Memories

On the way to Equine Therapy today, Noah saw an ATV on a trailer and that caused him to start recalling a lot of things from a home he lived at while in foster care. Being that this is not something he ever does, it caused Asher and I to listen very attentively. After he finished talking, Asher said, "Well I don't remember anything really..." and I said, "Yes, you do remember things, you've told me before, about when you went back to live with your bio-mom." After that, he whispered to himself, "Well I don't want to think about that." Realizing it was bothering him, I said, "I understand, but you do remember, though." He then said, "Yeah but I don't want those memories, I want all new memories. I want all the bad memories to go away and the good ones to stay." At that point I didn't really know what to say, but then it occurred to me to tell him, "Well you're in luck because you have an amazing brain that records new memories every single day! Not to mention, sometimes those bad memories can help you learn how to stay out of trouble, so we can appreciate them even though something bad happened, good can come out of it too."

Gosh it really hurt my heart to hear that his beginning is still so painful, that he doesn't even want to remember it. But, I know that there will come a time when their good memories will outnumber the bad. I realize their past will always be apart of who they are, but I am hopeful that one day, the good, bad, and ugly will all be able to coexist in harmony, instead of creating more fear and sadness.

I know it's been over a year already, but please keep my family in your prayers. Thanks.

Change

Today when I picked up the boys from school I had some free time in between dropping them off at my mother in law's house and going back to work so I decided to take them to the library that was close by to get a few things. More than anything, it was a tool to keep them occupied and out of mischief while I was away.  Since the boys have been with us, the library has been one of those things they've surprisingly enjoyed doing very much.  I personally don't recall begging to go to the library as a child the way these two do but I suppose if I'd never been given the opportunity to do something like that I would likely feel the same way.  Anyways, their enthusiasm for something as simple as a book that doesn't belong to them whatsoever, is intriguing.

Later on, when it was time to pick them up from their Nanaw's house, we gathered the books and got in the car. As we were headed home Noah said, "Mom I love going to the library so much, can we please please please go more this summer?" Me still being intrigued at the whole idea of them loving books I said, "Man, did y'all not ever get to go to the library before coming here?" Noah and Asher both exclaimed, "NO WAY!! We never did that before." So I said, "Well I guess maybe your last foster mom didn't want to take you because she was afraid some of the books would get ripped up or something."  Noah replied, "Yeah like I did before, I ripped up a book pretty bad once at their house."  Pressing on I said, "Oh yeah?  Why would you do something like that?" He replied, "Well because I was really really mad."  Then as the conversation progressed I asked him, "So how come you don't tear up your library books here at our home?" and Asher said, "Probably because he knows he'll get in trouble!" Noah got annoyed and said, "Nuh uh!! That's not true! I'm not afraid to get in trouble!  But I think because they don't belong to me so I have to take care of them...and well...well because I've changed." Realizing this was somewhat of a breakthrough moment I asked, "What do you mean you've changed?" so he says, "I changed because I feel like I have a more better future and I didn't then. I'm adopted and I know that my life is going to be better now and because y'all have told me that God has a plan for my life."  You have no idea how sweet it was to hear him say these things. I looked at him from the rear view mirror and watched his facial expression as he explained all of this and the confidence on his face was amazing! It blessed my soul to know for certain that this was coming straight from his heart.  Noah is the one that has his guard up at all times, fights to remain control of every situation, goes out of his way to manipulate the world around him and uses his poor speech to confuse others to keep them at a distance/guessing what he's up to. He is not a boy who will bare his heart to just anyone.  In the same moment that he's telling me these things, I realize he's repeating something I told him during a time when he was behaving at his worst and I was floored that he actually took in what I was saying and allowed it to bring forth change.

