"Madness"

2010: A Rough Year

We officially adopted K June 21, 2010, a true irony that it was the longest day of the year. I struggle daily with the challenges of parenting a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder, especially since I happen to be the target for all of her hatred and anger wrought from a short but profoundly disabling lifetime of abuse and neglect. I struggle to maintain compassionate loving feelings for a youngster who, through no fault of her own, utterly repulses me. I struggle to maintain compassion and love for myself as I navigate through some of the ugliest feelings I've ever encountered.

Five days a week I work with broken people who had childhoods like, or worse than, K's, and I am committed to giving her the best shot at being a functional human*, which means practicing a level of self awareness and mindfulness that I've previously been too lazy** to take on. Because it's seriously fucking hard.

Today K is with her sister, M***, and M's family. Our two separate families have made a commitment to making sure the girls maintain a relationship, and we swap weekends as often as we can. Lately K has been spending more time with her sister's family as we seem to need the break. K does very well with M's family and does not display the challenging behaviors we are privy to daily. For this I am both thankful and envious. I am thankful that K has the ability to keep her shit together; I am envious that we do not benefit from that ability. Mostly, I am sad that the threat and fear of trusting and attaching to us is so profound that she behaves in ways that cause us to fear our own abilities to hold on and stay the course.

I once had my astrological chart read by a guy who told me that I had it in me to survive "a concentration camp". Not to diminish the experience of any survivor of the concentration camps or any other kind of inhumane tortuous condition, but I definitely have my moments with K. And I question that guy's reading.

So for 2011 I renew my commitment to my family, to K, and to myself, to put our relationships before all else. I will not die on the hill of un-brushed teeth, poor table manners, stolen trinkets, and poopy butts; I will stand up for kindness, respect, and freedom from verbal and physical abuse. If we're not safe then K is not safe, because she will be unable to heal her own wounds if she continues to suffer further shame from the wounds she inflicts on us.

*What is a functional human? I'll feel successful as a parent if my children can provide for themselves financially (hopefully doing something they love that is legal), if they can regulate their emotions without harming themselves or others, if they have meaningful, respectful relationships with other "functional humans". There's probably a lot more, but those are the basics.

**I have some pretty harsh self-judgements around my "lazy" that I'm working on.

***M is K's fraternal twin. Their birth mother abused a variety of substances during the pregnancy and the theory is that K got the lion's share of the bad teratogenic shit, ergo she is more challenging and has more challenges.

Peace.

Madness

We are in the process of adopting Katherine, a beautiful and amazing 9 y/o 4th of July fireworks display. The first time I officially met her, she asked if she could take pictures with my cell phone of her art work (we were at our elementary school art show). I told her she could take three pictures. I knew she was in foster care and needing to transition into a permanent placement, and John and I had already decided to adopt her when CFS determined she was ready to be adopted*. We new of her reputation for having challenging behaviors (severe ADHD, PTSD, oppositional/defiant disorder, attachment issues, and emotion regulation difficulties).We figured we'd already dealt with host of similar challenges with Erlan so we felt like we were prepared/could handle whatever she could dish out. So, back to the cell phone and my first taste of Katherine chaos... after she took her three pictures I told her it was time to give my cell phone back. Foolish me, 20 some pictures, a few movies, and several laps around the school later, I finally had to grab her and wrestle the cell phone from her death grip. I've since learned that she is obsessed with cell phones and in a few years it will be powerful leverage for everything. Leverage is a valuable commodity in terms of parenting Katherine.

The first time Katherine came to our house, her foster family drove her out to our place, kept their truck engine running out on the road, and practically ran back to their car saying "may the force be with you". We had decided that for her first visit we would just hang out at home and let her "work" the llamas which she was excited to do, being the animal lover that she is. She had been with her foster family for nearly two years and they managed a cattle ranch, had horses (horses trump cell phones so we figured the llamas' appeal might be short lived), chickens, goats, and an 11 year old boy who tormented Katherine daily.** Katherine has a lot of anxiety and it manifests itself in a need to control absolutely everything. All the time.

The afternoon went along smoothly, but by dinner time she hit the wall and exploded. She started darting around grabbing anything that looked like something she probably shouldn't touch, she was impossible to engage or redirect so we got dinner on the table as quickly as possible. She grabbed at the food with her hands and shoved it in her mouth. She poured salt and pepper in her milk. She grabbed food off our plates. It was like having the Tasmanian Devil at the dinner table. As soon as we finished eating we loaded up and headed out. Neither John nor I felt like we could handle Katherine alone for the car ride back to her foster family's, and we didn't want to leave Erlan alone, so we all piled in--John and Erlan in the front seat and Katherine and I in the back.

