Really Silent!

Okay, now it has been nearly a year.

B has moved out and is on his own. He is doing reasonably. He's flunked out of school and lost a few jobs. But, he still has a place to live and is still receiving some supports. He gets in contact periodically and he hasn't dumped everyone who cares about him.

So, I think we were successful. We taught him a lot and provided a safe place to practice growing and failing without the consequences being quite as bad as in the "real world". He has still got a lot to learn, but, hopefully he's on a functional track to that learning.

I'm left thinking that there is a great need within the foster care system for families willing to take on youth in B's position. As it is we tend to say, "now that you are 18 (or even 16) (or, now that you have graduated from high school) you are ready to be on your own." Most youth don't strike out on their own without support, so, why do we think that youth who have had a rough life, with insufficient support at some point, are ready to do it?

Unfortunately, we probably won't do that same job for at least a few years. So, I hope that someone else steps up for the next youth.

We have been blessed with a baby and are on hold as a foster family until we adapt. Once ready for the extra work we will resume fostering. But, we will need to be pickier about which kids we take until the baby is old enough to understand safety discussions.

Wow...I've gone silent

I didn't mean to. I was actually enjoying this as a space to think. But, I notice that it's been nearly two months since I last said anything.

I think that I've been overwhelmed with life and with trying to figure out what the right balance is in my current parenting 'job'.

I mean, I have a bunch of skills that I could use to improve his success. But, I don't think that using those skills will really help him in the long run. So, I'm trying to step back and let failure happen. But, I can't help but notice the mini failures -- and the impact they have on me -- and want to start fixing them.

I'm growing used to his presence. That feels a bit odd to say, but, it's a bit weird to go from being an adult and pet only home with lots of visitors (of the human and furred varieties) to being a home with a teenager who is an extrovert that doesn't leave the house. So, for awhile it seemed overwhelming to constantly have to engage with someone who wasn't usually all that pleasant. I kept walking away and hiding in my room.

Now I'm doing a better job of expecting his presence. I still treasure the moments when my house is quiet for an hour or so, but, I don't expect it to be that way. My expectation for my home is that it will be a stressful environment and I remind myself that that is okay.

I still question how he'll survive when he's living on his own and doesn't have a trapped audience. But, that is just one more thing that I should let go of. I can't fix it, so, I'll need to let him fail or succeed on his own.

Are we the right place?

I find myself wondering that a lot. We are certainly better than the alternative that was available at moving time. And, we are certainly capable of teaching all of the things that need to be taught. But, are we really the right place?

And, does it matter?

Statistically, every move causes trauma regardless of the reason for the move. So, even if we are only the available place, does that make us the right place now that he's here?

A wanted to leave...in retrospect I'm able to see that her attachment issues were WAY worse than B's. But, I was prepared for it with B since he has the diagnosis. But, A was supposedly a "typical teenager". We fought it for awhile, but, then said that she gets to have power in her life and if that means that she wants to leave we should let her leave.

I think that B has been trying to tell us that he wants to leave. He's not quite as clear as A was. But, this time we're fighting it quite differently. Instead of explaining that we care for him, we explain what we can offer him and then tell him that he is welcome to leave if he wishes. It's a different approach and it feels weird, but, I also realize that he is going to have to leave sooner that he will really be ready. So, in some ways if he leaves earlier than that because he made an active choice to leave it might be less traumatic.

All that said, I don't think that he really wants to leave. I think it's some kind of test. I have no idea if we are passing.

I'm Hiding

B is in a foul mood today. I'm exhausted and had had enough several hours ago.

So, I'm hiding in my room at the moment, dreading the need to go back to interacting.

I can do it, right?

Learning that Love is Less Important Than Skills and Consistency

I've been thinking about love and attachment a lot lately. I've always believed in the importance of love and in the idea that "More than anything else we want to love and be loved." But, I'm learning that it's more complicated than I'd previously understood.

Yes, I yearn to be loved. Yes, I get a lot out of loving others. Yes, it is essential to me to develop loving bonds with my community.

Yes, I know that loving someone can be a choice and that you can treat someone you barely know in a loving way.

What I never fully understood before is just how damaged this part of a person can become. I've read about attachment disorders and I've read about people trying to establish attachments and I focused on that approach.

What I'm learning (sadly) is that if a child gets damaged enough and then gets old enough without developing the skill of attaching then they may not be well served by love. I cannot get past my core belief that internally, perhaps beaten down to a tiny speck, there is a part of them that still yearns to experience true unconditional love. But, that part has been so heavily suppressed and damaged that focusing on it actually creates more damage.

A told us that she hated us because we cared about her. We thought that we needed to break through and keep caring for her and telling her that we cared so that she would understand that love existed in the world. But, with B we are a little less naive, a little more sad and a lot more practical.

He doesn't need us to love him. We might think that long-term he needs people to love him, but, he will never be here long enough for it to be us. What he needs is us to be unfailing in pushing him to grow up and develop self-care skills. It's such a different way of thinking of our job as foster parents. And, it's hard.

