Mean

It's never fun when you pick your children up from school and notice another kid making direct eye contact with you as he walks towards you with a purpose. I know immediately what's going on.

He's coming to tell me something that my kid did. He's coming to get my kid in trouble.

I know this kid. He's in a class with my 2nd grader. Last year they were frenemies, but this year he talks about this kid positively so I thought that maybe their relationship had improved. I was wrong.

The kid proceeds to tell me about something annoying and rude my kid did a few weeks ago (he's been holding onto this for 3 weeks, waiting for his opportunity). He had no other motivation than to tattle on my child, because the issue had already been resolved. He wanted me to know that my child was annoying him. He wanted to make it clear that they were not friends. And while I believed the story he told me, it made me sad for my son.

I knew this day would come.

Rocky and I have been talking about our child for almost a year now. His differences. His delays. His disabilities. We knew that in time, the gap between he and his peers would widen and he might be rejected. We suspected, to a degree, that kids would not understand him, find it hard to relate to him, be bothered by him and his immaturity. We thought it might happen soon.

I still wasn't prepared for his confession.

"I just want to play with them, but no one wants to be my friend!"

And his tears flowed as I hugged him and kissed his forehead.

Kids can be mean, I said.

Why do you think they don't want to be your friend?

What kinds of things do they say to you?

My thoughts were confirmed: They find him annoying and mean.

The mean part threw me for a loop until he explained. Sometimes, to get back at them for excluding him, he tattles on them to get them in trouble. Sometimes he lies and blames them for things they didn't do. He wants them to hurt like he hurts, only he can't articulate that. Not yet.

And my heart breaks for him.

Because he truly does not get it. He's so oblivious. He sees kids playing and he doesn't understand how there isn't room for one more. Even if I could explain it to him, tell him what's going on, he wouldn't be able to understand it in a way that would help him fix things. He will hear my words, and he will nod his head, but it will go nowhere. He can't change. At least not yet.

My son looks normal.

He's tall, likes to play sports and draw, has tons of energy and loves to be a good helper. He is friendly, shouting "hi" to people that he knows across the street. He is thoughtful and empathic. He remembers if you said you've been sick and when it's his turn to say grace at dinnertime, he prays for you. My son has disabilities you cannot see.

While it's easy to remain hopeful while he is so young, I would be lying if I said that we did not lay awake at night wondering what kind of life he might lead with his limitations. What that will mean for him and his desire to become a husband and father. We hope and pray that he will end up high-functioning, happy and healthy. Of course, in dark moments, we fear the worst.

As a parent, the hope part is so important. Without it, the day-to-day struggles will swallow you whole. The setbacks will make you so frustrated, so sad, so tired, that you will need the hope to get you through another day. And my son needs that hope, too. All of humanity needs that hope.

And prayer.

Lots and lots of prayer.

Carry Me

One of the biggest challenges of being a foster/adoptive parent is the overwhelming feeling of unpreparedness at parenting a child with such high needs. Daily, I am confronted with the effects of trauma and neglect that my children experienced in their first few years under their family's care. Some days I ask myself what has been worse for my kids in those formative years- The trauma? The abuse? The neglect? Or is it just the perfect storm of circumstances that led to such profound effects on such young brains and psyches that they can't quite function in a normal way?

For me, I have two kids that encountered most of the same experiences as one another, and yet they were impacted in completely different ways. My oldest became hardened, less likely to trust, wary of giving and receiving love, suspicious, enamored with the bad guy and thug life. His brother was much more effected, because not only did he have the same experiences, but he was also exposed to trauma and neglect even before he was born, leaving irreparable damage to his fragile, developing brain. Parenting this child leaves me feeling exhausted, hopeless and frustrated a lot of the time.

Nothing can prepare you for parenting a child with special (or high) needs, especially a child who is not biologically your own. This isn't because you don't love the child as if they were your own, it's because the "not your own" adds a whole emotional and psychological aspect to the relationship that creates a distance and an expectation that wouldn't be there had the child been birthed from your own body. This isn't right or wrong; it just is.

Daily, I scratch my head at his choices. Become frustrated at his mistakes. Became angry with his lying, stealing, cheating and destroying. Daily, I become convinced I am not the best parent for him. Regularly, I question my decision to foster-adopt. Hourly, I ask myself how I can do this until I die, because God knows that parenting does not expire. Sometimes I feel trapped and I cry.

For the last 24 hours this child has had a stomach bug and has been throwing up every 3 hours. He has yet to make it in the toilet. I've cleaned vomit off of carpet, doorways, bathroom floors and walls, toilets, trashcans, and bedding. I have seen him vulnerable and naked, covered in all of his stomach's contents, crying because he was missing school. I have listened to him continually ask for food, even though he can't even keep down water. I have heard him ask if his daddy will read the Bible to him before bed. And I have comforted him as best as I can while also trying to avoid contact because I still have three other kids I have to take care of and mama can't get sick.

Today I read a blog post written about a mom whose son has autism. She posted with great candor how she struggles to connect with her son. Her biological son. She confessed how she doesn't often understand him, becomes frustrated by his behavior, angry at his inability or unwillingness to follow directions, and how she feels hopeless and sad when she thinks about her son. It felt like I was reading about myself. And it provided some comfort because if she's feeling that way about the son that she carried in her own womb, than maybe I could feel less guilt about my own feelings towards my foster son and his disabilities. Maybe I could give myself a break and admit that this is really, really hard and it probably will that way for a long time.

Let me just say, that for imperfect moms like me, I am so, so grateful for all the brave voices paving the way online and in the real world for us to be honest about how it really feels sometimes to be a mom. Without those vices, and without the community of the women that I have come so desperately to depend on, I would be in a much darker place as a mom when it comes to parenting  and loving my son.

Everyone says that these years go by so fast, and that's mostly true. But some days, in the trenches with kids with so much baggage, it's so hard to look ahead and see light. It's so hard to imagine that this too shall pass. With every minute, every day, every prayer, all I can do is the best I can and trust that the One who created us all will carry me through when my best is simply not enough.