Lunch with Fiona

Fiona has been struggling the past few months.  It has been hard negotiating the ups and downs of her mood swings, but last weekend we had a good visit.  She said to me that she finds it hard to visit home right now.  She wants to live here and can't.  To her,visiting here   feels like waving this in her face.  That is of course, not my intention. The goal of coming home to visit was to have healthy loving relationships with the family.  For a long time she has bought into my very genuine belief that what we are working toward is her moving to another less restrictive level of care.  I have repeatedly talked about how as kids get older they don't live with their parents.  They get their own place, or they have a room mate and share expenses etc.  It may help when I actually have one of my kids do this so that she can see I am not making this up!  Rob is close but still in college and not quite there yet.

However, despite her not doing well visiting here I wanted to do something to maintain connections so we went to lunch at a fast food chain of her choice. The food was fairly ghastly but the time together was fun.  There were selfies and laughter -- lots of laughter.  I wish I knew a better way to help Fi.  Her mental health challenges and her cognitive delays are kind of the perfect storm for behavioral challenges.  But since I can't come up with any better model than what I am doing right now, I am  glad we had time together to laugh, love each other and reconnect. This is Fiona and Lissa at the restaurant.

Executive Director Response

I finally heard back from the executive director of the program that runs Fiona's group home.  He basically said sorry, no bunny and gee I am sorry that other staff misinformed you.  But hey on the positive side, don't worry because you should feel really good about the fact that we are putting steps into place so something like this won't happen again.

Oh yeah, color me ecstatic!  Not!!  I wrote back that I would like details on exactly what those wonderful step are going to be because I have absolutely no confidence in the program and no faith that when I get an answer from someone that I will be able to be confident it is a real answer and not just what they thought Fiona or I wanted to hear at the moment. I await additional response from him and also from the other agencies I have contacted about the way the program handled this.

What they don't seem to realize is that this is far and away about more than a bunny.  It is about the spiral they put my daughter into by breaking faith with her. She didn't just break her TV that she spent 3 months saving for, she also tried to self harm.  This is something that she only does when profoundly disturbed and it has not happened in over 2 years.  The fact that this level of despair was caused by and agency that is supposed to have her well being in the forefront of their decision making very much angers me.

I have no expectation that I can change the decision. However I can be a person who holds them accountable for the mishandling and that is what I intend to do.

Life Guarding

Things have been going well for Fiona of late.  She has been less violent, and more able to talk through an issue.  Sadly I expect there will be some rough patches in the near future. The house manager is leaving for another position.  This seems to happen regularly with the house managers in this home and I find it frustrating.  I get a working relationship and just as things start to level out--communications are good, mail is properly sent to me, Fiona's needs are being met. . . bang they are on the way out.  There is always a hiatus while they try to find another house manager and this is the worst of all.  People covering the house rarely know the occupants well.  They are often over worked, over tired and uninformed.  For Fi this means there are going to be hurt feelings and outbursts.  Trust me, I have been to this rodeo far too many times.

Yet if I am frustrated, I know my daughter is frightened and angry.  Tonight she called me almost manically happy which is a sure sign that she is going to crash and burn behavior wise.  The house manager called me shortly thereafter and said he had told the ladies today of his impending departure and that Fi was very angry and upset.  I said I knew as she had all ready called and told me he was leaving.  (side note she was not happy he is leaving. She is deflecting this by mentioning his departure and talking about a bunny rabbit she has been trying to acquire for about 6 months.)

I know too that for Fiona  the change in preferred staff underscore the fact that their presence there is a "job."  She is work to them. And while she needs to be there, and while I know in my heart that there are days and times when being with her is so challenging that it is really HARD work, this has to all feel really ugly to her.

Even though I have been through this many times, I don't know anyway that makes this any easier for her.  I always feel like I am trying to help her tread water till the new manager is hired and then I can at least have a sit down and try and get a feel for their style and how to enlist the best assistance possible for Fiona. But for now, back to treading water.

Will Fiona's dental work get done??

At Amazing Jane's farewell party a couple weeks ago, I thought back on how long we had known each other.  She came into our lives in 2010 when Fiona first was placed in the Great School in the Big City.  At her retirement party it was revealed that she worked over 15 years at the Great School.

That is pretty amazing for most jobs nowadays, even more so for this type of job which has a high burn out rate.  I can see the difference in the revolving staff at the group home where my daughter now lives.  She has been there just over 2 years.  I have dealt with untold staff, 4 directors, and  2 clinicians,   It is sadly a not atypical situation for a field where people deal with a great deal of stress and are woefully underpaid.  The result is that people like my daughter, who need consistancy and stability, are all too often in the midst of change.

That is happening right now.  In fact, there is no house director at the moment and my contact is a gentleman who is a regional director and oversees a number of the group homes.  This is far from ideal.  I know they are in the process of hiring someone.  Meanwhile, Fiona has yet to have her final wisdom tooth out.  It is a bottom one and it is bothering her.

However she was extremely agitated the day of the appointment and refused to go.  The next day she went to the appointment but the dentist told her if she wanted she could be knocked out for the procedure. She wanted that but the consents I had signed were not for that so she had to come home without the work done again. I am unclear as to why she was even asked this as my daughter is not legally competent to make these decisions.

