You Can Say No, But...

When you go through the foster licensing process, there is a special form you have to fill in. It is just a long, long, long checklist of diagnoses and descriptions. You have to say yes or no to each on that list.  My husband and I have filled it in three separate times. 

It is a little like a game. We sit staring at one another as the social worker reads each item on the list. The game is trying to answer the same as your partner.  Not really, our rule is that if one says no, then the answer is no, but still. 

It isn't actually a game, but trying to be playful takes the ick off the process. It feels so wrong rejecting unknown kids based on the things that oughtn't define them. At the same time, it is an important step in the process. First, it compels careful consideration (Accidental alliteration! score!) by the prospective family. You have to talk about what you're willing and able to do. 

When we lived in a teeny apartment, a wheelchair was not an option, so we needed to say no. My husband and I have taken ASL classes and love the language, so we said yes to children who were deaf or hard of hearing. We had two aging dogs, so cruelty to animals was a no-go for us. ADHD and dyslexia are in the water we drink, so those were easy yeses for us, too. If you don't think you can do it, you should say no, because these kids coming from hard places need to be welcomed.

So, you do the icky list. It's rough, but get through it and take it seriously (while you're having fun) and say your no. It matters...until it doesn't.

Yep, that's the catch. Just like with biological kids, there is a lot out of our control with foster and adopted kids. Life happens. And people living in dinky apartments sometimes end up needing to use wheelchairs.

We made our list this time around, too. There are things we said no to that are now part of our lives. The difference is that we aren't talking about abstract experiences or diagnoses. They are our little girls and there is no backing out now--and we wouldn't dream of it.

Pivot!

We bought the girls bunk beds with a trundle! So exciting! Our littlest broke her crib months ago and her mattress has been on the floor since then.  Not ideal. In fact, it's not allowed if we were still licensed to foster.

We finally resolved it by purchasing a bed.  My husband and I had fun--well, I did, anyway--moving the beds between two rooms to see if we could get all three into one space to open up the other room for play. The obvious solution? Bunks!

Off we went in search of the perfect space-saving sleepers. And we found one with a trundle, no less. Marvelous! Everyone was so excited!

But reality. Predictably unpredictable, the girls were triggered. It took about 24 hours for one to come talk with us. Another hasn't said anything, but she is acting oddly enough that even this dope-of-a-mom figured out she has things going on, too.

Well, poop. Time to pivot. 

I let the girls know that we will keep all the new beds separate and where their old beds were--no designated playroom or group sleeps--for now.  OH! They were all so sad. I worked to explain that Daddy and I wanted this as badly as they did. But the Bible teaches us that we make our plans, and the Lord directs our steps. It is so important to move forward with our plans in a way that we are interruptible and redirectable. 

This is the life. It is true for everyone, really. But it is pronounced when raising children exposed to trauma. We can and should plan. But, as a precious friend always says, we must hold those plans loosely. It would be foolhardy to press on with a plan God doesn't endorse. He knows so much more and loves so much better than we do. It's ridiculous to not lean on His understanding and welcome His will.

When we do stack the beds, it will be at the right time, and it is going to be a party!

It Seemed Like Such a Good Idea

 It took days to shake the image from my mind.  My daughter, with safety goggles propped up unsafely on her head, left hand on a piece of wood, right hand aiming a power drill at the same piece of wood, was grinning at me as I entered the area.  To be abundantly clear, her eyes were on ME while her finger was on the trigger of the drill aimed at her hand. Can you see it? I can't STOP seeing it.

The day started so beautifully.  It was a Friday that my husband had off. The girls actually slept in a bit. We had a peaceful breakfast. The weather was nice enough for them to play outside, which they did without a fuss. After a leisurely morning, we thought it would a great idea to spend the afternoon at the science museum.  We had been once before, and it was just the last hour that the place was open.  It went well, so this seemed a great way to fill a few hours.

When we got there, one of our girls was attacked by ADHD FOMO. She couldn't focus on anything because her eyes kept wandering to other areas to see what she was missing. She was totally overwhelmed. 

