Light at the end of the tunnel

This week WASO has really made me think hard. I did a blog post that would have fitted this week's theme, last week!

See - Growing Up - Three Big Steps, mrsowpa.blogspot.co.uk

Oh well here goes, yes we have come a long way! A start is the fact that we have a family, 20 years ago we never thought this would happen. Our family is a little different from many and is complex but it is still a family. 

Our eldest child is more a young man now, trying to be as independent as possible while still enjoying benefits of living at home - food, washing, lifts, money subs!

Our daughter has more challenges with life as you can see from previous posts, but we have come a long way with her too. This post has caused me to reflect more about her and other big steps in her growing up.

Two years ago, she would not bathe or shower unless I helped her, yet before each washing episode there would be a rage. I think it was the toddler brain wanting help and comfort, fighting with the teenage brain who wanted control and independence. At the time she was also refusing any other sort of physical contact/comfort. Now however she is happy showering by herself, and she will come and demand hugs. Yes shower room is a complete state and yes, hugs are on her terms, but WHAT PROGRESS!

Graffiti and carving, are loads less and she now uses post it notes to vent her feelings on her bedroom walls, she also loves sticker emblems and letters of the alphabet to collage on her walls. I think things have helped, as I don't get so uptight about it, and let her do her own thing with her bedroom. She has a match pot of paint for occasional lapses, and we made a fabric cover to cover her carved bed head!

Bed times have always been a battle, early last year she was not asleep until midnight or later, most nights, we were all knackered! We have now had help with this and the majority of nights she is settled by 22.30. This would be good for most 14 year olds but for her it's incredible!

Secondary school is very challenging for her, but we have much better communication with them than primary school. She finally has a statement which also helps. The SENCO and some of her teachers really seem to "get" the attachment stuff and like her for herself! The careers lady, also recently met us and has talked to us about many creative educational opportunities for after GCSEs, that we did not know about.

Thoughts-

We still have many ongoing habits/behaviours that have not changed much, and she is forever trying out new ways to seek our attention. Unfortunately she still wants attention whether it is for negative or positive behaviour and her brain does not always choose the best option or think of the consequence! We are learning and understanding better, we think. We did not even know about attachment theories related to adoption until 5 years ago! We adopted them very young, when the research was also in its infancy, and so did not get warned of what to look out for, or how to support these children in the best way. 

I often feel for every step forward we take, we take two steps back. This is negative and unfair. Thankyou WASO for spurring me to do this piece of reflection even though it was hard! Our children are safe, comfortable and loved, we have a lot of happy times, and we are a family. How far we've come......

There is light starting to show towards the end of the rather long tunnel!

 

Growing Up - 3 Big Steps

Growing Up - 3 Big Steps this week.😊

First mega step! - Work Experience at 14!

Miss O has many issues with authority, anger, focus, timekeeping, clumsiness, and messyness at school and home so I was dreading her initial spell of work experience which they do fairly early at her school.

However, work experience this week, despite all my concerns, has gone well. She got there on time, each morning with much cajoling from us. I helped her to arrange it in a local hairdressers where she has been going most of her life.  She looked smart and adhered to their dress code - amazing! She has learnt to answer the phone politely, make bookings, use the money till and card machine, make tea/coffee, wash hair with the appropriate amount of shampoo(!), do hairstyles, prepare brushes etc. and done a lot of cleaning! I would not have believed it unless the manager had told me! I went in one day and she washed my hair very nicely.

She did text a few times - it is too hard, it is too boring - but we responded positively or ignored and she stayed each day.

She has filled in her work experience journal nicely with supervision by one of the salon girls and has got photos of some of her work. Wow!

She gained a few tips and a free hair do and, as she finds verbal praise hard to take, we have given her a card to say how proud we are of her and a shopping token. She liked this and has card displayed on her bedroom wall.

Second Step - Socialising

Miss O has always found it hard to make and sustain friendships, particularly at school. She has also never got on well in "clubs" despite support from the leaders. Miss O now has a strong friendship with a girl at school in the year below and for the last 3 weeks they have been attending and enjoying a singing club, she announced on Friday she'd be going at least twice in half term! Despite being nervous on first attendance, the prescience of a friend has done wonders. 

A boy, vetted by me, of course(!), is also on the scene - watch this space!

Third Step

Initiating cleaning and tidying!!!!!!

Miss O is not renowned for cleaning up after herself,to put it politely, but she never fails to surprise me.

We were going to be giving a lift to a friend of hers. I heard the Hoover going outside. To my amazement  she was cleaning and hoovering the car completely spontaneously, she claimed it was "RANK" and no friend of hers could travel in it! She had assembled various cleaning products, rags and rubber gloves. We have had to go through the rubbish bag she put "rubbish" in as she was not very discerning, but the car has a lovey smell now and shiny mirrors!

Thoughts

What a great week, we've had. As I said we are really proud of her, although I always have the little gremlin in the back of my head saying "don't get secure....it won't be like this for long....it will be awful again soon..." I need to bank positive days/weeks like this to look back on when days are more cloudy, and think of the future more positively.

Reasons to be Cheerfull

Reasons to be -

C hildren

H usband

E ar phones

E lectric food mixer

R adio

F ood

U tensils

L ove  😃

Our condensed journey to now

In the 90's we started the journey towards adoption, we eventually were lucky enough to have a cheerful little boy placed with us. A couple of years later we were able to adopt a baby girl, we couldn't believe our good fortune. We had relatively little preparation for either adoption and certainly knew nothing about attachment theories, we naively thought that adopting such young children would be fairly plain sailing!

Our son seems relatively stable despite his rocky start prior to moving in with us. He is now a fairly "normal" teenager, a bit lazy and a bit of attitude but caring and confident, seemingly dealing with his adoption story and us in a balanced way. 

Our daughter however is a very troubled soul, she had no one constant in her first months of life and has a very difficult adoption story to get her head around. She was late to smile as a baby and bonding was difficult, she was very demanding at nursery and labelled "naughty" at primary school, had few friends and got into a lot of scrapes. Behavioural issues magnified on change to secondary school. She is now a teenager, angry at life in general and severely lacking in self esteem.

We started to get organised support to help with our challenges, from CAMHS and social services a few years ago. We are lucky as they continue to support us well.

I started tweeting recently and so a blog seemed the next step, it was also in competition with my husband who has just started blogging too!

Won't be complex, just short thoughts, Let me know what you think!

Image from https://c1inalicante.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/walking-on-eggshells-shadow.jpg.

Ps I don't look like this, hardly ever wear heels anymore and certainly don't have the figure to match!

Dictionary of Miss O's Phrases

"Give me 2 seconds" means I've got distracted, I'm running late and as I have little concept of time I'm not going to be ready for ages!

"I'm hungry" means I have bad stomach ache from anxiety butterflies

"Why do you ALWAYS say NO?" Means I know you just said yes but I was not in a fit state to take it in

'**** off *****" means leave me alone I need some quiet time to cool off, hugs later please - on my terms.

"I didn't do it" means I did it but I can't understand honesty is best policy

" I hate you" means I hate myself and have very low self esteem.

"You are not my real parents" means I love you loads and wish I'd been born into this family but I'm too angry and upset about my pre-adoption background (and life in general) to tell you this at the moment.