of yoga, even if it’s just one piss-anne posture.  It stretches me out, usually makes my body more comfortable and at times more shapely, but finally and most importantly the challenge gives me dedicated time to just sit with memories and emotions, hopes and dreams, the messy and unmessy.

Last weekend, ComplicatedMelodi’s Mimi and I hosted our Add Water and Stir podcast and discussed parenting foibles: the good, the challenging and the ugly. Parenting taboos and challenges have been floating around in my mind ever since. I’m coming to grips with a couple of the reasons why there are so many parenting taboos.

Parent shaming is so dang real.

So a funny thing happened while I was out before dawn this week getting a script filled for Hope.  The pharmacist judged me for having my kid on a certain medication.

“You clearly haven’t done your research or you wouldn’t have your daughter on this medication.”

My foggy brain tried to pull it together. “Huh?”

“You could and should be controlling things with diet and exercise.”

“Um, not at 6:15am.  I’mma need you to back up on over to that counter and count out those pills and put them in that orange container, m’kay?”

Gosh, I felt like I’d gotten judged all over the waiting area of my local CVS. My ability to make decisions about my daughter’s medical care and well being  was openly questioned at the drop off counter, and I felt pretty put off by the whole exchange. The pharmacist didn’t try to educate me, she tried to shame me for making what she believed was a poor parenting decision.  Nice.

No wonder we are limited in how we talk about how we parent and the tough decisions we make for our kids.  If the pharmacist will judge my decisions, so will Jane Doe.

Everything my kid does reflects on me and my parenting skills.

While reading a great blog (My Perfect Breakdown) this week; MPB was discussing her struggle in deciding whether to be open to transracial matches.  It was a great post, check it out. As with many things the dirt is in the details, or rather the comment section; one commenter noted that as long as your child doesn’t grow up to be a criminal then you really needn’t worry about racial profiling or excessive force, especially if you’re in the “midwest.”

Girl bye. #bloop

That comment lit me up, because the subtext is so heavy–”Those parents raised a criminal and he got what he deserved.  His parents should have done better.” And let’s not forget “those crazy liberal, east and west coasters!”

Awesome.  And folks wonder why I worry about the well-being of my beautiful brown child.  She’s got a sharp tongue and a not so quiet loathing of law enforcement because of her early life experiences with them, and I wonder at what point will she get what she deserves?

I grew up in a nice working class neighborhood.  Kids played in the street and couldn’t ride their bikes around the block until they hit double digits.  Families went to church, celebrated together, cooked out together with Kool and the Gang and Sister Sledge playing in the background.  I slept over at friends’ houses.  My parents were considered strict, and at times it felt like they were very strict.  Other times not so much. It was a nice, wholesome experience. We had good people on our block, and I look forward to greeting them whenever I go home to visit.

And for our most immediate neighbors, 8 houses or so, my generation of kids grew up to be nurses, international attorneys, educators, engineers, members of the armed services, law enforcement and members of the clergy.  In the same homes, some of my cohort grew up to suffer from substance abuse, to deal drugs, to rob banks and to murder.

These folks all had siblings who did well, in the same home with the same parents.  It troubles me that those parents might be judged exclusively on the kids who grew up to make a mess of their adult lives, rather than the ones who excelled.  But because we are indoctrinated to believe we are responsible for our kids (even as adults), as opposed to our kids and that they are a complete reflection of our child rearing, the pressure we apply to ourselves not to eff up is crushing. And the truth is that often we don’t mess up, but our kids may very well mess up somewhere down the line.

If only child rearing, and child rearing while black, were so simple as to just not raise a criminal.

Chile, please exit stage left with that foolishness.

External judgment doesn’t hold a candle to the internal machinations of trying to figure out what the hell you’re doing on any given day. I have come to the conclusion that I’m, without question or competition, my own worst critic. I second guess ohhhh about 80% of my parenting decisions, maybe less, maybe more.  I usually ride them out, but I am tossing and turning over them at night.

Calling out for a lifeline?  Naw, much too embarrassing.  Some well-meaning folks in my life have said some really messy stuff about my knowledge about kids and my parenting so basically my therapist is the only one who gets the full download.

But I do suck in all that negative energy; add a bunch of my own lack of confidence and just backstroke my way through the day of figuring out how to raise a kid, a kid who has some issues.  It’s foolishness really.  All of it is just a bunch of foolishness. And it’s hard to remember that when you’re just trying to cope with the hard stuff.