The 45 minute drive was beyond remarkable. Katherine disengaged herself from her seat belt numerous times and I had to threaten to sit on her if I had to, to keep her safe in her seat. She grabbed at every loose item in the vehicle and sat on it so we couldn't get it back. She swore, she told a bazillion lies, she flipped us all off, and she talked non-stop. When we got to her foster family's house and her foster mom came out, Katherine's behavior changed noticeably. She quieted down, she followed Robin's instructions, and she walked back to the house like a normal kid. When Robin asked how things went, I told her mostly very well and that we'd talk later. We drove away in total silence, our eyes as wide a saucers. After about 10 minutes, Erlan turned to look at me in the back seat and using Dr Evil air quotations, said "MADNESS". We all laughed hysterically (and I do mean hysterically) and wondered just what the fuck we were getting ourselves into.

More than 6 months later and about a month to go until we can legally adopt Katherine, she is still the "madness" in our lives, and she is our joy and wonderment. She argues constantly, she still lies for the heck of it***, cheats whenever she can get away with it, and every now and then, she flips one of us off. Her table manners have improved considerably, she loves Erlan and is a fiercely loyal sister, she is always eager to help (especially if it means avoiding her own responsibilities), and most of the professionals who have been working with her for years remark on how much calmer she is in general since coming to live with us. Every single moment I am with her I am challenged to growth and patience. And while it is exhausting, I am hugely honored to be Katherine's mother.

*K was in a therapeutic foster care placement and the professionals weren't sure she was ready to "step down" into regular foster care/concurrent foster adopt placement. I thought is was an odd concept, not ready for a permanent family, but ready for life long foster care?

**K had a very volatile relationship with her former foster brother and Katherine was pegged as the troubled trouble maker. When I realized he was the same kid who called Erlan a retard a few years ago, I knew he was the problem, not Katherine.

***K used to tell lies constantly. Of course she would lie to keep from getting in trouble, but she'd also just make shit up, and when I'd call her on it she would have the gall to argue her veracity. I would tell her that I would call so-and-so and ask about her story and then she would come clean by saying "OK, I take it back". She really doesn't do it much anymore, but I use to call her Princess Full of Poo whenever she would make up something obviously untrue. Now she just embellishes like any good story teller.

2009?

I am officially referring to 2009 as my lost year! People go on a party tear and have a lost weekend or even a lost week, but I think one only loses a full year when one has amnesia, and that only happens in soap operas. So basically the past year has been like 365 days of the sand passing through the hourglass. Or maybe, so much happened and it all went by in such a blur that it just feels like a blip (but isn't all of life just a nano-secondth of a blip?).

At the end of 2008 a long lost friend from Ireland reconnected with me after several years, via this very blog, and I was so excited and so full of all the things I wanted to share regarding the past 10 years, that I got totally overwhelmed and never really resumed contact. Now it's a full year later, but it seems like just last week I received this:

sarah cottle said: Pam, Pam Fazier, formerly of Seattle, then Bozeman? Pam who I've been trying to trace for years? Pam who took me whale watching on the Pugeot Sound? Pam who made Vicki, Kirstin and myself dress in silly clothes, drink booze and attend a barn dance one thanksgiving eve before eating an overcooked, exploding turkey? Pam who visited myself and brothers Mark and Andrew in Timsbury, England then drove around Devon and Cornwall in a rickety camper van where we 'surfed' and ate 'fish and chips with vinegar' washed down with beer every evening for two solid weeks? Lord! can this be you? Please, please find this message and get in touch or if anyone out there can make the connection tell her its SARAH COTTLE from ENGLAND who loves and misses her... Soon...x

Of course I contacted her by email and told how thrilled I was to have been found, and that I'd been trying to track her down as well, but I never really took the time to write a proper letter and reconnect. And in a way, it doesn't even feel like a year went by, and I'm just as thrilled to know that I can at least write her a catch-you-up-on-the-past-10 years letter, because I know where she is in the world. Although, it has been a year and she might have moved, right?

The blurry bits I do remember from my 2009 fugue state are as follows:

• My sister had a baby girl, Hazel Coyne Sehlhorst, born 3/13/09-I went to Seattle to attend the birth, but she decided to arrive late and I had to return home.
• John and I took classes to become foster/adoptive parents.
• I went to Seattle in May to meet my niece.
• In June we started our transition plan to adopt Katherine, a beautiful 9 y/o mini tornado, by having her for weekends. She brought "MADNESS" into our lives.
• In July John's mom died.
• In August Katherine became a part of our family, my sister et famille came out for a week, I got sick, and the month was over.
• Back to school in September, Erlan starting middle school and Katherine in 4th grade. Two kids, two different schools.
• Turned 47, working full time, NextGen, H1N1*.
• The holiday season.

