Tag Archives: African American Parenting

January 15, 2018

Rested & Ready

Normally, on MLK weekend I plan some edutainment activities, but I was just struggling with my emotional responses to my daughter so much recently that I couldn’t get it together enough to plan anything. So, on the one hand I feel like I failed in my aspirational goal of being a social justice mom, but really, I got something else right this weekend.

I took care of me.

After raging like a hurricane, and giving off caustic energy for several days, I was exhausted. So, I rested. I did my workouts, planned my meals and crawled into my bed with a good book, my heated blanket and Yappy. I just tuned everything out (including Hope, other than making sure she was alive and fed) and relaxed.

I aspire to Yappy’s self-care commitment.

I breathed.

I made tea. I online shopped and ordered myself an obscene number of new spring dresses.

I luxuriated in solitude and exhaled.

And then I was able to think about how to get us back on track. Hope is an amazing kid, and amazing kids do dumb stuff sometimes, it’s just what they do. Heck, I did it too back in the day. Of course some of Hope’s dumb stuff is informed by a history of messy stuff.

I decided I would speak my peace to Hope and put this episode behind us, though she still has some consequence time to pull during the next week.

In speaking to Hope I had to remind both of us that anger is usually informed by hurt, deep hurt. It’s easier to be pissed than it is to be sad. I was sad that she broke the rules. I was sad that she violated my trust. I was sad that she self-sabotaged. I was sad that she seemed unable to take responsibility for her behaviors. I was sad and that made me mad.

And then I hugged her and reminded her that I loved her and that I have feelings that I struggle with too. And we turned the corner emotionally, ventured out to a new international store (I bought all kinds of goodies!), went shopping, and worked out.

I’m rounding out the holiday weekend by dying my hair—a new midlife crisis habit I’m enjoying. My hair is more gray than black now and about 4 months ago, I got it in my brain that after 10 years of avoiding dye like the plague, I would dye my hair fantastically bright colors. Because my gray is resistant to color and I choose semi-permanent color, I could enjoy temporary bursts of color without long term commitment. #perfect I started with a soft pink in October and followed with a bright purple. Tonight, I dyed it teal. It will have faded some by the time my annual conference rolls around in 5 weeks, but it will still be blue and the non-conformist in me is delighted about that. #notoconformity #mylifemytermsmyhair

I hated how I felt emotionally last week…really hated it. I’m proof that when you can choose to change your mood. It’s normal for all of that emotion to build up. Therapeutic parenting is….draining. I love my daughter, and I personally don’t have any other style of parenting to compare it too other than observation of others parenting, but I gotta say, I don’t enjoy therapeutic parenting much. #realtalk #truth

It’s essential for us and especially so for my Hope, who needs more connection and more safety than your average kid. And well, there’s hardly anything I won’t do for her; I’m committed to therapeutic parenting.

I’m ready to face another week and so is Hope. Tomorrow we will work out in the evening and chatter about our day, all while hoping that the anticipated snow misses us so we can keep the regulated good times rolling.

I am rested and ready. I’m thinking that is good enough on the edutainment front for this holiday.

1 Comment | tags: adoption, Adoptive Moms, Adoptive Parenting, adoptive parents, African American Adoption, african american adoptive families, african american adoptive parenting, African American Parenting, Parenting, parenting challenges, Parenting Lessons, Parenting Teens, parenting trauma, Secondary Trauma | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Lessons Learned, Parenting, Self Care

January 11, 2018

Connected and Ish…

By AdoptiveBlackMom

We’re a little over a week into the year, and I already feel like I have hell in a hand-basket in my home. Trying to get routines back in place is hella hard when there was a two week break, followed by two days of school, followed by three snow/cold days. The bull-ish has set in for real around here, and Hope has fallen back into her typical routine of whatever it is that she does.

I understand. I get it. There’s the trauma stuff. There’s the anxiety and depression stuff. There’s the ADHD stuff. There’s so much stuff. Tons of stuff, binders of stuff, lots of stuff.

And then there’s me on repeat about rules, expectations and routine. All of that ish is busted. It just seems to go into the ether and float away, and I’m peeved as hell.

I mean, if you live an illogical life, and there’s someone there to simply tell you what to do to carry on, then well, just follow the dang directions. It ain’t hard.

But alas, that would be logical and our greatest attribute is being illogical, so it’s not just hard, it’s like mythologically hard. Like Sisyphus hard.

Via Giphy

And I’m supposed to practice “connected parenting.”

Via Giphy

This parenting style requires that I move beyond and over the illogical parts to reframe and try again to connect to my daughter, building new healthier neuropathways…blah, blah, blah.Yeah, ok. I am all in on the connecting and moving forward, but errrr…uh….I find that what they don’t address in those books, on those videos and in those workshops is that parents have feelings too. We’re people, living and breathing imperfect creatures who also do dumb ish. They don’t mention that our hearts hurt from also feeling rejected and stepped on by our kids and isolated by families and friends who don’t have a clue what we’re going through. That even as we *know* intellectually what’s going on with our kids and develop/have the skill set to deal with it, this trauma parenting mess is some epic, next level bull-ish, and it makes ERRBODY feel some kind of way almost all the damn time. #webothmiserable #alot

Via Giphy

In all that soft spoken, “the child’s reptilian brain, blah, blah, blah” there is a failure to acknowledge we have our own primitive brains too, no matter how well adjusted or how much work we’ve done on ourselves. (I know that there are many folks out there who think that adoptive parents should go through more intense screenings and training, but trust: We are still emotional creatures, you can’t screen/train that out of us unless we are just going to have Sheldon Cooper as the archetype AP).

