Day 11: Why parenting kids from hard places is a gift

Today is supposed to be Ipod shuffle day, but I only listen to audio books on my Ipod, so that doesn't work for me.  So instead I want to talk about parenting traumatized kids.
Any child that is adopted has experienced trauma.  I do not care how young the child is, how wonderful the adoption was, how ethical your agency is, how you burned sage and chanted so that the child became pure, or whatever.  Adoption is trauma.
Children all react differently to trauma.  Some kids seem to roll with the punches and looking at them, you would never know the losses that are part of their lives.  Some kids cannot overcome the trauma and are unable to transition into new families.  The vast majority are somewhere in between, struggling and thriving, often simultaneously.  Parenting kids who are struggling can be exhausting, but also is so beyond rewarding.
     A child with trauma behaviors does things that drive sane adults nuts.  Nonsense questions, bed-wetting, tantrums that make Joan Crawford look like Mother Theresa, all those things are so stressful.  Parents can feel isolated because other people don't seem to understand that this child is not behaving like all other children.  I am an experienced parent, I have seen countless tantrums.  I had never experienced a child kicking, punching, spitting, and screaming for hours at a time until I had traumatized kids.  I have heard numerous four year olds ask "WHY?" a billion times during the day, but the nonstop nonsense chatter is a whole different ball game.
     So this gift is starting to sound a bit like Pandora's Box.  But truly, it is not.  I have been an adoptive parent for 6 1/2 years.  Let me tell you about the positive things.  Adopting a child with trauma behaviors is like having a mirror up to your face that shows you every ugly thing about yourself.  It shows you all your failings, all your mistakes, all your imperfections that you try so stinking hard to hide, even from yourself.  It forces you to confront those things, head on.
     I hate being vulnerable.  HATE HATE HATE it.  Parenting my challenging kids means I am vulnerable.   It has been so wonderful for me to let people in to see my imperfections.  It turns out that friendships are so much deeper when we are not trying to maintain this facade of perfection with one another.  Had I not been challenged in my parenting and needed help, I never would have known the power in vulnerability.
     I am kinder and more compassionate.  I can be judgmental.  I was unable to look at the world except from my own narrow sphere of experience. Now I know that the control that we pretend we have in our lives in an illusion.  The things I control start and end with me.  I cannot control anyone else, no matter how loud or justified or sanctimonious I am.  I can now see all the gray between the black and white that defined my life before.
     I am stronger.  I know that strength does not mean taking a stand and rooting there unable to budge.  I  can change my opinions, my beliefs, my life when I need to, because strength lies in flexibility.  Strength means hanging on, even when you are tired.  Strength means forgiving yourself and asking others to forgive you when you make the millions of mistakes that you will make.  Strength means asking others to apologize rather than wallowing in your own self-righteousness.
     I am humble.  I dare not say that I have something well in hand, because God only knows, I will have to eat my words.  I have struggled with pride, but have had to give up so much of that, because pride doesn't serve me well.  I can be proud of myself, that is fine, but to act as though I have things figured out is laughable.  I could give you countless examples, and if you know me in real life, ask me about the day D refused to get dressed for school.
    I take care of myself.  I know that if I don't take care of myself, I cannot expect others to do it.  I know how to take a break, how to recharge, how to nourish myself.  I don't tolerate relationships that are toxic because I'd prefer to deepen the positive friendships that I have.  I will not spend energy on things that don't matter.  I am not interested in getting knee deep in the BS of life anymore.
     Parenting traumatized children is difficult for sure, but it has made me better on so many levels.  I'll do a whole other post on how rewarding helping children find themselves is, but from a purely selfish standpoint, looking in that ugly mirror has motivated me to change.  And change is good.
   

Day 10: First Love and First Kiss

So my first true love is my husband.  Without a doubt, he is the only person I have ever fallen in love with. I remember that heart-fluttering, time-stopping feeling so well.  We are still in love, for sure, but luckily, that giddy, exciting, calling-into-work-sick-so-you-can-spend-more-time-together thing doesn't last forever. I love that the feeling of falling in love has changed over time into a comfortable and reliable being in love.

