Closing Time

I am beyond fed up with L. If it's not one thing with her, it's another. Now her thing is destroying her room at night after we go to bed. We put her to bed around 8, and we go to bed about 10. We go to her room in the morning to find it looks like a disaster area. She's pulled all the diapers off the shelf and tore up the sticky tape on them. She took all of the wipes out of the case one by one. She pulls all her clothes out of the closet and the dresser, and off of the hanging shelves. The dirty laundry is in bed with her, and basically everything she can reach has been turned over. We made her help us clean up last night, and explained to her again that this is not something you do. Only to find the same thing this morning. I'm done. I freaking refuse to spend my time cleaning her room again. When I clean it again it will be to pack her stuff so she can move. We just can't get through to her, and at this point I don't need her stressing me out. I'm not even sure I'm going to call her current social worker since she doesn't seem to care what she does. Her response to everything she is told is "Oh." I wish L's old case worker would come back from medical leave because this new one is a waste of space. She's coming by Friday afternoon for a monthly visit so she can see the crap that L does for herself. I'm not sure what the hold up is now with the aunt taking custody of the kids, but it needs to hurry up.

30

Today is my 30th birthday. I'm full on in the throws of all day sickness, but I'm happy and blessed to be pregnant right now. So since I can't even fathom eating cake right now or much else. I will post my virtual birthday cake here.

Big News!

Ok, now I feel like I can post this here since everyone in my outside the computer life who needs to know already knows. I would hate for my boss to find out here before I told her myself.

We have been blessed again!

I am beyond happy. Per online calculations I am due September 20. My first doctor visit will be Feb. 1. I've been in contact several times with my doctor, and we have my meds changed, and my blood pressure is doing good. I am already experiencing all day sickness...oh joy! ( I complain about it, but I know I would be paranoid as all get out if I didn't have any symptoms.) I am exhausted, and that mixes perfectly with school. I will finish this term, and then most likely take off until after the baby is born. I'm working on getting everything prepared in case I have to take an extended medical leave. But I'm hoping and praying that I will be able to work to at least 30+ weeks. Please keep me and my little bean in your prayers. I know we have a long road ahead of us.

Transitions

A lot has changed since I last posted. The day I emailed L's social worker to let her know that we needed her moved to a new home, and that we would give them a month to find her a new placement. She called to tell me that they had staffed the case the day before, and L's aunt has been granted a conditional placement for L and her 2 older siblings. So in about the next 2 weeks, L will be moving back into a home with her siblings which is what we really wanted for her. I just hope that her issues don't get ignored since she will be living with 8 other kids. She really needs to be tested for mental illness and/or autism, and we were in the process of getting that set up.

We had a nice trip to TX, and enjoyed spending time with family. Avianna is so smart, and so cute! It's wonderful to hear her talk, and see her crawling all over the place. I know she will be walking soon. It just doesn't seem like it's been a year.

I'm enjoying a lovely cold right now also. I thought it was just my sinuses draining, but it has now progressed into a full blown, hacking up nasty stuff, sneezing, and coughing time. The stopped us nose did allow me to change to very stinky diapers tonight, and not smell a thing! :)

I'm back

I've been busy, busy, busy the past few weeks with the holidays and the kids. We had a nice Christmas with Fuzzy. It was a long day because our plans kept being changed at the last minute by my mother-in-law. We were supposed to have lunch over here at noon, but after several time changes we ended up having dinner at their house at 5. Needless to say I was kind of cranky. But all in all we were thankful to have our son for another Christmas, and that's all that really mattered. Fuzzy got a good amount of toys like a push and ride trike, several elmo toys, and a basket ball hoop. But I swear that his favorite toy has been the $6 set of wooden blocks. He has played and played with them.

L was with her family for Christmas, but came back that weekend. So we saved some of Fuzzy's gifts for him to open when she opened her gifts. I was hoping to avoid the usual fighting by doing this, but no luck. L still tried to take everything that was her's and his. In the days following L's return she progressed into some of the longest, loudest, and worst fits she has ever had. New Year's day she screamed, cried, kicked, and flailed her body for 3 hours straight. She stopped long enough for us to go to some friends' house for lunch. But as soon as we hit our driveway she started up again. By the end of the weekend, Rob and I both decided that it was time to call her CW to see about having her moved to a new home. I'm not sure if we're making things worse by treating her like a normal 2 year old. We're still waiting to have her tested for autism and mental illness. I completed the initial eval right before Christmas, and we're just waiting for the approvals to come through.

