Attachment.5

Before I start in on today's post about attachment, I'd like to give a shout out to a bloggy friend of mine named Denise.

Denise is author of the blog Fostering a Blessing, and she is a single foster Mom to two boys. And she is struggling. She is new to parenting. She is new to adoption issues and trauma issues and attachment issues. It has NOT been a walk in the park for her.

When I write my pieces on attachment, she is right there in the front of my mind as I write, although I wasn't sure if she was reading them or not.

But last week, I was catching up on her blog, as I had missed a few posts, and I saw this:

On Tuesday mornings I so look forward to reading my friend Anne's blog. On Tuesday she writes about a topic that is near and dear to me...attachment. Today I love her post...love it. It is about parenting a kiddo with RAD. I could have written it...except for the part about how to parent through it. My natural instinct is the type of parenting where I throw gas on the fire. I am learning...slowly learning.

Here is Anne's post....Attachment.

Thanks Anne for enlightening me every single week. For being a constant reminder that these kids need something "different". God....thank you for bringing Anne into "my life". I hope to one day meet her in person. Through you all things are possible.


Wow. Denise, I'm so glad that my blog has been helpful to you. Having never met you, this will sound strange, but I am so very proud of you. I think you're doing an amazing job with these boys. Please know that even if you don't hear from me (I often have trouble commenting on your blog), you are always in my thoughts and in my prayers. God bless.....

Now then. Today's post on attachment. I'd like to touch on the cyclical nature of attachment with traumatized kids.

When parenting a child with attachment issues, you go through some pretty tough, very intense times. Times that make you question whether you can continue in this role. Times when you wonder how much longer you can make it the way things are. And then suddenly, it's better. And you think, "I MADE IT!!!!" You crossed the finish line and you're lying in an exhausted heap, but your child is lying next to you and you're both breathless, but you hold hands and your heart rate begins to return to normal. And you think that easy days are stretched before you and you can breathe again, and you pat yourself on the back for having made it.


  Cue sound of needle scratching across the record.

Sadly, this is NOT the way of it. With attachment disorders, it's two steps forward, one step back, and parents need to be prepared for this. Because generally speaking, the timeline goes a little something like this:
1) Adopted or foster child joins family.
2) Everyone enjoys a nice, comfortable honeymoon period.
3) Child starts to feel safe enough to scare himself.
4) Child begins to act out and push away. There is an "epispode".
5) Everyone is stressed and things unravel a bit.
6) It ends and things settle a bit. The calm after the storm.
7) Parents feel a false sense of security. Child begins to feel safe and secure, b/c he just went through the Tunnel of Stress with his parents, and yet he's still with the family, and there are still feelings of affection.
8) The safe and secure feelings scare the bejesus out of the kid. When he's felt this way in the past, it hasn't ended well for him, so yeah, he gets scared.

Numbers 4 - 8 get repeated on a loop. Hopefully, if things are going well, and learning is taking place, there will be more and more time in the calm after the storm phase, and fewer and fewer incidents, with less intensity.

With any luck skill and patience and love and support, the acting-out behaviors will eventually be extinguished.

So. Bottom line: when you hit a smooth stretch, enjoy it, but don't let your hair down. Appreciate it for what it is, and turn up the volume on the attachment activities, but don't fool yourself into thinking you've hit the homestretch. Chances are, that's still a long ways off.

If you'd like to read the other posts in my series on attachment, you can find them here:
Attachment The Attachment Tree
Attachment.2 I Love You
Attachment.3 Keck and Kupecky
Attachment.4 Control







Hey everyone, guess what? I'm guest-posting on Scary Mommy today! She's featuring my post "I am My Mother, and...." today, so go check it out. And above all? Share, share, SHARE! Much love!

Don't forget, I am now posting daily on my blog Life on the Funny Farm. Come on over!

Blog Rolls

I see some of the folks who follow me are starting to add Life on the Funny Farm to their blog rolls. Thanks! Weird to see this one slipping away, but it's time. Soon I'll stop posting on this one with reminders and just post the occassional adoption-related post here.

Visit me!
(at the Funny Farm)

Add me!
(to your blog roll)

Add yourself as a follower!
(at the Funny Farm)

Let me tell you how awesomely amazing you are!
(for making the move with me)

And if you're tuning in late and are wondering what's up with the move, you can read it here.






I'm slipping in the ranks. No longer on the first page. That's OK.
sniff
I won't ask for your votes anymore.
hanky
Just follow me on Life at the Funny Farm and I'll be able to move on.....