I was sent the scans last night.  I am calling the drs office today to clarify. I am worried about the anesthesia as the dentist we saw initially said she could not have this due to her airway being very small. He said that she would be difficult to intubate should there be a medical crisis.  Secondly the consent is for both the upper and lower tooth.  Fiona only wants the bottom tooth out and this is all it was supposed to be. The upper has not moved and is not causing discomfort.  I worry that she will be in too much pain if both come out on the same side. She had bad experiences with the previous two extractions and the worst one was the upper.  Her roots effected her sinuses. She is in allergy season at the moment. I don't want to borrow more discomfort and emotional disregulation here!

Fiona struggles

Mental illness is the pits.  There is no easy solution, and it tends to rear its ugly intractable head when one is least expecting it.  Or perhaps least prepared for it.

Fiona has been in a bit of a downward spiral these past weeks.  I think that a big factor is the wisdom teeth extractions. They have been doing them one by one.  So one tooth out, a week to 10 days of healing and bam, another appointment for an extraction.  Pain and doctor visits are hard on anyone.  On someone with mental health issues and cognitive issues, it is worse.

The two extractions done thus far threw monkey wrenches into visits as she was not well enough to come home for obvious reasons.  Then last Friday Rob had his extractions and though Fiona was okay, he needed quiet, rest and attention.  Also I had just been diagnosed with  pneumonia which while not a primary issue definately figured into the decision not to have her come home.

I have tried to be in extra phone contact. To send little cards or itunes gift cards for her.  But I know that for Fi visits home are a key part to stability.  I could see her beginning to show signs of disregulation at her ISP meeting this month.  By this Monday she was hysterical on the phone with me.  She had a fabricated story of leaving the home via her bedroom window and walking down the road with no one noticing.  According to Fiona she then turned around and went back in her bedroom window.  For a variety of reasons, this was a fabrication, but she did later try to act this out via a bathroom window in the home.  The windows are all alarmed and she was stopped.  However she did not calm or settle till after 1 a.m. and the next morning she also refused to attend the dentist appointment for the next extraction.

I sure can't blame her, though I am worried as the tooth does bother her. However her mental health is more important than the tooth at this point and I have asked the staff to try and postpone this for a month or so to give her time to stabalize.

Meanwhile Fiona is blaming her decompensating the presence of another house mate. She and the other young lady have a love/hate relationship and right now it is more hate than love.  Fiona is also angry with me because I told her that I always love her and I am here for her but I won't help her blame other people for choices she is making for herself.  Her housemate did not push her out the window, she chose to do that. Fi was not amused! She definately believes that if I don't agree with her I am against her.  So I have to just keep ignoring that and I keep calling and checking in, keeping things light.

But I worry. I don't know if she will be able to get things back into some semblance of control or if she will wind up with an emergency hospitalization. Now, I am off to get some pineapple, which I have found works as well for me as most cough syrups!

Celebrations and Reunions

So today I drove to a very big city to Rob's brother Dee's baby shower.  It was a great day. I was exceedingly proud of the fact that I navigated there without "side journeys" (aka getting lost) due to my abyssmal sense of direction!  Traffic was horrid and that made me feel stressed insdie but I think I did well getting through it and not conveying my terror of highway driving  LOL

We got there and met Dee's fiancee--that would be the young woman with the wide smile and the lovely melon dress in the picture. We hit it off instantly, she and I. She has a bubbly personality, is absolutely over the moon happy to be having a baby, and she and Dee are very deeply in love.  It is wonderful.  It was great to see Dee again.  It has been far too long since we got together.  He and I have also always hit it off.

There were cousins that Fiona and Rob have not seen in years.  There was their sister Krystal who they have not seen in years.  That is her on the far right in the picture. I had worked hard to prepare Fiona for the day. We had wrapped gifts together and talked about how baby showers work because she had never been to one before. I had filled her in on the folks I knew would be there.  What I did not know was that their birth mom was coming.  That is J on the far left.  J did not know we were coming either. I think Dee genuinely didn't think about it.  He and his fiancee did this shower themselves; I thought family were throwing it for them but that wasn't really the case.

Luckily I overheard that she was coming from the train station and had time to talk with Fi and Rob in advance.  So although to say they were prepared would be an over statement, they were not blindsided.  Poor J was though.   I felt badly for her as she sort of fell apart when she saw the 2 kids. (acutally she walked past Rob first, not knowing that the tiny fellow she once held was now a strapping young man) She and I went outside to a lovely courtyard and sat together.  I'd never met her, but we connected.  We both hugged and cried. I told her what good kids they are. She had not recognized Rob when she first came in and I think that was perhaps the most painful thing for her.  I spent time talking about hte fine young man that he has grown into.  How he is a quiet fellow but when he has something to say it will be deep and from his heart.  J said she is like that too.  It was good to share stories about the kids, to hug and cry together.  I am incredibly blessed and love my kids more than there are words for.  I also recognize though that our family is built on the fracturing of another family.  However I hold an image in my mind that I saw on the internet. It is of a Japanese art form where cracked bowls are mended with beautiful threads of gold.  I think at its best and most thoughtful, building families through adoption can be like that.

