Other People's Kids

Wisdom About Love

Oh, but Beth is so wise. Love does need to be fed to children in bite-sized, believable pieces when a child has been treated badly. That's one of the problems I've probably had with "Josie".

I wanted to love her so badly...but she wasn't buying what I had to sell. She just couldn't believe that here was a guy who was of an age to be her father and who wanted to be a sort of father to her. He claims he loves her, and he even acts a little like he loves her...but it's never been that easy in her world. The guy must be full of shit. Either that or he's a pervert to be stayed clear of.

I keep wondering when it will smack her upside the head that I'm not that way, or any other way except that I just love her. Maybe never now, given how the County has taken away any feeling of stability here for her, unless my suspicions are correct and she ends up back here in the next few years.

"Angel" is a whole different story. I can tell she already loves us, and I know we already love her like a daughter. She's young enough, and of the type of personality that she hasn't been too damaged by her previous young life to affect her ability to love and be loved. We are showering her with love, and she mostly just spews it back at us in equal measure and in some very amusing ways that will get blog coverage for sure. Some of her bedtime screaming and other acting out may be a type of "vomiting" (to use Beth's charming analogy) but the nausea has been getting less frequent and less violent (to advance the same analogy).

But overall in some ways I'm still too eager to help these kids. I've known this particular lesson for a long, long time and I always forget. As Beth says in her piece:

Sometimes all we get to do is to help them accept very small meals in very small bites. Hopefully when they leave us they are better nourished and more able to accept love than when they came.

Yes. That seems about right to me.

posted by Dan @ 8:34 AM