Via Google

There is never a discussion about how there are parenting moments—some trauma, some SPED, some just regular old run of the mill day-to-day stuff—that is just real bull-ish. Yeah, parenting is effing hard.

This week I have been on slow burn. Hope did some dumb stuff; some of it emotionally driven and some executive function influenced. Oh, I get how it happened. I get how the levers and buttons of her brain got us here. I get it. But I’m still simmering because it’s so ridiculously stupid. It just shouldn’t happen.

I’ve fought the desire to be confrontational. I’ve fought the desire to drop hammers. I’ve wrestled with natural consequences vs what I really want to do (rage if that wasn’t clear). I’ve just sat with it. I’ve emailed and texted my daughter when I knew that physically allowing audible words to come out of my mouth anywhere near her would be a really, really, bad idea. I have resisted doing everything that is in my naturally occurring combative nature to do this week. #winning

This week has been about restraint.

I am a wild Chincoteague pony pawing to get out and trample everything in my path. There is a bit in my mouth, and a saddle and reigns on me to just try to keep control of myself. Inside I’m an effing hot mess.

Yeah, they don’t tell you this ish in PRIDE, or those other parenting classes or any of those stupid parenting books for any kind of kid. Well, I’m here to tell you parenting ish ain’t academic.

I’m just trying to get through each day with some kind of peace of mind that I will not throttle my kid because she did some dumb ish that sometimes she literally can’t help doing. I exercise, eat right, have a cocktail, and try to get in bed early to just get some rest. I sing spirituals…because yeah, just because.

Most of all I try to keep my pie hole closed.

I’m not not speaking to my daughter. I just can’t handle but so much interaction right now; it just ain’t safe. Breakfasts are made, dinners are had and some workouts are done together. But I’m chasing solitude and peace to calm my frazzled emotions.

Someone asked me just today if I ever imagine what my life would be like if Hope hadn’t become my daughter. I can’t even imagine that; I have no idea. It was such a fit. I adore her, more than I ever thought I was capable of loving anything, I love her. It’s an expansive thing. Life has taught me that the thing that brings you that kind of love will try you to extreme.

Yeah, we’re there. Right now. Right here. We are so there, and I’m trying my best to parent the hell outta Hope.

All connected and ish.

5 Comments | tags: ADHD, adoption, Adoption and Trauma, Adoptive Parenting, African American Adoption, african american adoptive families, African American Parenting, Child Trauma, Connected parenting, Parenting, Parenting Teens, parenting trauma, Teens | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff

January 6, 2018

New Visions

By AdoptiveBlackMom

2017 both flew and dragged by. At times it seemed like it would never end and other times it seemed I could barely keep up with all the goings on. The fall was particularly challenging as Hope struggled with everything and I was on business travel 5 days a week for several weeks on end. By the time the holidays rolled around I was finishing up a huge project for work, trying to get a jump on some 2018 projects, and jump through all of the requisite holiday hoops.

I barely got the Christmas cookies baked. I never got our holiday video done (Grammy commented that she was looking forward to seeing it. Yeah, well, so was I).

I did manage to overhaul my eating habits in the middle of the holidays and up my exercise which resulted in some much needed pound shedding before the new year.

Mostly, as the year wound down, I focused on me and Hope. It was clear after the rough fall months that my steady presence was critical for Hope’s emotional health. My daughter was under my left butt cheek for a solid two weeks. She was affectionate. She was communicative. She was less anxious, less depressed and as close to stable as I’d seen her in months.

And we leaned into all of that. It was one of the best holiday seasons we’ve had since the creation of our little family.

We capped off 2017 with a decadent dinner downtown. We dressed up. Hope fretted about how fancy everything was. Our server was amazing at just helping Hope to soak up all the special of the night. It was magical right on through dessert!

On New Year’s Day, I began working on my vision board. I failed to create one for 2017, which might be why sometimes I seemed goal-less in some areas of my life. I decided to get back to this particular tradition in 2018, so I fired up Powerpoint and thought about what I wanted for 2017.

Thinking about what you want for a year of your life is cool but challenging. I try to really zero in on me–this is my vision board. I am cautious not put things I want for Hope on it, this is really about me and me alone.

After a few hours of pondering I came up with several major areas: adventure, freedom, creativity, health and companionship. All of this rests on a year of possibilities. I found images conveying all of this and put them on my slide. Then, I saved it as a picture.

Since I’d decided that this year’s theme would be the year of possibilities, I set about to get Hope to join me in doing her first vision board. I sent her mine as a model. She thought it was cool, but just didn’t know where to start.

Admittedly, I nagged her and told her how I came up with mine and how she could just do the same.

Will I ever learn that Hope and I are *not* wired the same?

Bless her heart, she sent me a bulleted list of some goals for the year rather than a vision board.

I sat down to read it and nearly cried.

