Get to the Point

A couple days ago Chad's social worker came over for us to complete his plan for this next year.  As we finished we also discussed our adult daughter and how things are going for her.  She has a team of providers and e-mails are sent to all on a fairly regular basis when there is a problem that needs our attention.  She said with a sly grin that she loved how blunt I was and said she sits there reading it saying, "Go Paula Go."  I took it as a compliment and that it makes her job easier when we, as guardians,  just state the facts and what our thoughts/decisions are.  It's the power of guardianship.  We get to make the decisions and generally others have to carry them out.  We have that power for three adult children, including Robby who was our foster son for 14 years.

I was contemplating on whether my bluntness is a good or bad thing and why it is that I've become more curt, particularly as the years go by.  I decided it's partly because I am experienced and feel pretty secure in my decision making when it's necessary and involves my kids.  I also decided it's due to the number of people we make decisions for  and the number of people they have involved in their lives that have to receive and carry out those decisions.  They have many professionals and others involved in every aspect of their lives.  There are seven completely dependent people in our lives and one who is on her way to making some of her own decisions, which is a whole other type of training.  I figure there are close to 50 some professional types who ask us to make decisions regarding their care, work, living arrangements, money, future funeral arrangements - made those decisions for Robby last year, medical care decisions etc.  Being blunt is simply a time saver.  Making small talk takes time.

For awhile Callie had a physical therapist who was freaked out by her impulsivity and was determined that she should wear a helmet.  The kid was like a bat - she never bumped into anything.  She might step on kids that were sitting on the floor in her way - they might have needed helmets - but she was fine.  She worried about table corners etc.  My philosophy was if they had sharp corners in a special ed. room I'm not thinking that's my problem - put protectors on the table corners then.  My other thought was, the kid already stands out in a crowd and we're trying to help her meld,  just how weird do you want to make her look?

When Chad was in his early teens we had someone on his team suggest he needed more age appropriate toys to play with - he liked and still likes - his super heroes.  My reaction was,  "Really?  I know a guy with an entire basement devoted to his toy train hobby.  He's a pilot.  I'm thinking Chad is just fine with his super heroes."  The general rule is they stay at home or in the car,  just like the pilot, know the time and the place to let your inner child out.

There are people in my life that I am gentler with.  I know they need that care and attention and I'm happy to give it.  When it comes to those who are in that "professional" realm, I tend to be the bluntest. Personally I appreciate knowing where people are coming from and I'm really good with straight forward.  It makes it easier for me to be decisive, which I'm thinking helps everyone.  I don't want to hurt people's feelings, but that being said, my emotional energy is pretty spent with the people I'm responsible for here at home and those in our immediate family.  So for anyone who's been on the receiving end of my bluntness I won't apologize, because it's how I cope and my "work" style, shall we say.  Just know it's really nothing personal.   I may just be in a hurry and trying to save both of us some time.

Menial Means Meaningful

Gratitude.  Thankfulness.  Contentment.  Satisfaction.  All great words for the month of November. Many people are submitting daily, or multiple times a day, things or people they are grateful for on facebook.  Maybe it's just inherent in the life I lead, but thankfulness is a feeling I never have trouble realizing.

Today both Shannon and Chad needed showers.  I helped Mark lift Shannon, he showered her and I dressed her and braided her hair.  Mark ran Ella and Jacob to school and I got Chad into the shower.

Every time and I mean every time I perform these, menial if you will, tasks I am overcome with gratitude.  I'm grateful that I can do these things for myself.  I'm grateful that today Shannon enjoyed her shower pain free.  I'm grateful that Chad, generally, has a wonderfully positive attitude and enjoys the process of showering, shaving, lotioning and dressing. I'm ever so grateful my body is strong and the process generally never causes me any physical pain.  I'm grateful for warm, clean water that's there whenever I need it.  I am sometimes absolutely overcome with gratitude and reminded yet again how incredibly blessed I am that I live a life that is so full of meaning and significance.