Even though it was almost a year ago I remember those days like they were yesterday; Noah would frequently have pretty bad crying fits etc. and would usually end up into a fetal position on his bedroom floor. During these times he would lash out at us and/or hurt himself so I didn't really want to get close to him whatsoever. As a matter of fact, I usually wanted to be as far away from him as possible.  At this point he'd only been in our home for a month or so and we had a lot of turmoil already and I was simply exhausted. Regardless, during these times I would go into his room and crawl up next to him on the floor and sit down.  My first inclination was to ask him what was wrong but most of the time he'd sit there and give me nothing but outlandish behaviors in return.  He'd usually begin to talk 'out of his head' about things that didn't make any sense (a tool he uses to scare others away) and when I would try to offer him advice, he'd roll his eyes as if nothing I was saying was of any importance.  However, in a few of these moments when he wanted nothing more but for me to back away, he'd say things like, "My life is ruined and I'm going to grow up and go to prison and I don't want to go there" or "I'm ugly and I do bad things" "I'm a horrible person, I'm so mean" or "I feel like I'm a bad kid and will die and go to hell" and then immediately resume his behaviors making it very difficult to want to continue trying to get him to calm down.  However, when he'd say this I'd respond by saying, "You know, God spoke to me about you before you even got here and he's got a plan for your life and it doesn't include prison" "You are exactly the son God wanted us to have and you're perfect for our family" and "Put your trust in God and you won't have to worry about dying/going to hell" or "One of these days you're going to be healed and you won't be like this anymore."  However, no matter what I said, he'd continue behaving erratically and I'd end up leaving the room so he could get himself together. I'd end up even more exhausted and not knowing whether anything I said made any difference so eventually I just stopped trying all together. But today, today I realize it did make a difference and I'm blessed because of it.  Let me tell you, it's HARD to keep track of the progress when you have children in your home that constantly display difficult behavior on a daily basis. But it's in the moments like these when he's unaware that he's opening up, where I get the most encouragement. Just to know that we're actually getting somewhere when it seems like we take one step forward and two steps back most days.  My boys are hard, they're the two toughest little beings I've ever met but little by little, they let us catch a glimpse of the real kid inside and I'm in love with what I see. 

We still have turmoil filled days, but at least now I know that what I say during these tumultuous times has the potential to bring forth change in his heart, whether it be now or later, and I will continue to try no matter how bleak it looks.  

Asher's song

It's almost an entire year later and Asher is writing songs to God at school about wanting to stay here. All I could do was hug him and assure him through my tears that he wasn't going anywhere. Times like these prove to me that God sees my heart and knows exactly how to reassure me that I'm doing okay. I judge myself daily about the kind of mother I am and question whether I'm any good at it, especially questioning if I'm sharing the love of Jesus as much as I should with them. Of course the ruler by which I'm measuring myself I'm always coming up short but I'm thankfully the Ruler of this universe sees me fit.  I am so thankful.

His trauma our trauma

I've learned throughout our adoption journey with the boys not to get too comfortable for too long.  As a matter of fact, I've become rather good at sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for the other shoe to drop, hoping and praying it won't, but it always does...at least for now.

When Asher came to us, he was nothing short of two handfuls of trouble.  As small, innocent looking, and adorable as he was, and still is, his 6 year old butt could turn the house upside down before you even knew what was coming.  Spunky and full of life, every therapist we came in contact with warned us we'd have a roller coaster ride with him. Boy were they right. Lol!  From day one we struggled with him and his ornery behavior, at home, at school, EVERYWHERE!! Let me put it this way, he's the kind of boy that not only craves attention, he DEMANDS it.  Positive attention, negative attention, whatever else kind of attention, he doesn't care as long as all eyes are on him. He's willing to scream, cry, say terribly mean things, lie, cheat, steal, break things, poop his pants, manipulate his brother into getting in trouble, sneak around the house in the middle of the night taking and hiding things, disrupt class, refuse to do his schoolwork, refuse to follow directions, and whatever else you can think of...ALL...FOR...ATTENTION. Needless to say it's been a very difficult ride with him, and at times I'm not sure I'd do again if I knew then what I know now. For five whole months we went through this with him over and over, always the same thing, day in and day out. Some behaviors would come and go, and some would rotate back around, but it was always something. There were days when my stress level was so high, I didn't know how I made it through.  But then one day in October of last year, all the drama just seemed to fade away and what was revealed was an incredibly bright, sweet, and eager to please little boy.  He started embracing adoption, embracing us as his parents, becoming more trustworthy, being sweet to his teacher, excelling in every subject, and for the first time in his entire life he came home with good behavior at school consistently. My what a breath of fresh air that was and I thought we'd finally arrived!  Thought.

