Forget the reasons why it may not work!

This has been a week of  issues that could relate to adoption. FASD, My Violent Child, even Call the Midwife. As well as Open Nests new video and Woman's Hour discussion about social media and adoption breakdowns. In the face of so much adversity is it surprising that so many of us living adoption, struggle with remaining calm, upbeat, informed and yet keeping our identity.

Mr L and I hadn't even heard of FAS/FASD* until we attended an adoption course, we knew nothing of neurology in infants and children and how parental behaviour could have such an enormous effect on how the brain itself actually develops. We didn't realise that emotional trauma of many sorts could affect how children mature emotionally. As an example I was very poorly after child 2 was born, 10 days post birth I was rushed into hospital where I had to be given a blood transfusion and massive doses of intravenous antibiotics to fight an unknown infection. The hospital couldn't find what had caused the infection or decide if I had an internal bleed. My only concern was for my 10 day old baby left at home. I was hospitalised for 10 days and then spent 2 weeks recuperating, with the children at my parents. Interestingly, child 2 struggles a little today with connecting with his peer group, how to deal with difficult situations. He has a tendency to over-react. I now wonder if that difficult start for him meant slight attachment issues??
Before our adoption training we had no knowledge about therapeutic parenting the only parenting we knew was that passed on to us by our parents and what I read about. Steven Biddulph and Dr Christopher Green are 2 favourites.

Listening and watching all the above this week has I think really highlighted how little we know about humanity. How desperate we are to understand what we should be doing to ensure the best for our children and yet in the next breath, society can be so judgemental of parenting and therefore have a massively negative impact. Of course most pregnant women would not drink at all if they knew about the risks of FAS/FASD, but the medical world doesn't  share that information openly and clearly. Violent children would not exist if we could consistently provide the parenting they required, and I am sure that parents struggling with their children's behaviour would step forward quicker to ask for help, if they knew that help would be forthcoming and non judgmental. If people would just drop their pre conceptions about parenting Open Nest would not have needed to create their video about how to support adoptive families.

How in reality can adoptive families remain positive, we have to fight constantly for what our children need. At home we have had to change our "natural" parenting techniques, at school we have to ask staff to think differently when educating our children, within family and friendship groups we have to explain why we do things the way we do, even though sometimes we are banging our heads against a brick wall and then when we are out, society judges us based on their experiences of parenting and their expectations of how children and families should behave.

So why do we get up everyday, usually with the birds and often after a disturbed nights sleep. Why do we put on our professional clothes, collect our books and files to visit the head teachers office to sell attachment training to the staff. Why do still risk days out, meals out and holidays despite knowing that there is a possibility that it will all go pear shaped.

For me the answer is LOVE!

*FAS/FASD - Foetal Alcohol Syndrome/ Foetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder

A Sensory Box

How to calm a 3 year old - talking? Rationalising? Time out?

Yeah right, none of those are going to work, not with our little chappie. Once the red mist descends he doesn't hear the talking, even if he was able he couldn't rationalize, what 3 year old can and time out well how can you reject a child full of massive emotions when he has already been rejected so much already.

It's time to think outside of the box. 

As many adoptive parents I probably could hold a degree in how to parent an adopted child, well that is if I could always be calm, if I could consistently remember the Dan Hughes way and if it was easier. Those of us that can be found with our noses, continually stuck in a book about therapeutic parenting will know that our brains are split into three parts, the reptile, the limbic and the neo cortex. But for those of you not in the know here is a quick explanation. The reptilian brain is the oldest part that's the bit that teaches us about basic survival - fight, flight or freeze. The limbic is that bit that is full of emotion - happiness, sadness and anger. The neo cortex which is the most recently developed is the bit that helps us with logical thinking, empathy and speech. Many children and not just those taken into the care system, struggle because the reptilian part of their brains are more active and stronger than the other parts, a brilliant example of how this affects them was shared by Nicola Marshall in her podcasts Teachers Introduction to Attachment. 

"Okay you are crossing the road, when a car comes hurtling towards you - do you stop look at the car and think, what are my options? Shall I run back to the pavement shall I run across the road, should I lie down hoping the car will miss me or do you react?" 

Traumatised children react, they spend most of their time in the reptilian part of their brain so whenever something worries them the reptilian part of the brain takes over and they DON'T think they just do.

Here in lies the problem, whenever something makes child 4 uncomfortable, worries or scared he reacts he doesn't think, he just can't and so we have to teach him how to control his reptile so as to enable him to cope with life. How do we do that?
Well, we have to keep the reptile occupied and that's where sensory calming activities come in.