Always Greener on the Other Side

As long as we've been raising children there have been disparities in the expectations between siblings. Chad joined us when Conor was just 2 and Jonathan was born shortly afterwards.  So, there have always been siblings whose abilities were sharply different than other siblings.  Explaining why this is and why our expectations for the typical will be different takes time and maturity for the kids to understand.

I have often heard complaints about how unfair it was/is that the typicals have to do chores the atypicals didn't.  My approach is generally to try to help them appreciate how blessed they are that they can perform chores or do homework on their own.  Occasionally I'd hear out of exasperation, "I wish I could be like Chad and never have to do anything."  By the way, he did and does do some chores, but his abilities are definitely limited.  That comment would always lead me to ask them to really think about whether they'd like to trade places.  If you were Chad you'd never drive, never date or possibly marry, rarely get to choose what you'd like to eat because you can't cook or learn to, can't take a pain reliever if you have a headache or even tell someone else you need a pain reliever or travel without someone else choosing the time and activity.  "Do you really want to trade places?"

Someone once said to Mark how much they envied Chad as he had such a carefree life.  No worries or troubles.  Mark's reply was essentially what makes you think just because Chad's not worried about business problems like you that his worries are any less important or troublesome.  Maybe his worries are more basic, but if someone forgets to get him lunch at his usual time why would he not be concerned about whether he's ever getting lunch.  What if something frightens him, but he can't tell anyone what that is to be reassured or have it explained.  Mark's feeling was basically, how dare you think just because your concerns involve money or a business that makes them bigger than Chad's basic concerns.  To Chad they are hugely important, doesn't matter if you think so or not.

I never had a kid try to further argue that they'd still rather be him.  Now, I think Chad has a pretty terrific life and he seems quite happy with it.  However, he does have his frustrations and we can't really know if he loves the life we've chosen for him.  He can make some choices, but the pool from which he chooses is decided by us.

I wonder how frustrated Chad would be if he could understand the choices we typicals make and why.  I wonder if it would drive him crazy to think we could have made all kinds of different choices, but didn't choose them because of fear or insecurity.  I'm thinking if I were Chad and became typical overnight I'd have some choice words for me.  "Why didn't you do this, why did you waste time on that?"  "I would have taken advantage of every opportunity if I'd had all that you have."

Isn't that just how it goes.  I always think I know what's best for other people and could do it so much better.  Why wouldn't Chad?  It's what I would do and really that's the point.  Chad is just like me - and you too.

Day 3 and final thoughts on the SO State Meet

Christian and Chad both had their 100M run and walk respectively.  Chad did well and came in 4th which was great for him.  Christian did great and came in first - a gold medal.  He was quite proud of himself.

There are always so many characters who stand out in my mind.  There's Joe who I observed in the staging area with a very crabby look on his face.  A sweet young volunteer was just trying to make small talk and Joe loudly and expressively said, "I should be at work.  I had to take two days off for this?  I'd rather be at work".  Poor volunteer had no idea what to say - I, on the other hand, tried hard to suppress my giggle.

Then there's Dennis - every time I saw him he was grinning and joking with everyone around him.  His joy was just ridiculously contagious.  Who wouldn't want to be around Dennis.  He seemed to have an entourage everywhere he went - no wonder with his infectiously positive attitude.

There was also the young lady who walked with a walker and tipped over the curb falling down hard.  The person with her couldn't get her up alone, but within seconds many hands had her up and were brushing her off.  That's why many of us were there - because we care about this group of people - as a group and individually.

Adoption story #1 - Chad

November is National Adoption Month. One suggestion was to write your adoption story. Well, we have 9, so thought I'd try to write 2 or 3 every week of November.

Our first story begins before our first born was, well, born. When we got married Mark and I discussed whether we would have biological children at all. It was in the heyday of population zero and we were pessimistic about our world and it's future. I told Mark I wanted to at least have one biologically and then we could adopt - and so it began.