I talked to the CW that is filling in for L's worker while she's on leave, and I talked to our home development worker about what is going on with L. At this time there are no homes to move her too so right now we have to decide how much more of this we can take. We have to call the CW back to let her know how long we will give them to find her a new placement. I'm just so torn about the whole thing. On one hand I feel like we have done everything we know to do, and her "fits" are starting to effect Fuzzy. But I keep thinking that if we hold on a while longer we could at least find out what her problem is so that she could start getting so help. I just don't know...

On a happier note we are getting ready to go to TX for my niece's 1st birthday this weekend. I can't believe it's already been a year. I seems like yesterday we were in the hospital waiting on her arrival. I'm hoping we can have a fun, stress-free weekend because it's been a while since we've had one of those.

Merry Christmas

I'm getting ready to head to church for Christmas eve service. I ran across this a few minutes ago and wanted to share it. It's been a while since I've seen this myself. I hope everyone has a wonderful and joyous Christmas. Love ya'll!

I think Christmas will always hold a special extra meaning to me for as long as I live. It was the day I found out I was going to be a mama back in 2005. So as much as I love the holiday, it still hurts. We went to a toy store this weekend, and I couldn't keep myself from looking at the pink Escalade powerwheel and imagining Maddie riding in it. I could just see her on Christmas morning chasing the dogs in her new car. She would be doing so much stuff right now. This would be the Christmas that she would start to understand what was going on around her. I wonder if it will ever get any easier or will I always tear up when I think of what she would be doing. I try to remind myself that she doesn't get just one day of Christmas. It's Christmas all the time for her.

Taking a Break

I turned in my 2 final papers for school yesterday evening, and I could feel myself being lighter and happier instantly. I am so happy to be done with this session, and I will enjoy the month break until my next set of classes. I have learned that this university is no joke. This is not the University of Phoe*nix this is a real graduate program, and I have to work my butt off starting from the beginning. I am looking forward to my next class because this will be the first theology class I've ever taken. I know the kids will be happy to have all of my attention back now, and Rob will enjoy not being a single parent of 2 toddlers. I'm LOLing right now because Fuzzy just came up to me and started rolling his dump truck up my butt! My house is a wreck right now so I will be cleaning and finally putting up our tree this weekend. Also I have a bunch of shopping to do because I have not had a chance to get much done the last few weeks. I am happy that I have all my big stuff ordered and on it's way to me or it's recipient (I hope Avi loves her gift!).

Well, there have been no changes since I last posted except Fuzzy's CW mentioned that his BM may be moving to my town. Ughhhhh! L will be spending Christmas here since the family visit has been canceled. I'm glad because I don't want to deal with her regression and attitude again after she spends a week with her family and then has to come back here.

I plan to post more the next few weeks so I guess I'll get to work on my house now, and TTYL!

Party Mayhem

We went to a Christmas party/dinner for our church band tonight. I am thanking God that I am at home now on my couch in my comfy pjs and the 2 bad ass kids are in bed. I will not...let me repeat...I will never take those 2 kids to another party that is not a child's birthday party ever , ever, ever again. I think we were there 5 minutes when L started in with her screaming and crying because I asked her to go back in the living room because the kitchen is not a playroom. I promptly took her outside, squatted down to her level, and talked calmly to her. Yeah, and that worked out so well...whatever. So after a few minutes of this not working I asked her did she want to play with the dog. That shut her up quick.

Then we had dinner. L ate all her food rather quickly, and I know it's just because someone else fixed her plate. If I had fixed it she would eat like she usually does at home, either it would take forever or she would eat. Then Fuzzy decided that he was hungry but didn't want to put in the effort to eat for himself. So I had to sit next to him the whole time feeding him. I barely got to eat for myself. Once we gave up on him eating, he roamed around playing. He kept getting a hold of things that he shouldn't and throwing horrible fits anytime someone told him no. I was ready to go long before I normally would have wanted to leave just to get them both home and in bed. Another thing is that people don't listen and don't remember that we don't want L staying in people's laps and being carried around like a baby. We're trying to break her of that dependence on people especially the need to run to and hold on to strangers. She does a lot of inappropriate things that we have been trying to work on.

We got home and I put Fuzzy to bed with no problem. L fought and cried and screamed for sometime until I finally gave up and just left her in the room screaming. She stopped a few minutes later. These fits of hers drive me crazy. I just have to walk away. I just want to scream because they make no sense at all.

I have learned that the next time someone invites us over I have to drop the kids at the grandparents or get a babysitter if I want to enjoy myself.

Cute Video with a Meaning

Update

We got to the court about 1:15. BM showed up shortly after that, and tried to hold Fuzzy. He was not having it. He kicked and squirmed and cried so she gave him back. He wouldn't even touch or look at her. She tried a few more times to get him to sit with her, but he pitched a fit each time. When we got in the courtroom, the judge asked us to let her hold him. We tried to hand him to her, but she said no he's better off over there. I'm kind of glad because he would have pitched a fit, and the judge may have decided that he needed more visits because he's not bonding with her.

