Crash course in parenting - Life as a foster mom

The state got back to me (sort of). They said they could ask bio dad if they could share his info with me, but not actually tell him who I was.  They did say that a) he is currently the placement for his youngest child and b) that he is doing very well, and will get full custody of him soon. What the h e double hockey sticks is going on here!?!?!  So, just waiting to see if he will allow the state to share information with us.  This is just getting plain out crazy. I don't know if/when we'd ever want to meet up with him, or if he would want to meet up with us, or if anything at all will come of this.  But this is starting to feel like something out of the twilight zone. My personal comfort zone with this kind of thing is tiny (VERY TINY) given the history of him that we know...however, people can and do change...it's just very hard to believe.  I may have been fed a bunch of bad information, I don't know. Ugh. I am wasting so much time trying to find more ...

Y has been asking about bio dad. A lot. Several times he has mentioned trying to find him when he gets older. I've been pretty candid with them about bio dad. His history (at least, what I know of it) is not pretty.  I have shared most of it with the kids. What I haven't shared is that he has a lot of other children.  According to his Facebook, he has a lot. As in, double digits.  Not sure how many different mothers are involved, but I'm confident it is more than 4.  We haven't discussed siblings with the kids yet.  Therapist said that around 12 is a good time, based on maturity and ability to comprehend. But of course we wouldn't lie about it either, if they asked before then. Therapist said we ought to research bio dad and get as much information on him as possible.  Thus, I have been doing it. It's kind of hard to research someone with a common name. There are people who live in the same town with the same name, one even with the same middle init...

So, I called D today. I wanted to ask him about Jolene's mom.  I wanted to ask if he knew that the person who everyone said was her mom was actually her mom, if he knew...I thought hey, maybe it's not actually her mom, and I'm the only person who doesn't know? He said...she's crazy, of course it's her mom and it makes no sense that it wouldn't be.  She has one older biological full sister.  He said he refuses to speak with her anymore, and that she told him about a year ago that the government was spying on her and that she went to try to send him money and they were asking way too many personal questions so she couldn't send him money. She then told him to be careful and that they were going to start spying on him as well, due to his connections with her.  He hadn't told anybody about it except for me. He said Jolene's (who he also doesn't talk too) is abusive, and was abusive even to him as a child. Anyway, that's all I'm gonn...

I told the big kids' bio mom about therapy. I was just, you know, trying to provide some information about what was going on with the kids. I thought I should mention it, in case it came up later. Also to show we are being proactive with mental health issues, as her family (and her) have a lot of mental health issues.  I told her we are going to get all the kids in therapy, but right now the therapist only has room for 1 and so it is Y. But the other kids will go as she has room. She asked why Y was going first. Well, it's because he has some problems with getting angry and acting out.  Pretty, I would say, normal, especially for a child who was neglected as a baby. I didn't mention that part to her as I'm not trying to offend anyone.  She was on drugs at the time; any memory she has from that time period will thusly be distorted. And again, I'm not trying to offend anyone, the past is the past. The best we can do is try to recover and move on.  Well. She comes ...

So just a quick little update. Big kids' bio mom is wanting to see the kids more.  She hadn't asked in a while, I haven't really hardly talked to her.  But she did ask a few days ago. I talked about it with the kids' therapist, and with hubby of course.  We all feel like things are just really...strange right now, and it is not in the best interest of the kids to increase visits. And that if we did, it would be very difficult for everyone to reduce them (if we needed to, for some reason).  I know she won't be happy with that. It was very helpful for the therapist to point out that we already are being more open than we agreed to be (with her baking a cake for the kids' birthdays, and the ability to send letters even though the kids really don't write to her).  I think about this daily and wonder if we are doing the right thing. This is nothing we take lightly. I think bio mom has a lot of guilt about the things she did (and didn't do) in the past, an...