When J felt stronger we went back inside and the kids spent time with her.  She had also brought her youngest daughter who is 9 and whom she is parenting. She and Lissa played  together.  R is wearing the pink shirt in the picture.

On the way home I stopped at a nearby Dunkin Donuts and sent all but Fiona in to pick up some fuel for the ride home for us all.  This gave Fi and I a chance to talk together about how she was feeling.  It was her turn to cry and to share some of her conflicted feelings.  She was glad though that her big dream of all of her family-adoptive and biological--being together happily had come to be.  She also recognized that the day may have been hard on KC who has not been able to meet his birth mother although they do have intermittent contact by letter. We did not have more than maybe 10 minutes or so before the troops were back with some food but it was enough  (I think) for reassurance and for reminding her that J can love her and she can love J and I will still love her.  She can also feel happy AND sad about J.  It is okay to have more than one feeling about someone.

I think it went okay because although I had brought a prn in case she needed it, she did not and the homeward trek was pretty normal.  Singing to the radio, talking and acting like her typical self.  I have emailed a lengthy post to the group home so that they will be aware of all that transpired. Meanwhile, I am feeling incredibly blessed that this reunion was able to happen.

Yesterday, at least for that moment in time, the gold threads of healing were shining in the cracks of our large family.

Planning for a festive Saturday

I am dancing inside with excitement.  Fiona's group home has a new clinical director and I really like her!  I am totally totally over the moon with excitement to have her as part of my daughter's team.

For the first time since she went to the group home, I have felt like I am not tilting at windmills and justifying myself six ways from Sunday.  But let me back up, so poor confused readers can see my excitement.

Fiona and the rest of the kids and I are going to go to her bio brother Dee's baby shower tomorrow.  I know how very very much Fiona wants to attend this. I also know that it is not likely that she will get lots of opportunities to see Dee or other members of her extended family. With their work schedules and transportation issues, it is challenging to orchestrate.  So this is a great time to get together.  A gathering like this is typically less stressful for my daughter as she is a social butterfly and loves to flit and chat with lots of people. It is when things get more deeply personal that she struggles.

Dr. C, the new clinical director called me this week and we had a very long, very productive discussion about the event, Fiona's issues, my plans for addressing issues that could come up or that have shown up in the past etc.  At the end of the conversations she said that I had a really good plan in place and that she would meet with the team and recommend it be approved.

The next day I got an email from the house director, that copied Dr. C saying my daughter has a consult to have her wisdom teeth extracted that same day.  While the procedure whould not happen then, they wanted to take her to the appointment and then meet me somewhere on the highway and have me take her to the party after that.

This filled my little heart with dread.  Part of my "plan" involves Fi helping to wrap the gifts she helped to pick out and to use that time to talk with all the kids about what a baby shower is.  How people act there, how there is not lots of one on one time with the new parents etc.  The dental visit would make those prep steps impossible.  Perhaps a less directionally challenged person could have that discussion en route. I will need to be totally immersed in the drive to the city.

Dr. Collins called me again last night and amazingly  she shared my concern! She felt that my plan was a good one and a healthy one and that combining the two was far too much for my daughter.  She advised me to contact the house director and ask that he reschedule the consult and that I notify the DDS of my decision as well.  I have done so and hope that all this means that tomorrow will be a day my daughter enjoys, feeling the love of both her biological family and her adoptive family surrounding her and supporting her.

Checking in with Fiona

Fiona was here this weekend and it was all good--till it suddenly wasn't.  I had no inkling of trouble brewing, she was not showing any of the physical indicators that cue me that she feels stressed. She wasn't saying anything that would give me a hint.  However a very mnor thing (KC creating a new game to play with a ball while the rest of us walked a dog) set her off.  She announced she had planned to play soccer. She only wanted to play soccer. We were not fair. KC was mean. She made a mistake having me her guardian and finsihed off the tirade with tears and announncing she wanted to go home.

I know that she has told me when she is calm that she does not like losing control in front of her siblings so I figured that was the root of that request. However she refused to communicate with me and stormed into the house, leaving me to explain to the staff as best I could, all that had happened.

Then I came home and spent the rest of the night off and on consoling KC who was devastated by the outburst.  He and Fiona are very close and he felt blindsided and betrayed.  Fiona called that night and said she was sorry, but I could still hear the anger and agitation in her voice.  I told her I acceped her apology and that we would talk Monday.

I called her after work and she sounded much more herself.  She wanted to know if I was mad at her. I explained that I was not angry, but that I was a little disappointed that she felt she had to run home and that we could not work on taking some space and then talking.  I also said that I thought something else was bothering her because games had changed before and that had never been a problem.  I asked if she was nervous about going to Dee's party next Saturday. She said that yes she was.  She wanted everyone to get along.  I said that I was sure we would.  She wanted to know if I had ever been with all the people that would be there. I said no, but I had met a lot of them and that I was looking forward to meeting those I have ony Facebooked or emailed.  Fiona's deepest desire is for all of us bio and adopted sides of her family to "blend."