No change. The social worker did what she said she would after her district supervisor told her to not change the case plan and they recommended that the case goal remain as reunification. The judge still thinks that the BM has made "so much progress" which is a load of bull. So we will continue supervised visits in the office, and go back to court again in March. At least we will have our little man for Christmas. I keep praying for strength because this process is so hard. I will never do this again.

Pictures

I just realized that I haven't posted any pictures of the kids in a while. So here's some from the last month. Most of these were taken the weekend we thought they were going to take Fuzzy away from us. One of these days I will get a new picture of L that I can post. Everytime I pull out the camera she will stare at me the whole time. She never looks away!

Court

Tomorrow we go back to court at 1:30 PM. I got a call from the CW asking me to bring Fuzzy so he can visit with his BM. WTF? I've seen other foster parents bring the kids to court, but it doesn't make any sense to me. What kind of visit can you have in a court room waiting for a case to be called? Also I refuse to stay any longer than I have to for the case. I'm using my time off for her to visit. Her scheduled visits are Monday and Wednesday not Tuesday. They canceled his visit today without telling me. It would have been a simple courtesy to tell me so I wouldn't spend time in my busy morning getting his diaper bad ready for a visit. But no that's too much to ask for. I'm supposed to bend over backwards to make things as easy as possible for them, but eff me.

We're praying that the judge will intercede in this stupidity and wishy washy social worker game. I'll update here hopefully tomorrow night. Thank you all for your prayers and well wishes.

I'm less than 2 weeks from the end of my first term in school working on my graduate degree. Currently I'm in Human Services with a concentration in Executive Leadership. I know that I want to get into a field where I can help people, and make a difference. I've been thinking and toying with the idea of changing to become marriage and family therapist. But I don't know. The field I'm in now has several different concentrations that range from business to marriage and family to end of life care. I just don't know. My main problem is that I need to decide between staying with human services or moving to counseling since they have different classes. This has been a hard term since it's my first one after being out of school for years plus having to work full time and take care of the kids and the house. I'm taking off a day next week to spend the whole day reading and catching up on my final papers that are due on the 18th. I've got all A's right now and I want to keep them!

I'm Still Here

I haven't posted in a while because I just haven't felt like talking. Fuzzy's CW called last week to say that they (her, her supervisor, and the district supervisor) discussed the case and now they are not going to recommend changing the case plan to adoption. So basically they think that what BM is doing is still not a big deal, and she should get even more time. We're praying that the judge will see things differently and change the case plan. But all we can do is pray and trust that God will take care of Fuzzy and us.

We had a nice Thanksgiving. My brother and his family were here so we got to spend some time with them. My niece has gotten so big since I last saw her, and she's crawling around so well. She kept giving me these huge grins. It was fun to watch Fuzzy playing on the floor with her.

We did some black Friday shopping, but we didn't go out until later in the morning to avoid the craziness. Saturday was spent at home most of the day until we went to dinner with some family. Today I woke up with a horrible migraine and congestion. I could barely see straight. I managed to go up to the church to get the computer ready for the 2 church services before I came home and crashed for several hours. I'm still not feeling too hot, but I'm forcing myself to stay out of bed at least for a few hours before bed.

L came back from her extended family visit. She's been acting up, but I know it's because she's upset about having to leave her siblings again. There's no way to really explain to a 2 year old that she's just going for a visit. We cut her a lot of slack. But we also can't let her just run wild and get away with breaking all our rules because she's been away.

Praise Report

We went to court today, and Fuzzy is still with us! The case was called and the judge ordered BM to take another drug test, and said that if it's a good test then she would have something positive to tell her. Well, she left with the bailiff to take a test. We sat and waited for 30 minutes before she came back. Then about 20 minutes later the CW came out and pulled us aside. She said that we must have had a lot of people praying for us. The test was not good so we will go back to court in December. They will send the test off to another lab to confirm the results. And in December they will be recommending the case plan be changed to Adoption. My heart just about leaped from my chest when I heard that. God is so good. Robert and I were both prepared to go into this hearing with guns blazing with our attorney, and put everything on the line. But something kept eating at me about doing this. I prayed about it and felt led to not go that route. I felt like we were trying to make our own way and not following God's way. Then we got our horrible news this past week, and started praying. I prayed and prayed for God to give me the strength to follow his plan. I knew that nothing would happen to Fuzzy that was not already in God's plan. So for now we are celebrating that our son is home, safe and sound. We will continue to pray, and thank God for everything.