My Hope is maturing in ways that weren’t clear to me. I knew she had recently confided that she was a bit overwhelmed by the future–prepping for college and adulthood. I wasn’t prepared to see a list that tackled all of that head on. Hope’s list was the most cogent, mature thing I’d ever seen her produce; it was specific, it was optimistic, it was forward thinking. It was everything that every parent wants to see their kid lay out for themselves for the year ahead.

I desperately wanted to post it as is everywhere, since that who “sharenting” thing is real, but I only shared the list with a few close relatives who would really appreciate how awesome Hope’s goals for herself really were.

I gotta say that I also felt like…I must’ve done some stuff right on this journey for her to get here. We have so much farther to go, but man, that list was like a winning lotto ticket.

I took Hope’s list and reinterpreted it in pictures for a vision board. I sent her a couple of drafts to see if the images I chose were in line with what she had on her list. I made a couple of gentle recommendations on a few additions which she greatly appreciated. Within a day or so her board was finished and I saved her board as a picture just like mine.

Vision boards are useless if you’re not going to post them as a reminder to yourself throughout the year. I typically post mine in several places–my bedroom, bathroom and maybe a small version in my office. Sometimes as my screensaver.

I sent Hope her vision board picture and then I sent both of our boards to Costco for printing in multiple sizes. I framed one for each of us to put in our rooms. Hope really seemed to dig having this visualization of her goals for the year. So did I.

Fuzzy to protect our privacy!

I’m hopeful that this is a practice that I can instill in her to do every year. I know for me, even if I don’t do everything that’s on it, I make progress towards getting it done. Redoing my bedroom was on my 2016 board; it didn’t get done until the end of 2017 but gosh do I LOVE my new bedroom. I got there…eventually.

I am excited about the possibilities and adventures that are in store for me and Hope this year. I’m also glad that we have some guideposts in place for us to measure our individual progress.

It’s going to be a great year.

Leave a comment | tags: 2018, adoption, African American Adoption, African American Parenting, Older Child Adoption, Parenting Lessons, Parenting Teens, Vision Boards | posted in Finalization Life

December 27, 2017

Holiday Feels

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Hope has been on winter break from school for over a week now. I can tell she’s finally unwound and has been just enjoying herself. We’ve had more time together and have just really enjoyed some good bonding time. Over the weekend we finally got a chance to see the movie Coco, about the Day of the Dead—if you haven’t seen it, you should. It’s amazing. As we were watching it, I thought to myself—well, there’s all kinds of stuff that is transferrable to adoption up and through this movie; I wonder how Hope will process this.

Well, I found out on Christmas night.

The thing about the Day of the Dead is it’s about remembering your people, your family. You honor them. You keep pictures up so you can see them, remember them, so that they can come back to visit you on that holiday.

For a kid who’s lost a parent—either to death or other kinds of separation—this is a bell ringer.

Earlier this year, we visited Hope’s extended first family and I made a point of getting copies of pictures of her parents. When we returned from the visit I had a collage made and the pictures are hung prominently in our home. I thought it was important, but after watching Coco, I saw the importance through a new lens.

We are coming up on a period in Hope’s life when she’s been separated longer than she was with her family. And because of her age and the countless transitions, memories are being questioned and sometimes things seem fuzzy. It wasn’t going to take much to trigger lots of emotion.

I found myself reminiscing about my own childhood and my grandmothers who are long gone now. I got a little choked up myself as I looked at my larger family on Christmas and pondered what they would have to say about their progeny. I was a bit in my feelings too.

And then there was the triggering event. It’s Hope’s story so I won’t share that, but it wasn’t bad, just some circle of life stuff. It was enough to have her snotting on my shoulder for 20 minutes.

The truth of the thing is that my daughter misses her first parents. She misses them deeply. She misses her extended family and understanding their connections to her. She’s seeing some of them age, and watching aging just ain’t fair. Hope’s realizing that some of the narratives about her life that she spun for her own survival aren’t holding up over time.

All of this sucks, it sucks royally. And there’s always some fairly innocuous event that triggers the avalanche of realization, and even when I *know* that it’s imminent, it catches me off guard.

I feel like those moments make my heart stop. I know I suck in air; my mind starts to race considering what’s the best approach to bring Hope comfort. My own tears trickle down my face and my heart aches for my daughter. More than anything I want to take away the pain, even when I know that the only way is to just help her push through it.

I sat with my daughter for a good 20 minutes as she sobbed. I cradled her; I stroked her hair. I waited for her to find words to describe her feelings. I told her I loved her, that I knew this all sucked, that none of it was fair. The only upside is that I know my daughter is feeling; for so long she wouldn’t allow this at all. Feeling isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, but it’s healthy and it’s necessary for healing. It’s taken us 4 years to get to these free-flowing, pain-filled tears, but the truth is that I hated when she couldn’t and didn’t cry and now that she does it breaks my heart in ways I didn’t think were possible.

Hope and I enjoyed a nice long chat Christmas night about grief, about aging, about memories and how to keep them alive. I try to draw parallels whenever possible, and I search for solutions to make the situation as close to right as it can get. It’s so hard. It really is.

It’s in these moments that I’m convinced that my journey to mothering was rocky and occasionally blocked just so I would have some wise-sounding ish to say to Hope who really seems to need to hear it. That day to day stuff I might be raggedy as hell, but this… for these in the moment, high intensity, therapeutic parenting episodes, I’m totally clutch. I also feel like these are the moments when I HAVE to get it right. I gotta do all that reading, all that prepping, all that internal monologuing just for these moments. It’s in these moments that I stop thinking about the unfairness of my own journey or at least put it in the larger context of how unfair life is in so many ways.