I picked up Miss M's cake today. I also picked up the letter her bio mom write. It was pretty innocuous, nothing weird at all in the contents. It looks like the reason it was so expensive to mail was because there were rocks in the envelope.  I know that bio mom believes that rocks have powers.  She didn't mention the "powers" of said rocks in the letter. I am just not sure how to handle this! I think that the "properties" of these rocks meant something, and this is why she sent these particular ones. Specifically, she sent black tourmaline, which isn't even a cool looking rock...but it is supposed to do all kinds of things (thanks, Google!). Included also were crystal quartz, which is supposed to pair with black tourmaline to do something, and pyrite.  Also I know she's studying this in school (or was, not sure if she still attends) so I'm not just pulling this out of my butt! So now I'm trying to figure out - do we explain to Miss M t...

So, this blog has almost turned into just a place to vent, and to work things out. I am sort of sorry but, then again, this is my blog and I guess if it's not the one place I can share my feelings and what is going on then there isn't any place! Big kids' bio mom wanted to make Miss M a cake for her birthday. Now I don't know if you remember, several months ago Miss M wrote her a letter. I guess she moved, so it didn't get to her, but it also never came back to us. About a month ago bio mom asked me for our address so she could write back.  I gave it to her but we never got anything in the mail. I figured she forgot, or didn't have money for stamps, or something. She sent me an email last night saying that she sent one big envelope in the mail for Miss M, since M wrote her a letter, but that she sent all the other kids letters too, in a different envelope. She sent me a picture of the envelope for Miss M because it came back to her. She had written the wrong...

A few random bits of info: 1. Claire is basically potty trained!  Yay!  It was rough going there for a while, and she still poops in her pants more often than I'd like to admit. But #1 is going pretty well, for the most part.  I gave up on Peanut. He pees on the potty when you put him on (or when he puts himself on it, which he still does from time to time!) it's just that he pees a lot of other times too.  So maybe we will try again in a few months.  One out of 2 ain't bad, and he's pretty young yet! 2.  Peanut's bio mom...I'm a little bit worried about her. She is posting stuff on FB like she still has him. She was having a public conversation with someone and then she said "I have to go, my son is tired and crying". Yeah...he was at home, OUR home, sound asleep in his bed.  She's posted other things about how he misses his dad, and she is so thankful she has him.  I want to call her out on it but feel like it might not be wise.  I real...

I decided to start potty training.  Both Claire and Peanut. At the same time. I may or may not be completely insane! Yesterday we spent most of the day in the kitchen (on the wood floor) and outside.  We did no pants, and took their potties around wherever we went. They have matching potties, it is very cute!  We read stories, ran around in capes (they did, I did not, lol), sang songs. There was lots of pee, some in the potty but mostly not. By the end of the day I was completely exhausted, pretty sure Peanut was not getting it at ALL and that Claire was really hit or miss.  She did poo in the potty (YAAAY) and also did 2 big pees in the potty. Peanut pees about every 5 minutes, on or off the potty, wherever he happens to be. Today is going better. Peanut is actually doing a good job of telling me he needs to potty. He even wanted to sit on the adult potty, and he went! 3 times!  Claire can hold her potty for longer, so when she goes potty it is a TON of...

Our daughter, M, did not live with us when she was born. For a variety of reasons we didn't feel we could care for an infant on top of everything else we had going on at the time (you can read back about how torn up I was about this choice, back in September/October 2010). I did daycare for her for the first 6 months of her life, but someone else was her foster mom, who held her at night, woke up with her, put her to bed. Then when M went to a "real" daycare, due to the fact that I was losing my ever loving mind, she still came over to our house at least once a week for a few hours.  When it became clear she would be available for adoption at about the age of 18 months old, her foster mom (who had not been planning on adoption) asked us if we would adopt M.  We of course agreed. Since then, M's old foster mom has been just wonderful. She's come to all of M's birthday parties (except for one, where she had just recently gotten surgery on her foot!), and about...

Peanut's mom's rights got terminated officially today. We went to the hearing which was last week. It was crazy.  There was so much lying etc. I wrote it all down, I just want to be able to remember and my brain isn't what it used to be. Still, bio mom's attorney did a good job of making it seem like bio mom just needed more time. I thought the judge would give it to her.  But the GAL and the state's attorney agreed that 20 months is long enough, and not enough progress has been made.  The initial case from 2016 was never closed, even though he did go home for a few months. I didn't want to go into too many details on here so I'll leave it at that. No adoption date is set yet, I'm sure it won't be for at least 5 more months. I'm pretty sad, but also somewhat relieved knowing that he is safe and doesn't have to be put through any future craziness.  It's a strange mix of emotions.  She can still appeal, of course. We will see! He real...