Next we tried to sit through an astronomy film on the domed screen.  That was just silly, expecting 4, 7, and 9-year-old girls to be still for that long.  Bust.

So we headed for the "Maker" area. Crafting is my girls' idea of heaven. It is the one activity that can occupy the bigs for hours. There were several stations within the area, and I settled into one with the littlest.  The other two wandered around, getting the lay of the land.  They settled in the wood-working area. When the baby followed them, I did, too.

Which is when I got my haunting nightmare image that won't leave me alone.  My husband was setting each up at a different station and had given instructions to the eldest first. Then she apparently ticked every box of instruction and did the opposite. Safety goggles? Certainly not on her eyes. Placement of hands? Certainly right where the drill is going to go. Where do you look when your hand is on the trigger? Well, obviously never at the drill itself. Be still my heart!

Homeschool Curriculum

I am excited about the next homeschool year because I decided to write the curriculum myself. I am a diehard Sonlight fan and used it to school my first two children from first grade to twelfth. I shopped around and landed back at Sonlight for my girls.

When I made the purchase (with no little kicking myself for getting rid of most of it from the first time around), the price hurt a bit. Then I made adjustments to how we were schooling, which led to more purchases. At the time, I was earning a little income from the job I left to homeschool. I knew that would not be the case any other year.

I was browsing at a local bookstore with my husband and we were looking at some of the great deals they offered.  Offhand as we left, I said, "I'm going to just write my own curriculum and get books from there." I took myself by surprise because I hadn't realized how much I'd been thinking about it until it came out of my mouth. My husband protested, knowing how much I love Sonlight.

But once I said it aloud, it took on a solid form and this enthusiasm started bubbling up. I could hardly wait to get home to start planning. Guess what I will be doing over Spring Break? 

March: 2024

Last year, in March 2024, the chaos of fostering was replaced by the chaos of adopted life. My husband picked up a part-time job working on the weekends.  He had to stop attending church. We were on our fifth! I really liked this one, and hoped we would belong for reals soon. My personal prayer life and Bible study were steady.  Perhaps the only steady thing. I knew God was faithful. I knew God wasn't surprised or overwhelmed. I knew He saw, He cared, He supplied.

We had one daughter in a slightly better daycare. I have NEVER had a child in daycare; it was a cocktail of ego-bruising and learning-curve that I did not enjoy.  I have been the daycare provider countless times. Now I was the working mom, exhausted and spread too thin.  What did I care if it was crazy socks day? I was trying to survive.

We had one daughter with me, enrolled in my AM Kindergarten class and my PM PreK class.  It was wonderful spending the whole day with her. She learned how to read, about Jesus, how to play with other kids, and gained some emotional intelligence. We had her in therapy and got some clear diagnoses for a few special needs. Her growth and development that school year was astonishing.

Our middlest child was attending second grade at the public school down the street. Thank God for her first- and second-grade teachers! Both invested in her, rooted for her, and did their best to provide a safe place for her. I also have NEVER had a child in public school. Another blow to my pride and confrontation with inadequacy.  

Our adult daughter was settling into a new job as a vet tech after returning from Sierra Leone on a teaching trip with my mom. It was a lot, but she has enough stubborn in her that when things get hard, she fights. Our son hit a roadblock in December and was recovering from a mental health crisis.  When the kids hit 18, you are not finished parenting. It gets more nuanced. You're backburnered when things are good. When things get rough, you can only persuade and pray your butt off.

God bless all the working moms. It is so much to juggle. And what on earth are you supposed to do when someone gets sick, huh? The life feels impossible.  But, as I mentioned, I had the Best Job Ever, so my boss and coworkers helped me way beyond the call of duty.  

In March, I was still recovering from a concussion I received one morning when the back hatch of our car fell on my head.  I still struggled with fatigue and word salad.  Life was good, but also really, really hard. 

There was always at least one girl going through something that required all of our attention. I felt continually inadequate like I was drowning.  And ungrateful, because I knew my life was good. I was complaining about my blessings.  But my blessings were smothering me.

What a March!