I’m now far more careful about passing judgment on Hope’s first parents and their failings.  I have no idea what brought them to the places they’ve gone in their lives.  I can only imagine that in the midst of whatever it was they went through, they were probably dragging themselves down because it feels like it could be impossible to be successful. I can’t say I know the depths of that pain, but I’ve learned my own pains and fears in parenting this year.  And some days it feels really awful.

So how are you supposed to have a reasonable confidence level, especially when you feel shamed and judged and some of that is internally driven?

I swear I wonder how some parents get up in the morning.  I guess some just don’t.  And we don’t talk about much of this at all do we?  The shame of experiencing some kind of “I have no effing idea what I’m doing so I’ll just keep it to myself” drives the quiet.  But it’s there.  At least for me it is.

So as I muddle through one of my own personal challenging seasons, I guess I’m also looking at ways of considering self-care differently.  More positive self-speak, more moments of quiet.  More exercise, some yoga, better food, more positive self-speak.  More tuning out parent shaming, more tuning out twisted concepts that everything Hope does reflects on me.  More effort in reconciling that what I think will be Hope’s long term best, may not what she ends up doing.  More effort to just guiding her to be a self-directed, well-adjusted young woman.

And more effort just trying to build confidence in my own parenting skills, however fledgling they may be.

11 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned

November 9, 2014

Lessons in Karaoke

By AdoptiveBlackMom

This week seemed to go on forever and a busy weekend makes it all feel ever more run together as Hope and I start another week of this life together. I can’t believe it’s been almost a year since her first visit, and here we are planning a Thanksgiving meal, Christmas and some winter break shenanigans. The beginning of the week I was a witch on wheels. I’m almost ashamed of some of my parenting; I was crabby and Hope found my last nerve and jumped on it like it was a trampoline. Oy!

But we got through it and we’re better for it. The sun always comes up; sometimes we really need to work on remembering that. As usual, I learned stuff.

There are parenting moments that really teach you things you never forget. When I was in sixth grade I decided to really flex and cut up. I got my first detention (and a couple more for extra credit in wacky teen years). I wrote more sentences about how I wasn’t going to talk inappropriately in school. I went places I wasn’t supposed to go (and got caught). I learned to cuss in royal fashion. And I had to sit with my desk facing the wall between two file cabinets in Mr. Smith’s history class on a few occasions.  Oh my parents were so over my drama.

During a parent-teacher conference Mr. Smith, well into his 60s at the time, told my dad that it was all really age appropriate, that it wasn’t so bad and that he really just needed to give me space to grow and mature a bit. My dad often tells this story about how a parenting light bulb went on for him that day.

In fact, he told that story (without revealing it was me cutting up) today while he was teaching Sunday school. He didn’t know I was sitting in the back of the church listening. I whispered to Hope that Grandpa was, in fact, talking about me. She needed to know that I acted a fool in my day, and I needed to marinate on Mr. Smith’s words to my dad in my own situation.

I have no idea if Smitty is still here with us, but that was good word. My dad commented to me later, “You know it meant a lot to me, you’ve had a LOT of teachers since then and his name was the only one I remember.”

Smitty gave good word, and I’m glad that Grandpa shares it. It’s a good lesson for me all these years later.

Sometimes you just have to drive and pay. Hope likes to wear her hair in kinky twists. I haven’t worn braids/twists since I was in college and I had someone on campus do it, so I honestly no little about getting my hair braided/twisted. The place that I’ve been getting her hair done is nearly an hour away—absurd in an urban area like DC with a braid gallery every few blocks—and it’s kinda pricey. So I got a great recommendation for a place much closer with a a better rate.

Awesome.

Except it wasn’t.

Six plus hours, lots of cell phone breaks, a lunch break and random putzing and futzing, and Hope and I were ready to just go run in traffic to get out of there. The mini-shop was in a barbershop (at least there was an endless stream of “yes we objectified them, don’t judge us” eye candy strolling about). But, with all of the menfolk around, there was no way I was leaving to even go get a street hot dog, so we were growing hungry (as opposed to hungry) and exhausted.

After dinner at a gourmet burger joint, I was in my pjs before 8pm.

We will drive the hour, pay more and be happy, comfy and home in less than 6 hours. #lessonlearned

Bougie lessons have started in earnest. If you listen to the Add Water podcast you’ll know that Mimi and I talked about raising our kids in this middle class life and what that meant for us and for our kids. Hope has had tons of new experiences over the last 10 months, but I’m finding that the types of experiences are changing. Some are subtle; some are more dramatic. This week I took Hope to afternoon tea at a local tea house.