I genuinely am not thinking that anything other than a good time will happen.  I think she could finally see that I am sincere in that and seemed to sound more relaxed.  Hopefully she will do well at her program this week and Saturday, we will be off to Dee's baby shower.

A post about healing

Fiona called me last night all excited.  She wanted to talk to Rob because she had some "big plans" for Mothers Day and wanted to be sure she was going to be home for it.  Rob was out skateboarding so he'll call her tonight but I could assure her that she would be home. And that, more than whatever she is planning, made me smile.

The fact that she could be home--heck the fact that she WANTED to be home, is so huge that there are not really words to describe it.

Sure, she has called me Mom since she was nine.  But for a looooooong time, that was just a word she put in front of my name; I think because she thought she was expected to. I wasn't her mom in her heart. That spot belonged to a woman who due to her own problems and demons had let Fiona down, and had left "the system" to handle it.

Mothers Day has always been a day we didn't do much with Fiona. Because in the weeks leading up to it she was understandably filled with a cauldron of  painful emotions.  Over the years she shared--anger at her first mom.  Grief for her first mom. Longing for her first mom. Despair. Hating me for being white and gay. Hating me for existing.  Wishing she could be my biological child so she didn't have to feel any of these things. Wishing that her anger and fear didn't block her from healing.

There have been countless hours of therapy. Countless times of hugs and cuddles and just reminding her that I loved her for who she is and that she didn't have to stop loving her first mom, nor should she.  There has been reaching out to her first mom to try and facilitate contact. There has been knitting as many aspects as possible of her first family and our family together into one big raucous, loving family. . . and there has been healing. At last. At least a little bit.

Fiona is 22 now, so I am not minimizing how very much as a parent of a traumatized child you need to be there for the long haul.  If you have a Dr. Spock book that says what will happen at what age?  Throw it out.  Things happen so much more differently with kids coming to us from abuse and other forms of trauma and loss.  There are deep deep wounds that supplant all the milestones, that jumble up the development.

Usually Mothers Day has traditionally only been for Kirsty and there is an "Oomas day" for me (usually on the first day of summer, my favorite season.)  This year we will likely be changing that up because that whole concept would be too hard for Fiona to grasp. And her wanting to celebrate this with me is honestly, the greatest gift of all.

The Fabulous Forever Family Party

While the group home experience made last weekend very stressful, the party that Fi and I planned to celebrate the guardianship was a great success.  There were 11 of us, family, Fi's friends from the Great School and Amazing Jane.  Jane had only gotten back from vacation the day before but had agreed to not only come but to bring some of the friends.

I had made a reservation a week or so in advance and we had 2 waitresses that were assigned to just us.  They were so kind and handled everyone so graciously.  As you may imagine, some of the guests had some cognitive or behavioral challenges (my Chet falls into that mix incidently).  Yet they were kind and calm, handling the occasional odd question or extra wait time for someone to decide if they really wanted dressing on their salad, with aplomb.

Fiona just shone with happiness.  I think as much as the fact that we were cementing "forever family" for her, we were also cementing the promise we made at the start of the transition from the Great School, which was that she would not lose contact with people she had become close to.

She got a heart necklace that K and I made, Jane gave her a picture that I had taken of all the kids together at Christmas, and her friends gave her jewelry.  It was a really bright gem of an experience.  I will remember how she was smiling always.

Speaking of memories, we have not been to Olive Garden since KC was 2.  Yet when Fi chose that restaurant he recounted a memory of how they used a giant grinder to put the cheese on his pasta.  He was correct, but I was floored that he would remember that from such a young age.  This is not really a random little aside.  What it made me stop and think about was how many memories remembered or shadowy that Fiona still deals with, most of hers made intense from situations of trauma.  I am glad that at least for that moment, there was a happy memory that outshone the others.

Fiona's behavior plan

The pictures are all examples of art Fiona has created over the past few years.  The first, is a marvel to me.  A 3 d guitar, almost full sized with layers of cardboard.  It is in my bedroom as she gifted me with it and I love to surround myself with things the kids have made.  Next up is an acrylic painting she did for Rob for his birthday a couple years ago.  Below that, a painting she did for me. It is on that crinkly cardboard.   I emailed them all this evening to Gail who is going to use them as proof that Fiona could benefit from and enjoy some real art based curriculum and therapies.  Something more than making puzzles that are glued together and hung on the wall.  Not that puzzles are not a good pass time--but they should not be the be-all end-all of her artistic experiences.

Gail and I talked briefly tonight after I got home from work. She had called the director looking for a copy of the behavior plan.  She was sort of brushed off.  I explained that the plan has not been formalized as I refused to sign off on it in its present state. I explained we were meeting Thursday. Gail asked that I scan her the proposed plan with my markups (which I am fine with doing).  She actually is quite happy that I did not sign off on this without further discussion. I do find it interesting that the director did not share with her why they could not send the plan.