My and Hope’s Christmas was great, even with a moment overcome by adoption-related grief. We are learning to fold these moments into our lives. As a mom, I’m learning to spot triggers and other things that need to be processed by Hope. I try to do my own processing and reflection more intently, and I just try to sit with my daughter to help her find her way through this life of hers.

As I see my Hope come into a new life chapter filled with more healing, I am eager to see what the new year brings for us. I know it won’t be easy, but Hope is getting stronger and I’m so amazed to have this front row seat for her evolution. I’ll keep tissues at the ready and my shoulder available always.

2 Comments | tags: adoption, Adoptive Mothers, adoptive parents, African American Adoption, african american adoptive families, African American Parenting, Birth Family, Families of Color, Family Ties, Grief, Grief and Loss | posted in Finalization Life

December 24, 2017

Lessons While Driving

By AdoptiveBlackMom

So, Hope recently got her learner’s permit. As we walked to the car with her permit in hand, she asked, “So when do we hit the roads?”

LOLOLOL. *wipes tears*

Um, no dear heart, when do we hit the parking lot is the better question.

Then she tells me she has this checklist from the DMV.

That’s cute, we’ll get to your checklist, but for now, I need you to leave that at home.

So, on the way back from Costco last week, I pulled over into the elementary school parking lot and declared that the first lesson was happening now.

So…yeah, that happened. I nearly got a cramp in my hand from holding the door handle so tight as we jerked around the parking lot. I screeched a few times to STOP. Hope eventually found her footing a little and stopped reactivating my whiplash from my summer accident.

In 15 minutes my sweet girl realized that driving was more technical than it appeared, my hair became a little grayer and my life probably shortened by a day or so from sheer fright.

The second time we rolled through a parking lot we learned a bit about pulling and/or backing into parking spots and turning. We only hit a curb once.

I’m also grateful for review cameras on cars. Whoever came up with that idea is an effin’ genius.

Anyhoo, today I took Hope for her third parking lot lesson. There were 4 cars parked in this HUGE parking lot. We were nowhere near them. Hope got behind the wheel of the car and began to speed across the parking lot towards the sidewalk.

*SCREAMING* “Wait! What? Where? What the hell are you doing!!!????!!!!!”

“There are cars in this parking lot!!!”

“WAY OVER THERE! BUT WHY ARE (tries to modulate voice) you driving across the parking lot like this.”

“I don’t know.”

“STOP THE CAR!” #drivingtrauma #jerkystop #myneckhurts

We finally got it smoothed out and eventually Hope drove all the way around her high school and parked kinda sorta near the cars.

In all, Hope is actually taking to driving quite well, but she’s exhausted after a short lesson because the lessons make her anxious. I try to help her have fun in this process. It’s making me remember how stressed my parents seemed when I was learning how to drive. I’ve chuckled more than once thinking about Grammy reaching for the dashboard and hitting the imaginary brake on the passenger side of the car.

On the way to our next destination after today’s parking lot triumph, I asked Hope if the practices mad her anxious. She said yes, but that she was always anxious in the car. Huh?

“Yeah, I’m anxious in the passenger seat.”

“But why? Do you worry about my driving?”

“No, in the passenger side, I don’t have control of anything. Now, in the driver’s side, I’m in charge of everything. It makes me nervous.”

Ahhh, here I am thinking that driving represents freedom, and Hope is thinking about crushing responsibility. Yes, driving comes with responsibility…a lot of it, but I always thought it was counterbalanced by the freedom to go.

For Hope driving is a metaphor for her life. All those years when she had no control over anything that was happening to her or around her, she was just a passenger in her life and that royally sucked. Now she’s transitioning to the driver’s seat and learning how to run her own life. After such a rocky start; it’s hard for Hope to understand that this transition is natural and to be expected and yeah, it’s a bit scary, but also super cool.

It’s in these moments that I’m reminded that Hope isn’t quite ready to grow up. I wonder if she wants to just maybe get a little bit of a redo on her childhood. And as much as I want Hope to catch up to her peers developmentally, I’m suddenly finding myself a little happy that 1) she recognizes that she’s not ready, 2) I get to have more a little more time with her doing the day to day mothering. Momming is hard as hell, but gosh, I dig this kid and I enjoy being her mom.

In the last month or so, I’ve been intentional about dragging her out of her room and spending time with her. She’s funny, goofy, smart, empathetic, stubborn. She both is and isn’t the kid I met 4 years ago. I’m just digging having this time with her.

Even when I am gripping the door handle of my car as she builds her confidence about driving and living.

Leave a comment | tags: adoption, African American Adoption, African American Parenting, Music, Parenting, Parenting Teens, Teen Development, Teens | posted in Finalization Life

December 7, 2017

Parenting in the Era of #MeToo

By AdoptiveBlackMom

As my fellow sisters continue to take to social media to share their experiences around sexual harassment, assault and other predatory behavior, I’ve been thinking about how all this affects Hope and kids like her.