Homeschooling Schedule

I have the privilege of being a new homeschooler and veteran homeschooler at the same time.  I started homeschooling a few weeks after my second baby was born so that my 2.5-year-old would have dedicated time with me.  We kept going until that baby graduated high school.  Through those years we moved twice, changed churches a few times, and lived several different lifestyles.  I founded and ran a homeschooling group with friends.  We did tours and playdates.  I wrote entire programs for us to carry out in co-op-style classes.  I also counseled new homeschoolers, getting them set up to school their kids successfully from home. Throughout all that, we had different children in our home because I was either homeschooling or nannying them.  

I've got some experience! But, true to the assertion that there are as many ways to homeschool as there are families, this is new and different.  Schooling three kids specifically NOT from the beginning with more special needs than my first crew and in relative isolation is different. So, true to form, I am learning as I go.

I recently changed our homeschooling schedule because I was really overtaxing all of us by trying to do a little bit of everything each day.  I thought the consistency and small bites would provide routine so that growth would be steady and the predictability would give the kids a sense of safety and ownership of their days.  It's a good thought worth its place, but it was time to wriggle things around.

So now I have staggered days. On Mondays and Wednesdays, we do core work using Sonlight curriculum. That is Bible, Social Studies/History, Literature, and Science.  I use the four-day schedule, so we double up and still complete a week's worth of work in a week.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we do extracurricular activities like Spanish, Piano, and Recorder.  Fridays are special because my husband is home every other week, so we go on outings with him.  When he is at work, we do arts, cooking, and messy science projects.  Each day we do Movement, Reading, Writing, and Math.  We also do a preschool-style circle time each day with things like prayer, calendar, weather, and Bible verses and stories.

So far, it's working out pretty well.  I might flip-flop the pairs of days because I chose hefty work on the days we are committed to Choir and AWANA.  But I'm going to wait.  Because the change is about looking at the week as a whole, I'm giving myself a solid month to adjust.

Our daily routine still exists regarding blocks of time.  I am eager to see how the opened space allows for more connection and breathing room.  

Is It Luck?

Sometimes people don’t know what to say when they learn we adopted three girls.  Other times people genuinely mean to say that the girls are lucky we adopted them.  And I cringe every time. 

My oldest daughter has surging feelings whenever she hears it.  Who would call a child born positive for drugs lucky? Or one raised in an abusive or neglectful home?  What is lucky about living in an apartment with an empty fridge or maggots in the corners? And most universal to adoption stories, what child is lucky to lose his or her first family? It’s best not to suggest to our firstborns that their younger siblings are lucky.

My thoughts on it are a little different.  First, I rarely use the term lucky for any situation.  I don’t believe in luck.  Setting it aside and dealing with the actual intent of the statement, I am equally uncomfortable with my littles being called lucky.  While my oldest girl focuses on the circumstances that allowed us to adopt, I am acutely aware of my failings.  I am not a perfect mom.  I am not a perfect anything.  That might seem trite or inspire an eyeroll, but I am being very serious.  These girls have been through enough; they don’t need a lousy mom.  I’m aware of how frequently I mess up and can make myself crazy thinking about the ways I may be messing up without knowing about it!  What’s lucky about being raised by someone like that?

My sister has another perspective.  Her mouth is too colorful to quote, so I will paraphrase. She says we retired and could have followed the American Dream scheme and lived a lifestyle that didn’t include scraping money together or doing without some luxuries we ‘earned.’  Our daily life could have been my pursuing a career in my interests and my husband enjoying well-deserved rest.  We could travel and dance and play.  We could have a disposable income!

Instead, we decided to jump back into the thick of child-rearing at the cusp of empty nesting.  These girls have been through trauma—and so have countless others.  Some of those others won’t be adopted.  They won’t land in a permanent place with people they can call their own.  In her more aggressively-phrased way, my sister says we’re freaking amazing (but she didn’t say freaking).

That makes me so uncomfortable!  I was uncomfortable enough to end the conversation, and very uncomfortable writing it here. The good that comes from it is a determination to make my life agree with her assessment.  I pray, “Let it be, Lord!”  Let me be freaking amazing! Let the girls be blessed with a healthy permanent family to change their statistical trajectory.  And, Lord—Lord—please save those masses of other kids who need the same!