We also will meet at the home on March 6th to work on the ISP for Fiona. That is as I understand it, similar to an IEP for kids. Only the service plan is for adults.  I am very lucky that Gail is on board. I did tell her that the folks at the home were coming round a bit.  I think that they are not used to very involved family members. (to which Gail said "tough! they should be thrilled that she HAS involved family")  While I personally agree (grin) I also know that systems get rolling based on the norm and if that is NOT involved family, that perhaps explains some of what I have bumped up against.

At any rate, we are involved and are here for the life time so the group home will hopefully adjust to that. Meanwhile, in other Fiona related news, she and I are planning a "Forever Family" party to celebrate the guardianship.  She is inviting friends from the Great School and some of the staff from there. We will hold it at a restaurant that she loves and hope to do this on February 22nd.

Behavior Plans and Niagara Falls

This is a hard post to write, because in no way do I want anyone to take away a negative impression of my wife.  In fact, I have the utmost respect for her as a person and as a parent. Everyone has limits and I understand that.  She has stretched and grown so much during this parenting journey, a journey in large part started by me, because I always wanted kids. Lots of kids.  She would have been happy for us to remain a couple. She loves our children, but craves more solitude and silence than will ever be possible till the kids are grown!

Last week I received Fiona's proposed behavior plan from her new program.  I am very unhappy with it.  There were attempts to make her visits with family contingent on behavior goals. There is a plan to try and have her have 12 months with no instances of talking back or swearing etc with more than one re-direction from staff.  (ex:  Fiona gets mad and swears, staff suggests calming activity, Fiona accepts all is good.)  Except that this is not feasable or logical. And her participation in the wider community is also potentially held hostage by a need to achieve this and other significantly challenging behavioral changes. There is a transport edict  where she must ride in the very last row of the van because in 2006 there was an incident where she did something unsafe.  2006 and nothing since.

I believe in helping everyone work to their best potential. But I also believe in achievable goals. Making a plan to reduce the behaviors would be great--but not to start with 100 per cent success! Not recognizing the work she has done in the past 7 years is also unfair.  For this and a myriad of other reasons I have refused to sign off on the plan in its present incarnation and there is a meeting in early February to discuss it. I have red inked it and sent it back so that the whole team know my concerns and so that we can work together on a healthy and amicable plan.

When I shared the above example with my wife she was furious on Fiona's behalf. She pointed out that she herself has a Viking temper and could not guarantee that SHE  and fully functioning non disabled individual could agree to respond to a calming activity if she was really upset. She was angry because she knows there are things she (my wife) has changed about herself since 2006 and that she would be upset should they go unrecognized.

I said that it was nice to know she was in my corner on this as I knew that she didn't feel the same level of commitment to Fiona that I do.  It is sort of the elephant in the room in our relationship. When Fiona had to be removed from our home, my wife was so upset, so scared, that she took a giant step back emotionally and never really stepped forward again.  The doctors determined Fi could not live with us, agencies made contact difficult.  In many ways it was easy for her to step back.

I wasn't personally scared when Fiona's incident happened here  and that probably played a big role. I was scared for the kids, but not myself.  I am tall, and a second degree black belt.  But for the other kids emotional well being, yes, I was scared.

I am also an incurable optimist.  I believed then and I believe now, that by being there with and for Fi as much as the powers that be and as much as Fiona herself would allow, that some level of healing would happen. At the very least, she would see that everyone does not walk away. When the opportunity to be her guardian came, I immediately said yes, though I knew that K would not be thrilled.

I also believed that if I just kept on trying that eventually my wife would come round.  I told K that I  call it the "water eroding granite" theory.  It is essentially the same tactic that I used to help my inlaws see that I was after all a pretty nice person. I just kept constantly being nice, ignoring negatives and years later, we really all do love each other.

K laughed when we were talking and said it is not just water eroding granite.  That I am in her words, "f*ing niagara falls eroding granite."  But she is okay with it. And she has come to see Fiona in a different light.  The fact that the group home seems to judge Fiona based on very old issues that are not really relevant to her present behaviors has helped K to see that she was doing the same thing emotionally. There really is a nugget of good in all things.

Fiona's Update

More snow and it is FINALLY (caps for KC's verbal emphasis) snowman snow.  Every year we take a picture of the snowman and its makers.  Here's this years. LOL

Had a call from Fiona last night. She was crying and unhappy.  Her side is that residents don't want to include her or ignore her.  I got an email from the house this a.m. which said she was instigating and tried several times to elope from the home several times over the weekend.  They did approve my request for a weekend visit, (Friday night through Saturday evening) but wanted me to agree to "reinforce that this was contingent up on her following program rules."  Um. No.

Family is not a hostage for the program. We are not a bargaining chip.   I wrote that I was more than willing to support the team by reminding her of hte importance of following house rules. But that we had travelled this road with other institutions and when family is used in this manner it did not work well.  It did not improve her behavior and it made her feel that we just did not want to see her.

I also wrote that it was my hope that coming home and feeling connected would make it easier for her to cope with the constraints of the home she is living in.  Her world at present is much smaller than what she was used to, with only 5 other residents. If those 5 are not her friend at the moment, there is no where else to turn for company.  I also reiterated my position that she needs to have some type of activity within the community and not be bound to the house for such extended periods of time.  I suspect  the home is not lovin me right now.

