We are family

OK, one of the weird things I obcess about is what we are to Fiona.  I think in part this is because when you deal with all the professional folks that are part of this young woman's life, they have to categorize you.  So I have worn many hats, so to speak.  I have been the pre-adoptive mom.  I have been the educational surrogate.  I have been the visiting resource.  Then she got yanked way the heck away from us and i wasn't able to be even a visiting resource.  When I would call and try and get updates from the social worker at the time, she would not return my calls in a timely manner.  I get that they are overworked; I am too.  But 2 seconds to tell me that the child is getting my mail?  You can't do that?  You can't tell me if she is stable?  Seriously, I had the DSS unit on speed dial at work because I would leave messages about 3 times a day for 2 to 3 weeks in order to get a call back.

Then there were the placements where clinicians stressed to me that 'all' I was was Fiona's brothers adoptive mom.  The implication was sad.  It was like I had no place in her life.  That none of us did except Rob.  And saddest of all, Rob is still trying to sort out their relationship and his very conflicted feelings surrounding Fiona.  He doesn't write to her.  He does talk briefly on the phone, and now that we can visit occasionally, he does participate in that. And he seems happy when we visit, but somewhat guarded.  But he had years of being afraid of her.  Then he had a lot of time when at the insistance of social workers I dragged him to visits with Fiona when it meant missing times with the friends that he had made.  We would make the 90 minute one way trip only to find she was raging and could not see us.  Then we would drive 90 minutes home and the party he had been invited to was all ready done.  Trust me, this doesn't make for great sibling bonding.

So the short version is that I have become accustomed to elaborate justication when talking with each new clinician.  I tell them the whole story (because I have found they usually don't know it for whatever reason).  I explain that regardless of the fact that I am not legally anything to Fiona, that I love her.  That people should not just disappear from someone's life because they are not able to live together.  That constancy is the one gift I can give her.  Some of them get it, some fight me.  Luckily the school she is in now supports this type of  connection.  But the years of justification have left me wandering in that no mans land of  -what am I? 

Clearly I am dense.  Because on Saturday when we were at the library, KC proudly told the librarian that after we got done there, we would be going on a bus, a train and a taxi.  The librarian asked him if he was going to go see a special show.  Without missing a beat, KC said "no, just going to go visit some family."