Grief

Grief is a horrible honor. The horror is pretty evident and requires little explanation.  To live without someone who filled the space in your life and heart is agony.  The honor may be more mysterious but beats steadily beneath the keening. I got to know wonderful people who decided to fill my life and heart with themselves.  I would choose to miss them over never having known them.  I outrightly pity those who can’t grieve the people I’ve lost because they never got to know them.

I have been ‘honored’ several times now.  I lost my dad’s mom when I was 14.  We lost a baby we named Alex before birth.  Then my mom’s mom died when my son was 7 months old.  That was hard and I actively miss her each day.  We lived with her for over five years, and she was like a second mom to me.  My son is named after her.  While my kids never knew her, they all know about her.  I keep her alive with stories, photos, and furniture. 

After that my cousin was brutally murdered and his killer has never been found.  I pray for his parents and brother all the time because I know grief never leaves.

The next ‘honor’ that changed my life was when my big sister died just before her 45^th birthday.  We are coming up on the 10^th anniversary of her passing.  I hate it. I positively, 100%, hate living without her in the world.  It’s wrong and definitively grievous. My life has changed so drastically since she left, and I don’t know how to process that I have lived in homes and loved children without her.  It’s anathema.

Her loss initiated a string of more losses, starting with her husband who followed her 19 months later. We also lost our first foster daughter whom we had hoped to adopt.  She is alive but lost to us. Her leaving changed our family.  My children are markedly scarred, and my husband and I cannot make it better.

So, I know grief.  I know the waves that hit from nowhere.  I know the anniversaries that loom large and fill me with dread.  I know how some anniversaries shock me with how mildly they pass.  And other instances when there is no perceivable reason, but I am laid flat.  I know the sweet remembrances, the tortuous what-ifs, and the ridiculous deals I make with myself or God.  I know the sense of isolation and the wondering how everyone else seems so very fine today while I sit having to will each painful breath into my lungs.

I also know that God wastes nothing.  My grief matters—and so does yours. I know He sees and feels it all with us. Every tear is captured in a bottle, and there is a promise that one day every tear will be dried.  All grief will be gone.  This pain is temporary, but still not a waste.  Not merely something to be endured. 

One good thing is that my experiences help me love my three little girls effectively.  In fact, they help me love my whole family meaningfully. Further? They help me love everyone I encounter.  I am more compassionate since experiencing loss.  I know what I can and cannot fix.  I know that there are times when the best thing to do is sit—like Job’s friends BEFORE they opened their big dumb mouths.  Sometimes, we are called to merely witness.  We don’t always have to do; sometimes we need to be still and abide without words or actions and witness the horrible honor of grief.

Attachment Injury--the Dos and Don'ts

I talked about the power of yes earlier.  It is crucial to kids’ development to receive innumerable yeses.  While meeting that need, we must monitor exactly who gives out those yeses.  Getting a yes from anyone and everyone doesn’t serve the kids well. On the contrary, it actually causes harm.

We are fearfully and wonderfully complicated creatures, praise be to God!  As such, no part of us functions in isolation—and there are many parts to us.  Kids need those yeses to develop cognitively, emotionally, and socially.  However, forming strong, healthy attachments is just as imperative. 

Kids from hard places often sustain significant and multiple attachment injuries.  Some are injured to the extent that they stop seeing people and relationships as valuable (because they are unreliable).  Instead, they see people as tools to get what they need—or want, but that’s another post for another day. 

It is easy to see how this happens. Kids go to school and daycare where every adult is there to respond to the kids’ needs.  Both places—daycares to a greater degree—have a high turnover rate.  The kids are trained to listen to and receive help from any adult.  Add social workers to the mix and consider how we tell foster kids to get into a car with the new social worker (a stranger) who will take them to see their parents.  I remember with every foster placement we had losing count of the social workers. How wacky is that?! 