I knew better than to get too comfortable but this time was different, it lasted three three whole months for God's sake!!  Yet, what I assumed was our 'real child' turned out to be a small glimpse of who he truly is underneath all of that hurt.  After all of this progress, sometime at the end of January and little by little, things started going backward.  Stuff started disappearing again, misplaced items, broken things shoved into drawers they have no business being in, instances where he'd dupe Noah into getting in trouble etc.  Then came the lying, argumentative/disrespectful attitude towards authority again.  It was almost overnight.  I noticed a few things here and there but it wasn't until his teacher called me out of the blue one day asking if someone had died in the family or if something had happened to him because she was that concerned!  The only thing going through my mind was, HERE WE GO AGAIN!  And there we went, right back down the same dark path I thought we were finally free from.  I questioned him if someone had hurt him or if someone was bullying him but the answer was always no.  But the fact of the matter was, he wasn't the same kid, he didn't even look like himself in the eyes, and it was clear that something did happen to him, we just didn't know what.

One sleepless night after pining about it for a few days I asked some fellow adoptive mothers to see if they had some insight and one of them made a comment about triggers of past trauma that flicked the light bulb on in my head. I remembered that when I read their CPS file, I wrote down some important info/dates and tucked it away if and when there came a day when we needed them.  Figuring there might be a clue somewhere, I pulled that paper out and glanced at it. When I was almost to the end, my heart almost fell out of my chest.  Right there scrawled sloppily across the paper in black ink was, "Asher was reunified with bio mom and sister 1/26/12, Asher was returned to the children's shelter 2/21/12." My poor son.  Here was a kid who'd been removed at a year old, whose life was seemingly always foster care with short visits here and there with his biological parents, who had finally found himself at rest...a place he thought was HOME. Yet not even a month later there he was, ripped away, heading back to the children's shelter. Yeah something happened alright, something terrible, something absolutely unequivocally painful happened.  Let me tell you, the mind can forget, but the heart never forgets.

Since finding this out I've attempted to get him to verbalize his feelings to see if any of this would come out but it always fell on deaf ears until today, but I suppose he was finally ready.  Of course he's been grounded for his behavior because we can't just stop the discipline, but instead of leaving him behind with Bob today while I shopped, I decided to take him along to the store with me.  Not even a minute into the car ride there it came, memories long forgotten just rolling right off his tongue like it was yesterday.  He started off by saying, "Most of the time I forget, but if I think back far enough, back back back, I can remember it all..." and then came the tales of being back with his bios at their apartment for that short month.  I sat quietly listening to him tell me about them leaving them with a male neighbor sometimes but other times all alone at 4 years old with his younger disabled sister while they worked, sometimes even putting a few dollars into his pocket before they left. Sneaking out of the house and down the street alone to the corner ice cream/candy shop, no doubt to see what he could steal. He said sometimes he'd even hide behind the store by the dumpster and just watch people but he always came back home before 'mom' caught him. They didn't have a car and walked just about everywhere they went but sometimes they'd ride in a taxi. He said his parent's really 'trusted' him and 'trusted' that the neighbors would watch over them when they left. I was dumbfounded, I didn't even know what to say. All I could think of and still up to this minute was, who the hell are these people??  What caseworker in their right mind would do something like this to my son?? What parent leaves a 4 year old and his DISABLED little sister alone?? I just can't fathom it.  What an injustice they did to my sons heart by sending him back there, and not just to him but to us because we're now paying the price.  His trauma has become OUR trauma, and FOR WHAT??  Reunification above all else?  PLEASE!!

I'm just thankful to God for watching over him and thankful that he didn't spend any more than twenty seven days back in their care because I'm certain he wouldn't be here if he did. I can't even imagine the emptiness and confusion he's been dealing with. My only hope now is that all of this will pass as we head into March and his heartache and pain subsides for a while. I know it'll just cycle back around again but I'll welcome any kind of break we can get. At least by this time next year we'll know what to expect.

Please pray for my kiddo's and for God to give us the wisdom we need to get through times like this. 

