You Are Not Alone

The last three months there has been a LOT of potentially emotional stuff (Loss-related anniversaries, birthdays etc etc etc) I had one especially sad day smack-dab between our estranged son's birthday and my what would have been my parents' 50th wedding anniversary ... and aside from that I'd say I'm doing VERY well.  (Thank God!!!!)

I've noticed as my anxiety has decreased markedly... more memories have been surfacing... more evidences of exactly how unwell our children were just before their conjoined meltdown.  

I'm not overwhelmed by it... It is with a calm knowing they are... and have been very ill.  Our adopted children are behaving EXACTLY as the symptoms list of their mental illness describes they might.

I realize with a little help from my RADparenting friends it is not personal.

I'm so very grateful for the various communities of Parenting RAD that let me know on so very many different levels I am not alone in my experiences. 

I've been singing this song...
There has been a LOT of potentially emotional stuff (Loss-related anniversaries, birthdays etc etc etc)I had one really sad day... and aside from that I'd say I'm doing VERY well. (Thank God!!!!)

I've notices as my anxiety has decreased markedly... memories have been surfacing... I've been remembering more very specific evidences (seen and understood more clearly via the miracle of hindsight) that keep exactly how unwell our children were just before their conjoined meltdown.

I'm not overwhelmed by it... It is with a calm knowing they are... and have been very ill. It is not personal.

I'm so very grateful for the various communities of Parenting RAD that let me know on so very many different levels I am not alone in my experiences.

I've been singing this song...



www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwONvf6k_-Y


I'm grateful to know I'm not alone... I'm grateful the Lord is with me... and I'm especially grateful God has connected me with other parents who love their RAD kids, despite having been beaten and battered by their beloved children's illness. 

Together we're trying to figure out what's best for our RADkids, our nonRADs and ourselves. 

Adoption... Always Best?

I am VERY pro-adoption... but I can't help but doubt that adoption is always the BEST choice. 

For our kids...
I believe for their time,
and season,
and circumstances...
adoption WAS best.

I believe "our" kids

were "meant to be"

part of our family...

BUT I don't believe

adoption

was the

best-case-scenario 

for them. 

I realize I'm tip-toeing-barefoot into the fairy filled hills of make-believe... but I believe THE ABSOLUTE best-case-scenario for every child is to be raised by BOTH their biological parents in the setting where the child's biological parents are healthy and happy and head-over-heels in love with each other... and each of their children. 

I know "stuff happens" 

and life ain't make-believe 

                                      and far-too-many-times      

kids are stuck 

in situations

paying the dearly 

the consequences 

for situations 

they did not have

a single choice 

about. 

When we were FINALLY settling into the "beautiful years" I had an obnoxious churchified crankster tell me all about this book she was reading about allowing God to plan your family and how adoption IS a Biblical concept... BUT... adoption SHOULD NEVER take place when the biological parents are still living.

I wanted to punch her. 

Years later...

Our "officially diagnosed RAD" that appeared "healed halleluiah!!!" for oh so many years went on a mission trip to a "third world" country.  She seemed healthy when she went... She seemed healthy when she returned.  RAD appeared to remain dormant before-during-and-after her out-of-the-country missions trip.

The "missions team" came back with tales of this "backward" nation and all it's woes... mostly "they eat beans for breakfast!!!"  "they can't flush toilet paper" added to all the lack-of-technology woes... (But apparently the "team" realized the third-world-nation manufactures their coca-cola with cane sugar... so that third-world-nation had ONE positive thing going for it!)

One of the sad facts on the missions team "tsk tsk tsk" list was that mothers of young children who were in jail actually had their children in jail with them. 

"Can you believe it?  Shame shame shame!  Those poor children, raised in jail!  Thank God we're so advanced here...for the sake of the children!"

Something pricked my heart as the churchified cranksters were busy patting themselves on their own backs for being so intelligent to have been born in our advanced society. 

My heart was pricked during the Beautiful Years... when our RAD appeared to be attached and loving, when things in our family were so very beautiful.  RAD at this point didn't appear to be an issue at all... ALL our kids appeared healthy and happy and well adjusted in our family... STILL my heart was pricked.

When it came to keeping babies with their mothers... 

I thought the third-world-nation got it right. 

I wonder...  Knowing how VITAL the primary biological  parent-child ties are to a child's development... witnessing firsthand the damages of Reactive Attachment Disorder in our adopted children's life... I can't help but wonder...

Does our modern, 

technologically advanced society 

REALLY 

"help" children 

when they remove children 

from their biological family? 

During hardship, 
or famine 
or worse? 

Like I said... I believe our kids belonged home with us!
At that time, and in those circumstances, our family was our children's best chance for a healthy life.

Our family was never the "ultimate best" but we were absolutely the "best remaining" choice for our children. 

I can't help but wonder if we can do better for the kids that are out there...
for the kids who haven't been born yet. 

Today

is hard.

"Forever Family"

Once upon a time my husband and I dreamed of adoption... all my adoption related dreams were all so-very-happy.

My husband and I were thrilled when our adoption dreams came true!  Sure!!! The early years were difficult!!!  There was a diagnosis in 1995 for our brand new daughter... "Reactive Attachment Disorder with Hypervigilance."  (16 years later and I still almost never find others using the specific wording our 6 year old's psychiatrist MD used to label our new daughter's mental illness...) 
The first three years were CHALLENGING to say the very least, but we were young and so-very-optimistic... and things in our family... in our home became so very beautiful!!!