In addition, kids from hard places don’t often attend family functions where the parents are the sole caregivers in a sea of ‘other’ adults.  Think about birthday parties, libraries, children's museums, and places of worship. Because of this, foster kids can lose the ability to distinguish the significance between adults.  When they don’t have a steadfast set of adults who are only there for them, there’s no wonder.

Autumn starts with too many Halloween events where kids literally wander around taking candy from strangers. Next, there are a plethora of Santa visits where kids are told to sit on the laps of men they do not know and tell them their deepest wishes.  Foster kids are often enrolled in extra programs like WIC, therapies, services, and medical screenings.  That means more strangers are asking personal questions and conducting exams (with the requisite piece of candy at the end of every meeting).

This doesn’t even touch on family/home life, where strangers are primary caregivers.  Strangers doing baths and bedtime routines.  Strangers doing breakfast. Strangers, with their different smells, different voices, different food…  Strangers meeting the need for comfort and affection—or not. And who knows how long this place will be?

It makes perfect sense that over time a kid would think that all adults are there to serve them.  Understandably, kids from hard places have a weird sense of entitlement.  It also follows that they wouldn’t dare attach to any particular adult, but still be happy to get a much-needed hug and gift from one, without bothering to learn that adult’s name or caring if they meet again.

This is when kids learn to use affection as a commodity and develop masterful manipulation skills.  These behaviors are cultivated to survive but can become ingrained and intensely difficult to undo even when they find a safe and stable environment.

To protect children from a diagnosis like RAD (Reactive Attachment Disorder), we must help them know who their adults are.  And it is important for other adults to consistently direct the kids to their primary adults for all their needs.  This is tough.  The kids are sweet and huggable. Their stories inspire compassion. Their reactions to even little gifts are phenomenal; who wouldn’t want that hit of dopamine?  But true love does what is best for the other, and what is best for kids from hard places is to heal from attachment injuries.  And that is done by letting them know they have special adults who belong to them above everyone else. 

What does this look like day-to-day? You don’t have to push them away or do anything that feels like rejection.  Gentle redirection with open body language builds appropriate connections without undermining the attachments growing in the new family.

Ø  Showing joy with smiles and high-fives when you see kids from hard places. 

Ø  Limiting tangible gifts.  This helps them see you as a person with value in your presence, rather than what you bring.

Ø  Sitting a child next to you rather than on your lap.

Ø  Affirming a need and stating that their adult would be happy to meet it.  “Wow! You drank all your water. Nicely done. I know Mommy would love to get you more if you're still thirsty.”

Ø  Consistently and visibly acknowledging parents as authority.  “You want to go outside? What does Daddy say about that?”

Ø  The best thing to do is check in with parents privately for guidance.

I wish I had known this before. When I loved other people’s foster and adopted kids, I didn’t know.  I learned the most by watching an informed friend relate to my daughters with astounding love and astonishing wisdom.  I hadn’t even noticed what she was doing until she mentioned it when she checked in with me.  She had never given them food or drink, never helped with a shoe or jacket!  She managed to use exceeding grace in directing them my way for everything. These subtle nudges underscored for my kids appropriate ways to relate to us as parents and to other trusted-but-secondary adults in their lives. 

The Power of Yes

 Are you familiar with the term TBRI? It stands for Trust-Based Relational Intervention.  Karyn Purvis is credited with its creation, and you can check her and her ideas out at the links below.  It is worth your time.  While taught to adults who love kids from hard places, the ideas apply broadly and are helpful across the board.

One of the ideas I learned was the notion of yes. I will speak in generalities, but concrete information is available in those links.  Basically, we all need to hear a mammoth number of yeses in our first years. This sets us up to develop successfully through the stages of early childhood.  It touches on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Erikson’s Stages of Development.

Maslow teaches that until the basic needs are met (along the lines of shelter, food, and security), we cannot develop at higher levels (like academics and morality). You can check out more at Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Erikson teaches that in the first five years, kids need to learn that they can trust their caregivers, that they are themselves capable people, and have a purpose. More on Erikson’s stages can be found here. Erikson's Stages of Psychosocial Development - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf

The idea is that kids need to hear yes (in word and action) thousands of times for them to move through these critical stages of development successfully.  Meaning that they will be equipped to tackle the next stages with confidence and a sense of self-efficacy.  The stages build on one another, and without firm foundations, they are left limping through life.  In short, the yeses count.

