Two Years Ago, Probably. Now? I'm Not So Sure.

Well, Thanksgiving was an enjoyable time. My family got together and enjoyed all the good food that comes with the holidays. A. is always so good at events like this one that if I told anybody what the stress load was like at our house on any given normal day they would probably be totally surprised.

We are hanging on by our fingernails, not wanting to "pull the plug" yet. We take it day by day, week by week, trying to make it through the holidays. A. is finding that we are not as willing to engage her in conversation very much anymore and so I know she is feeling like we are cutting her out of our lives. I am having a hard time wanting to talk with her the way I used to because I have come to understand that I have no idea what part of what she is saying is going to be the truth or a lie. How does one deal with that? Talking with one another is supposed to be a way of getting to know things about each other and it is a way to draw closer to each other. What is the point of talking with someone who is giving you conversation that is false and misleading? It is so stressful and misleading and hurtful.

I guess I'll just keep trudging along for now. I am not sure what will happen after the holidays though. I crave peace in my own home. Yet I am filled with guilt at the thought of sending A. to live with some other foster family. This is a no win situation. A.'s mom's termination trial is mid January. Finally, after 4 years in foster care we may be nearing the end of this ordeal. This is what I have been hoping for all along. And now that termination is almost here, I feel ready to give up. Once upon a time I would have fought tooth and nail to gain the rights to adopt A. Now, I'm not sure what I will do. This case has dragged on way too long and I partially blame everybody who has had a part in making this case go on for 4 years for messing up A.'s mind even more than it was at the beginning. If this could have been settled within the first one or two years I think things would have worked out much better for all of us. But it didn't and now I don't know if I can take the step of permanently making A. a part of our family. She is 13 going on 20. I don't know if I want to live through the stress of her teenage years. (Sigh!)

Someone tell me about a child you had to let go and it turned out for the best, or perhaps a child you thought you would let go but then decided to keep and it worked out great. I could use some uplifting stories.

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just thought I would do a quick post about what I am thankful for before I have to get out of bed and get busy for the day.

I am so thankful for my entire family. Each one of us is unique with our own set of personal struggles and gifts that make us who we are. We compliment each other. We each learn from the struggles that someone in our family is going through. I have been taught to give thanks for my trials because each trial will make me stronger and wiser.

So, thank you, God, for my trials and my family.

I HOPE I DON'T SOUND LIKE A MONSTER!

Things have been getting much too intense around our home over the past several months. A.'s lying seems to have taken over most of our thoughts and energy. I knew I had to learn as much as I could, as quickly as I could, in order to get a handle on this problem.

I have been reading via the internet whatever I could find about children who lie and why they lie and how to deal with it. I think the most important thing I have learned is that it is not necessary to try and catch each and every lie that is told. Yes, lying is wrong and it has to be dealt with, but even more important than the lying is WHY is she lying and what behavior is she lying about.

So, that being said, I acknowledge that knowledge is only a small part of the battle. It is one thing to have gained some understanding about a problem and yet another to actually do something about it. Each morning I say "today I am going to treat A. with only patience and love and only deal with the important issues." But I know that as soon as I walk out of my bedroom and have to deal with the day to day issues of life, I will fail miserably. A. will ultimately roll her eyes, sigh heavily, tell me that the rules of our house are stupid, blame everyone else for all of her problems except herself, tell me some lie about why she did this or that, and I will immediately lose it. She is so head-strong and unwilling to admit that she plays any part in her own problems. I get so bogged down with the frustrations of dealing with her attitude that I then over react when even the slightest misbehaviors happen.

That is my struggle now. To put life back into perspective. Is A. REALLY that much worse than my own 3 biological children were? Well, yes, as far as the lying is concerned she is. But, some of the other stuff I get so upset at her over is at least to some degree just her being 13. One of my own bio children also has a huge attitude. Do I lash out at her over everything she does just because of that? No. I love her and to a large degree understand her struggles and am able to set aside some of her behaviors because I know some of what makes her who she is. Why can't I seem to do that with A.?

I'll admit a secret that I don't like to admit even to myself. I fear that even though I do love A., I also deeply resent the stress that she has brought into our home. Remember, my family did not go looking to be a foster family. We took this girl in because we had known her and her family for years and we wanted to help. (My hat is off to all of you foster parents who deal with much much bigger issues than what we are dealing with.) It is this resentment that keeps a wall between me and A. I don't feel I have been successful at helping her to overcome her deeper issues and that makes me feel like a failure.