My first kiss was years before I met my husband when I was in sixth grade.  I was going out with a boy, which consisted of a lot of hand-holding around the school.  He gave my first kiss and then after two weeks, we broke up and I joined the official club of girls who he had gone out with before me.  It was quite a club.  Apparently, he had held hands with many girls before me.  The loss and utter tragedy.  We went to different high schools, but played a common sport, so became buddies again in high school, although we were never close friends.

Day 9: The Future

I hope to have grandchildren.  I hope to have good, strong, healthy relationships with my grown children.  I hope that my children find life satisfying.  I hope that my husband and I continue to have a strong relationship.  I hope to travel.  I hope to look back on my life and feel like I have crossed all my goals off my bucket list.

Day 8: Satisfaction

Today I am supposed to recount the last time that I felt deeply satisfied.  It was last night, around the dinner table.  I love having the people I love sharing a meal together.  I love the evening prayer, followed by a chorus of "Free to EAT!!!"  I love the chatter and the silliness.  I love having enough food to fill every tummy and I love watching my children who have known hunger feel secure.  I even love the gross burps and farts that are almost a nightly ritual.  I love watching my children interact with each other as they tell stories about their day.  There is no safer, more comforting feeling than being around that table.

Day 7: Zodiac sign

I am an Aquarius and I fit my zodiac sign pretty well.  I am weird and independent, honest and loyal.  On the down side, I am stubborn and can be unemotional.  I tend to see the practical side of everything, and I take the long view of almost every problem.  I love being around people, but I also need to have alone time to feel totally relaxed.  I am friendly to almost everyone, but despite appearances, I am not very open with many people.  I have only a few close friends at any given time.  I like to see the good in everyone, but want people to say what they mean.

Day Six: 30 Interesting Facts

1. I started dating my husband when I was 19.
2. Our 3rd and 9th marriage anniversary are the only two years that we have not had the corresponding number of children.  We got our referral for P one day after our 3rd anniversary.
3. I used to be able to speak German fluently, although I have lost a lot of the language now.
4. I was a state champion wrestler my senior year of high school.
5. I am learning sign language.
6. I didn't get confirmed in the Catholic church until after college, although I was baptized Catholic as an infant.
7. I would like to have 12 children.
8. My husband proposed while we were in Germany.
9. I cannot take naps without being completely groggy and grumpy for the rest of the day.
10. I love to read and read an average of 2-3 books/week.
11. I had never dusted anything until after I graduated from high school.
12. I want to vacation in Thailand and hang out by the beach.
13. I want to vacation in Italy and hang out in farmer's markets and restaurants.
14. I have been a vegetarian since I was 9.
15. I gave up cheese for 6 years in a misguided attempt to become vegan.
16. Cheese is my favorite food.
17. I have weird urban hippie dreams about owning a mini-farm.
18. I am way too lazy to have a mini-farm.
19. I am a horrible artist and cannot sing to save my life.
20. One of my bio kids is a great artist and another has perfect pitch.
21. I love to cook and spend one to two hours in the kitchen every day.
22. I think minivans are cool.
23. I love having guests.
24. Although I am a vegetarian, our family ordered two cows, three pigs, and 64 chickens this year for meat-eating purposes.
25. I have extremely vivid dreams.
26. I also have extremely vivid nightmares.
27. I am truly happy most of time.
28. Self-deprecation is totally hot to me.
29. I love almost every ethnic food there is, but I intensely dislike restaurants like Chili's and Applebee's.
30. I am a food snob.

Day Five: The day I lost the blog challenge questions

And then I found them again.  Because I rule.  And then I bookmarked them so I wouldn't lose them again.  And then I looked at today's topic and almost pretended that they had stayed lost.  Today's topic is "A time when you thought about ending your own life."
Yikes, suicide, on my tenth or eleventh blog post?  That seems a little deep and morbid.  I have been bummed, of course, in my life.  There were times when I probably had a touch of depression.  I have never seriously considered suicide.  The closest I have come is when my youngest child was very sick and I thought, "Please take me instead.  I will gladly trade."  
I can remember being in 8th grade and getting majorly busted by my parents and telling a friend that I should just go kill myself, but that was more about drama than actually wanting to end my life.
I know that many people have been in DARK places where ending their lives felt like a better alternative than living.  I am super fortunate to have not been in that position.