Hope is 16. We watch the news, and I try to keep her abreast of current events. Last year, we sat and watched Bill Cosby’s legacy tumble down as numerous women came forward to say he sexually assaulted them. For me, it was painful to watch the Jello pitchman, Cliff Huxtable, lovable, funny guy I grew up watching shed all of that and be revealed as a sexual predator. He wasn’t a part of Hope’s youth, so it was more removed for her.

But the moment that we’re in now where the revelations are weekly or daily, where a senatorial candidate has been accused of trolling for girls close in age to Hope, where social media is flooded with stories of #metoo: it’s kind of triggering for both of us.

So many kids have a history of sexual abuse; nearly 1 kid in 10 among all kids, and over 1 in 4 of US kids 14 to 17 years old. When this latest moment launched, Hope and I had a really personal #metoo discussion. I shared my stories with her, and she shared a little bit of her story too. I thought it was important for me to talk about things that I felt were violating, so Hope could continue to develop her own benchmarks. We talked about limits, about how to defend ourselves against unwanted advances, and about who and how to tell when something unwanted happens. I wanted this conversation to help both of us feel empowered.

A few days later, on the way to school and while listening to a pop culture podcast, the topic came up again. This time I focused on being clear with Hope about my hope and expectation that she tell me if she’s ever hurt. We’ve already established that I have a tiny bit of Huck from Scandal in me, and I promise to try not to straight up murder anyone who hurts her (torture might be more fulfilling anyway). I wanted her to understand that I want her to be safe and that I am prepared to do whatever I need to do to make that happen.

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We’ve had talks about dating safety and what that looks like In practice. We talk about consent and slippery slopes that aren’t consent. I posted this summer a podcast series that I listened too, The Heart, that explore how many women are “gently” pressured into sex when they were clear they didn’t want to have sex. The show explored how insidious pressure can be and how easily a no can be converted to not a yes, but a “well, ok, but I’m not really into it.” We talked about always making sure you have bus fare and that maybe, just maybe I should let her in on my Lyft app so she can always get a ride if she finds herself in a not so safe situation. We talk about how you can hold your keys so they can be used as a weapon.

We talk a lot.

And still, it feels like we’re oversaturated with news of predatory behavior.

Earlier this week over breakfast as we watched coverage about Matt Laurer, Hope asked, “Is that the one who flashed himself from the bathroom?” No that was allegedly two other guys. “The one from that Netflix show?” No he seemed into assaulting men and being an a-hole to both genders. “Ok I know it’s not Bill Cosby because this guy is white.” I finally remind her that we used to watch Today until they did Tamron Hall wrong, and I switched to CNN. “Oh…oh yeah.”

There’s seriously so many stories tumbling around that it’s hard to keep up.

I try not to be alarmist with Hope. She has enough anxiety without my contributions, but I do want her to be aware of what’s happening and how relevant the discourse is to her life. More importantly, I want her to learn so she can be safe in ways that affirm her confidence and security. It’s hard though; it’s hard right now when we’re having conversations about high profile predators in positions of power making decisions about other people’s lives. This is some scary ish.

The best I can do, is keep talking, keep affirming, and keep my inner Huck contained.

via giphy

7 Comments | tags: adoption, adoptive parents, African American Adoption, African American Moms, African American Parenting, Parenting Teens, Safety, Sex Talks | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff

November 5, 2017

Thoughts on Momming an Adoptee

By AdoptiveBlackMom

It’s National Adoption Awareness Month, and as I always do, I spend some time scanning Twitter reading adoptee tweets and reading adoptee blogs and articles. I do that all year, of course, but I take a special interest the adoptee voice during NAAM. I think a lot about what they are saying and what Hope might be thinking about her experience as an adoptee.

I mean, whether she knows it or not yet, these are her people, and they are giving voice to some of the stuff that is probably floating around in her head. Stuff she is unable or not ready to articulate.

So, I listen. I try to talk a little less and listen a bit more.

I write about my experiences as an Adoptive Black Mom, but I’m mothering an adoptee, Hope.

Part of my job as Hope’s mom is helping her find her voice. I don’t know what my daughter’s future holds for her. It would surprise me if she evolved into an adoptee advocate/activist; Hope is becoming a conscious kid, but it remains to be seen whether that will blossom into something. Who knows though, right?

Part of momming Hope is helping her figure out how she wants adoption to fit into her story. She gets help dealing with the stuff that led to her being in a position to be adopted. She talks to me about what she’s ok with being disclosed. Hope decides how much contact she wants with her extended biological family. Hope gets to decide how how/whether she wants to use her name, since we just added my name to her existing name. Hope gets to make a lot of decisions; my job is making sure that her surrounding environment is open and safe for her to make decisions and for her to have as many options as possible. My job is to be a facilitator. I get to help make this stuff happen. My other job is to check my ego as a adoptive mom.

Adoptive parents are often held up as these amazing saviors. Certainly, children need homes and people want families and adoption is often a bridge between those two facts. The truth is that I wanted to be a mom. My decision to adopt was selfish. Even the so-called noble choice to adopt an older child was rooted in my desire to maintain some aspects of my lifestyle—I didn’t want to have to deal with full time day care or feedings or potty training or any of that. I wanted to be able to still travel without taking a small house of baby stuff with me. An older child would be beyond that stage, would even as I parent offer some kind of engaging companionship, would be able to pack their own overnight bag for a trip anywhere. How I got to the mom I am now started in a pretty selfish place, and I’m ok with that.