Farm Friday - The Funny Farm

So for a while now I've been leading a double life:


I've kept 2 blogs.







Bringing Borya Home was public, and meant to keep readers abreast of adoption-related topics, where Life on the Funny Farm was private, and intended for inside stories only those in my inner circle would find interesting in the slightest.

But somehow things evolved and I got lazy and time passed and now here I am writing about anything and everything on an adoption blog while Funny Farm sits in a corner all lonely.

And I'm switching things.

I know I'll probably lose a lot of readers, but from now on, Funny Farm will be open to the public, and I will be posting there daily, as I've been doing here. I will still keep Bringing Borya Home open, but will probably only post there if it's an adoption-related topic.

For a good long while, I will post a link on BBH that will take you to the new post on Funny Farm, but to make it easier on yourself, consider adding Funny Farm to your blogroll, or subscribing in whatever way works for you(RSS feed, email, FB, Twitter, etc).

With your help and support, I'm sure we can build Funny Farm up to where you all have taken BBH in no time flat. I added the new blog onto TMB not so long ago, and though it started out in the 900s, it's now in the 200s and moving up every day. Will it ever get to the front page like BBH? I know with your help, it most certainly can.

Consider it a barn-raising.















Voting. Simpler than a barn-raising. Just a click of this button!



Image courtesy: honeymoons.about.com

Adoption Tuesday - A Book Review

I received an email recently from a woman named Karen Henry Clark, who is a fellow-adoptive Mom as well as an author. She has written a children's book about adoption entitled Sweet Moon Baby, and she asked me if I would review it.

So here ya' go, folks, my first official book review:





Sweet Moon Baby, An Adoption Tale, is a beautiful story with a fairytale feel that tells the tale of a child born, then let go by her birth-parents, then found and loved and raised by her adoptive parents.

The simple text of the story, coupled with the achingly gorgeous illustrations of Patrice Burton, will help the young child follow the journey of a baby girl born in China to parents who loved her, but who knew in their hearts they could not give her the life she deserved. As the child is carried by the river, and helped along her path by a few protective creatures such as peacocks and pandas, monkeys and turtles, her adoptive parents across the world wait and prepare and search for their daughter.

Under the watchful guidance of the wise moon, her parents find her at long last, and the three become a family.




I loved so many things about this book: the illustrations, the love for their little girl from both the birth parents and the adoptive parents, and the "caretaking" of the baby that took place along her journey. I followed up my reading with a few questions of the author:

Anne Kimball: Such a beautiful story, and so many wonderful examples of how the baby was loved and watched over and yearned for. However, what can you say to the child that might feel uneasy about the birth parents placing the child in a basket on the river?
Karen Henry Clark: I understand. I had a hard moment of truth minutes after our daughter was given to us. My husband held her as I looked through the documents, and my heart stopped at the words: "Baby found forsaking on steps of leather factory." Instantly I felt the isolation, the emptiness of that night for her. Was she awake? Did she cry for her mother? Does some part of her remember people looking at her and walking away? Because there is no way to know, I tried to create a story to fill the mystery that will always be with her. When I read the final draft of SMB to her, she smiled and said, "That baby slept through all the best parts!" And who wouldn't love to believe they'd been carried past the moon by a peacock?

In the end, I appreciate that literature, even a picture book, challenges readers to ask questions. There is always something deeper behind the thing that confuses us or touches us on the page.

AK: How did you decide to write your story in this style?
KHC: When we adopted our daughter from China, we discovered all kinds of interesting things about how the related books affected her. She never grasped the stories that convey one animal can love/mother an entirely different one. She didn't connect with those metaphorical tales of personification. One autobiographical story about an adopted Chinese baby left her thinking the baby would be returned to China because of a reference to the birth mother at the end, not the impact we would have hoped. So this set me to thinking about the kind of story I'd want for her.

Explaining China's one-child policy and all the social or cultural preferences involved in the subject just didn't seem to belong in a picture book. I knew I wanted her to feel loved, not abandoned. So I decided to avoid the non-fiction approach because that was already on the market. I decided to set the story as a classic, timeless fairy tale. I hoped that note would be immediately struck by the book's subtitle Sweet Moon Baby: An Adoption Tale. The characters have no names. The story is meant as a metaphor. I try to keep the elements simple to suggest at the most basic level why or how people decide what they decide. The parents face issues that a child might understand more easily than a centuries-old preference for boys. The adoptive parents wait and pass the time with happy things, instead of writing about failures with foster children or infertility or stacks of forms--real things beyond the comprehension of a young child. The moon represents Hope/Faith/Destiny/God. A certainty that adults can feel and believe in but can't always convincingly explain. And the river is the force, the current that surely moves that baby along home. I felt compelled to show, because of my daughter's early thought about a child returned, the little girl growing up in her new home, happy and loved and cared for by all the wonderful things her birth parents always wanted. And it is suggested that the goodness of China remains with her forever.