So, together with the feelings of resentment and feeling like a failure, I'm afraid I take my frustrations out on A. too quickly and too often and sometimes out of proportion to the behavior being dealt with. Now, how do I go about getting myself back under control and seeing A. as the 13 year old adolescent with a troubled past that she is? I want so much to make her feel loved by me and I'm afraid she is not sure about that anymore. Here is another problem I have with her: When she knows I am frustrated at her, she gives me space. When she feels like I have softened up and am not being so hard on her, she becomes a leech, wanting to hang on me every opportunity that she can. I know that sounds horrible for me to say and I want to make it clear that I don't have a problem with healthy hugs. But A. and her own bio mom used to hang on each other all of the time, I guess to make up for all the dysfunction they knew was going on in their family. So A. feels like that is the way it should be between her and me and even her and my husband.

So, now, if I do treat her very lovingly and try to overlook some of her behaviors, she becomes glued to me. I can be walking across the room lost in my own thoughts about some chore that I am trying to accomplish and all of a sudden there is A., stepping in front of me, expecting me to stop and just stand there and hug for several minutes. This happens all of the time. Then, I am faced with peeling her off of me and hurting her feelings. No matter how nicely I explain to her that a quick hug once in awhile is a good thing, but to be constantly hanging on someone is not, nor is it even healthy, she just won't stop.

I hope I don't sound like a monster. All of this resentment that I talked about has only been escalating this drastically for the past 6 months or so and we have had A. with us for 4 years now. There were periods of time over the years where I would feel this way, but I could always pull myself out of it. Something is different this time. Perhaps it is because A. is getting older and so am I. However, whatever is making this harder can't become an excuse for either of our behaviors. I know I have to work on myself and that is what I intend to do.

I believe in prayer and I know many of you reading this do too. Please pray for my family. We don't have the problems that some families do, but the problems we do have is our reality and therefore they are just as hard to deal with as people dealing with more difficult issues.

I would also like to ask those of you who read my posts to add me to your blog list on your sites. I would love to connect with more foster families and be able to give as well as receive more advice/comments about all of the many many issues that foster families face. That is, after all, the main reason I began this site in the first place: To give and receive support from other foster families.

Dealing With Common Behaviors of Foster Children

I ran across this article about dealing with the behaviors of foster children. Our foster daughter struggles with telling the truth so I have been searching the internet looking for advice on how to treat this negative behavior which can and in fact does completely disrupt our family. This brief article gives a quick overview of 3 common behaviors and a quick explanation of how to deal with each.


How to Deal with Behaviors of Foster Children
By psrael

Step 1
Lying.... Lying is a trait I have found very common in my foster children. First of all, it is important to realize that no child wants to be in trouble and in cases of abuse or neglect they may be willing to do anything to keep from getting into trouble. If you know a child has done something unacceptable it is imperative that you not set the child up to lie to you. Never ask a child if they did it, but rather, "why". This helps you deal with the behavior rather than compounding the behavior with a lie.

Step 2
Stealing.... My experience with foster children doesn't make dealing with someone that steals more understandable however a few things to keep in mind when it comes to stealing is that they normally are taking things that they weren't allowed to have at home. I think it is normal to assume that taking something away as punishment for stealing, however, most foster children have had every material possession taken away more than once so this proves to be of little help. You must find the one thing in your home that is important and that has to be used. It might be the chance to play a video game or go outside with friends but something that has proven to be important to that child.

Step 3
Some Foster Children are hurtful when being reprimanded and use comments about their birth parents to lash out. Although most of us have never had to be in the foster care system it important to never speak negatively about the parent because it will only serve to undermine your work with these children. I have always pointed out the positives of each parent if there are any and pointed out that their parents are in control of their progress not the child.

To view original article, click on title of post.

HAVE YOU BEEN WHERE I AM? ADVICE?

It's 3:25 a.m. and I can't sleep so here I am at my computer.