I’m still far from perfect; and sometimes I fail miserably, but I hope my efforts count for something.

In pursuing older child adoption, I’ve also learned that there are a few more privileges that some other adoptive parents might not have. I don’t have to worry about figuring out how or whether to tell my daughter that she’s adopted. My daughter knows more about her story than I ever will, and she is more than capable of telling me what she wants me to know.

Like some other adoptive parents, I had to figure out early on how to incorporate biological family into our familial universe. I had to learn to lean into my own lessons on graciousness and the expansiveness of love. There can’t be a lot of jealousy or threatening feelings when you focus on welcoming people into a family. Your kid doesn’t have to figure out whose team they are on when parents conceptualize only one big team.

My daughter’s story is not normal, but I’ve worked hard to normalize our family and our life. I never want Hope to question my love and support for her. I never want her to think that I thought adoption cut her off from her biological and genetic connections. It’s easy to say those things don’t count when you have access to your biological/genetic connections. I never want her to feel like she can’t talk about her birth parents in our home. I never want her to feel like she has to make a choice in defining her family holistically. When she has asked me to find someone in her family; I have. When she has then said she didn’t want to make contact, I put the information away until she changes her mind. When she asked to do something special for her family members who have crossed over, we have said prayers, celebrated birthdays with cakes and released balloons (sorry environment). What Hope needs to help her navigate her adoptive life, I do what I can to make it happen.

I have tried to create an inclusive family for us, and you know what? It hasn’t been difficult. It has occasionally been a little challenging, but it hasn’t been hard. Being Hope’s mom has called me to step my game way up. I’m better for it. I hope that Hope is better for it.

So, I hope this year, this month, National Adoption Awareness Month, that APs will create space for their kids to broadly love and be broadly loved. I hope that we can learn that more is better. I hope that we can support our kids in the ways they need, not just the ways we need. I hope that we can listen to adoptees more and heed their advice and guidance. I hope we can all just love more.

1 Comment | tags: Adoptees, adoption, Adoption Blogs, Adoptive Families, Adoptive Families of Color, Adoptive Parenting, adoptive parents, African American Adoption, African American Parenting, Extended Adoptive Families | posted in Finalization Life, Lessons Learned, Parenting

October 24, 2017

Battle with a Teacher

By AdoptiveBlackMom

I’m an educator. My sister is an educator. I work for educators. My friends are educators.

Educators are my homies, and you can usually find me defending educators—especially K-12 teachers—hard!

My engagements with Hope’s school regarding her academic challenges have been far more positive than not. Of late, it’s been more challenging to get Hope to avail herself of the accommodations designed to help her be successful. Pride is one of the 7 deadly sins for good reason.

In any case, midway through this quarter I continued to monitor Hope’s grades. I didn’t put pressure on her, I just wanted to keep an eye on things. I reached out to several of her teachers; she seemed to be especially struggling in those courses and I wanted to know a bit about how she behaved in class, had she been to visit them about her work and whether she was regularly engaged.

One teacher was outright dismissive. I told her that her response was problematic and what I needed to know moving forward.

Hope managed to pull her grades up, but I knew it would be a long year with this teacher.

Fast forward to this morning when the teacher sends me a lengthy email about Hope’s lackluster performance, the fact that she has given her additional assignments and the fact that I was not holding up my end of the educational social contract.

Oh really?

I quickly wrote her back noting that this might’ve been avoided if she hadn’t been dismissive weeks ago, that Hope would absolutely NOT be doing additional assignments under any circumstances, and that she really had no clue what the details of my social contract were so she might want to get back in her lane.

We scheduled a call for after I arrived at the airport and things didn’t just go left. I was so damn furious after this call that we will be meeting with some administrators in the future.

I no longer disclose that Hope is an adoptee or that she has emotional struggles unless it’s necessary. She is entitled to some privacy; she is entitled to some normalcy. I disclosed a few weeks ago that my daughter struggles with ADHD.

Today, the instructor indicated she knew all about that because her son has it and he even had to go on anti-depressants briefly because he was down and really at his tween age, what could he possibly have to worry about? And what could Hope have to worry about?

I had to close my eyes and take a breath not to verbally stomp this woman.

Now, sometime this quarter the teacher disclosed that she was an adoptee, specifically a Korean adoptee. Hope was drawn to her because of both the adoptee identification and she still loves all things/people Korean. What I didn’t realize was that Hope had chosen not to disclose that she too was an adoptee.

Well, I began to explain that Hope’s struggles with ADHD are not organic; they are trauma based. She is struggling with many adoption-related issues and she is being monitored closely. She’s not “down” and only requiring a brief stint on drugs; medication is a part of her life and helps keeps her functional. And yes, she is an adoptee, an older adoptee who is struggling and who is exceptionally good at masking her struggle outside of our home.

I thought a brief moment of compassion and some level of shared experience might wash over us, but nah. Teacher lady proceeded to tell me that Hope needed to learn responsibility with this ‘punishment’ assignment, and I needed to learn how to properly offer positive reinforcement and incentives.

giphy-downsized

Say what now? Whoooosaaaaahhhhh….

