Foster Further

 I had the strangest experience today. In the hundreds of thousands of hours I've spent mulling over foster-adoptive relationships for the past two years, this was a novel thought that had never occurred to me before. We were in the car driving home after I'd picked up the three littlest ones from school. James did something small that did not annoy me one iota today, but which I distinctly remember made me extremely angry a few months ago. Like, lose-my-shit kind of angry. The kind of anger that, even in the moment, you're thinking: whoa, what the hell is THIS?  I remember yelling. I remember his face. I remember feeling terrible. The worst self-loathing that boils in my gut for hours. I also remember that it was one of the last time I got that angry. I can see now, reflecting on the changes over the past few months, that I was finally starting to come out of wherever I've been for the past two years. Why? Why was I so irrationally angry about a tiny typical little kid...

...an organized mind. Planning, finding patterns, predicting outcomes, maintaining focus long enough to follow through creatively--I am suddenly seeing mental skills I've never observed in Jane before. This week Jane began lining up her dolls when playing with them. She played school with them for the very first time in her life, ever.  In the sandbox area Jane has begun putting on tea parties. Each container (all identically holding mud, but some decorated with leaves while others have stones or twigs) is a different food. There are even condiments such as salt and paper and sprinkles. She does an elaborate explanation for me while inviting me to sit down and partake. It's so earnest and intentional and creative and REAL to her. She's enthralled. She began writing "storybooks" which consist of multiple pages with pictures and scribbled lines that she tells me are the words of her story. She tells me what she plans to write before she makes a book. Her stories hav...

Spring is really here. The sun is shining, flowers are blooming, my children are outside playing in the dirt every second of the day. I'm getting yard projects crossed off my list, we're having fires outside just because we don't want to come back in the house. Everyone is going to bed with sore muscles and clear minds. And Jane, like a shy flower, is blossoming at last! A few weeks ago she began earnestly "helping" around the house. It's only things that a 4-yr-old can do but she does it all on her own without prompting and is so deeply proud of herself that it's absolutely endearing. I hug her and kiss the top of her head and thank her genuinely. She beams. It's lovely. I love it when she has her own idea instead of copying someone else. I love it when she focuses and completes a task. I love having something to genuinely praise her for. The day she organized all the shoes on the porch into neat pairs nearly made me cry with happiness--finally, a...

After my saddest day with her...this moment of unbearable joy. Jane drew a picture with our whole family (that's seven people, each represented by just their eyes, waist, and legs), a sun, and a rainbow. She draws almost every day and usually many pictures in each sitting. She's lived here 16 months. This is the very first picture with a sun and a rainbow. Drawn on a cloudy, cold, muddy spring day. I realized almost a year ago that she never drew any suns or other happy scenes. I'm a special education teacher for behavior disordered children; I don't have a degree in child psychology but I know some signs to look for. I took notice and started waiting. 16 months. Two Christmases, a birthday, and an adoption later...she finally found her sun. And this is the very first time she has drawn our whole family together. She named each one for me while I blinked furiously so she wouldn't see my teary eyes. 16 months. 16 months. Such a long time for her to finally deeply...