PhotoGrid_1415592046706 We’ll work up to the fancy tea that is offered at some of my favorite hotels in the area, but this tea house offered the perfect setting for what ended up being a real lesson in bougieness. Finger sandwiches, truffles, scones and jam—it was all there and Hope tried just about everything even if she was apprehensive at first. I’m proud of her for trying things. I don’t know how bougie I expect her to be or to become, but I want her to have experiences to look back on, to draw on and to talk about as she progresses in life. Today we talked about skiing over the winter break and do Black folks even ski?

Um, of course we do. Duh!

Karaoke is going to change our life. By Friday of this week I had recovered from carrying a broom the early part of the week, which was an achievement worthy of note on its own merits. Friday night while searching for something to watch on On Demand we stumbled upon Cox Cable’s Karaoke channel.

O. M. G!!!!!!

If you’re a Cox subscriber, it’s under On Demand, Freezone, Music.

Hot. Damn!!!!

We giggled as we searched through the offerings, but then I found that the channel had Cameo’s Candy, and I lost my damn mind.

MFSBgifdraft-new

Yassss, boo, yassss!

I had my own solo, Soul Train line. I was so hype. I wopped, prepped, snaked and robotted for 5 straight minutes to Hope’s delight and horror.

Listen, I was getting it. Do you hear me???

Getting it. Candy gave me all of my life and some of yours too. We will be adding Karaoke to our regular routine. There’s some Macklemore songs on there that I need to seriously breakdown for Hope this week.

Best part? The radio went on to blast the Cameo throwback 4 times today, and I was JAMMING like my life depended on it.  Jamming while driving. Chair dancing and errrrthang!

It gave Hope and I something fun to do and bond over. The music mix is good, and it really is mad fun.

So that’s my word for the week. I’m planning on sharing more of my own musings about National Adoption Awareness Month this week, and what it means to me now that I have my darling Hope.

Leave a comment | posted in Finalization Life, Lessons Learned

November 5, 2014

Adoption Awareness Month Musings

By AdoptiveBlackMom

About a year ago, during National Adoption Awareness Month 2013, I announced to the world that I was adopting Hope. We were already matched. I had been out to visit her, and I was anticipating her nearly two week visit later in the month. All things pointed to an imminent placement with the goal of eventually finalizing.

I was excited, elated, high off of joy. I was going to be a mom! I knew it would be challenging, but I thought hey, I can do this and I want the world to know.

To quote Lauryn Hill, “It was all so simple then…”

A year later, my daughter Hope has now been with me for 10 months, and we finalized our adoption 6 months ago.

And we have been through some ish.

A lot of I’ve written about or rather through, and a lot I haven’t written about at all. Some of it seems…unspeakable, and in those moments I felt as broken and as alone as I ever have and probably as much as Hope felt at the time.

Along the way, I’ve found a cool community of fellow adopters. Day to day support has been…tricky at times, but truthfully, even if I didn’t feel like it, someone was there. It wasn’t always the person I wanted, but someone was there.

I got some things right, but I’ve made colossal mistakes. I’ve triumphed. I’ve failed. I’ve cared, been accused of caring too much and have not cared so much as to give one more damn at times over the last year.
I’ve experienced so many emotions that I’m convinced I created some new ones along the way. I’ve experienced sadness and anger the most, to be honest. Happiness is something I often have to deliberately pursue because that emotion hasn’t taken up permanent residence here yet.

In all, it’s been some radical highs and some spirit crushing lows.

And if I’m really, really honest, I am not sure I would do it again. Oh, gosh I love my daughter fiercely—and she is MY daughter– but I would be lying if I didn’t admit I was still mourning the life I had or that the challenges of the year haven’t worn me down in multiple ways that give me pause about everything.

No regrets, just curious about what my alternative life would be like now (it’s nice to fantasize) and wondering what could I have possibly done to have been better prepared or to have done a better job along the way.

So there’s my broad stroke recap of the last year as I reflect on “adoption awareness.”

These awareness months can be odd things, you know? We celebrate different peoples, histories and cultures; we commemorate things, pledge to fight diseases by raising research money and walking and running various distances. We raise awareness about all sorts of stuff, including adoption.

Ok, so be “aware” of adoption this month. #yepstillasmartypants

I’ve been reading a lot of adoptee blogs lately.

Sometimes they make me feel absurdly self-absorbed in my thinking and writing about my trials on this journey. But then I remember this is a blog about my journey in my own voice, so there’s that.