In our first job out of college we were houseparents in a group home for mentally retarded adults - there were 21 when we arrived - 2 over the household's limit. As were learned about the lives of our clients we found that the adults who had had loving families to grow up in had fewer mental health issues and were enjoyable people to be around. Several of the clients had spent much of their growing up time in institutions - this was more the norm at the time then the folks who grew up at home. We decided we wanted to adopt a child with special needs and be that difference in their life.

Conor was born Sept. 16, 1980 and shortly afterward we received our foster care license and began providing respite for kids with special needs. There was a family who were featured in a movie called - "Who are the Debolts?" They had adopted 14 children with multiple disabilities and were the pioneers of promoting the adoption of kids considered "unadoptable". The father of the family came to a local adoption seminar and after listening to his inspiring story I was hooked. They brought photo albums with pictures of kids from all over the US who were waiting to be adopted and I was mesmerized by all the beautiful faces.

We met with Children's Home Society and explained the type of child we were interested in adopting - special needs and up to age 8. We were 27 at the time and were sure we could handle anything, I think. As we looked at the Minnesota photolistings we picked out a picture of a beautiful blue eyed blonde who was almost 8 years old, had Down Syndrome and was named Chad. He had been in the book for about 2 years and had recently returned to foster care, thankfully the same one he'd previously been placed in, after a failed adoption. They seemed generally stunned that we'd be interested in a child with his needs and who was so old. Since he was the child who had been waiting the longest and was the oldest - they suggested we start with him. They also suggested that we go to the county for our homestudy as it was unnecessary for us to pay their private fees when the county would do it for free. This was long before the state began paying private agencies to handle special needs adoptions.

So, off to the county we went and attended all the required classes etc. and filled out stacks of paperwork. Our county contacted the Chad's county and a meeting was planned. Our first meeting took place at a restaurant in northern MN where he lived. As we were discussing Chad with his foster mother, a wonderful, patient, Christian woman who seemed a little overwhelmed trying to keep up with him, he dashed into the kitchen and started sticking his hands into the fresh pies on the counter. We had only just met him, but, apparently we were expected to chase after him.

On the drive home we weren't sure what to do, but we also felt as if we'd made the commitment to him from the moment we picked his picture. Then, the unexpected happened and we discovered we were pregnant. This was definitely not in the plan. Again, we just knew that God had chosen Chad for us and we weren't going to back out.

We had at least one more meeting - again in a restaurant - this time he tried to climb over the booth we were sitting in. Thankfully the next visit was in our home where we could control the situation a bit more and in January of 1983 Chad moved in for good. It was a tough transition for all of us. Conor had been an only child, we had had just a 2 yr. old and now had to navigate school and special education. Chad had been placed from the foster home he'd lived in all his life into an adoptive home for six months and then returned and then placed with us - a lot for any kid to figure out let alone one who was nonverbal and developmentally delayed. We had never heard of RAD or reactive attachment disorder. We were basically clueless and didn't really take into consideration all that Chad was experiencing. Frankly, I think we thought we were pretty awesome and who wouldn't want to be with us - it's amazing what difference a little perspective and life experience makes.

For the first weeks, months and years we counted the time till he'd be 16 and we could consider a group home. I know it sounds heartless, but we were just coping as best we could. Those who didn't know Chad as a little guy shake their heads in disbelief that he was ever that busy - he's aged, as have we, and slowed down considerably. That kid who we were sure would kill us off by the time he was 16 turned 36 this past summer and is easygoing and fun to be around. He brings us laughter every day with his silly antics and dance moves. Although, sometimes I think it'd be nice to have some time during the day when everyone is at school and I don't have to think about what to do with Chad when I need to run an errand or something, I don't feel an urgent need for him to move on. Someday, but not today. Thanks Chad for starting us on this adoption journey and thank you for forgiving us for our ignorance and being patient with us as we learned how to be a family who, at least tries, to be full of grace.