How's that, a whole year in 9 bullets?

Main Accomplishment--living through a hatch and a dispatch** with sanity (and hopefully sense of humor) in tact.

Thankful for--my family, especially John; my job which, in a sense, is also family; that we are still housed, clothed, and fed, as so many are not.

Haunted by--the fallout from reporting a coworker and friend to the state licensing board.

Regret--any pain caused by my unintentional unkindness.***

Resolve--to write a proper letter to my friend Sarah; to try to do 2010 more intentionally; exercise; ditch j-screwed.

* I did not have H1N1, but it and NextGen (our new electronic health record system), were all consuming work phenomenons.

** My brother Steve married his pregnant wife the day after our mother died, and at the wedding a good friend (the mother of one of Steve's high school friends) after a few glasses of wine came up to me and said, we used to call this "a match, a hatch, and a dispatch". That phrase has always stayed with me as a sort of circle-of-life type thing.

*** Any intentional unkindness has either been accounted for, or hugely enjoyed.

             

Coconut Cream Pie

Yesterday's highlight was coconut cream pie.

That said, we've been experiencing some racial tension in our little paradise vacation neighborhood. On our first day here two little native Hawaiian girls road up to the end of the cul-de-sac where we are in these cool little motorized cars. Erlan, who can be a bit of a gaper sometimes, just stood staring at them. He was already tired and feeling a bit fragile when one of the girls said "what are you staring at?"; he was struck dumb and couldn't reply so she told him if he didn't stop staring she would beat him up. He started to cry. Soon an older sister came to tell us that her sister had ADHD and if she, the little sister, bothered Erlan again she, the big sister, would beat her up. My guess is that Erlan was both fascinated by the little motor car and by seeing children with skin color close to his own.

Yesterday when we got back from our sand and surf outing a little boy was literally prowling around the back of the house and when we surprised him, he dashed off with a small nerf ball Erlan had brought from home. Eventually, I asked for the ball back and invited the boy to stay and play. He handed over the ball and left with his little sister (the six year old who made Erlan cry). Later in the day, the six year old, Anilla, came to ask to borrow the ball to play with. Erlan handed it over with the expectation that it would be brought back. A few hours later when the ball had not been returned, Ren became incensed and decided he and Erlan would go over there with their nerf GUNS and demand the ball back. I said absolutely not, they hadn't given a time line on the borrowing and they would just have to wait. Ren pretty much had a tantrum, Erlan was crest fallen, and I was a total bitch. This was a $2 little spongy ball for fuck sake; let it go. Soon three siblings returned, Alika the boy who originally tried to take the ball, Anilla the six year old who threatened to beat up my son, and Nila the 4 year old on training wheels. The story was that the ball had gone to the dump. Totally unbelievable but that's the story they stuck to.

Over the course of an hour we agreed that if the ball "turned up" they would bring it back, as Ren and Erlan only have a few toys here, and then we would leave it for them when we go. The children told us that their mother owns all of the houses on the street and she is a millionaire. When I asked if they have a lot of kids in there school, Anilla said "no mostly Haoles". I said "you mean like us?" and she said "no, you're mixed". Now I am truly about as white as they come (actually yesterday I thought I could get away with SPF30 instead of SPF50 so today I'm pink) except for the freckles and age spots, so they obviously were talking about Erlan. I don't know if our mixed status gives us a sort of cache with the kids or it makes us worse.

There is definitely a huge disparity on the Island with regard to housing. I spoke at length with shop girl who has lived here for nine years and she said the biggest problem is that son many of these rentals go empty while there is almost no affordable housing for locals who have to work three and four jobs to afford the extremely high rent when they actually can find housing.
John is pretty freaked out by the whole thing, probably because he can empathize given our situation on the West Boulder. I think it's important to be aware of race and class issues, and class, and especially economic disparities when we travel to other regions, states, or countries. It's not just about the sand, surf, and lush landscape. It's also about the history, the people, and the culture, and our tutors are a rag tag bunch of local siblings. I wonder what lessons they have in store for us today?