Perfect

I was so proud of Noah today. During speech therapy he was having a hard time getting the words out the way he wanted so his therapist explained to him that no one speaks perfectly and that there is not one perfect person in this world. After listening to what she had to say he responded by saying, "Well except God and Jesus, THEY are the only perfect ones!" and all I could do was sit quietly and grin.

This is the same kid who struggles sometimes every minute of the day with OCD and his obsession with perfection. Every word he utters and every movement he makes is consumed by it.  Sometimes as I watch him struggle with simple everyday tasks we all take for granted, and believe me y'all it's really difficult to watch, I can feel the frustration build inside me. At the same time my inner most being screams, "Just tie your shoes for God's sake, it's not that hard!! C'mon Noah, put the towel in the dirty clothes, JUST PUT THE TOWEL IN THE DIRTY CLOTHES!!" as he fumbles wildly, shaking, and ticing, having to accomplish it until it feels 'just right' in his world.  I'm not going to tell you that I don't have moments where the frustration gets the best of me where I actually say those words OUT LOUD because shamefully, I do. There are days I am weak from the stress of watching him consumed by his inner turmoil, on those days the tension is palpable, on those days I tend to slip up, on those days I feel like the worst mother in the world.  Yet, there are times when I somehow muster up the ability to stifle the frustration and anger I feel towards OCD and what it does to my son, and the words I choose to let beyond these lips are, "Son, there's no perfect way to speak and there's no perfect way to do anything.  Jesus is the only perfect one and He can help you." Before today I truly felt like those words fell on deaf ears as he would seemingly bypass what I said and continue doing what he was doing before. Even after saying that, most of the time I have to physically remove things from his hands or lead him away from a situation, and sometimes I have to make him redo whatever it is ten or more times until he stops and does whatever it is without performing any rituals. This life isn't for everyone but albeit, it's mine. This is the son God chose for me, and though he's far from ever being 'perfect' (whatever perfect is anyway) he's a part of God's perfect plan for my life and I am thankful.

I know that one day Noah will be healed and though I can't see the bigger picture or have all the answers as to how it's going to work out, I rest in knowing that God's ways are not my ways. He's never lied to me and He's never let me down and He will work it all out according to his perfect plan.

Realness

Forgive me followers for I have sinned!  It has been exactly six months and four days since my last confession. We have been so busy learning this whole parenting thing that I rarely have the time to sit down and blog anymore but the fact of the matter is, I still need an outlet. Anyway, moving on.


I figured I would share a moment of realness we had with our youngest son today.  This is an extremely rare occasion so when it happens, it most definitely is share worthy.

Today we had long time plumber friend of ours come over that the boys had never met to fix our water heater.  As he was on his way out the door he said something to the effect of, "Congratulations on finalizing your adoption next month! That's so exciting!" Out of nowhere my youngest son responded by saying, "Yeah me and my brother were in foster care and I hate foster care!" "Our parents were bad parents so we had to get adopted."  "They fought a lot...and I don't like seeing them fight." "But I have them now, (pointed to us) and they're good parents and I get to live in a home with peace!"

OH. EM. GEE.

You could have heard a pin drop at that point.  It was an awkward silence...a very definite awkward silence...but if there ever was a time when my heart both broke and welled up with happiness, it was in this moment. (I never knew such an feeling was possible.)  This is a child that has said weekly in the beginning that he misses/loves his parents and he wants to go back with them. He has also talked about turning 18 and finding his mother or moving far away with her. However, in just a few short sentences, he powerfully summed up his seven years on this earth without any inhibitions and bared his heart. My own heart broke to hear the pain, sadness, and loss he endured but yet at the same time it flooded with happiness in awe at the goodness of God who thought him worthy of a happy ending that includes Bob and I and that he was finally embracing it.