Meeting G

Last night G was supposed to arrive about 4ish.  She texted me that she was running late--still at the house where Fiona lives. Would it be all right to come between 5:30 and 6:00 p.m?  I said sure.  6:30 and still no G.  She finally rolled in about 7:30 p.m apologizing for being late. She was caught up in details at the home and time got away from her.  No worries, I finished popping KC into bed while she made a call to break a dinner plan and then we sat down with tea to talk.

She is a woman who is passionate about what she does, and I think very very wise.  I've had some concern's about Fiona's new home and not surprisingly, G does too.  The administration at the home have been unwilling to share much data with me because I do not have the hard copy of the guardianship award to show them.  I have emails from the legal staff but this was not enough for them. They have refused to share med schedules and their daily plans for Fiona. They have stalled on sharing her approved contacts list.  The list goes on.

I explained this to G and she I think must have set them straight today as suddenly my in box was FLOODED with communications from the staff.  Suddenly they are eager to set up a February meeting, they are still going to work on the risk management team meeting, they had papers for me to sign and med schedules to review.

G and I are both concerned by how dull Fiona's day seems when we look at what is going on there.  When we toured, Fi and I were told that she would have a structured day program outside of the home.  That has not happened. There may be a good reason,but substituting movies and puzzles is not a reasonable or healthy therepeutic option.

I am equally concerned by diet.  Fiona is pre-diabetic and diabetes runs in her family.  She has successfully controlled this with eating healthy choices.  The home seems unaware of how to offer healthy choices.  Lots of take out Chinese and pb and fluff sandwiches. . . "because the ladies like them."

G really wanted a feel for who Fiona is as a person. I showed her pictures and some of her art work and said how much I hope that we can find a way to foster that creative spirit within her.  It is something she loves and something she is good at.There almost isn't an art form that would interest her.

I know she wants a job and I shared that with G.  It seems that there should be some type of mentoring for a job at least explored.  There are things I am convinced she could do for a short period of time (2 to 3 hrs) daily.

Basically G gave me the go ahead to be the squeaky wheel.  She suggested that I find out who her Rogers monitor is, who her rep payee is (G is quite certain it should not be the agency that runs the home) and get a current list of upcoming doctor appointments.  Even if I can not attend all of them, attending a few here and there will help me stay very much in the loop and not hear things through the lens of how the home staff want me to view things.  She also very much understood what I was saying when I explained how the home wants to eliminate contact with staff from the Great School and why this was not a healthy model for Fiona. She agreed that it was a very old behavioral model and not one we need to follow. She and I both are in agreement that former staff have very much taken on the role of close friends and quasi family in Fiona's mind.  She has had enough ripped away from her. We need to show her that people do not disappear.

G could see the pictures of all the kids on our walls, all their art mounted around the house. It was clear that Fiona was central to our lives.  She will only be on the case for about 6 months and then it will transition to a person in a local office in my city.  But in these transition months I am going to learn all I can from her so that I can make sure Fiona gets the level of care she needs and the best possible life she can live.  G left my home at just before 10 p.m.  I have struck gold and found someone with the dedication and expertise of Jane to help down this next new bit of road I walk.

Introducing G--the newest member of Team Fiona!

Last night when I got home from dance with the littles, Rob had a phone message for me.  G. from DDS had called and would like me to call back.  I tried her this a.m. from work and left a voice mail.  I tried right before lunch and left another voice mail.  I knew that this was about Fiona but did not know details.

G. finally connected with me in the early afternoon. She is a really nice person. She is from the city which originally had Fiona's DCF case and will eventually transition Fi to someone up here. But as the originating city, her office will help insure that all the proper services are in place.  How totally cool!

G. needed some help as the person who was originally going to handle this is out on medical leave.  She needed easy stuff, like the phone number for the home where Fi lives and the contact numbers and names of the director and such.  I have a "Fiona" file on my computer email so I had all of that and more.

She commented on how helpful this was, and I said that because I was Fiona's guardian I wanted to make sure I had all my facts so that she would always get the kind of care and supports that she needs.  It turned out G. did not know that I was the guardian.  I said I was but that I did not have the legal document showing it yet.  However I did have the name, phone number and address of the legal folks that took care of this in the faraway city.  She will call them as they are geographically close to her and is thinking she can supply me with this document next week.

Normally I would not be that fixated on a piece of paper, but it seems to be very crucial to me getting information from the folks at Fiona's new residence.  I emailed them asking about the day services that I was told she was going to receive.  I was told that when I send them the guardianship paper that they will tell me.  This may be some weird HIPPA reg, but I sort of think she isn't getting the services.  (since she told me she sits around all day watching movies.)  I know she needs this for her mental health.  So getting the paper sooner rather than later will help.  G. will also help find out details about services when I shared that I was unsure what level of supports she was receiving.

G hopes to be in our area on Wednesday. She has a number of appointments for other clients and wants to meet with Fiona at her home in the afternoon.  She offered to come by my house and meet with me afterwards.  I could not believe the graciousness of such an offer.  I look forward to meeting with her next week.  And tomorrow, Fi is here for the day.  We hope to go shopping, plan her guardianship celebration, make snowflakes out of paper, watch a movie and hang out.