We had a minimum of 10 beautiful years before the most severe living nightmares began... 

These days I go to sleep... 

I have nightmares 

about our once-upon-a-time

"dream children"...

I wake up... 

the real-life nightmares continues. 

I had nightmares again last night... all dream-sequence-absurdities that so very clearly sum up the real-life nightmare we have been living in the years since our RAD's started approaching "legal adulthood." 

I grieve... such tremendous grief!!!

It is so absurd... because...

I am grieving the living!!!!

I buried the ONLY earthly father I have ever had this year.

.

The ONLY  mother I have ever had is now his widow.

 .

Both are my biological parents.

.

My six biological siblings and I were raised by both of them, together.

.

 Had Dad lived a few more months...

Mom and Dad would have celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this month. 

                                                           

Dad and I have always had a reciprocal loving relationship.

What a wonderful thing it is 

to be confident in love! 

Dad and I 
have always been 
part of 
a    REAL  
"Forever Family."

In Dad's "last years" our bio-daughter frequently commented with admiration how my Dad was loved and respected by MANY ...and looked up to as a "father figure" to so many fatherless individuals.

 ***

Certainly there is pain and grief regarding loss of my beloved "Daddio" here on earth!

                                                           

Yet,

the pain related to my father's death

is not nearly as 

deep
and as  

cutting

as the depth

of  

pain

and  

grief

related to our adult RADs' "RAD-typical" rejection of us.

"They" 

(adoption promoters) 

PROMISED us 

and our "new" kids that

we would be  

"Forever Family."

My definition of "Family" is directly related to my experiences.  

My kids draw their definition of  "Family" from their experiences. 

I believe one of our biggest problems

in our relationship with our adult adoptees is  

we've had different experiences.

I can't imagine going through life without the foundation of my Mom ALWAYS being my Mom... and my Dad ALWAYS being my Dad. 

I never had my parent's friends... "friends of the family" attempt at ANY LEVEL to "save me" from my biological parents... not from the chores they assigned, nor from the loving and healthy rules they had established for me.  No couple ever offered to become my "new mommy and daddy" once I was over 18.  (not before I was 18 either... not ever!)

We prayerfully hope one-day our RADaffected adoptees will be able to have loving reciprocal relationships.

And while we wait... 

my husband, bio-daughter, and I 

remain heartsick!!!!!!!!!!!!

 .

.

.

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
      But when the desire comes, it is a tree of life."

-Proverbs 13:12

Our Lovingly Attached and Healthy Bio-child

We are so very blessed to have a lovingly attached and healthy bio-child.  We are so very grateful for her!!!!!!!  As a successful young adult, she lives many states away.  We have managed to enjoy each-others company in-real-life far more frequently than I ever imagined possible with the oh-so-many-miles that separate us!!!!

In-between our awesome visits, our bio-daughter calls and texts regularly.  Her calls are not just "hi/bye" methods of checking in... when she calls she wants to TALK to US. 

She LOVES us!!!

We laugh and have a ton of silly jokes that we share amongst ourselves.  Such delicious silliness based on fun times we've shared together!!!!  In most cases they're "you had to be there" kinds of jokes that keep us giggling for a lonnnnng time afterwards!!!!!

Some days she calls for advice, 

some days she wants to vent,

or run her perspective of options before she finalizes big decisions. 

Some days she calls just 'cause she misses us.

She wants to share with us what's happening in her life.  She loves us. 

Oh what a joy it is to be loved!!!!!

Our bio's most  recent calls have been about how the Lord is surrounding her with people who are asking about her faith and are flat out asking if they can go to church with her.  Our daughter has always been strong in her faith... but has never been "preachy" and she's not ever invited those who are asking... they are asking her.  
Our bio-daughter tells me she doesn't understand how or why people from so many very different parts of her life keep asking her about her faith.  

From our bio-daughter's point of view the years since our young-adult-RADs attacked our loving family have been her worst-ever crisis of faith.  

She could not imagine how the Lord would allow such horrible things to be done to our family... not only by our RADs, but by the "christian" community she grew up in.  

She does recognize the attack by "the church" is not God-ordained.
 
Our bio-daughter sees how the Lord is faithful to His Word...  
giving beauty for ashes.

People from so many different parts of her life keep asking very specific questions to find out more about The Light our bio-daughter carries within... (and shines so very beautifully!!!!!)... even in the midst of RAD inflicted adversity... as very real pain pushes our daughter even more deeply into God's loving-embrace, those witnessing her pain-filled-journey-of-faith are likewise being drawn to her Source of comfort.

A trampled rose 

gives off a the sweetest fragrance. 

"The breaking of the alabaster box and the anointing of the Lord filled the house with the odor, with the sweetest odor. Everyone could smell it. Whenever you meet someone who has really suffered; been limited, gone through things for the Lord, willing to be imprisoned by the Lord, just being satisfied with Him and nothing else, immediately you scent the fragrance. There is a savor of the Lord. Something has been crushed, something has been broken, and there is a resulting odor of sweetness. --Watchman Nee"