Thank you to everyone that has been thinking and praying for us. I love you all!

In the End

Today we got the worst news possible. Fuzzy is going to leave us on Tuesday. His case worker, her supervisor, and the district supervior met earlier this week and decided that he has been in care too long. And his Bm hasn't done anything to him yet that would let the state terminate her rights. The fact that she puts him in danger all the time doesn't matter. He has to actually be physically hurt. The system is broken, and there isn't anything we can do to fix it. So they have moved court up from Dec. 6 to Nov. 17. They are recommending to the judge that he be returned immediately. No one cares about all of the evidence of her not taking care of him and riding him around on the interstate sitting in her lap. No one cares! I managed to hold myself together while his caseworker was here. I did tell her that I pray nothing happens to him. But if it does it's on her head. Rob and I took off this afternoon, and spent the day in the park just letting him play. We took lots of video and pictures. Tomorrow we're scheduled to take family portraits...our last pictures with our son. I'm trying to remember that this is all according to God's plan, and nothing will happen to him that God has not intended. But it still hurts so much. In 3 days, my son will be taken away from the only home he's ever known, and dropped into a horrible, horrible place. I pray he will overcome, and make something of himself.

I'm not even sure why I pulled up the website, but something lead me to do it. I started looking at the available children again on the state foster care websites. On there I found an adorable 10 year old little girl. Her little write-up sounds great. She's doing good in school, doesn't have any medical issues or emotional issues that we know of, she loves Dis*ney and H*annah Mon*tana. I wanted to know more about her and find out where in the state she's living right now. I don't know if this will lead to adoption at this point, but you never know. I contacted my licensing worker, and she's getting in touch with the case worker for this child so we can talk with her. I'll keep you posted on what happens.

Hidden Gems

My sister-in-law sent me this email today, and I wanted to share it with ya'll. It's so true and something that I will have to keep reminding myself of especially if things don't turn out well for Fuzzy and us.

Hidden Gems

Sometimes we have an experience that we don’t understand, but if we look deeply, or wait long enough, a reason for that experience will usually reveal itself. All the events in our lives lead to other events, and all that we have manifested in this present moment is the result of past events and experiences. We cannot easily tease apart the many threads that have been woven together to create our current reality. Experiences that don’t make sense, as well as any that we regret, are just as responsible for the good things in our lives as the experiences we do understand or label as "good."

This is especially important to remember at times when we feel directionless or unsure of what to do. It is often at times like these that we take a job or move to a place without really knowing if it’s the right thing to do. We may ultimately end up leaving the job or the place, but often during that time we will have met someone who becomes an important friend, or we may have an experience that changes us in a profound way. When all the pieces of our life don’t quite make sense, we can remember that there may be some hidden gem of a reason that we are where we are having the experiences we are having.

It’s fun to look back on past experiences with an eye to uncovering those gems - the dreadful temporary job in a bland office building that introduced you to the love of your life; the roommate you couldn’t tolerate who gave you a book that changed your life; the time spent living in a city you didn’t like that led you into a deeper relationship with yourself. Remembering these past experiences can restore our faith in the present. Life is full of buried treasures. Chances are, you’re sitting on some right now.

Low Standards

It's 2 AM and my son is coughing and hacking in his sleep. We can't get and keep him well, because we have to keep sending him to spend time with that idiot. No matter how many times you tell her that he can't be around smoke, she doesn't care. It pisses me off to no end that some people are held to such low standards that most people wouldn't even consider them parents or even a free teenage babysitter just because they gave birth. She makes him sick. She puts in him a lot of danger every time he's with her, but it's ok because she gave birth to him. I would die for him, but it doesn't matter because I didn't give birth to him. It's ok for her to ride him around in her lap in a little smoke filled pick-up truck. It's ok for her to feed him so many whole grapes that he's pooped whole grapes for 2 days. It's ok for her to let him sit around and marinate in a dirty diaper to the point where his private is red and irritated. I guess the judge will only see a problem is what she does lands him in the hospital, and even then she may just ignore it like everything else.

Next week, Fuzzy will be gone for 4 days, 4 whole days. God help me and God protect him.

My little boy is gone again tonight, and will be gone tomorrow night. I hate this. I feel so lost without him here. I should be able to get a bunch done on my homework, but I can't because I keep thinking about him. Everything here reminds me of him. His little shoe was in the middle of the floor where he walked out of it last night. His favorite stuffed frog was where he dropped it this morning when we left for daycare this morning. I'm trying to keep my faith that things will work out for our family, but I can't help think that we will walk in court next month and they will snatch him out of our lives forever.