That said, I’m learning from the blogs of adoptees that there is this clear call for voice, for agency over self, over their adoption narrative and about all the bits and pieces that make for unique experiences with uniquely framed challenges. And as I read these blogs, I wonder about Hope’s experiences—not just from the last year—but from her life. Naturally I think about these things a lot, but as I learn more I maybe see this journey much differently than I did before.

In the midst of my own joy in coming to motherhood, there sits such huge amounts of loss that at times it can be breathtaking.

I can’t enumerate all that Hope has lost, but in my nearly 42 years, I haven’t experienced a fraction of that kind of loss. And despite all this “adoption awareness” I must remind myself of that nearly hourly. When she is acting like a real pill, and it is a mixture of being 13 (plainly hell on earth) and having experienced so much in her few years, I have got to remember the role the latter really plays in the behaviors that push me to the brink. I don’t all ways do a good job of this; to be honest, I feel like I largely suck at it. This home probably isn’t as healing as it should be at times. And I imagine that it’s because I fail to be “adoption aware” in the moment.

”Adoption awareness” is largely narrated by adoptive parents. I didn’t appreciate that a year ago. But now, as I see new adoptive parents praying that God gets the birth mother to stop considering to parent her child so that they, the adoptive parents, get to keep their child, I get the pervasiveness of that framework. I see both sides of the story now, thanks to the voices of adoptees.

I hear it now as I went to the altar this weekend for prayer for me and Hope as the person praying to me said that my little family was predestined by God and isn’t it wonderful how things worked out. Well, yeah, it is, but really did Hope have to suffer for me to parent her? So, her loss was predestined. I struggle with that, even as I know how many times the Holy Homeboy has demonstrated his power in the midst of tragedy; I radically question the why must Hope suffer, even today as irritating middle schoolers tease her about even needing to be adopted and as we navigate integrating our lives together.

Adoption is rarely neat and tidy. Gosh we need more complicated people to jump into these complicated situations. But we also need to keep an ear to the ground and be ever mindful about how our children see themselves in the journey, how they reflect on the journey and how they narrate their own journey.

My journey is forever linked to Hope’s and this blog is about my story, not hers. It is just one side of the adoption story. I look forward to years from now, having tea (or something stronger) on a wraparound porch (my architectural fantasy) hearing her talk about her journey. If I really try hard to pay attention now, I won’t be as shocked by the emotions that come tumbling out then as I seem to be now.

So that’s my early month two cents, musings on National Adoption Awareness Month.

1 Comment   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned

October 26, 2014

Growth Spurts

By AdoptiveBlackMom

This has been a challenging month for me and Hope; as the month comes to a close I realize that it’s been growing pains. The joints that hold us together have undergone a really rapid period of growth that has stressed us and made us both step up in areas and let go in others. So time for the new lessons.

_____________

Hope is not the kid she was a month ago, and that’s kinda cool. My going away on business travel was tough on us this month, but Hope seems to have dealt with it well. She’s more self-assured and modestly ( and I mean a smidge!) more responsible than a month ago. In a pinch she can really step up. I’m proud that we discovered this, even if she still wants me to baby her quite a bit when we get home.

Grief continues to cloak our home. It’s tough sometimes, but we’re making progress. Having some meaningful items from her family has made her ability to just openly grieve easier. The loss of the Furry One has affected both of us deeply, but she’s now in an environment where it’s ok to show emotion and it’s ok to just work through the grief. Even though there is a sadness here, it’s healthy. We sit with it as we work through it. I miss my dog. She misses her dad. We miss them every single day and missing hasn’t necessarily gotten easier, but our ability to cope has. I would never admit it to her, but I’m about thisclose to running to the shelter and getting us another dog. I miss the nails clicking on the hardwood floors.

This church thing cuts deep. There have been times when I really rejected going to church. Just all out rejected it. I was raised in church, come from a long line of religious leaders. But organized religion drives me up the dang wall. I hate the preening and posturing. I did and do get down with some liberation theology. I reject the prosperity stuff. I just want to do good, be good and show up at the gates and be proud of the life I’ve lived. We can believe in lots of things, and I do. Christianity isn’t an exclusive path for me; it is what I identify as, but I would say my theology is more complex. My current church has been fertile ground for me, though. It’s been a good fit and Hope has taken to it better than I could’ve dreamed. I love that she loves going, that if we miss a couple of weeks she’s asking to go. I love that she wanted to go to the women’s only service that we have once a month. I love that we talk about faith and that I can see the wheels in her head turning about faith and salvation. It’s good stuff.

