Upon Closer Inspection
I can remember sitting in the doctor's office as a little girl with a Highlights magazine in my hand, staring at the seek and find. It was always a bummer when someone had the audacity to use a pen and circle the hidden objects. I mean talk about ruining it for the rest of us! But if it was clean of precircled objects, I'd happily gaze at the picture trying to find every item on the list. There was the butterfly in the bark of the tree or the ice cream cone hidden in a fluffy patch of clouds. But then you'd get something like a needle or a top and try as I may, it wasn't there! So, I'd have to start over with finger to the paper, covering every centimeter, trying to locate the last hidden treasure.
That's pretty much what life is like right now. We've officially had the kids in our custody, 24/7 for two months. If you stop by to drop off a meal or happen upon us out in town and have asked how things are going, I probably told you life is very "tiring." I don't know when it won't be like this, but usually when people ask how things are going, I'll tell you that we have one who some days wakes up in a foul mood and then makes her younger siblings cry just because she can, or the one who waits until I finish explaining what she cannot do and then smiles as if I've told the funniest joke, there's the 13 year old who sulks when she doesn't feel she's getting enough attention or gets jealous of her siblings when they get a little individual love, and if I have to repeat "put down the cat!" one more time, my head might start to spin and pop off. I of course know that the cat has claws, that cat will embed said claws in skin when she feels insecure, and am trying to prevent injury, but obviously in little minds around here, my words are just one way I'm trying to kill the fun.
Truth is, you may not want to hear or even read this dismal list of grievances, but honestly, it's what comes to the front of my brain these days. Probably because all of these things we are working through scream the loudest in our lives.
Just like I did with the Highlights seek and find, I've had to take the past couple of days and stick my finger in every inch of the past two months looking for the hidden treasure.
So....
We had one child who used to constantly crack her knuckles, shake out her fingers and make this clicking sound. We thought of them as nervous ticks, and she's almost stopped doing them completely.
We have another child who every time we tried to talk to her, if she was already occupied with something she was interested in, she'd stick up her hand like "not right now" and not even glance our way. Needless to say, that was slightly irritating. Now, I can't remember the last time she's done that.
The 13 year old? She peppers our days with stories of life with "otras mama" or other mom. Now, that may bother some to have a kid talk about her other family before us, but for us, it means we've made our home a place where she feels comfortable sharing what life was like in her past. And she needs to be able to share, and we need to be parents that she feels will listen.
When we first got home, our littlest would run out the front door, without shoes, into the yard or the road on his bike without a care or any other person. I thought, we are going to have to install a bolt on the door, or I will never be able to use the bathroom without the security that he won't be two streets over. And yet, we've explained again and again that he cannot leave without mommy or poppy, and a good 75% of the time he says, "mommy, can I go afuera, por favor?" Yeah, it's not 100%, but it's progress, and shows some English usage!
Our first dinners sort of looked like a Viking smorgasbord, with hands clawing to get the most meat first, or kids who'd start piling on seconds once they tasted something, because they needed to make sure they got what they wanted before someone else took it. I'm surprised someone didn't lose an arm or get stabbed with a fork. However, tonight and most nights, I can safely say we pray first and then pass the food around the table. Does it sometimes stall when someone is so excited to start eating that they forget to pass it on? Yeah, but we just sigh and remind said child that the rest of us want some too.
If you happen to see me out in town, and I look a little scattered sort not quite myself, that's probably a fair assessment. These days are long hours of hard work. One class we took said a brain has to do something 300 times before it will rewrite the neural pathway that was there before. 300 times. 300. I just can't even. But, I do. Every day. And some days, I open my eyes while the sky is still dark and my brain thinks positive hopeful thoughts for the day ahead, and others, I mourn for the days whenI could hand kids some pop tarts and go back to bed for another couple of hours and not worry about what I'd wake up to. I'm not perfect, I'm just trying to survive.
So, tonight, as I do every other night (because I'm not doing it EVERY night), I stood outside the shower twice and got my shirt wet twice as I leaned in and washed two heads of hair. For some reason our youngest girls just won't wash their own hair, even if I get tear free shampoo, they just continue to ask for help. And, one will demand that I stand outside the shower till she's completely finished. There I am waiting in my damp shirt for her to finish scrubbing, only to hand her a towel when she steps out, sort of like some personal attendant. It's one of those things that, yeah, I wish I was doing something else while I wait staring at the same piece of art on my bathroom wall every other night. But, one of those heads of hair was laying in my lap tonight while I played with the freshly watched curls and stayed there through an entire movie, holding my hand by the end.