We are Family Forever!

I got a call from Amazing Jane today at work. She said she had gotten an email from Fiona's former DCF caseworker saying that I was legally appointed her guardian on December 31st!  I am really excited that this has happened.  Of course, tonight, Fiona called and she was very upset with the staff and the other house members and was not at all having a good day.  I am not sure how much is her mental health issues and how much is some things that need to be addressed, but at least now, I feel that i can email and call staff and speak from a position of team member instead of the quasi interloper kind of thing. Hopefully Fi will be home this Saturday for a visit.  I'd like her to help me plan a way to celebrate this.  Maybe pick a restaurant that she loves for a special dinner out and invite Amazing Jane and Fiona's friend O who now also lives in our area?

Christmas celebrations

Christmas was amazing!  The littles and I slept on a giant air mattress in Lissa's room.  They feel that they have to have a slumber party with me on Christmas Eve.  I started this when they were teeny tiny as it gave me a way of making sure they could not hear "the elves" putting packages under the tree.  My bedroom is farther from that general area.  However, with Fiona spending the night, she was in my room. So we did this in Lissa's room and had just as much fun.  All the kids have tiny trees in their room and hers is blue and awfully pretty.

The littles woke at 4:45 on Christmas morning, but I kept them in bed whispering with me till 6:10 a.m.  (another reason we have the "slumber party."  My wife would be singularly unamused by a 4:45 a.m. wake up!  Then at 6:10 we all got up and did the stockings.  Stockings are very fun in our house.  There is very little edible and very little that is pricey but things are sort of quirky and unique.  For instance, tiny little telescopes for playing pirate.  Wooden tops. small collectable figurines.  My wife found many of these items at a cool toy store on sale when she was doing holiday fairs with my Mom in November.

After stockings, we adjourned for breakfast.  Long ago, in a smaller family dynamic, I just put yogurt on the table and oj and tea.  Nowadays, it is more like a breakfast feast.  There is yogurt, fresh fruit, oj and coffee and tea. There were eggs, veggie bacon, sauteed mushrooms and grits.  And cinnamon buns.  It is mandatory that I make cinnamon buns.  I made two pans of them from scratch.  By 11:00 a.m. when the grandparents arrived, there were enough for them to have with coffee and tea and that was it.  They were all gone!

After fueling up, and starting the dishwasher, we went in and opened presents.  My wife and I do our stockings and gifts Christmas night so it was just the kids. That way we could take pictures and just enjoy it.  Most especially I enjoyed the fact that Fiona was with us and having such a good time.  She really really enjoyed everything.  She also had really been very thoughtful in the gifts she got people.  KC got one of those fuzzy hats that have long scarfy things hanging down with built in mittens.  He had wanted one when we were together at a fair this fall and I said no because the vendor was pricing them crazy high.  Fi remembered and made sure he had one at Christmas.  She got K and I a beautiful candle holder.  Really stunning and destined to be the centerpiece at solstice dinner next year.  She got Lissa a darling sweater vest with a leopard collar.  Lissa is wearing it today and you can tell she knows she looks fine!   Likewise, the kids had been equally thoughtful in choosing Fiona's gifts and she was sincerely excited about them.

By 8:30 we were cleaning up the detritus of opening and there was time to get dressed and relax and try out some toys.  At 11 the grandparents arrived and another round of gifting ensued.  I was proud of the kids as some of their gifts from them were not tangible--gifts that help others via heifer project.  They were just as excited about having rabbits bought in their honor as if they got a toy.  Cool!

More cleanup, visiting and eventually a big dinner.  Not a fancy dinner, but a filling one.  Big trays of pasta, a huge green salad, sparkling cider for kids, wine for grown folks, and cheese cake, Fiona's birthday cake, cookies,pie  or poached pears for dessert.

Fiona could not believe she was having a birthday party as well.  She was gracious and calm throughout and seemed again to like all our choices.  At the 11th hour I found out that her new residence will not allow her to have her cell phone. Chet had bought her a cover for that and I thought the gift now rendered inappropriate and potentially painful. So we swapped it out for an extra gift that I had really bought for an aunt.  Easy enough to replace that one later and Fiona was none the wiser.

By 2:30 my mom and G were back on the road and the kids and i hung out and played the rest of the day.  Sometimes they used KC's new microphone and either did stand up comedy (which was dubiously funny but mostly funny in that they THOUGHT it was funny) or Fiona would sing along to some of her new CD's.  They played new wii games and tried out KC's marker maker.

We also got to talk with Krystal and wish her merry Christmas.  She was en route to a movie so she did not talk too long but Christmas night she asked Rob to call her back and they talked much longer.  I am glad that connection is strengthening. Rob and Krystal were very close as young kids and when she moved down south it was a huge blow to him.

At 5, staff came to take Fiona back to her new home.  I hope she settled in well. I will call tomorrow to see. I think maybe calling tonight might be too much too soon. Not for Fiona, but for the staff who are not the easiest folks in the world to deal with.  I don't want to do anything that rocks the boat while I await the final guardianship stuff going through.