We have over the last few days been creating all sorts of sensory calm stuff - we already have a big green 5 minute egg timer sometimes if I need and I mean need to get something done I can give child 4 the egg timer and ask him to hold it with the caveat that once all the green grains of sand have passed through we will do something exciting, like swing on the swing or bounce on the trampoline. But I have learned that I need many types of egg timers to keep that little red crocodile busy. So With the help of Google and Pinterest we have created a jellyfish in a bottle of blue water, glow worms float in a pink sea, balloons stuffed full of playdough and rice. A bottle full of glitter glue, warm water and glitter is brilliant and I am planning on buying an exercise resistant band. The idea being that at dinner time I can tie a band around the legs of his chair and he can kick at it, without making lots of noise. What we have found is that if we can keep the reptilian bit of the brain occupied the other parts of the brain have the opportunity to do their jobs.

We are hoping that we will be able to teach child 4 how to regulate his red crocodile so that except when a car is hurtling towards him he will be able to stop, think and breathe before he reacts. 

Number 4 build a den

What is it about the outdoors?

All our children love the outdoors but child 4 in particular is in his element. It doesn't matter the weather, wind, rain, snow or sun he just wants to be outside. Outside he can run about, spin around arms out stretched, he can climb trees, jump in muddy puddles and shout and scream, he can be free of all constraints.

Being outside means that I am not distracted by the ironing, cooking dinner or the phone, my focus is all on him, we often have our best conversations on our way to the farm or doing the school run. We spend time just being together, heads close as we watch a caterpillar slowly inch its way across the path, following bees and butterflies from flower to flower and heads lifted to the sky watching the peregrines swoop and dive.

We play together building dens in the garden, jumping on the trampoline, we blow bubbles, play with water and sand, we dig and plant seeds and we feed the chickens and collect their eggs.

When we are indoors we expect different behaviour from our children, we want them to have indoor voices, climbing up a bookcase or jumping from sofa to chair is dangerous, playing with water means flooding the bathroom. Even painting, playdough and glueing and sticking are usually constrained to one room often a kitchen table and the activity is followed by as much time cleaning up as playing together. I often find life is tougher indoors than out, we are quicker to stop our children from exploring when they are climbing on the windowsills. We silent their excited screams and thumping footsteps. We call a halt to those noisy active chasing games, sometimes mistaking the noise for arguing and fighting. They themselves are more likely to irritate each other if we spend too much time together within the four walls of our home.

This half term, we took advantage of the few decent days of weather. We have built a den in an unused area of the vegetable patch and we have travelled to the Wild Place a huge acreage full of woodland walks, meadows with towers awaiting wild flowers to show their faces. Barefoot trails, woods full of wolves, lemurs enjoying the sun. Zebra, okapi and eland wander through their enclosures and hogs wallow in their mud pits digging for vegetables.

 Now the weather shows signs of getting better I at least can consider being outdoors more, I am planning a forest school area where the den has been built and with child 1 needing to build her cardio vascular strength for her Borneo trip we will be walking more, climbing hills and strolling through woods. We can climb trees, fish in the streams nearby, run through fields and explore the nearby woods. We can build fire pits to cook marshmallows over, grow beans over the den, we can make a mud kitchen and fill the sandpit. The farmer behind us has said we can feed the lambs in a few weeks when he is over run with new ones being born. Everyone of these activities are learning opportunities. Not just counting and speaking, but also cause and effect, building, learning responsibility and most importantly bonding.

ROLL ON SPRING.

https://www.50things.org.uk

Interview with a school

Sometimes being a governor isn't good when you are also a parent! You see and know things that perhaps you would prefer not to, life isn't fair, straightforward or black and white. There are budgets many, many children each of whom matter, targets, standardised tests and so on. The constraints are huge, so when it comes to one set of parents asking for a whole school change for what on the face of it is for one child there really should be no surprise that those requests are met with caution or sometimes complete dismissal. After all in many cases the person sat in front of us has years of experience in teaching and school process'. Yet none of whom have any understanding of the issues regarding children in care. Not intentionally, I am sure but our education system does not seem to take into consideration children who do not fit the norm emotionally or academically.