What’s not good stuff? Listening to the announcements about baby dedication next week this morning (and jokes about whether dinosaurs dedicated their babies—I wanted to scream “or adoptive parents of older kids?” In fact it made me cry, right there, in the middle of service. I couldn’t go to altar call today; I normally go to pray for me and Hope, but after nearly a year of going faithfully nearly every service since I started this process, I couldn’t make myself go up to pray for us. I felt so invisible, so unwelcome to do it publicly.

I am convinced that there is still a greater message in this for me. I’m wrestling with trying to learn it. There is a divine reason for enduring the rejection in a space that my kid is thriving and where I am now miserable. I have no idea what that reason is or how long it will take me to uncover it, but I believe there is a reason.

Hope’s faith gives me hope. So we met friends for lunch after church today and when we get in the car we channel surfed to find some appropriate post-church music. Well after a few rumpshaker channels, I ended up plugging in my phone and bumping my favorite mix of gospel. Hope loves this mix and she sings along. Today she mentioned that when she changed foster homes the last couple of years she sang one song in particular: Fred Hammond’s We’re Blessed. Oh, getchu some here!

Yesssss! #ilive

For reals, how can you NOT have some hope after that? #anointed

Now I have to admit that this is one of my favorite faith hype songs. But really, how profound is it for a foster kid to sing this when whenever she moves to a new home? Even if she wasn’t really sure why she was singing what she was singing…wow, what a testimony about how the Holy Homeboy steps in? She continues to stun me with depth.

Of course some of the depth is countered by the swirly teendom, but still.

I love my little conundrum of a kid.

We are blessed indeed.  At the end of the day, the church thing doesn’t matter.

Late in the midnight hour, the Holy Homeboy is going to turn it around.

Maybe I’m doing ok in this parenting thing. I posted an article on my ABM FB page today (have you liked it?) about regrets parents have. Oh gosh, I have so many regrets over stupid things I do on the daily. But I think I might be doing ok. I was listening to Hope describe me and some of my behaviors to a friend today. I cracked up because she has me so pegged. Now sometimes it might seem like I’m riding a broom around this house, but I love my kid with a fierceness I didn’t know was possible. I try to make her happy and safe. I give her lots of structure and she’s thriving. Whatever dumb ish she does, she does because she’s 13 and 13 year olds do incredibly dumb ish.

I think I might survive this, and I think she might too.

_____________

Keeping track of this stuff helps me to just not get so bogged down all the time. The reflection is helpful; there’s so much I want for us and for Hope, specifically. I’m sure I could be doing better, but I think we’re going to be ok.

We’re blessed.

2 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Finalization Life, Lessons Learned

October 25, 2014

Radio Silence

By AdoptiveBlackMom

silence

It’s been more than three weeks since I last heard a peep from my church on my request to publicly dedicate Hope. I mean nothing. Not a quick email, phone call, nothing.

The last email I got thanked me for letting them know that National Adoption Awareness Month was coming up and they are praying for me and Hope.

The silence is actually deafening. It hurts my ears and my heart.  I wish the Holy Homeboy had built me for patience, but I discovered many years ago that he simply did not wire me that way.

Sigh.

I finally sent an email withdrawing my request. I’m sure that somewhere the Holy Homeboy is disappointed in all of us, but I couldn’t take anymore, so I just pulled back. I’m strong, but this was the place where I drew strength. and it all dried up.

You can’t be strong if you’re thirsty. #ABMism

Each day the silence and the rejection it implied became more painful; each day it revealed to me how we were viewed by our church—as some kind of anomaly. Each day it told me that we don’t fit, even if on the surface it looks like we do. Each day it affirmed to me about how our church’s mission maybe didn’t really mean me and Hope should be there. Each day it just took something from me…it actually stole a part of my heart from me, right after it stomped on it.

Or in this case it's better than no response at all.

Or in this case it’s better than no response at all.

I am protective of Hope. I know I will have to tell her that this isn’t happening. I think I’ll wait until she asks though. She will, and I will deal with it then. I don’t think she needs to know the truth. She’s lost so much already. I can’t bear the thought of losing a church too. We’ll probably still worship there for a while; she enjoys it so very much. But I don’t see myself there anymore. The thought of going just feels…empty.

I hope that I will forgive as the Holy Homeboy does. And that I will find some grace to cope; adoption requires so grace and some days I don’t feel built for that either.