Are we tired? Yes. But are we hanging in there and having moments of progress? Yes, I think we are. It all depends on how I look at it.
That's pretty much what life is like right now. We've officially had the kids in our custody, 24/7 for two months. If you stop by to drop off a meal or happen upon us out in town and have asked how things are going, I probably told you life is very "tiring." I don't know when it won't be like this, but usually when people ask how things are going, I'll tell you that we have one who some days wakes up in a foul mood and then makes her younger siblings cry just because she can, or the one who waits until I finish explaining what she cannot do and then smiles as if I've told the funniest joke, there's the 13 year old who sulks when she doesn't feel she's getting enough attention or gets jealous of her siblings when they get a little individual love, and if I have to repeat "put down the cat!" one more time, my head might start to spin and pop off. I of course know that the cat has claws, that cat will embed said claws in skin when she feels insecure, and am trying to prevent injury, but obviously in little minds around here, my words are just one way I'm trying to kill the fun.
Truth is, you may not want to hear or even read this dismal list of grievances, but honestly, it's what comes to the front of my brain these days. Probably because all of these things we are working through scream the loudest in our lives.
Just like I did with the Highlights seek and find, I've had to take the past couple of days and stick my finger in every inch of the past two months looking for the hidden treasure.
So....
We had one child who used to constantly crack her knuckles, shake out her fingers and make this clicking sound. We thought of them as nervous ticks, and she's almost stopped doing them completely.
We have another child who every time we tried to talk to her, if she was already occupied with something she was interested in, she'd stick up her hand like "not right now" and not even glance our way. Needless to say, that was slightly irritating. Now, I can't remember the last time she's done that.
The 13 year old? She peppers our days with stories of life with "otras mama" or other mom. Now, that may bother some to have a kid talk about her other family before us, but for us, it means we've made our home a place where she feels comfortable sharing what life was like in her past. And she needs to be able to share, and we need to be parents that she feels will listen.
When we first got home, our littlest would run out the front door, without shoes, into the yard or the road on his bike without a care or any other person. I thought, we are going to have to install a bolt on the door, or I will never be able to use the bathroom without the security that he won't be two streets over. And yet, we've explained again and again that he cannot leave without mommy or poppy, and a good 75% of the time he says, "mommy, can I go afuera, por favor?" Yeah, it's not 100%, but it's progress, and shows some English usage!
Our first dinners sort of looked like a Viking smorgasbord, with hands clawing to get the most meat first, or kids who'd start piling on seconds once they tasted something, because they needed to make sure they got what they wanted before someone else took it. I'm surprised someone didn't lose an arm or get stabbed with a fork. However, tonight and most nights, I can safely say we pray first and then pass the food around the table. Does it sometimes stall when someone is so excited to start eating that they forget to pass it on? Yeah, but we just sigh and remind said child that the rest of us want some too.
If you happen to see me out in town, and I look a little scattered sort not quite myself, that's probably a fair assessment. These days are long hours of hard work. One class we took said a brain has to do something 300 times before it will rewrite the neural pathway that was there before. 300 times. 300. I just can't even. But, I do. Every day. And some days, I open my eyes while the sky is still dark and my brain thinks positive hopeful thoughts for the day ahead, and others, I mourn for the days whenI could hand kids some pop tarts and go back to bed for another couple of hours and not worry about what I'd wake up to. I'm not perfect, I'm just trying to survive.
So, tonight, as I do every other night (because I'm not doing it EVERY night), I stood outside the shower twice and got my shirt wet twice as I leaned in and washed two heads of hair. For some reason our youngest girls just won't wash their own hair, even if I get tear free shampoo, they just continue to ask for help. And, one will demand that I stand outside the shower till she's completely finished. There I am waiting in my damp shirt for her to finish scrubbing, only to hand her a towel when she steps out, sort of like some personal attendant. It's one of those things that, yeah, I wish I was doing something else while I wait staring at the same piece of art on my bathroom wall every other night. But, one of those heads of hair was laying in my lap tonight while I played with the freshly watched curls and stayed there through an entire movie, holding my hand by the end.
Are we tired? Yes. But are we hanging in there and having moments of progress? Yes, I think we are. It all depends on how I look at it.
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