Gross, I know. I'm sorry. I just have to get this out there. This takes a lot of courage for me to write, but I am putting it out there because I think maybe other people struggle with these things too. And we should help each other, if we can. We have a problem.  Our oldest daughter, who is nearly 7, has been peeing in her room for about the past year and a half (maybe more). At first, when she started sleeping without diapers on at night, she would come out of her room seriously 20+ times to go to the bathroom. Every 5 minutes, at least. She'd go, pee a tablespoon, then go back in her room. Rinse, repeat.  Finally we put the kabosh on that and said look, it's OK to come out of your room at night, but, like, after you go to sleep. I mean how to you explain to a child who can't tell time when it is OK to come out of her room to go pee? She was staying up til well after 10 p.m. and then being super crabby the next day because she was getting no sleep! So, I'm n...

There was a court hearing on July 26, and we got custody of Peanut. His bio mom didn't show up to court, so even though we came to court it was over in only a couple minutes and we didn't even set foot in the courtroom. He moved in this past weekend.  It was a mad frenzy of moving furniture, selling stuff on Craigslist to make room, cleaning, etc.  Hubby's parents have approximately 30+ outfits for him - I have never seen a kid with so many clothes! Seriously!  We barely have room for it all!  :p  So far it has been smooth sailing.  He is such a sweetheart, and all of the kids were totally thrilled to welcome him into the crew. Assuming his bio mom confirms the visit, we are taking him to a visit tomorrow. The worker asked us to supervise but I just don't feel comfortable doing it, since we'd have our 5 other kids with us.  It's going to be at the mall, so we are going to take the other kids shoe shopping (the worker did find someone else to superv...

We found out that Peanut's TPR hearing is coming right up, on August 14.  Today would have been his dad's 45th birthday. I'm very sad for him, that he will not have any memories of his dad. We are still waiting on our home study. They haven't gotten my fingerprints back yet. They've gotten hubby's back, and we got fingerprinted on the same day. This makes no sense but we are talking about the government here, it doesn't have to make sense! We also started going to family therapy. Our therapist is really awesome. Whenever D was in therapy it was just him and the therapist talking; I had to beg borrow and steal to get any information at all it seemed.  This therapist is really focused on building our relationship with our kids, and I'm very happy about that! The kids actually have little to no one-on-one time with her; sessions always have me or hubby present along with the kiddo. Nothing too strange or crazy is going on, I just feel like with the re-a...

This weekend we went to visit hubby's mom's family to celebrate her brother's (I think?) 50th wedding anniversary. It was a surprise!  We left Saturday, drove the 5-ish hours, went to the thing (which was at a park), then went to the hotel and crashed. Sunday morning we were woken by Miss Claire saying oh-so-sweetly from her crib "Hi, Ben!"  We were (all 7 of us) in a single hotel room. It was a really nice one, but falling asleep was a little hard.  Anyway. Sunday, we went to an amusement park!  The kids all had a good time. Claire finally, after 3 days of no naps, took a nap in the stroller which was very much needed. We got home that night at nearly 11 p.m.  Claire, Ben, and Miss M all fell asleep in the car on the way home and started SCREAMING hysterically once we arrived home and they had to wake up and go inside.  Ah, the joy of being up late too many nights in a row! I got Claire's diaper changed, and she refused to let me change her clothes so ...

As is sometimes typical with foster care, it seemed we were waiting...waiting...waiting...and waiting. And nothing was happening. Then suddenly things are happening fast, and we're trying to figure out what the heck is going on! Last week the state called to set up a time for us to do a homestudy. We are in a different state from Peanut, but within a 30 minute drive. However, those state lines are a huge pain in the butt! We had our homestudy (part 1, anyway) scheduled for today.  Yesterday, we got a text from hubby's mom (Peanut's current foster placement) that the caseworker told her the next court date will be a TPR hearing. Bio mom didn't show up to her court date last week, which isn't surprising since the Department has no way to get ahold of her.  He also said she has had this happen with other children as well, which I was not aware of. I knew she had other kids, but wasn't sure what their story was. The Adoptions and Safe Families Act requires t...

