Questions, Questions

I have lots of them today. Bear with me. Answer them if you can.  Offer humor if you can. 

1.  Am I unreasonable to expect my almost 16 year-old daughter to be responsible for her own laundry?  And to not let her go out in public with me if she is not clean and appropriately dressed?  This is Leigh we're talking about--  my RAD/OCD/PTSD/Depression/BPD child, who consistently has to be sprayed down before we go somewhere because she smells bad. 

2. Am I unreasonable to NOT allow my almost 17 year-old daughter share a bed behind closed doors with her girlfriend. (She's gay, so this is not a "just a friend," this a "we're dating" girlfriend.)  I'm opposed to any sort of spend-the-nights since they are in HS and I don't care if you're straight or gay, it is not appropriate to spend the night with the person you're dating.  My friend Katie, a lesbian, agrees with me, but she says she's so conservative she beats herself up in the parkinglot. 

3.  Am I unreasonable to expect my teenagers to complete basic housekeeping chores for the good of the family, even if they didn't personally make the mess in question?  My theory is that you ate the damn food that I worked to pay for AND cooked, you can clean up the kitchen. 

4.  And along those lines, if I ask you to do something, and you don't do it or half-ass it, I reserve the right to tell you no to something you want done, just on the backscratching principle.  Right?

5.  Is it wrong that we're still waffling about adopting the babies?  Is that a sign we shouldn't?  Or a sign that for the first time in our adult lives, we're looking at something long and hard before jumping in?

6.  Since Leigh has been off her meds, I have done a lot of thinking. Is it wrong that I plan to bully her into a birth control implant that she can't remove without pain and difficulty?  Is it wrong that I am starting to fantasize about spiking her food with Prozac?

7.  And am I wrong to be FURIOUS and HURT that bio-grandma called Danae's phone?  This is a violation of our agreement to move at our speed on bio-grandma's part; and for Danae, a violation of the promise she made to NOT give her cell number to her bio-family. 


That's all for now.  Thanks.

Firsts...

Today was a day of firsts, some great, some not so great.

We'll start with the happy stuff:  MoMo used the big girl potty, big girl toilet paper and said "Bye-bye peepee!" to her urine as it flushed away.  I've sat her on it several times prior to a bath to get her in the habit, but tonight, she asked without being prompted.  Actually, she was about to be unceremoniously plopped into the tub, skipping the time on the toilet, when she pulled away, went over to the toilet, patted the front of her diaper and pointed at the toilet. 

Also, today, NaNa, went from lying down to sitting up in order to reach for a toy...  all by herself! 

Hooray for the babies!!!

Now, the other first, not so great.  Dawn and Marie are visiting their birth family this week.  The woman they call grandma tried to help Dawn run away at one point, so my respect level for her is pretty much zero.  That, and when I confronted her about it, she started making stuff up about other members of my family.  She's not their grandma, but a neighbor who lived near them when they were kids.

Anyway, I got a text from Dawn today saying that as a welcome home gift, her family had paid for her to get a monroe and her first tattoo.  (A Monroe is a piercing above the lip to look like Marilyn Monroe's famous mole.)  The tattoo is an algae green hibiscus flower down near her hoo-hah.  Yay for us.  Part of what irks me about this is that she texted me yesterday, wanting Hubby and me to pay a deposit on an apartment. Again. 

HAHAHAHAHA.  I ignored that text, choosing to follow my new rule of life: Be nice.

Weekly Wrap-up, June 6

I didn't do a wrapup last weekend because we were out of town, and I'm still planning to share the details, but Hubby's been on second shift all week, leaving me with solo teen and baby duty, which leaves me no time for blogging or anything else.

So here it is, for those of you overdue for your voyeurism fix... the Wrap-up!!

Ridiculous Waste of Taxpayer Money in Education We had another fire drill last week. We had one the last week of May, and again the first week of June. Federal law says we have to have one every month. We have one week of school left, and our kids are just crazy enough that we can’t do it the last week of school.