AK: Do you ever find that children question the fiction of the forces caring for the baby along her journey?
KHC: Because Sweet Moon Baby is a tale, it presents the important distinction of fiction: A reader is asked to suspend his disbelief. Children are in varying stages of being able to do this. Does any child ask: "If Cinderella falls in those glass slippers, won't her feet be cut to pieces?" or "Couldn't Goldilocks be killed by the bears when they find her upstairs?" The valuable point here, to me, is that they ask the question so the adult can help them understand the overriding theme involved. The significance of the glass slippers is their value as the clue, not as danger. The bears do not represent death, they are self-respecting homeowners who don't deserve this nosey intruder.

What better place to face the potential problems of a river than on the lap of a parent who can guide a child to see that no matter what the potential peril, a kind soul helped? The baby is saved and saved again. A child deserves to have reassuring answers. That is how confidence grows.




Thank you Karen! Beautiful book. Look for it on Amazon.







And thanks for the vote! Just a click of this button....

Thanks are in Order.

I just realized that it's been about a year since I started blogging in earnest. As in posting daily, keeping some semblance of focus, promoting it through FB and Twitter, and throwing my hat in the ring in places like Top Mommy Blogs and Circle of Moms and stuff.

And I gotta say Wow.

And I gotta say Thanks.


Not that I'm gonna win any Most Read Blog on the Planet Award anytime soon, nor am I in danger of going viral with a post about an egg-bound chicken or squabbling teenagers, but it's nice to know that folks seem to have responded.

I won't bore you (and embarrass myself) with numbers, but suffice it to say that my blog now gets as many hits in a day as it used to get in a couple of weeks. And though I'll probably never be in the top 10 on Top Mommy Blogs, it's nice to know that I've maintained my position on the "front page" for the better part of a year now.

The act of blogging (as well as the gentle persuasion of some of my readers) has also gotten me to submit a few pieces for publication, and to that end, I have found some success: a bunch of essays in adoption magazines, along with several in upcoming books, as well as quotes in a couple of e-zines and The New York Times. I know, right?

I'm still not even sure why I write this blog. It started as a journal of sorts when we were going through the adoption, and as a means of updating friends and family on where we were in the process. These days, however, it is simply a hodgepodge of the stuff of our lives. The pain, the joy, the wet-myself-with-laughter-stuff that goes on 'round here.

Many bloggers say, "I write for myself". To which I say, really? Then why not a journal in the drawer of your nightstand?

Me, I write to share. Share the funnies, share the pain, share what I have learned/what I hope to learn about Reactive Attachment Disorder and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and adoption. Share the critters.
Seriously, anybody want some cats?

Because, you know what they say: misery loves company.

And these days? I've got lots of good company.


Thanks again, people. Really, thanks.....




And as always, thanks for your daily vote by clicking this button.



Image courtesy: blog.hubspot.com

Proposal - Check!

In 2010, one of my New Year's Resolutions was to start writing a book.

Check.

In 2011, one of my New Year's Resolutions was to finish my book.

Check.

For 2012, one of my New Year's Resolutions is to land an agent or, failing that, start looking into self-publishing.

In progress.

While I've sent query letters out to a few agents, I've been kind of avoiding (OK, completely avoiding) any agents that include "proposals" as part of their submission guidelines. And I've been putting off creating a proposal like a college essay done the night before it's due.

But I've done it. I've finally done it. And the word according to Word is that I spent 799 minutes editing it and it is 46 pages and 9663 words long. This is just the proposal, people. Jheesh, no wonder I put it off for so long.










Ridiculous.

Anyway, now I have no more excuses, and I must proceed with submissions with reckless abandon.

Shoot, now I have nothing to hide behind.

Yikes.


To vote for me? You don't need to write 9663 words. Just click this brown button once. Thanks!


Image courtesy: english.siuc.edu

So this is kinda cool....