 The YIPPEE Project  aims to 'increase knowledge of the post-compulsory education of young people who have been in public care as children'
A research project funded by the Framework 7 Research Programme of the European Union, this research brings together and studies five EU countries – Denmark, Hungary, Spain, Sweden and the UK. 
When children in care were asked if they felt that schools offered them a safe and secure environment the responses were a resounding yes in every country EXCEPT the UK!
http://tcru.ioe.ac.uk/yippee/

It hadn't occurred to me that the primary school that has served for our 3 older children may not be the place for child 4, until I read Sally Donovans " Unofficial Guide To Adoption" and when it did I was filled with concern almost bordering on despair, what if the school I had been such an advocate for wasn't able to take on child 4 and his potential needs. I knew deep in my heart if the school couldn't or wouldn't ready itself for supporting children with difficulties with attachment I would have to consider an alternative. So using Sally Donovan's chapter on advocacy I planned our interview with care, I dressed professionally, packed up all my adoption books, set up a folder with all the research I have on attachment. I wrote out everything I wanted to talk about and revisited my knowledge, finding old and  new research supporting our request for staff training. It was imperative that the head actually believed that children whom have been adopted have been traumatised, they are not just magically fine because they have a new family who can take care of them. Their trauma can exhibit itself in what could be viewed as naughty behaviour or symptoms of ADHD. If the staff didn't recognise or believe in the research then there would be no hope for us building a relationship with them.

On Tuesday Mr L and I met with the head and the SENco. I was nervous, what if they showed no understanding or willingness to listen? what if the head suggested that I looked at other schools to ensure the best possible outcome for our son, what if I was just unhappy with the reactions. But   Phew , all worked out. The SENco had just been to a county meeting where attachment was the headline topic. The school were sending four staff for KS1 to an inservice training day about attachment and if that was successful and useful then the school would ask for the trainer to come into school to explain the neurology and impact of attachment and how staff can deal with the behaviours that spiral from it.

I left the meeting relieved, I couldn't have asked for a better start to what will be a new  relationship with our school. The SENco is definitely in our corner, she is learning everything she can about attachment and is very open minded to the research and its suggestions in how to deal with the behaviours our children exhibit. With her championing my son and with the head at least willing to learn about attachment our son is in with a fighting chance to an education with all the emotional support he may need.  And it's not just him who will benefit, with the school looking at how to get the best from their children by using therapeutic methods mean that many other children will benefit too.

a potty trial

On Wednesday afternoon child 4 decided that he didn't need a nappy anymore. Wahey, celebrations, hand clapping galore, the waiting until he was ready seemed to have worked..........

There have been signs that he was beginning to recognise his nappy, he used to hide when filling it and then deny having had a pooh when the delightful aroma would reach its smelly tendrils up our nostrils. Only a couple of days before, I walked into the bathroom and there he was sitting in the dark on his potty. He sent me away and then did his business and flushed it all away.

Wednesday was a success, he managed all afternoon to use the potty, he wouldn't let any of us help him and certainly didn't want any spectators. A bit of that control Behaviour rearing its head, but he was doing so well we decided to go with the flow. Thursday was nursery, so I packed his bag with spare clothes including new pants, wipes and nappies just in case. J his key worker was excited and more than happy to go with child 4's demands, I wasn't sure how it would go, I was hoping that because toilets in a nursery are a kind of children's community meeting place all would be well. Foolish, foolish, foolish. Child 4 refused to use the potty and had a melt down when the little toilets were suggested. So he came home with bags of wet clothes. J and I attempted to talk to him about what he wanted to do but he just shut us out, talking about anything else but potties. J asked  "Would you like to bring in your potty from home?" Child 4 answered "Can I go outside now"   Today was an exact replica, he wanted to wear pants but just wouldn't use the potty.

We have decided to see how the weekend goes, I've promised to let him buy a new potty to take to nursery on Monday - he of course wants a cow one or maybe a pink one, please please please go for a pink one - Amazon amazingly do have a cow potty but at £25 not sure I really want to go that route - I'll be pushing for a pink one!

I am honestly not worried if he wants to wait a bit or if he wants to keep on trying, the others just got on with it too and when accidents happened they just put their wet clothes in the washing machine. None of the older ones emptied their potty though. They would proudly show me there potty fillings. Child 4 though oh so different and despite being proud that we are making headway I am sad that it's all hidden away and I am having to gently remind him that independence although a good thing isn't always a requirement when you are 3 years old and have a family to help you.

#Taking Care

I have always been quite open about my life, in fact one of my co-workers has said that she sees it as a gift, the ability of being able to give part of myself so honestly and unashamedly. Can't say that I see it that way, I have always believed that a problem aired is a problem shared. But I find now that I don't share, because when I do, I rarely feel supported. Everyone it seems has pearls of wisdom - you need to put him on the naughty step, it's your own fault you don't discipline him enough, all children do that, my kids did that, you need to start treating him the same way you dealt with the older children. I explain about rejection so we don't have a naughty step, I explain that we keep him close and make sure that he knows that he is loved regardless and help him with any appropriate consequence, yes, I know all children do the things he does but they don't do it with the same force of emotion - I know because the 3 older siblings who are our birth children did some of those things but it wasn't anything like what we deal with, with child 4. I explain that his start in life was so very different to his siblings so it's not right to parent him in the same way. Sometimes I see a glimmer of understanding, but often I see their eyes glaze over or they shrug their shoulders as if to say, well if you don't take my advice then what do you expect, oblivious to the fact that I wasn't really asking for their advice, I just needed a bit of understanding, a hand on my shoulder or a reminder that we are doing ok.