Kids from hard places, who’ve experienced trauma, abuse, and/or neglect, lack the necessary number of yeses. To build their resiliency and provide them with what they need to continue to grow, we need to make up for the loss of yes in their lives. How do we make up for all the yeses? 

It’s a big and essential task. In the TBRI training, we learn to do our best to create opportunities for yes.  An example is to have snacks available all the time, but require the children to ask for them—so that you can tell them yes! To help children feel safe with us as caregivers, we need to find ways to provide nurturing that they either missed entirely or lost when they were removed from their first caregivers.  That can mean massages and snuggles.  It might also mean feeding the kids—in a straightforward manner or playfully like throwing popcorn for them to catch in their mouths. 

In my family, I am still very hands-on in the bathroom with bathing and toileting.  They need the extra touch time and nurturing that comes from applying lotion and assuring basic hygiene practices are followed.  I frequently feed my youngest and try to give a cup of milk to her on demand.  She needs this the way an infant does. 

Because that is another thing we learned. When kids come from sustained trauma, new caregivers need to cut their chronological age in half (and round down!) to understand where they may be developmentally.  That means the two-, five-, and seven-year-olds who arrived in our lives were more like one, two, and three! 

This drives home the wisdom of a friend who was comforting me when we had had the girls for about ten months.  She told me we had ten-month-old triplets who happened to be two, six, and eight. This was the most accurate (though seemingly paradoxical) description of our situation.

https://youtu.be/7vjVpRffgHQ?si=w9IcgVVUa9zjEOU4

Karyn Purvis Institute of Child Development

Advent Traditions

Happy Advent, all!

I love this time of year and am excited that we have more kids with whom we share traditions.  How do you spend this month?  We have a few traditions that are special to our family.  Some traditions come from my childhood or my husband's. Some we created with our adult kids when they were young. And we are making new traditions now!

New and Old Memories:

Last year was our first Christmas with the girls and I’d read some good tips about blending families and honoring traditions.  We asked the girls about any activities they could remember doing with their first family that we could repeat.  They remember ‘light lookin’ so that was easy.  They jump in with two feet to our activities and love being part of them.

Stories:

Tabitha’s Travels is one in a trio of books about kids spending the month before Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem.  They have adventures and meet Jesus.  We read this each evening. We tried Jotham’s Journey last year, but they weren’t ready to sit for that long.

Decorations:

We have a Christmas tree in the living room and the basement by our school area.  We have nativity scenes all over the house. My husband has a little Christmas village to which he adds every year. We have a new mistletoe bell in the entryway, so kisses and giggles are flying about.  I love the decorations, and we keep them up until the 6^th of January.

Christmas “Light Lookin’”:

This is a favorite every year, but now we live in a neighborhood with two separate streets that go all out.  Instead of driving, we bundle up, bring hot cocoa, and walk around to take in the sights. I truly love this time and we do it more than once. When we get to include neighbors and friends, all the better!

Movies:

We have a long list of movies we enjoy this month.  Top of the list are The Star, The First Noel (with Andy Griffith), and Why Do We Call It Christmas with Buck Denver.  We also enjoy While You Were Sleeping, The Santa Clause Movies, The Polar Express, Jim Carrey’s Grinch, and Noelle.

Advent Calendars:

My oldest daughter got me a great one a few years ago with drawers.  I put a strip of paper with a Bible verse in each. I used to add a Kiss to each, but now we do M&Ms or Skittles so there are enough for each little mouth.  We also have a paper chain with verses from our church this year, so we will see how to incorporate that into our routines.

Christmas Eve PJs:

Everyone gets to open one gift on Christmas Eve that just happens to be PJs. Then we all wake up wearing photo-ready pajamas for gift opening!  Pretty smart!

Santa Game:

We tell our children that Santa is a game families play to show love. It is not our place to tell any other child about the Santa game!  This is drilled in pretty firmly, let me tell you! 