10 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned

October 16, 2014

The Package

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Since June, I’ve been wrestling with the emergence of Hope’s biological extended family finding us. The irony of their emergence is that I had initiated my own search of them a mere six weeks before. I was curious about them. Hope had memories, both good and bad about some of the folks in her family. I wanted to know about them; I wanted to know where to find them if Hope wanted to reach out to them. I wanted to have some control over when and how the connection was made. And then the first day of our celebratory vacation, I got the Facebook inbox message.

I remember immediately feeling threatened—What did they want? Even though we were “legal” would they try to take her from me? Would Hope choose them over me?  Would she run to them if she got pissed off at me? Was blood going to trump me? How did they find us? I had given Hope a pseudonym on social media and our privacy settings were pretty high.   I remember feeling so panicked and so very threatened. I didn’t want to lose the kid that I had just put on lock, so to speak.

It has taken some time to navigate advancements in this relationship. I insisted that they go through me for contact. I asked questions on her behalf. I sent pictures and very modest updates. I got royally frustrated, no pissed really, when it was clear that some family members had higher expectations about my engagement with them.  It has also been rough because people who have hurt her seem to have selective memory about their relationship with Hope.

Of course this has been emotional for my sweet girl too. The first few mementos they sent triggered anger, sorrow and so, so much grief. But this time has also represented so many breakthroughs. Hope is busy constructing an identity that includes two last names (She kept her birth surname and just added mine—it’s long, but it works!); she now has some items that are priceless to her; she has begun to make peace with a lot of her grief. We’ve developed a few new rituals to commemorate key dates in her life before me, thanks to the emergence of her family. It hasn’t been easy and Lord knows I’ve griped, but being found has not been a bad thing.  It’s been a hell of a challenge, but it is not a bad thing.

Recently, Hope’s paternal grandmother sent her a package. I’ve been on the road so much recently that I just picked it up this week. The package included some cards, poems, some of her granny’s arts and crafts (there’s an apron for the liquid dish detergent bottle <quizzical grin>), and most importantly, Hope’s father’s American flag.

I pre-open things, and even though I knew it was in the box it was a shock to see it, lovingly wrapped in plastic, preserved for when they found Hope. The cards were addressed to my daughter using her full name, her new name, my surname.

Seeing her name and the small simple thank you card they included for me changed everything.

They acknowledged that I was her mother. There is no threat; Hope just has a really big family. I cried more than Hope did.

Hope went through everything in the box; I continue to see her grow and thrive. I’m so proud of her. These developments are so important to her.

We’ll be integrating these arts and crafts into our home; they are special to both of us. (There are bar soap cozies too. I imagine that there’s a plastic slipcover somewhere to be seen in my future; my spidey sense tells me so.)

We will be moving to phone calls soon and a visit eventually; Hope’s family is a reasonable drive away. All in good time.

This journey continues to teach me so much.

1 Comment   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , | posted in An Expanded Family, Dealing with the Past, Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned

October 6, 2014

Lessons from the Road

By AdoptiveBlackMom

It seems we’ve turned a corner in Casa d’ABM. I am on my second business trip and a third is right around the corner. I’m tired and probably a bit irritable. My forced absence from my home for work has resulted in Hope really stepping up. She’s doing laundry and really hanging in there. I expect that she might go off the rails before it’s all over, but so far so good. I’m proud of her; I know that it’s all a challenge. It’s a challenge for both of us. We’ve got great help and we’ll make it through. This change in routine has resulted in some new lessons for me. Yeah, always learning; always reflecting.

­­­­­­___

This teenage girl thing is a hot, flakey, buttered mess.  I’m so glad that Hope talks to me, and I’m trying to keep my mouth shut at key moments so that she will keep talking. I wish that I could make things easier for her, but what with hormones, talk of anorexic lunch mates, school fundraisers and bullies… it’s all a bit much. Some people have said I jumped into the deep end of the pool; some days I feel like I jumped off a cruise ship into the ocean.   But for now, she tells me things. I watch her watch me for even the most subtle facial expression as she decides what and how much to tell me. I watch her retreat into her room when things just get too much. Hours go by. She’s ok, but she just needs time. I watch her start to fret about her outfits; she’s evolving from a jeans and tee girl. The rough edges are smoothing ever so slightly. Hope is growing.