This not sharing is quite alien to me and it makes me feel ashamed, as if I should be ashamed by child 4 or my lack of ability to parent him in the "politically correct" way. This makes me cross, the only way to educate people about children in care is to share actual experience backed up by all the research we adopters have read and studied. If we feel too ashamed to share how can we educate!!!!

Child 2 made dinner tonight : Chicken and Avocado salad followed by Chocolate and Raspberry muffin

Then yesterday on my way to work, I was thinking about #takingcare100, a photo of something that is you taking care of yourself, something that makes you happy and I was, as I have been for the last 10 days thinking of what makes me happy, for me and I seriously couldn't think of anything, I had lost the will. Suffering from a nasty cold virus for 4 weeks, lack of sleep, hospital, ambulance (again) and doctor trips, dealing with the tribulations of a toddler on the war path and trying to organise 2 birthday events for child 2 & 3 and a black tie event to raise money for child 1's Borneo trip has wiped me out. It's amazing how a little negativity each day can affect the whole day, I read somewhere recently that if we looked at our day as a piece of white paper the things that go wrong are in reality just a couple of dots - I need to reclaim me or I am going to just disappear into the black swamp that is currently my life. All those adopters on Twitter and those who link in on The Adoption Social have handed me the lifeline to pull myself out and to encourage me to make the changes so very necessary to my sanity.

http://theadoptionsocial.com

So I have shared the negative and the positive of family and friends support via #allchildrendothat and I am planning stuff for me. Child 2 made dinner in his food tech class today, I am off to see Mary Berry care of a friend who saw that I needed some away time. Chinese New Year is just around the corner so I have a feast to create. For my birthday we are going to arrange a city break for adults only,  Mr L, myself , KBS & AS and Mr & Mrs H. Then there is a Sunday morning family and friends walk to a pub in the next village for the bestest ever roast beef and Yorkshire puddings. That will take us through until May, oh and if I am feeling a bit lost or low a Gin and Tonic Board meeting may be called.

 There feeling better already.

Hopes and Dreams

Expectation - "A strong belief that something will happen or be the case"

An interesting word expectation, a word often used by parents, educators and members of the community. Our children are expected to behave in a certain way, they are expected to achieve certain grades they are expected to be respectful, helpful and polite and sadly if they are adopted or fostered they are often expected to be grateful or feel lucky. I had never really thought about my expectations or rather the effect those expectations had on others until I had children. I remember saying once that I believed that my children behaved in a certain way because I expected them too. And there is definitely truth in that however this adoption road has made me re think our futures and for the good.

Ten years ago when I was informed that child 1 was going to remain in the reception class, whilst all her friends moved on into class 1, I wasn't necessarily surprised and actually believed the opportunity for her to have another year in a very play led environment would be a benefit, however many others would/did see this as detrimental to her education, in fact many people's expectations of her academic abilities were based on this and this was so damaging during late primary school and early secondary school. (I can't tell you how wrong they were, she is growing into a beautiful, creative, confident and happy teenager.)

With child 4 I fear that people have flawed expectations and he doesn't have the same foundations that child 1 has to ensure that he can have the same confidence in himself.  In the adoption world we talk of trauma and attachment and the behaviours they trigger, in education it seems that lack of education in the needs of children in care that our children are at worst expected to fail or when their behaviours are not the same as the other children in the class they are isolated or their early years are carefully managed and hidden away like its a dirty secret, they are expected to quietly get on with it - "it doesn't matter if you don't have a photo of you as a baby." Then there are those who expect our children to be happy because they are lucky to have found a family to look after them and love them.

I want to shout from the roof tops "Forget expectations, how can we know how our children feel if we don't ask them, let them try the things they want to try and if they don't succeed so what, help them up and find something new! After all they have to live their own lives not one shaped by the expectations of their parents".

                                                                        Over the last two years I have moved away from expectations and into the world of hopes and dreams.  I hope all my children do the best they can in school and I will help them in anyway I can, I hope they make the right kind of friends, people who like them and respect them and I can help here too by keeping an open house environment, the kids you don't want your children to hang out with will hopefully stay away. I hope that child 4 feels loved and secure enough to talk about how he feels to come to us when things go wrong. I hope that they have the courage to follow their dreams and I will walk with them until they don't need me too.   

 I don't expect any of them to be grateful for having a loving and happy home as they are what makes our house a home but I do hope that they remember growing up here with happy memories and I dream of the day when they and their families come to visit.