I got an email last night from someone over at BlogHer (which I had joined a few weeks back). They decided to feature one of my blog posts - Grooming Your Cockatiel - on their front page. I know, right? That's what I thought. They even paid me for this honor. I can now buy myself fancy coffee every day for a couple weeks if I want to without feeling beholden to anyone.

Anyway, check it out here by clicking this link below. Join the other 500+ people who have done so, so you can consider yourself part of the "in crowd". A dream come true for you, right? Glad I could help with that.

s

Turn and Face the Strange Ch-Ch-Changes

You may have noticed a few changes on my blog of late.

In the olden days my blog was unadorned, save a few bits in the sidebar about me and/or my family.

Now? I've got a BlogHer ad and list of some of their recent posts, a Facebook badge, a button so you can share on FB and tweet on Twitter, a means for you to search the blog, subscribe to the blog or follow the blog by email.

So annoying.

And I'm sorry, I am.

But as you may or may not be aware, I am trying to get a book published. First draft is written, 2nd draft being worked on. Goin' fishin' for a literary agent. And I actually did hear back from one of the agents. While it wasn't an offer and it didn't sing my praises, it also wasn't a form letter rejection, like the others. She told me I need to get my numbers up. Numbers as in platform. As in blog hits and Facebook fans and, perish the thought, a following on Twitter.

In other words, marketing.

Ugh.

However. Preliminary reports would suggest it's working. I've started a new public FB account and I've been linking my blog posts there. I've been tweeting. God save me, I've been tweeting. I have joined BlogHer and I've been submitting posts there.

I've only been doing this a week or so, but my numbers are beginning to climb.

So while I had to be dragged into this more aggressive blogging world kicking and screaming (well, grumbling and whining, anyway) with all these gadgets tucked in everywhere linking folks hither and yon, it appears it does help to increase my audience.

So I hope you can tolerate these annoying ch-ch-ch-changes, and that you decide to hang out with me a while longer. And hey, don't be afraid to grow with me. Check me out on FB. Subscribe to my blog by email. Perhaps you could even tweet me. Or what would be truly awesome sauce, as my kids would say, would be if you referred me to a friend or so. You know, like the old commercial, you tell two friends and they tell two friends, and so on, and so on...

Because at some point, when my blog hits are like 42,000 times higher than they are now, maybe that agent will take another look at my book. And then I'll get all famous and you can all say you knew me when.

Awesome sauce.

Tweet me!




And click me!

Disaster

My house is a disaster.

It is messy. It is dirty. There are stacks of papers that need tending. The garden is full of weeds. There is dog hair in every nook and cranny.

I am a mess, as well. Although I must say I have been finding the time to shower and put on clean clothes and wear undergarments of a supportive nature.

Usually.


Why this neglect of house and home and self?

I was working on, but have now finally finished....

MY BOOK.


That's right. For the last year and a half I have been working on writing a book.
















The first draft is now finished.

I sent my first official query letter to an agent on Thursday, September 1st.

I am expecting my first rejection letter in just a few short weeks.

I will frame it and hang it on a wall.


I know there is still much work to be done with making changes to the first draft and sending out query letters, but I must say I am glad I have made it this far. There were times I doubted that I could.

But I have received so many warm, encouraging comments from my readers to do this.

I wanted to honor that.

And James has made so much progress in becoming part of our family.

I wanted to honor that.

James would ask me now and then how the book was coming along. To him, it's been extremely important that this story be told. He wants others to see that it can be done. With love, and patience, and persisitence, it can be done.

And I wanted to honor that.









Just like you honor me by keeping me in about the top 1 to 1-1/2 % of the blogs on Top Mommy Blogs every time you click this button to vote for me. Thank you!




Image courtesy chrislovesyo.com

Published Again!

Just got word that I'll be getting published again! I had submitted a couple essays to an editor putting together a book on foster parenting and I've learned that at least one will be making it to print and possibly the other as well.
Now I just need to put together a bio and send in a picture. Whaadya think my chances are that I'll be able to dig up a photo of all eight of us that's free of:
a)one kid holding up devil's horns over another's head
b)nose-picking
c)someone crying over being stepped on/poked/shoved/looked at
d)deranged looking parents telling everyone to cut it out this instant and just smile, dammit!
I'd say slim to nill.....

Published!

Got word last week that an article (essay?) of mine has been accepted for publication! It will appear in the September issue of Adoption Today. I figure this is not only good for me, as I've discovered I truly enjoy writing, but good for adoption if I can get some of my views out and be an advocate of sorts.