Lady, I done took and told you she’s 👏🏾not 👏🏾doing👏🏾 your👏🏾 effing👏🏾 punishment 👏🏾assignment; you know nothing about Hope’s intrinsic or extrinsic motivation triggers so mind your beeswax and your adoption narrative is not the same as Hope’s so again, get in your lane.

She came again with how she would send me some incentive charts, and I just said, well, look at that, I’m at my airport gate, got to go. *Click*

Making me sing church spirituals, trying to get my mind right dealing with this teacher lady. Imma need the Holy Homeboy to show up and show out…cause for real…I am not the one.

giphy

At home, I told Hope she didn’t need to do any other assignments for this class this week; the grown folks have some stuff we need to work out and I need to to focus on getting her feeling safe, attached and functional.

The ONLY good thing is that I really do not have any more damns to give about Hope’s academic performance right now. My daughter’s well-being is everything. Sure, I want her to do her best, but not at the risk of her mental health.

Meanwhile, I feel like this teacher and I are going to butt heads for a while. She was downright offensive today. I’m hoping that with time she will have a better understanding of Hope’s struggle, but if she keeps pushing and academically punishing I’m going to have to be *that* mom.

She really, really doesn’t want to meet that chick.

8 Comments | tags: ADHD, adoption, African American Adoption, African American Parenting, Education, Trauma | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Other Stuff, Parenting, Teen parenting, Trauma

October 22, 2017

Thoughts on a Bad Night

By AdoptiveBlackMom

I’ve started my fall travel-palooza. I’m only on my second leg, and I am very, very anxious about the rest of the trips.

I’m already exhausted and feeling overextended. I’m stressed, dehydrated and high or sluggish on carbs. I thought I would treat myself to a manicure and a massage at the airport a couple of days ago before my red eye, but by the time I got to my connecting airport everything—EVERYTHING—in my terminal was shut up tight. Closed. I couldn’t even get a diet coke. I folded myself up in my seat and tried to sleep.

I caught 90 minutes of shut eye at home that next morning, and then what feels like my never ending day got back on the road. I ran errands, bought food, filled prescriptions, bathed the dog, did the laundry, herded Hope to her band competition and back to fetch her at 11pm at night, tidied Hope’s room and prepped my room for the nanny. I grabbed a few—and I mean a few—winks of sleep before it was time to get up, finish packing, walk Yappy, and catch my Lyft to the airport.

But, I went left around that 11pm pick up. Actually, I didn’t go left, I went crazy.

My beautiful teen daughter is rather…messy. I was not allowed to be too messy; my room as a teen was tiny. There wasn’t much space to be messy. Hope has a decent sized room, and well, I hear that general messiness has come to be accepted as a typical teen quality.

I reject this, but apparently that doesn’t matter because at the level of my house, the data show that it is true.

Hope is a bit of a mess. I try really, really, really hard to be understanding. I swear to the Holy Homeboy that I do try to understand. I honestly believe that our messiness can be indicative of our emotional state—heck I call my front hall closet the magic closet. I swear, the lion, the witch, the wardrobe and all of Disney could possibly be in there, but I digress.

Hope’s room…Lawd.

When I’m home and can stay on top of her, she can stay on top of the room. I don’t expect it to be eat off the floor clean, but some level that hangs around “kind of tidy” is what I’d like to shoot for. That’s achievable when I’m home. Even still, I find that I have to roll through once a week with a trash bag and thin things out. I throwaway obvious trash and put personal care products away. I make her bed, pick up her laundry and put it in the hamper (literally INCHES away). I try not to go through “her” stuff too much, just align the corners of the piles. Then I hit everything with some sprays of Febreze and run the oil diffuser. I rarely comment on what I find, and she doesn’t get in trouble unless I find something really, really, really serious.

Well yesterday I had to do the trashcan routine, and Er Mah GAWD! For a kid who has a bug phobia, she has no problem creating environments where bugs would simply love to take up residence. I did what I normally do, but with the schedule and my lack of sleep, I ruminated on all the crap I had to clean up. I didn’t take into consideration that she might be stressed when I’m away and that it might contribute to the mess. I went straight tunnel vision with righteous fury that had hours to build.

And by the time I fetched her I was trying to keep a lid on my fury. I knew it wasn’t worth it. I didn’t want to spend our few minutes together bickering. I knew both of us were tired.

But I just couldn’t let it go, and not letting it go was like lighting a match to dynamite. I totally blew and I totally blew it.

Before I knew it, I was yelling and saying horrible things, things I knew hurt. I was a crazy mess, and embarrassingly, I admit that Hope was more mature than I was. And even as I saw her face, I could feel my heart cracking because I was conscious enough to know I was being a total and complete asshole.

This was not mothering. This was not who I wanted to be. I was a total mess.

And so I apologized.

Yeah, after I got in one more verbal lick. Seriously, I was so stupid. But I genuinely regret those moments. I worry about how they affected her. I worry that I’ve pushed her away. I worry that I’ve irrevocably damaged us. I worry that she won’t forgive me. I worry that I’ve dredged up old emotions that we’ve worked so hard to reconcile.

I feel like I failed in the most epic way. I know we’ll survive, but I worry that this will be a big setback. I worry that I have broken so much trust.

I wish I had been able to keep it together.

I worry that this is only the beginning of my travel season and that the challenges will only escalate as will my fatigue.