We don’t play the game to the degree of saying Santa is real.  We want them to believe us in everything, so way back with our first two kids, we decided it would be a game born from the historical figure who gave gifts.  And play we do!  Stockings are stuffed and someone gets to be Santa on Christmas morning to hand out gifts from under the tree.

Crafts:

We make ornaments, Nativity games, graham cracker houses, and any other craft I can think of.

Quiet:

Along with all the activity, we protect quiet moments with no agenda. Time to snuggle, read books, listen to music, and talk is important all year round.  We discovered that it is imperative around holidays. This is a time for memories, some not so pleasant.  My adult children carry grief from losing loved ones this time of year. My young children carry grief from losing nearly everything and everyone they knew before us. Last year they also had some unexpected traumatic triggers.  Thankfully we had made room for everyone to feel what they needed to feel and process what came up in safety.  I feel even more prepared this year, though I’m probably not!

Those are the highlights. I would love to hear about your traditions!

Sensory Processing Disorder

Sensory Processing Disorder is a newer condition to me.  Some terms used to describe people with this disorder—or are adjacent to it—are sensory seeking or sensory avoiding.  Just to keep things interesting, it is important to remember that an individual can both seek and avoid sensory input. Another thing I find true about any of these diagnoses is that almost everyone can relate to the feelings and situations described.  A diagnosis is appropriate when professionals conduct lengthy interviews and tests to perceive symptoms that are consistent and persistent and play a dominating role in a person’s work and school life.

We have one child who has been assessed by a professional who determined that SPD is quite strong in her.  We have two others who have not been assessed, but who behave in ways that lead us to suspect they would also be diagnosed.  They all have strong compulsions to touch anything and everything, even if there is a negative consequence (like being burned). They also have aversions to sensory input.  My kids specifically repel from noises that do not typically bother others. Certain types of clothes are a no-go because they are too uncomfortable.

We have a variety of toys, tools, and routines to help our kids function at their best.  First, we flat-out avoid situations that could get loud.  It is just not worth overstimulating them or causing them pain. We also talk about expectations and engage in role-playing before we have an event where sensory seeking (like touching everything) is not appropriate. 

We have an entire box of fidgets to pacify touchy hands.  Our Occupational Therapist suggested heavy work and different ways of moving to satisfy some of those compulsive needs.  So, when we see a kid starting to buzz, we have them carry random heavy things from here to there and back again as a game. It usually ends when she can no longer stand because she is laughing so hard. We tell them to move like bears or crabs on their way to wash their hands. It is a fun way to get chores done and helps them focus because of the work required to complete it. 

We have TheraBands to work muscles and give safe ways to exert themselves. We also have sensory brushes, weighted blankets, and a light machine. I would love to get one of those stretchy swings in the house, but I don’t know how to pull that off.  For now, we have a circular swing hanging off a tree branch that they can sit or stand on. 

And finally, there is the glorious play bath. The sensory play that can happen in a bath is varied and open-ended.  As long as they follow basic parameters, they are free to explore and discover on their own.  It’s marvelous, especially finishing with lotion, songs, quiet talk, and hair brushing.

I find that even our kids who don’t have SPD behaviors benefit from a lot of these practices.  We all get overstimulated, after all.  Have you tried any of these things to calm yourself or a child?  Anything I failed to mention?

I Started Writing This, But Saw Something Shiny

Here we are on day two of looking at some of the issues we have encountered with any of our five kids.  If there were a poster family for ADHD, we might be it.  You should see me trying to write this post!

Starting with my parents, there is not one in my family of origin or current family whom ADHD hasn’t given a big fat squeeze! When you are raised by and with people who have ADHD, it is like water to a fish: I just don’t know any differently. Doesn’t it take your family four hours to leave the house? I thought everyone had trouble with being on time, remembering why they are where they are, knowing they are forgetting something, and having no idea how long any particular task takes. I thought spaghetti-like conversations were the mark of being female because there are so few men in my family.  I thought losing things like keys, wallets, and important papers was common for everyone. I never examined why everyone I am related to is always procrastinating, thriving on self-imposed deadlines, and swinging from hyper-focused to being incapable of finishing anything.  I didn’t know I had ADHD. And then I moved 2000 miles away.