I didn't get any comments on my last blog about my foster daughter's habit of lying, I was disappointed. I could really use some help with this one. I have questions like: Should I punish her for each lie she tells? Should I punish her for what she lied about? It seems like I would always be punishing her if I used each lie she told as an occasion for correction. It doesn't seem to work anyway. Nothing looks as though it gets through to her. Her behaviour never changes, no matter what consequences I may throw her way. I can talk calmly to her, explaining why what she did was wrong and try to get her to see what lying will do to her reputation. Or, I can punish each and every lie, hoping that a consequence-per-lie system will help her to stop. I can raise my voice and let her know how frustrated it makes me when I have to spend my days deciphering when she is lying and when she is telling the truth. I have explained all about how she is destroying the trust between us, and in fact already has. I can go on and on talking, lecturing, punishing; but nothing makes any difference. Why? What is in this child that makes it so important to her that a lie will come out of her mouth more easily than the truth? We have tried to demonstrate to her that if she would only tell us the truth, she may still receive a consequence because of whatever it is she confessed to, but the consequence will be much much less than if she first lies about it, leaving us to discover the truth for ourselves through our own intuitive means.
I think if I could figure this one out, and learn how to help A. to open up to us and not feel as though she has to lie; our family would be well on our way to healing a lot of the pain and hurt that we have learned to live with ever since A. came into our home. We are so at the end of our rope, and we don't want to be. In our minds, our hands reach for the telephone numerous times a week, ready to call the case worker to tell her she needs to find a new home for A. We have actually called once but never actually said the words. We just talked out our problems with the case worker and told her at the end of the conversation that we would take it week by week. I would hate to do anything right before Christmas anyway.

I'm still hoping for advice from someone who has been where I am.

ADVICE NEEDED: FOSTER CHILD AND LYING

When my husband and I took in our foster daughter, we were not actively seeking to be a foster family. We had known this girl and her family for several years so when the Child Welfare Agency removed this 10 year old girl from her mother's care, the mother requested that we take her in. We were officially named as God Parents so that we could be considered a Relative Foster Family. At that point, we were able to take A. into our home as our foster daughter.

We had no idea what we were in for because we had never looked into, nor studied in any way, what was necessary to be a successful foster family. This 10 year old girl came into our home with all of the usual problems that we have come to understand are common for many foster kids. She saw way too much of the raunchy side of life while she was growing up those first 9 years of her life. She was the "mom" in her family. "Mom" to her little sister and also to her own mom. Then she was sexually abused by one of her mom's boyfriends at age 9. By the time she came to our home, she was a mess.

We took her in thinking we could just take care of her the same as we had taken care of and raised our own 3 biological children. Wrong!!! We quickly learned that this girl that we had taken in and grown to love was not able to think in what we call a "normal" way. She can not process normal day to day reality in the same way we do. Her mom had been severely abused as a young girl and had never bonded to any adult as a child. As a result, she now has what is referred to as "Attachment Disorder". One of the ways people with this disorder learn to cope with life is through constant lieing. Unfortunately, as A. lived with her mom for the first 9 years of her life, she learned how to lie and manipulate just like her mom.

We now do not know when A. is telling us a lie or the truth! We have zero trust in her. She lies about little things and big things. Our fear is that she is only 13 years old. Her teen years are just beginning, which are hard in the best of circumstances. She has already shown extreme interest in boys and in babies. She has asked us what we would do if she came home at age 14, pregnant. What would we do? Would we let her raise the baby? Could she still live with us?

My head spins when I think of what we may be facing in the next few years. We don't feel like we can ever trust her. We don't even leave her alone when we go to the grocery store. I can't see a time when I will ever want her in our house alone, at any age. I fear She will go through our room and personal things. She has already smoked so I imagine she will try that again if given the opportunity. There are just so many ways I can't trust her I can't list them all here. I want so much to just give up and let her move to another foster home. Yet I keep putting it off. I don't know why because I am pretty sure she will not change and our lives are in for some extremely tough times.

Is that selfish of me? I just want my life to return some sense of normalicy. We weren't looking for this, we just stepped in to try and help a family out because we knew them. Now we don't know which way to turn. I am hoping that someone who reads this will have experienced the same feelings and similar experiences that our family has. What can we do about our foster daughter's lieing? What sort of punishments are appropriate for her, that will actually help her to see how damaging her lies are? We have tried several different things but she doesn't seem to learn from anything. She seems to just blow off everything we try to teach her about life. If A. wants to do something, she will do it regardless of whether or not we have already told her not to do it. '

I am really hoping to get a response from someone who has been through fostering a child who lies frequently. We need advice or I fear I am going to give up. If I can't help A., then why is she at our home? She needs to be somewhere where there are people who can get through to her. Is there such a place? Our case worker told us that 75% of all foster homes in our area are considered bad foster homes. That is pretty scary. How can I let A. go when I know the chances of her winding up in a "bad" foster home is so great? Yet, how can I continue on with her in my home when I am so at the end of my tolerance?

Any advice out there?