All this growth has resurfaced some old behaviors. Old habits die hard. Early on, Hope and I struggled with the lingering impact of her being put in caretaker roles. There were days when this kid thought she was all the way grown. #nomaam #haveseveralseats It was challenging to get her to trust that I was the sole adult in this relationship and that I took care of everything. At some point the pendulum swung all the way to the other end of the continuum with me engaging her with very childlike things. She was very much baby-like for some weeks there.

And now we’re back to trying to be grown. Lawd, this child. There are moments when I really just feel like saying, “Sit your $5 behind down before I make change!” Right now we are really struggling with some of her assessments about the adults in her life, particularly teachers. She fancies herself an educational expert and is quick to conclude that a teacher is not appropriately deploying the curriculum. #eyeroll It is a tedious process of Q&A to help her question her conclusions, focus on the learning, and considering what she might do differently to elicit a different, more positive response from folks. In the end, it’s always about whether she feels like she can trust the adult to take care of whatever it is that needs to be taken care of. We seem to be in a season when she isn’t as trustful. A lot has happened already this school year, and I know it’s resulted in some of this setback. It’s tough.

Adoption conversations occur all the dang time, and they require so much energy. Yesterday it was a question about why we call animal mutts and what that says about their parentage and hers (is she a mutt?). A few days before it was a chat about how to see her biological grandmother and an aunt without the rest of the family knowing she doesn’t want to see them. Days before that it was a desire to see her original birth certificate, then a conversation about her thoughts on ever seeing/talking to her biological mother. Then there was the confab last week about the upcoming holiday season and establishing traditions that are mindful of broken traditions before, of pleasant and horrible holiday memories, of how completely overwhelming it is to start over again.

Then there’s the movies (last week The Amazing Spiderman), the TV show (Grey’s Anatomy) and on and on. Sometimes I feel like I’m just always waiting for a shoe to drop on an adoption topic. Some days they spark lots of conversation; other days there is no noticeable impact, but I know it’s lurking.

I’m not afraid of these conversations. She is committed to establishing herself in this family, but she’s also trying to figure out who she is and how to reconcile it all. It’s a lot for 13, especially when 13 is already so messy.

And speaking of messy, we are going to work to expand the family connections. Hope has concluded that she wants to try to broker a relationship with two family members. Of course, it’s the ones who seem to respect boundaries. This is cool, though it’s all so very emotional. It means I have to work hard to manage my own assessments and learned experiences of the last few months in relating to members of the family. I am struggling to figure out how to protect her from the other family members who don’t respect established boundaries and who she is very adamant about not seeing, hearing from or having any contact with at all.   I’m learning a lot more from fellow blogger, Mimi (www.ComplicatedMelodi.com), on how to be empathetic towards Hope’s biological family. It’s tough though when my experiences haven’t been great and when her experiences haven’t been great and her expectations have been dashed before. Oy.

High expectations hurt people over and over and over. This journey changes you. It changes the people around you. It brings out the best in people. It brings out the worst in people.

There are always so many expectations, and they are so very high. Your own expectations are the worse. You are your own worst critic; especially when you are wrestling with some rough stuff going on at home. The expectations just never seem to let up whether they are internal or external. And there’s no way to meet all those expectations.

I find myself sometimes feeling furious and exasperated by all the expectations and my subsequent failure when I don’t live up to them. I don’t have too many confidants who aren’t other adoptive parents; sometimes other people just don’t understand. I found myself confronted by outrageous expectations this week. I was furious; I was hurt and I just wanted to lash out. And I did to some degree. I know I can’t do it all or the way other people want me to. I can’t live up to it all. I don’t even want to. But it hurts like hell when all you want to do is what’s best for your kid and folks muddy the waters with unreasonable expectations about ish they know little about.

Hell, it’s bad enough when I muddy my own waters. Everyone, including me, just needs to take a chill pill.

Technology is providing a great assist in this parenting thing. Hope is shady. Of course she’s shady, she’s developed extraordinary survival skills during her 13 years, and well, she’s 13, she is wired to be somewhat shady at this stage. I try to stay at least one step ahead of her and technology helps me do it. I use various apps to manage her online experience. I block pages, I monitor how much time she’s allowed to have online. Some of my faves are Screen Time (only $2.99 a month) and Blocksi (free), which is a browser add on that blocks certain content, including specific pages you enter. Hope whines a lot that I don’t trust her, and occasionally I’ll loosen the reigns to give her some space to show that she can handle some freedom. That usually lasts a week or two, and well, we find that some of the blocks come back online.