I flew to my next destination this morning. Before I left I hand-wrote my daughter a letter of apology. I gave no excuses. I didn’t dig in about cleaning her room. I didn’t ask for forgiveness. I just said I’m so sorry that I said the awful things I said, that I made her feel bad, that I let my anger, frustration and fatigue get the better of me. I asked for grace as we press through my travel season.

I asked the nanny to take care and to check in to make sure she was ok. I let them go do a little retail therapy, and I gave her some space.

I’m hoping that we’ll be able to right our ship when I get home in a few days. Unfortunately, I’ll be off again to another city by week’s end. But I’m hopeful that my resilient daughter will bounce back. I hope that we won’t be too damaged by this event. I hope that I can learn how to keep my mouth shut and how to let the dumb stuff go.

I didn’t ask for forgiveness, but I hope to God that she does indeed forgive me.

My current worst fear is that she won’t.

1 Comment | tags: adoption, Adoptive Single Moms, Adoptive Single Parenting, Adoptive Single Parents, African American Adoption, African American Parenting, African American Parents, Parenting, parenting teen girls, Parenting Teens | posted in Coping, Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Parenting

October 11, 2017

Weeping May Endure

By AdoptiveBlackMom

Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning…

I drafted this post a few days ago. I am no longer weeping, but I wouldn’t say “joy” has settled in either. Hope and I are deep into the regular weekly schedule, and we are very tender. We are both in better places. We are at least a few steps above where we were on the day I wrote this. We are fortunate that these moments don’t last always. We are seriously still having a rough time, but I am on working on getting my mojo back.

Today is a bad day. A very bad day for me emotionally. I’m guessing it’s probably been a challenging day for Hope too.

But for real, I care, but I don’t. I’m so far in my feelings today that, um, yeah, I’m totally being self-absorbed today.

I’m tired. I’m so tired of fighting to keep us alive, reasonably functional and moving forward. It feels like my life is a giant mule that has decided that it isn’t doing a damn thing ever again. And today, I’m exhausted from dragging, pushing, and pulling it along.

This weekend was a three day weekend. A couple of weeks ago, I fancied taking Hope and Grammy to New York for an overnight in the city. I dreamed of doing some sightseeing, having a lovely dinner and just enjoying all that girl time together. But as with everything in my life these days, I feel like the weekend snuck up on me and it arrived with no plans.

I pivoted and thought, “Hey, it’s been a rough few weeks, why don’t we just take it easy.” I’ve been dealing with some reemergent pain from my accident so a low key weekend wouldn’t be so bad right?

Ha!

How about face masks and manicures? Foot dragging.

How about a streaming movie? Nonstop complaints.

How about brunch? Nah.

How about….? No.

I ran my errands, got some exercise to stave off the pain a bit, popped some meds and settled into binge watch The Mindy Project. I had plenty of time to get invested. Hope sat in and watched a few episodes; we were in the same room, but I wouldn’t say we had a shared experience.

It was a pretty lonely weekend and if I’m completely honest, I felt pretty rejected.

I had a lot of trouble sleeping because of my pain, but I resolved this morning to liven things up, get us out of the house and have a little fun on our Monday off.

Yeah, all of that came crashing down before 9am.

I thought, hey let me call my stylist and let her get a quick wash and set and then we can get our manis today. Hope shut me down with her own song and dance about her stylist’s instructions.

By the time it all went down I was trigger happy and spun off into a mad, sad, depressed, sulky spiral that, frankly continues.

I’m mad that I feel like I “wasted” a weekend waiting around for my daughter to do something with me that might seem like quality time. I was sad that she was clear that she would somehow hold up the battle of the hair dressers as a trust thing when God knows she never follow’s her hair dresser’s instructions for hair care. I was offended that she would rebuff my offers to go do stuff together—especially the hair thing because I don’t pay to get her hair done (see doesn’t take care of hair reference above). I was pissy about the fact that laundry takes her 87 hours to do two loads because it just does and it pisses me off and I knew once she started that there was no hope of trying to salvage the day. Frankly, I was just a messy, emotional tinderbox and this morning was a match.

I’ve been fighting past my own human emotions to keep us going. I don’t get the luxury of feeling a lot of the time. Today I wish I just hadn’t allowed those emotions to settle in and rise to the surface.

I am tired, and hurt, and angry and tired, and sad, and tired, and hurt and I find myself hating the people who hurt her, hating the system that didn’t help her enough, being angry with myself for just not figuring out the right pieces at the right time. And while I adore my daughter, I would give my very life for her I do not like her very much right now. #keepingitallthewayreal And before anyone thinks that my daughter and I don’t talk about how we love each other but sometimes we don’t like each other—we talk about that A LOT both in and out of therapy. I will probably like her again in a few hours…because…she’s my kid and I do adore her.

I find myself just wishing I had kept pushing forward instead of feeling all of this today. It’s just too much and the energy in our home is just icky. My marbles are splayed all over the floor. Sigh…it sucks.

It. Just. Sucks.

2 Comments | tags: adoption, Adoption Journey, adoption support, Adoptive Mothers, Adoptive Parenting, African American Adoption, african american adoptive families, African American Parenting, Parenting, parenting challenges | posted in Finalization Life, Hard Stuff, Parenting, Trauma

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