Shake for me girl; I wanna be your back door man

Two complimentary events occurred this week. I started using testosterone cream to jump start my libido and Erlan discovered Led Zeppelin.
Flagging libidos are common in women my age, especially women on SSRIs. There's nothing like peri-menopause and Zoloft to deaden the drive. Of course my lovely medical provider, Rebecca, did suggest that I consider going off the Zoloft, but why have a sex drive if I don't have a partner (self pleasure aside)? Without Zoloft, I experience levels of irritability known to bring on toddler like tantrums due the mere contact of loose hair to skin. There's a line in a Beastie Boy song that goes "don't touch me, 'cause I'm electric; and if you touch me, you'll get shocked, shocked, shocked". That would be me off my Zoloft. My lab work did show that I'm low on testosterone so I'm going the transdermal cream route.
Wednesday morning I started 'operation renewed sex drive'. On the way in to work/school, Erlan and I were listening to the big list (random play of all 3000+ songs on the iPod) and Led Zeppelin's Whole Lotta Love came on. Erlan was in transports of joy! He immediately asked me to put this song on his list and then asked to hear it over. Then we switched from the big list to Led Zeppelin and have been listening to them exclusively. Wanna whole lotta love? No duh!
Thursday I bought a new camera. I've been doing research, wanting more mega pixels, and yearning for a SLR vs a point and shoot. John had been encouraging me to get a point and shoot because he didn't think I'd like dealing with all the lens issues and weight. I had basically agreed and picked out this point and shoot. When I got to Costco they didn't have the point and shoot but they did have the rebel and I went for it. So now I'm a wee bit overwhelmed with my purchase and definitely getting where John was coming from with his concerns, but I have an expensive piece of gear which will require lots of expensive attachments and if that's not testosterone kicking in, then I don't know what is. I'm also very excited about learning to use this camera and getting tips from Chieko.
My biggest concerns regarding HRT are facial hair, male pattern balding, and the desire to purchase an
X-Box. The onset of any of these and I'm ditching the cream.

So...

So so suck my toe all the way to Mexico.

It's been quite a summer thus far, and although John likes to tease that it's over, there are still several more action packed weeks left. Good or bad weeks? You decide.

July was a bit hellish, quite close to literally, given the record setting high temperatures. The biting flies did not disappoint; there were more than ever before, probably due to monsoonal humidity; there were new types, particularly a small buzzing gnat-ish thing that liked to bite me just under my ear lobes causing painfully itchy boil-like protrusions that resembled Frankenstein knobs coming out of the sides of my head; and they were bigger (the horse flies were frigging huge). I actually like the horse flies. I like to let them land on me and settle in so that I can smack the shit out of myself, stunning the horse fly into near death in the process. I then either smoosh the HF into pulp or pull its wings off and toss it into the river for the fish. I believe that the bruise I incur in the self injurious part of this ritual is far less painful than the HF bite and its ensuing consequences. We even had a huge infestation of mosquitoes in the house (probably because we waited too long to put in the screens) and they particularly liked to bite me on my feet and ankles while I engaged in my Sudoku addiction at the computer. I did discover that Coppertone Water Babies with SPF 50 acts as a fly repellent as well as a sunscreen.

Usually August marks the rapid decline of the biting flies, however to date, we are still under siege.
August also brought us more tire joy. The first week of August I was a wee bit late to work one day due to a nail in a tire, which was patched up without much ado. On Sunday 8/5, two days before Erlan and I were to depart to Seattle for Gail and John's wedding, my John, while changing the oil on the Subaru, discovered that each rear tire had a nail in it, one was in the sidewall. FUCK.
Four new tires were purchased: $600.
Peace of Mind during the twelve-hour drive to Seattle: Priceless.

The Saturday before leaving for Seattle, we met up with friends at the Big Timber Waterslide Park to celebrate Erlan and Jack's birthdays.

While at the BTWP, one must suspend the disbelief that one (or one's child) will not contract a horrible viral and/or bacterial infection and that one (or one's child) will not die in a terrible slide malfunction or collapse, because the BTWP is so much fucking fun! One time I did whack my head on the tunnel wall of one of the slides and experienced a momentary brown out, and Erlan is still enjoying a pretty nasty URI, but I tell you, it is totally worth it.
We enjoyed our day at the waterslide with Jim, Barb, Jack (birthday boy), and Hazen Marshall; Frank and Ren Wall; and an old acquaintance from my Bozeman life, and her grown up daughter (whom I worked with when she was an infant which makes me feel kind of old in that OMG this person that I knew as a baby is 18, and that means that 18 years have gone by, and I'm 18 years older, and what have I done in those 18 years?). We ate birthday cake during a storm and nobody got hurt even once and everybody had a great time.

Then came the trip to Seattle, which I will detail in depth on another day because my brains are about to explode.