Well, this weekend we had our May visit with bio mom.  We had planned on Saturday morning at a park, but it rained all morning and was chilly so I asked if Sunday afternoon would be OK.  Can kids play in the rain and not die? Yes. Is it fun for 2 hours especially when it's chilly out? No! We went to this park by her house, so she could walk there and not have to take the bus.  It was beautiful weather, and it was PACKED!  She said there have never been that many people there before when she has gone.  They have a lot to do there, including a splash pad. I didn't know about the splash pad so we didn't bring swimming suits or anything, but it was fine. There was a pond and a giant playground, and trees and grass...what more could you ask for? There were for sure a few really tense moments.  At one point she asked if Y could take off his shoes and walk around the pond.  I don't really like the idea of the kids having their shoes off in a public park i...

I did meet my twin last weekend. OK so we aren't really twins (obviously!) but when I heard her story I was just blown away by the similarities to my own. Our church has had a series of forums this year. One was about infertility, one was about divorce/widowhood, one was about adoption. I didn't make it to any of the other ones but I wanted to attend the adoption forum. They had 3 panelists - one was adopted as a newborn, one was adopted by her father (bio father left her mother when she was 2) and has also adopted a child internationally, and one has adopted 3 children from foster care before having biological children. The woman who adopted from foster care shared a story that was so similar to ours with D.  About living with a child who doesn't want to be adopted, who tells you he hates you, who says he'd rather live in JAIL than live with you.  Who tells you you will never be his mother, who does stupid things and makes poor choices.  Who acts angry all the ti...

I'm writing more about bio family relationships. You can read part 1 and part 2 if you are interested in this on-going, unending saga. When we ended our story last, Bio Mom had stopped talking to me for.  Two weeks later, Ben (our  bio son) gets a letter in the mail. With a return address of our city.  Yup, it's from Bio Mom. Apparently she moved to our city, and didn't say anything.  Well...that's sort of weird, right?  I texted her and let her know we got it and said thank you (it had stickers and a picture in it). She said she mailed letters for the other kids too, on the same day, but we didn't get those letters for another week for some reason (that has happened before so I'm not surprised, our mail is crazy). Then the other kids got their letters.  The outside of the envelopes said "Mommy Hername" on the return address which is what we had all agreed she would be called.  However...on the inside they were all signed "Mom (Hername)...

If you'd like to read Part 1, here is the link. She started talking to me. A lot. Like, every day.  She asked for advice on everything in her life it felt like. She was almost like a child in many ways, not knowing typical things. She said she was drug free and that she had become a Christian, and I believed her (and still do).   Fast forward to December 2016, we happened to be in said city that Bio Mom lived in, visiting our family, and reached out to her to ask if she'd like to see the kids.  I felt like things were going well and like I could trust her, yeah she said some sorta weird stuff sometimes especially about her past but it is what it is. I didn't know what to believe and what not to believe, some of the things she said were so crazy about things that had happened to her, but still. She was making an effort big time and I wanted to reward that. So we picked her up from her house, went to a children's museum there, and went to dinner with her. Every...

This was an incredibly long blog, so I am breaking it up into multiple days Sometimes stuff with bio family is lovely with adoptions. Sometimes, stuff with bio family doesn't exist. There is no contact, everyone just goes on with their merry lives. When we were setting up our contact agreement with Bio Mom (when the state basically told her that she was going to lose her rights, she could sign them over or they could take them) - Bio Mom wanted us to agree to weekly visits.  We said no way, that would not allow the kids to truly attach to us as their parents etc.  So then she asked for monthly. We asked our caseworker, the GAL, anyone else we could get our hands on what was a typical contact agreement like, spent a lot of time talking it over, looking up info online on what was "normal" etc. We came up with twice a year as what we were comfortable with. She said she didn't want to be like "santa clause or the easter bunny", that if that was all we...