Separated from my ultra-ADHD family members, I started to see myself in a new light.  Flitting from one topic to another during conversation, or one task to another didn’t look so normal. Suddenly, my behavior—and my daughter’s exasperation—finally clued me in that I might share this diagnosis.

And guess what? ALL FIVE of our children have signs of attention deficit.  God chose so well for us!  This is one we know and embrace! When we homeschooled our son, I read to him while he did flips or hung upside down on the couch. Observers doubted his comprehension or retention.  How could anyone pick up on my words with that much activity?  We lovers of people with ADHD know that the truth is that if all his attention went to holding still, he would have none left over for listening. And today you will always find him with little Lego figures in his pocket so he can fidget whenever he needs to.

We can make these accommodations for all our children.  It is a perk of homeschooling to arrange the day to help our kids be successful, turning something like ADHD into an asset!  We alternate active and quiet activities and provide ‘busy hands’ when there is a need to be more still.  The girls illustrate what I read, play with fidgets, sit on inflated textured pillows so they can wiggle in a smaller space, or snuggle under weighted blankets.

Outside of school, we watch their faces and body language to see when we need to intervene before they run into a virtual wall.  We have breathing games to help them slow their brains down. Charts are around the house to help the girls stay on track with various routines. And big, active, or heavy movement is worked into every day.

It took me three and a half hours to write this. I distracted myself. Four daughters took turns interrupting me with their needs.  My husband came and went. And I distracted myself.  By the way, my little series may be interrupted by other posts because focusing on one theme is difficult for this gal!

Family Culture

I am reading a Bible plan about developing a family culture of strong faith.  Today’s focus was on defining traits that would characterize our family.  I’ve been praying about it, looking for wisdom and insight.

Honesty is a no-brainer for my family.  I’m a bit of a freak about it.  We often say, “We tell the truth in our family.”  It shuts down a lot of nonsense before it starts. Some other traits that I want to mark my family are mercy, trust, and compassion.  Our One Word of the Year this year has been attachment.  It’s a key word for kids from hard places, but a necessary component to any healthy life.

I continue to pray as I move through my day.  I want to be purposeful and mindfully foster a culture for our family where each is washed in traits that draw them closer to God. I want them liberated and equipped to carry out the work God calls each of us to do.

Do you do this?  Are there words or traits that naturally characterize your family?  Are there things you purposely develop?

Both And

 I hope it is obvious that I love my crazy big family. I could write books about each member and not comprehensively convey the exquisite beauty and value I see. God made and ordained this family to be. All in His perfect timing—which often felt too slow to me—He fit each person together to create something that I pray radiates through time and space with His love.

However, the paradoxical truth is that, if everything were perfect, three of my kids wouldn’t be mine.  I wouldn’t even know them.  While I am confident that God is pro-adoption and that something holy happens at these unions—fusions—adoption is nearly always preceded by brokenness. 

When trying to help our girls understand what was happening to them—and we must always be mindful that their lives thus far have really happened AT them—I used an analogy of boats. 

Imagine every family being a boat.  Sometimes these boats run into trouble.  The trouble could range in range and magnitude from a scrape on the hull to decimation.  When the boats leave people in the water, people from other boats can pull them up. 

This analogy models all the complexities of real life.  Which boats can take on new passengers?  Are all the people in the water rescued, or are some left behind?  What if people from one boat end up in a whole bunch of other boats?

Sometimes the degree of separation the analogy gives brings relief and clarity.  Other times the separation can’t be perceived, because reality is oppressively painful. Then I must set aside any attempts to explain or assuage and just sit and grieve with the ache and unanswered questions.

Adoption is wonderful.  It is often a saving grace, a second chance, and a glimmer of hope.  But just as frequently, it is mixed with grief; a capsized vessel; and shivering, wary new passengers who’ve survived the unspeakable.

I love my family.  My girls are mine, wholly.  I love raising them.  I get to share my days with delightful little sparks of joy. And if their lives were perfect, we wouldn’t even know one another.