Though we mercilessly pursued them, when my boys came home, my life became virtually unrecognizable. It may sound insensitive but there were nights that I cried myself to sleep wondering how I got us into this mess and if it would ever be okay. I had moments of jealousy and resentment and that in its self led to feelings of guilt knowing that I felt that way when they were relying on me to be the best mom I could be. I honestly wondered if I would ever learn to love my new 'normal.' Yet through this journey I was handed a mirror into my inner most being and with it God has been revealing to me that though I need his help daily to be even a little good, I'm equipped with a strength and endurance that I never knew existed within me to bare their brokenness. Though I tend to forget to say it out loud, it especially resounds in my mind in times like these that all of the long days, sleepless nights, stress, behaviors, and extremely uncomfortable moments endured are a blessing and I am privileged to have been chosen for this life. 



With love,
Hannah

Overnight visit

Last weekend we were able to have our 1st overnight visit with the kids.  Boy were we excited!  A whole 24 hours with the boys was exactly what we needed following all of the sadness we'd endured with my father-in-laws passing the week prior.  Talk about an emotional roller coaster because in the midst of all of our sadness there was a deep longing to be with our kids, we missed them so incredibly much.  After having a late Friday evening wrapping up the drawing and with very little sleep, we got up as early as possible and got down the road.  The trip to SA was grueling but the closer we got to our babies the more energy we had to keep going on. Let me just say this, that toll road that starts in Round Rock with the 85mph signs aligning it is AMAZING. Lol!  Driving that got us there in record timing! When we arrived our kiddos were outside playing basketball with their foster father and several other foster kids. Once they realized we were there and watching, they started showing off for "mom and dad!" But in order to keep from wasting too much time we got all of their stuff together and we were off to start our day! It was too early to check into the hotel so we decided to go to lunch and then shopping for a few things we needed for our time together.  The boys did so good!  I learned just how picky our oldest is when it comes to food. There are a lot of tasty things he does NOT like but I'm confident that it will change as things progress.  I mean c'mon, the child doesn't like mac n cheese for the sake of all that is holy!!  I asked him, "Exactly what kind of child are you?!"  Haha!  But it is what it is and he's mine all mine. :)  At the store I had to go to the ladies department to get a sports bra and figured I'd leave the boys with Bobby to keep from embarrassing them and myself, but do you think that worked?!  NO!  My youngest told Bobby that he wanted to see me and my husband realized that it was a security thing with him so he brought them over conveniently as I was holding up a nice bra to my chest!! They were giggling at me and I couldn't help but laugh back with embarrassment and hide the bra behind my back all red faced.  Lol! I guess that's going to be a first of many silly "mommy" moments so I had better get use to it. 

When we finished lunch and shopping we headed to the hotel to get checked in and ready to swim.  We had purposely picked a hotel that had an indoor pool so that we could stay in with the kids and have fun. My my you'd have thought the boys were at Disney Land!  They were jumping with excitement to get their swim suits on and get to the water.  When we got there I was busy blowing up floaties for our youngest and the oldest just jumped right on in like nothing!!  Apparently he can swim like a fish and thoroughly enjoys it.  Our baby took things a little slower and chose to cling to me a bit at first even with the floaties on but he got over that pretty quickly and was able to practice swimming, floating, and jumping off of Bobby's shoulders, eventually without the floaties. We spent all of 3 hours in the pool having a great time and unbelievably they never ran out of energy once.  It was so much fun! After that we went back to the hotel room and took baths/showers, ordered dinner, and popped in a movie.  The boys were so happy to cuddle up with Bobby and I.  It really seemed like they couldn't get close enough to us and we loved every minute of it. At one point my youngest asked me if he could call me mommy and I said yes. That hit me at the core and made me so happy.  Of course throughout the weekend he went back and forth between calling me mom and Hannah but that's to be expected and I'll take as many "mom's" as I can get. 

When we were done with the movie and it was time for bed, our littlest said he wanted to sleep with me and for brother to sleep with Dad so we agreed and got under the covers. He then jumped on top of me and said in a sweet little voice, "Hold me I'm your little baby!!!!"  Lol! What's funny is all day long he'd been telling me, "I'm NOT a baby I am a BIG boy!" but as soon as night came there he was getting as close to me as he possibly could begging to be rocked and coddled and that's exactly what he got.  After he fell asleep I noticed that my oldest was having some trouble sleeping. He was pulling on his covers, sitting up and looking around in the dark, and tossing around unable to get comfortable.  So I got up and told him to get in bed with his brother and asked him if he wanted me to rub his feet.  He said yes so I put his feet in my lap and started working. It wasn't two minutes and he was out and I was a proud momma at that moment.