I only pushed a little today, because I just didn't have the energy for it. But, everyday that I let go is one that I cannot use to help prepare him. Tomorrow, I must be stronger. Tomorrow, I must issue bigger expectations (than I did today) and make it clear that he must comply.

Natural consequences are often easy, but, it's also easy to let the wrong ones happen when I'm low on energy. I need to be resilient. I'm realizing that part of why I need loving relationship is that love is what drives me to work through exhaustion. For instance, my dog will get a walk regardless of the rest of my day. So, if B doesn't need love and if it's almost detrimental to work on the development of a loving relationship with B, I need to find another motivation for myself in order to ensure I that give him what he does need.

It's a sadder view of the world, but, I really do believe that it's a more realistic view for this teenager. He needs to learn to care for himself and to have a life that is more than sitting on a couch playing video games. I need to teach him those skills. He needs that more than he needs anything else.

Honeymoon is Over

At least it feels that way.

Fuzzy Beasts

Have you ever noticed how much stress animals can pull out of a situation?

Or, how you can get a person who refuses to exercise with a 10 min walk to keep moving for 40 min when you explain that the dog needs it.

They snuggle and love unconditionally.

That said, I find it an odd thing to watch youth with attachment disorders interacting with animals.

One said, "Oh, you have a cat; I love cats!" as the first words she said when visiting us. Then, she proceeded to chase off the cat and after moving in she'd shove him out of the way on a regular basis and was completely uncaring about the fact that she could hurt him by leaving small elastics everywhere. Interpretation: she wanted us to like her and she saw a cat, so, she figured she should tell us that she liked them. But, really, she didn't attach to anything enough to care about interacting with a cat.

B on the other hand seems to truly have compassion for animals. The only exercise he does is that forced by us by pointing out that the dog needs it. But, he really wants the dog to be happy, so, he does it. The same cat that didn't like the girl who claimed to love him, climbed into B's lap for a snuggle within 2 days of him being here. But, the pets from his previous placement "aren't his" anymore and he "doesn't care about them anymore". So, he attaches in a way while they are present, but, if he walks away he no longer cares. It's harder to interpret. Does he miss them and think that it's better to pretend that he doesn't? Or, does he really not care? His attachment issues are considered to be more serious, but, it's hard to figure out.

P.S.

Let me know if you're still reading. It's nice to know if I'm talking to myself or others. Thanks!

I'm Back?

Apparently I needed a serious break from thinking about things. I stopped writing here, then, I stopped posting on message boards and then I even stopped reading everyone else's blogs.

We're still fostering and have B-17 living with us at the moment. It's an experience full of challenges that has the potential to be a fantastic service or to blow up royally.

My wife does a much better job of keeping emotions out of it. She says that she knows that we can do what we've been asked to do and if he has a fit and tries to sign out of care or drops out of school (which will mean that he's no longer eligible for care) then we will still know that we provided the opportunity. Intellectually, I agree with her, but, in practice I wish that I could fix all of B's attachment and honesty issues since I want more for him than to simply learn how to care for himself.

Taking teens who've had a difficult early life is definitely something different from what the world envisions.

How Do I Know When I'm Ready...?

...to try again?

I'm feeling worn down, and I'm not really managing everything as well as I should be.

But, I'm enjoying my interactions with the teens I work with on a daily basis.

So, are we ready for a new placement?

Boy, did I ever need a break!

I haven't even been able to read or write on the topic.

I think part of it is that there's not much I can say that I'm allowed to say and the issues are extreme enough that I fear my anonymity would be lost were I to share actual details.

But, there's also an odd cycle of guilt and anger.

I do not think that we did anything wrong.
I do not think she could have survived long-term in our family regardless of when we'd learned what we learned.
I do think that we did everything we possibly could.
I do think that we have the ability to be successful foster parents.

but...

we did not reach her. And nobody else is likely to try again.

It's a sad way to begin this journey.

We've been thinking about when we'll be ready for another placement and what we're feeling ready to accept and there are some ideas that younger might be easier. But, I also think that we do have something to offer to a teen who is the right fit that won't necessarily be found elsewhere.

I'm wishing that my emotions could catch up to my logic.

A Response -- Who am I?

If you don't mind, I had a few questions. How old are you? What do you do for a living? You said you worked with teens, but in what capacity? You say "we" — are you married?

Crayon -- I don't mind you asking questions, but, my answers may not be too satisfactory.

Although I enjoy interacting with people online and have had friends in my life whom I've initially met in the strangest places (on a Subway platform in a large city, on a bus in a foreign country, etc.), I can be very reserved about the sharing of specific details.

So, I am old enough that I could have had my own 15 yr old and young enough that I still dream of possibly succeeding in my quest for bio-kids.

I am married and we said to each other numerous times this weekend that we didn't know how single parents could survive. There were two of us and we involved outside emergency personnel as well but we're still absolutely exhausted. I am thankful for my partner on a daily basis -- I'd just about given up on love when I finally found it right in front of me.

I work with teens in a variety of contexts. I've gathered significant work experience with kids aged grade 6 - 12 and limited experience with kids in grades 1 - 5 and undergraduates. Right now I work predominantly with (about 100) 11-17 year olds.