Since I’m traveling a bit at the moment, I needed to be able to continue sending her personalized notes first thing in the morning. Usually I hang these in the bathroom for her. Google Cloud Print has changed the game! I now just create my notes in Google Drive and print to the house so that the nanny picks it up and hangs it in the bathroom. Tonight I printed an updated chore list—Hope acted both amazed at my ability to print remotely AND blow up her chore duty spot at the same time. Ha! ABM’s tech game is strong!

___

So, anyhoo, we’re doing. The travel separation is tough; I know I will have a different kid at the end of the month. It’s scary and exciting, though. She’s doing some real growth right now. I can’t wait to see what the next blossom entails!

 

1 Comment   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned

September 29, 2014

Silencing the Noise

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Recently blogger, Love Hurts, posted an essay called, “am I a good mom?” I can’t say that I ask this question specifically; it’s more that I review collections of incidents and do assessments and think about where I could do better, how I could’ve done worse and be glad I didn’t.

I’m constantly looking to improve, but overall I have gotten to this space in which I try to be kind to myself. I try to give myself a break. It is an odd thing to have no kids one day and a kid, a teenager no less, the next day. It’s hard work. I get it half wrong or just all wrong every day. But I figure Hope seems happy, she’s safe, she’s fed, she’s loved, she’s learning. I must be doing something right.

I’ve come to believe that my worries about parenting are triggered by factors and individuals outside of me and Hope. There are the comments about what I let Hope “get away with” as we continue to work on big issues from her past. There are the side eyes I get because I’m apparently doing the most. Then there’s the passive aggressive commentary when I’m apparently doing the least.

I try to stay inward focused on Hope’s needs just so that I can tune out the noise. The noise doesn’t add any meaningful input into my life or parenting. It does serve to further breakdown whatever confidence I might exude on any given day. It makes me question the things I absolutely know I got right and cry more over the things I wonder if I screwed up royally.

What’s interesting about the criticism is that it rarely offers a suggestion for a better way to do anything or if the commenter might pitch in to help. Sometimes they offer suggestions, but they aren’t helpful because the offering is made without tons of nuanced information about my and Hope’s journey through trauma and adoption. So it really is just noise.

Today I am sitting in a conference room in the mid-west in a meeting away from Hope. Today she is out of school. Nanny 1 has left for the day and the other nanny won’t be in until this evening. Hope is “Home Alone.”

homealone

Hope has food.

She has a list of chores and activities.

Appropriate PPV movies were purchased this morning.

The crockpot is going for dinner.

I will call to check on her throughout the day.

Hope’s got an emergency contact list and access to two building concierges who can help out if necessary.

She’s 13 and will be home alone for maybe 10 hours. She will likely sleep 4 of them easily.

I did play a bit of resource Cirque du Soleil trying to have someone there to entertain/watch her today. My machinations didn’t work, and so she’s home today alone.

And you know what?

She’s going to be fine.

Are we both a little nervous? Yep, because I’m not downtown; I’m 1200 miles away.

Am I confident that the likelihood is small that she will burn the condo building down or some other cataclysmic event will occur? Yeah, I’m pretty confident.

Do I think by the 3rd check in call/Google hangout that she’s going to go all snarkily, “ Mom, geesh, don’t you have something to do?” Yep. And I will smile and tell her I’ll call her back later.

And do I think that she will be happy to see Nanny 2 this evening? Yep.

Will I celebrate her major achievement in demonstrating teen responsibility when I get home tomorrow? Yep, like a boss (provided the condo building is still standing)!

explosion570

Do I wish things had worked out differently? Yeah, but they didn’t.

Does any of this make me a bad mother? No, I’m pretty confident it does not.

Parents make tough decisions with available resources all the time. It’s what parents do. I know through this journey as a new single mom that I have much more empathy for birth families and the challenges they may face along the way. Sometimes things go really, really wrong. I’m fortunate to have resources, to understand systems, to be able to pull things together to fill most of my gaps. My heart breaks for those without those resources and ability to navigate the rocky landscape; it’s easy to see how a cascade of bad, tragic things can happen.

So instead of internalizing the critiques, staying pissy about them, and finding ways of “punishing” those who poke my mom’s eye, I’m going to send out some energy to other moms, new moms, adoptive moms and any kind of moms who need it. You’re doing fine. You’re making tough decisions, some will be great, and some will suck. You will triumph, and you will stumble. I hope that you don’t experience or internalize the negative criticism floating around about your parenting and that your would-be critics think to ask how might they help you be more successful rather than point out your perceived flaws. The former would be so much more productive than the latter.

7 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , | posted in Lessons Learned

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