Worst Mommy Moment: My daughter Leigh has an abscess in her armpit. She is in desperate denial about how it got there…a complete lack of hygiene and using a dirty razor while dry shaving. And she is desperately seeking attention for it. And even after her probation officer made her do pushups for lying to the judge about her grades and it swelled up and burst again, I just can’t get that excited about fussing about the fact that she tried to tell the PO that she wasn’t supposed to be doing pushups. I have however, hidden the pain meds she got, because I caught her trying to take them just because she wanted to.

Best Mommy Moment: Um… Sad to say, I’m not sure I have one. Our weekend trip last weekend was nice, but very stressful, and not at all as relaxing as I needed it to be. So I made everyone stay home today and basically said that we weren’t doing anything because I needed some downtime. So I guess having a selfish mommy moment has worked out because we’ve had a quiet, drama-free weekend.

I’m Glad I Married My Husband because… he did all our laundry at the Laundromat, and I mean ALL of it the morning the bug guy came and gassed the house to kill the fleas. And $120 later, we are mostly flea free!! Thank GodAllahBuddha!!!

Budget Groans: We still need a van. We have two in our driveway, but can’t drive either of them. And since we don’t have the titles on them, we can’t sell them or trade them in. Ugh.

Dawn Moment: She still thinks she’s kind of pregnant, but doesn’t have the money for a test. And she officially has no health insurance now. Yay her!

NaNa Moment: She likes peaches, ranch dressing and ReddiWhip. No so much salsa and bananas. And she likes baths, which makes me happy.

Leigh Moment: It’s been all about the armpit this week. Lanced twice. Sliced and stuffed with “packing” once. Two antibiotics. She pulled the packing out herself today, even though she’s supposed to wait til Monday. Shocking, I know, right? Yeah. Not so much.

Danae Moment: Her girlfriend spent the weekend with us. They feel asleep on the sofa watching a movie, holding hands. Hubby took a picture, and Danae and her GF thought we were going to be mad. I thought it was typical teenager. Hubby thought it was cute that they were holding hands. I think she’s still surprised that we aren’t damning her to hell for being gay.

MoMo Moment: We bought her an inflatable pool and she tried to take the kittens swimming. They were not pleased. She’s also learned that if she steals NaNa’s pacifier it makes her cry. She has also started to tell us no when we say anything to her. She also likes it when you fill her her mouth with ReddiWhip.

Political Grouch Moment: I’m trying not to be a conspiracy theorist here, but after how many weeks we have oil STILL spilling into the Gulf? Really?

Moral Ambiguity Moment: The caseworker newly in charge of adoption assistance called to find out Dawn’s status. We told them that she’d moved out again about two months ago. Hubby got a tongue-lashing for not reporting the change. We were told by the previous caseworker that we’d get a form in the mail every four months to fill out and return, and if there were changes, to report them then. So we were expecting the form any day, and were planning to report the change. I’m trying hard to figure out if I should feel guilty about the two months of assistance that we got while Dawn wasn’t officially living with us.

Looking forward to... our students' last day of school is Friday June 11. Teachers' last day is the 18th, but the 17th is a furlough day. That's loads of fun. I'm looking forward to sauteed shrimp and wild rice tonight, and strawberry shortcake again. Fun with babies and ReddiWhip!!!

Birth Family Drama

Once upon a time, there was an exuberant young couple who were in the throes of their very first adoption, when they heard their soon-to-be-daughter had three sisters who were also somewhere in the foster care system.

At that knowledge, they set off on a quest to find them, and if at all possible, add them to their family.

It was not to be, at least not then.

The youngest, Bethany, had already been adopted.  This is confusing, but bear with me.  Bethany was adopted by her biological father's grandparents.  Her biological father, and his teenage son by another woman, were two of the men who molested and abused the other three girls. Awkward? 

The two oldest, Selena and Danae, were living with a biological great, great-aunt (hereafter referred to as GGA).  We were able to make contact with both families, but not until after we'd written impassioned letters asking a variety of social service agencies to help us bring the sisters back together. 

