1-2-3-4

Yesterday, Henry had some baby food with rice cereal or oatmeal. Then, Alicia gave him a piece of waffle. Apparently, he started gagging on the waffle and everything came back up. Sigh. I don't know what's going on there. Two vomits in two days. Double sigh.

Jeff and I had our seventh training session for foster/adoption. On the way to class, Jeff and I discussed the merits of foster care/adoption vs. private/overseas adoption. Jeff said that he could see why people go the latter routes. Quicker. Easier. It costs more money for the latter, but in essence, by taking the foster care/adoption route, one is spending a good deal of time becoming a social worker w/o pay. The number of meetings involved after one gets the child is staggering. But Jeff and I are still committed to this route b/c we want to help children in our community. We just don't want to give lip service to community involvement. Hopefully, by helping a child or two or three, we'll be giving back in a real way (not just writing a check). We think that we might do some respite care while waiting for a placement. Respite care involves taking in a child for an afternoon or couple days, giving the foster parents a break if they need one or if something has come up in their lives that requires immediate attention.

As we had hoped, the classes are getting us to think about what kind of children we are willing to take into our home. It would nice to be able to think that we'd be open to just about anybody, but realistically, that's not the way it is going to work, especially because we have Henry to think about. Many of these children have been abused in many ways. Unfortunately, those who have been abused sometimes lash out at innocent others, which perpetuates that cycle of abuse. Sometimes other children in the home become victims.

As I have mentioned before, our screen going into this program is for children 0-4 years old. We are having some second thoughts about whether or not 4 years is actually too high an age in comparison to Henry's. I think that we'd like to stick to Henry's age or younger. Obviously, the tighter the screen, the less likely one is to get a placement. The agency doesn't care if the family screen is really tight, keeping in mind that if people say that they are only interested in white girls with blue eyes, blond hair, born in the month of November of 2007, they are much less likely to get a placement. But the agency does mind if families "try a kid out" and then tell the agency later that they want the child removed. As we have been told numerous times, getting a foster child isn't like trying on a new pair of shoes. They prefer we have tight screens that will truly match our needs (as well as the child's needs) so that the likelihood of the child being "disrupted" is minimal. Every time a foster child is moved from home to home, that "disruption" (lack of stability) damages their psyche. We learned that "disruptions" to the attachment process (whereby children have a psychological need to "attach" to at least one adult as they grow up) can result in learning disabilities, even if the child was not born with a genetic problem or brain damage. "Disruptions" cause a spiral of grief (being separated from a known, attached adult) that hinders the processing of short-term memory (hence foster and adopted children don't do as well in school on average).

Right now, Jeff and I are weighing the pros and cons of taking in "babies." Is the 0-6 month age right for our family? We had actually intended to get into this process for taking care of preemies. We are wondering whether that would be good for Henry or whether it would be better simply to say that we want to take care of toddlers or older babies (6 months to 3 years old). I think that we could do a baby (I mean, we would if it was our biological child, right?), but as Jeff rightly points, it is a little different b/c we do have full-time jobs. I won't be taking maternity leave. If one of us was a stay-at-home parent, it wouldn't be an issue. In our opinion, for babies especially, there is no question in our minds that children's needs are served best by having a stay-at-home parent. No question. Unfortunately, it isn't been a realistic option for us. If we took in a baby that was a "drug" baby, how would that affect Henry? What if the child screamed all night, as many drug babies often do because they are in "chronic pain" not just colic? Would we have the stamina to take care of the baby's needs, Henry's needs, and then work full-time?

The way the process works is that when CPS informs A Place to Call Home (APTCH) about a child, the family specialists call families who have screens that would include the child's known profile (I say "known" b/c sometimes not a lot is known about these children). Then, the APTCH family specialist calls the matched families and says, "We have a child who has a profile of [fill-in-the-blank]. Are you interested?" If yes, then the APTCH family specialist forwards the "yes" families to the CPS case worker who selects the family for the child. When they call us, we can absolutely say "no" if it doesn't seem like the right fit or if there is something going on in our lives that would make a placement at that time not work. Jeff and I came up with a family rule last night that basically says, if either of us has reservations, we will automatically "pass" on the placement. No lobbying the other if the other doesn't think that it will work.

Last night, we were given more examples of a pervasive sub-theme that human insensitivity and cruelty knows no bounds. Phylis told us about one mother who adopted a boy at age 2. When the boy was age 11, she decided that she wanted to become a comedian, so she "unadopted" him. I can't even imagine how painful that was for the child. To be told implicitly that becoming a budding comedian is more important than you. That you are not as worthy. In another example inside their agency in the last couple years, a woman had adopted a child. She found a partner who had two kids. The partner and the partner's kids didn't like her child. So, the woman "unadopted" the child. The phrase WTF seems appropriate here. I've also never understood how some people can euthanize their pet when it is healthy but becomes "inconvenient." Truly, people should be screened heavily before they are allowed to have pets or kids.

When we arrived at the grandparents' house to pick up Henry, he was of course wide awake. Apparently, he napped from 5-6:30PM. His new skill, according to Grammy, was counting. He was in the kitchen and knocked over a tin. Grammy told Henry that he had to clean things up. So she picked up one of the objects and dropped it back in the tin and said "One!" Henry picked up the next objected and said "Two!" (unprompted). Grammy picked up the next object and said "Three!" Henry picked up the next one and said (unprompted) "Four!" They picked up the rest and counted to twenty with Henry repeating (not knowing) the numbers after four.

I'll be honest. We were a little (OK...a lot) skeptical when Grammy told us this story. We sometimes think that Grammy exaggerates Henry's abilities. But, she pulled out the tin, and we witnessed him saying "Two! Three!" after Grammy said "One!" I suspect that he does know the order of the numbers 1-2-3 and maybe even 4. That doesn't mean if I pulled out four objects, he would know that the word "four" means four pieces. I am nevertheless impressed that he knows the order of the numbers to 3 or 4. I haven't counted to 10 for him in awhile. I used to sing him to sleep by saying the numbers to 10 forward and backward and in Spanish.

He was a bear to wake up again this morning. He instinctively moved toward my side of the bed as Jeff called his name. He snuggled up close. I am, after all, the weakest link on discipline. And he is so fun to snuggle with. Tonight, we are going to try to get him to bed by 8PM. A lofty goal.