Thank You

I appreciate the sentiments. We do seem to be getting the same message from everyone we talk to. So, logically, I believe that I did everything I could. But, it's still emotionally very challenging. I get it...a 15 yr old who doesn't want to be somewhere can really do a lot of damage and cannot really be forced to stay.

I was surprised by how calm I managed to be within the midst of it all -- I would have expected myself to react more. But, somehow I just kept saying, "I will not be the next person to reject this hurt child." Sadly, in the end, not being rejected was something she couldn't handle.

Thank you for the additional support.

Working with teens is always hard, but, fostering them is apparently going to require a new level of expertise. Hopefully, our next placement will go better.

Did I Fail?

I have so much to say and so little I probably can say in this forum.

The crux is that A asked to leave after discovering that she couldn't convince us to kick her out with escalating behaviour.

So, on the one hand, I feel like I did well because I passed the tests and didn't reject her despite some pretty extreme attempts to force us to. On the other hand, I feel like I failed because she's gone and it appears that the behavioural escalation wasn't really a test, but, rather an illogical approach to getting what she wanted.

I also can't help but feel that it was a tip of the iceberg scream for help and I don't know if she's going to get that help now that she's gone back to a place where they invest less direct energy into caring specifically for her.

Oh God!

So many things to say and so lacking in a way to say them.

In short:
- I totally get why people like to start with infants and why it's hard to find foster homes for teens.
- I feel rather lied to about A's history and completely not supported by the system that told us we were getting into a shared parenting experience.
- We've said (many, many times) that we will NOT kick her out, but, she can choose to ask to leave. But, my goodness it's challenging to keep saying the same thing and just keep absorbing more and more problematic behaviours.
- So many bad decisions in such a short period of time and such extreme behaviour that I'm completely out of my depth.
- Exhausted because we decided that we couldn't allow ourselves to both be asleep at the same time.

Feeling Better Today

I think there are still issues and I don't really feel like we've solved anything. But, I'm feeling better and more confident today.

I hate confrontation and getting started with it all felt really hard. But, the reality is that we are expressing concern, telling her we care, etc.

She responded to things by doing more homework last night than I'd seen in a week. Let's hope my confidence lasts through the next issue/test.

Longer than a comment should have been...became a post

Thanks for the response.

Sadly, in our jurisdiction, truancy is now ENTIRELY the parents' problem. The schools are required to have a certain number of teaching hours, but, the students are not required to attend. However, if they don't attend, they don't pass and the parents have failed to fulfill their responsibility of getting them there. (I.e. I can't pass it back to the school and truancy officers.) I can email the social worker (whom I believe wouldn't appreciate a skip-day) and try to make her get involved. There are also supposed to be people she can refer us to...in fact we were told that the referral had been made, but, we haven't heard from anyone.

I do agree with you about the control issue, though. We've tried very hard to give her lots of control over things, but, she's having a hard time seeing it. I think if I were to do it all again (which I'm sure I will someday) I'd start with more rules so that it would be easier to relax them. Instead, I feel like we have to pull them in...after all, when we said that she could be in control of things we qualified that she had to make sure school happened.

I do like the idea of thinking of chores as something to earn though.

And, I think that the planned skip day (perhaps with my DW since my work would not appreciate it) would likely scare her into wanting to go to school. (She's not such a big fan of spending time with us -- she'd like to ignore our presence.)

She says she likes the cat, but, she's been ignoring him tonight too.

Info In

Two missed classes -- an entire afternoon skipped.

Me: Why weren't you in school?
A:
Me: Where were you?
A: Around.

I said more while she avoided looking at me and tried to ignore that I was talking.

Is anybody reading? What do I do? How do I make someone (who says that they like school) go to school?

How much can we hope to accomplish at a time?

She skipped at least one class today -- waiting to find out about others.

She didn't get up in time to eat breakfast, make lunch, etc.

She's not cleaning up after herself, leaving lights on, etc.

She's not doing any chores.

I kind of get it. Nobody's ever really pushed her on these issues before AND they are clearly good ways to push us to prove that we're willing to keep at it. BUT, can we really try to make it all happen at once, or, is that just piling on the "punishment". (I don't really think it's punishment to be expected to eat breakfast and lunch, but, she thinks it is.)

I also don't get how to deal with the dichotomy between "I like school" and regular skipping. Why does she skip if she likes it? Is it a test for us...how long will you keep caring; will you really consequence me if I fail? Or, is it a test for the teacher...do you care enough about me to follow up on a skip? Or, is it a test for the social worker...will you send me back to a group home if I screw up in the foster home? Or, is it just that she's coming apart at the seams and needs someone to catch her as she falls. (Or, is she just a teenager making stupid decisions?) So many possibilities!

How do I know what to do?

Sometimes School Assignments are Thoughtless

Why would you tell teens that they are likely to have a job similar to that of their parents? I mean, I've worked with enough kids who felt like they'd be failures if they didn't become doctors/lawyers like their parents -- I'm talking here about kids who I knew would never get there -- but, it's suddenly even worse when you're looking at a smart kid who comes from a family with issues.

We need to do a better job of thinking about where our kids may be coming from!