We were told by one of the caseworkers, prior to meeting GGA, that GGA only wanted to adopt Danae, that she didn't think she could handle Selena.  Then we met GGA, and she told us she was waffling back and forth about the situation.  She didn't want their bio mom to know she had them, and didn't want to hurt them any more than they already had been, but at her age, then 55, she didn't know if she could parent a set of 8 and 9 year-old sisters.

We told GGA that we'd asked Social Services if we could adopt all of them before we'd met her, but that we'd stopped asking when we found out that they'd all been placed for adoption.  Which was true.  At that point, we wanted the girls to be able to stay in touch--letters, phone calls, and "meet us halfway" trips across the state every month or so. 

I should have heard the warning bells go off when she said, "I don't even see my own children that often."

But I didn't.  Then they had a court appearance, at which time GGA had to sign paperwork declaring her intent to adopt both girls.  She said she wanted Danae, but couldn't keep Selena. 

Social worker and judge said, "Adopt them both, or they both go to Cappuccino's family."

That would be reason number 1 that she hates us. 

The second reason came about four years later, when she called out of the blue and wanted to come visit.  She stayed in a hotel, and let the girls stay with us. 

The girls told us about their new caseworkers...  New abuse issues: physical and sexual.  GGA had been crazy beating the girls, while GGU, her hubby, apparantly really liked the fact that they were sprouting girl parts.  They shared some details with us.

I was horrified.  And backed into my own little corner. 

As a teacher, I have no choice. I am a mandated reporter.  So I called Social Services in their county and asked to speak to their caseworker.  And guess what, they'd told me way more than they'd told the caseworker. 

And when they pulled into their driveway after they left their visit with us, a deputy sheriff, case worker and custody order was waiting for them.

And back into foster care they went. GGA called me and proceeded to call me everything but a white girl.

Reason number 2 she hates us.

After monthly calls to social services to try to get sister visitation for Leigh over the next six months, social services threatened us with a restraining order (I still don't see how a once per month phone call to request visitation, or at least a return call from a caseworker, constitutes stalking, but they have the courts and guys with guns on their side.  So I stopped calling.

Three years later, Danae found me on MySpace.  I found out that Selena had gone back to GGA, but that she had refused and was in a group home because there were no foster homes available where she was that would take teens. 

So I called Social Services again to see about visitation. They asked if we wanted her.  This was July of 2008.  Danae moved in with us in January of 2009, and we finalized her adoption in November of 2009. 

Reason number 3.

Now, all that to get to the point at hand:  Selena graduates from high school Memorial Day weekend, in a small town outside of Atlanta.  And (please, please, please GodAllahBuddha, don't let it rain on Saturday!) we'll all be there, because it is an open ceremony. If it rains, we'll have to have tickets, which is a whole other mess, but I have to believe that the Powers That Be would not do that to Danae and Selena, who have only had sporadic contact since their separation in 2008.

(We made plans for them to see each other over Christmas of 2009, we drove the four hours, and GGA canceled.  She was tired and didn't want to leave the house for the ten minute drive to the public venue we'd negotiated.  So we showed up at her house so Danae could give Selena her gifts and at least hug her. GGA was not pleased.)

Needless to say, GGA is VERY not pleased that we'll be at graduation.  I've thought about calling her, but I know it would do no good. 

My heart is hurting in advance, because Danae and Leigh want Selena to hang out with us all weekend, and I know damn good and well that GGA will not let that happen, not even a little bit.

Selena is 17, and does not turn 18 until August 1.  She has not been allowed to get a driver's license or learner's permit.  She has a cell phone that GGA occasionally lets her use, but freaks out if she sees that she's talked to Danae.  Selena has been told that she will only get to go to college if GGA drives her there every day. (Granted, all that is filtered through Danae, but I suspect that there is more truth than fiction there.)

At any rate, Memorial Day Weekend will be VERY memorable...  the question is, for what?