Christmas Eve

It's Christmas at our house, the door is open wide. (well not in the picture or you'd miss the pretty wreath!)

We've pig piles on the sofa and laughter has filled the house.

The cinnamon buns are on their cold rise for tomorrow's breakfast buffet. There will be the aforementioned buns, but also eggs, vegetarian sausage, vegetarian canadian bacon, grits oj and coffee.

                                                                                     Pies have been baked. Fiona's birthday cake hasI

 been made.  Pears have been poached.  We had a lovely festive Christmas eve supper.  Then we piled into the living room to watch "The Santa Clause"

After the movie, we read The Night Before Christmas, and the littles showered.  They have now hung their stockings and are abed.  However, Fi and Rob are still up, watching The Grinch.

This is so great, having everyone here. That in itself makes this the best holiday I can remember.  

Fiona's guardianship just took a jump forward

This week I got a citation in the mail regarding my petition to become Fiona's guardianship.  The citation gives anyone who wants to object to the petition until the 31st of December to notify the court of their feelings.  Fiona's mom and Fiona have also received a citation. I have worried a lot about that.  How receiving that citation would feel to Mom J.  How it would hurt and what she would feel that she should do regarding it.

Late last night, Amazing Jane forwarded me an email she had received from Fiona's mom.  It made me cry.  She wrote to Fi that she heard she was doing well and she was glad. She said she wanted to apologize for all the mistakes that she had made and all the bad choices many years ago. That she had been suffering from depression and didn't know where to turn for help, but that now she did, and was doing better.

She went on to say that she had heard that I was a very good person and would be a good guardian for Fiona.  Fi wants to call her mom with me when she moves out here and I am fine with that.  One of the things I was told by a different therapist years ago, was that if Fiona's mom could give her permission to love others, that her healing could really move forward.  For a variety of unbloggable reasons, we were not able to connect with Mom J and try to initiate this.  Jane has helped facilitate this and I am forever and ever grateful to her.  She also has supported me as I have worked to help Fi and Rob's first families see that I want them in all our lives.  There was a real rift caused by the agency that removed the children from the birth family. While the removal most definately was in their best interest at the time, the way the family was treated afterwards was punitive, belittling and flat out made a lot of them hate me.  Though I did not do those things, I was sort of an emblem of what had happened. I was white. I was, by their terms affluent.  Surely I saw them through the same lens.  It took a lot of work to help them see that I am my own person, and most importantly, that I love these kids.  And I love their families. Fiona and i both share a very similar vision of knitting together her "two families."  I see it as a big circle around the kids, Fi I think has a different mental image but the end result is very similar.

In many ways, this is the best present all of us could receive this Christmas.

Jitters

Much is going on with  Fiona lately.  Some is good--it looks like my guardianship will be done and finalized in November. This is a relief.  I think it will help me to advocate for Fiona and have a position of relative authority to do so.  As opposed to the dance I have done for all these years, explaining the rather convoluted yet emotionally binding ties that we have.

I was told that the new agency wanted to meet me and my family 11/4 and that they wanted me to tour the group home w ith Fiona on 11/11  I requested the time off and was approved. Then the new agency said, gee no, they didn't need to meet with me on 11/4 and I could just come to the group home on 11/11 when Fiona visits and have lunch with her.  Um, OK.  It bothers me though not to have met these new folks.  Not to have a single email from them--any communications I have received have been through Jane, despite the fact that they have been given two contact numbers for me and my email.  In my longish experience in dealing with agencies, this worries me.

Then there are first family issues for Fiona that are complicating all of this. Fiona, like most of us, has trouble with change.  Her problems are manifested more profoundly than perhaps most of us though and there has been an uptick in incidents of unsafe behaviors, raging and such.  Into all of this, has been added renewed contact with D and a request from the birth family that her sister Krystal be allowed to visit.  Krystal has been living down south with an aunt. She has now apparently come back to the Northeast and is presently only about 10 miles away from the Great School.  She has been in phone contact with Fiona.

However the Great School director feels that there is enough on their (the schools plate) and Fiona's at this point. Despite my advocating for supervised visits at the school, despite Jane advocating for the same, our request was denied. Krystal will not be allowed physical visiting at this time. It will be up to the new group home staff and myself to facilitate this once Fiona has moved.  My feeling was that the staff at the school is well versed in how Fiona responds.  The new group home will not be.  While I will give this my absolute best effort in coordinating physical visitations, Krystal will be much further away from us.  I am not a licensed therapist and don't really feel that this should be something that I should be in charge of, given Fionia's level of mental illness.  Yet I also feel that to not work on this is a huge dis-service to her and abdicates my responsibilities as well.  So I am fretting about this a bit.

I am also fretting about the fact that the present time line for her move to the new group home is two days before Christmas. She is scheduled to spend Christmas Eve with us.  The first time ever.  Holidays are hard for her and it seems like the system sometimes sets up those least able to deal with it when big changes are planned at times that are all ready hard.  Can you hear my heavy sigh?