When I finally laid down myself I was so tired but still couldn't sleep because every sound they made caused me to wake up and immediately check on them. I just wanted them to be okay and it didn't matter if it was at the expense of my own rest.  I'll never forget the feeling of being so exhausted but not caring at all, it was mind boggling. I know this sounds crazy but in that moment and probably for the first time, "I" didn't matter to me as much as they did. It's the closest I've ever been to loving something completely unselfishly.  Even in marriage there's a measure of selfishness that married couples need to have because marriage is a give and take type of relationship.  One spouse can't continually take without giving because the other will eventually grow empty, weary, and feel forgotten about. But there's something supernatural that happens in a parent/child relationship that isn't revealed until you experience it first hand. This magic, this mysterious happening, is all about sacrificing your own self to make sure your child has everything he/she needs in the world and I'm convinced that this mystery reveals the very picture of how God sees us.  We are His children, chosen before the foundation of the earth, and for us He created the earth and sacrificed everything he had to get back what the enemy tried to steal. The very reason why we have the gift of grace and forgiveness is because of a loving father who was willing to give it all up to reconcile us back to Him through crucifying of Christ, his pride, joy, and most prized possession. I am by no means comparing myself to God but it is in this journey that I'm beginning to see and love Him in a whole new light.  There are many many facets to our creator and we haven't even scratched the surface of his goodness.

The next morning we woke early to attend church with the boys for Easter service.  Boy were my guys handsome!  Bobby bought a new outfit and our two rascals had on the cutest little suits I've ever seen. The Biffels were lookin' good!  :) Once we arrived at the church we asked the boys if they wanted to go to the children's service but they said they wanted to stay with us so we went and sat down.  The music and message was so uplifting and amazing that we stood and clapped several times and both boys joined us as well.  It was so funny! When church was over we headed back to our boys foster home where they were planning a HUGE Easter celebration for the kids. Apparently their foster mother is one of three foster moms in her family so everyone and their children/placements get together at their house because they live on a pretty big piece of land with lots of space for a nice egg hunt.  They had lots of food, activities, and fun set up for the bio/foster kiddos there and it was nice, but there was a distinct difference of how the foster children were treated from the family children.  I wasn't too thrilled about that. Aside from the match events we've attended, I've never seen so many foster children together in one place before so as always, it was enlightening.  Some of them were pretty rough looking but there was an occasional sad one here and there.  You can see the sadness and confusion in their little eyes, it's palpable at times. But I've learned that this is the reality of foster care.

After the egg hunt was over and the celebration was coming to an end, it was late and time for us to head back to Fort Worth.  None of us were happy about it, AT ALL. We had to coax our boys to walk us to the car to say our goodbyes because they they didn't want to. As we were telling them how much fun we had and that we were going to miss them, our littlest said, "Okay BYE!" as if to say that he didn't care about us anymore and to just leave like everyone else does and that really hurt. It was as if in that moment we were no different than every other person who had abandoned them and that is not a place I ever want to be again. But regardless Bobby and I dismissed that by continuing to tell them how we loved them and how much we were going to miss them and that nothing was going to keep us from being a family forever one day soon.  That seemed to make him crack a smile but he was still looking down at the ground.  He then began to beg us to stay and come back tomorrow and next weekend while our oldest hugged and kissed us over and over telling us how much he loved us and was going to miss us so much. It was heartbreaking.  We got into the car and shut the door and the boys ran ahead and stood by a tree waving and blowing kisses at us and as we were pulling off ran beside the car a little bit yelling, "Bye, we love you, we miss you, bye!!" Needless to say by that time Bobby and I were bawling like babies while watching our boys disappear in the rear-view mirror. My only hope from this day forward is that we have more hugs and kisses and less goodbyes because I don't think we can take much more of that.

Please pray for our boys as we all continue to wait for their homecoming. The days seems to be getting longer the closer it gets and that is especially hard on them.  I can only imagine how they must be feeling but I know that God is merciful and will take care of them while we're apart. 



Hannah