A Haitus from my Haitus
Anybody who is a long-time follower of my adventures knows that I'm prone to long, unexplained absences from this space. I warned you, back in the dim mists of the past when I started this thing, that I will not allow this thing to own me, and if I don't feel like posting I won't until I feel like it again. So there.
On the fostering front, nothing much has happened lately anyway (unless you count the cop and two sheriff deputies that stopped by for a nice little search of the Boy Child's bedroom today, but that's another post for later).
But the adoption front...well, let's just say that after months of anguish and worrying, many legal threats, thousands of dollars in legal bills, health problems for the birth mom related to stress, and some other rotten stuff, the court date finally came last Friday.
And the tribe didn't even bother to show up by phone.
All that crap they gave us, all the pain and heartache, those horrible days in the hospital after Amanda was born, and they didn't even bother to let us know it was okay now.
I'm going to say this now, and then I'm probably not going to mention it again. The Indian Child Welfare Act is a poorly written legislation obviously put together by B-team congressional staffers with no real-world experience. It is being used at least in some cases to punish women whose decisions the tribes disapprove of. It is fostering a bitter culture of racism and entitlement among many Native Americans, and it is building bitter resentment among non-natives who are/were otherwise well-disposed toward people of other races, including natives.
In short, it's a crappy law written by crappy lawyers being used by crappy people to do crappy things, and it should be at least massively amended and probably repealed at the first possible opportunity.
So then.
We have our beautiful little girl. She now officially has our last name, and is ours for life. It's almost like she knows it, too. In court she charmed the judge completely. The bailiff looked like some kind of pro wrestler, and I swear he was grinning from ear to ear when he thought nobody was looking and I was afraid he was going to get down on the floor and start playing with her.
She's our angel, and nobody can ever take this one away. Heh. Can you tell I've got it bad? Of course, as Daddy, it's my official duty to show a picture. Enjoy. I know we will.
Labels: Adoption, Amanda
The Greatest Joy
It is with a spinning mind and an immense joy in my heart that I hereby announce to anybody who cares that I just got The Call from The Wife. The judge has approved our adoption, and in a couple of weeks we will officially be Amanda's mommy and daddy.
I'm in shock. I've become so conditioned to the idea that nice guys finish last, and the court usually makes the decision I would rather they didn't, and the law was more often used to cause mischief than to deliver justice. That we should be granted this gift finally, after all the shock, grief, wrangling, rage, muttering, cursing, pleading, and who knows what all else over these last months...well, it's a kind of gratification I don't recall ever feeling. I MAYBE felt something akin to this when I studied and worked my last quarter in college to earn 26 credits, and, for the first time in my entire scholastic life, received straight A's on all 26 credits' worth. And then, if I hadn't been so tired of school I just didn't want to deal with it, I could have participated in commencement exercises for two different schools within a few days of each other. Instead, I just fled to the lake cabin and spent a week or so sitting on the dock, tanning, fishing and recuperating.
I don't need recuperation this time, though, except maybe emotionally. And I have a wonderful wife and beautiful little girl to help with that, thank God.
I...I don't have any more to say right now. I have to work the rest of the day anyway...I may have more to say on the subject tonight. Or maybe I'll just sit and hug my little girl awhile and think about how good God can be when He has a mind to.
Labels: Adoption, Amanda
Examining a Way to Skin a Cat
Okay, we've come a lot, and we feel we've got a handle on the kinds of things that might work and the ones that probably won't. I personally like the one of adopting the birth mom in order to make her "family" so we can adopt her child...but apparently the Indians also get to decide after the fact that family who are legal but don't have Indian blood aren't "real" family. Sigh. It's difficult fighting an opponent that is omnipotent and has unlimited funds that ultimately come from your own pocket.
One interesting item about the tribe...as things have proceeded, it has come into focus that there appears to be one lady at the tribe that is the problem. We have doubts whether the objection would have been raised at all in the first place except for her. Unfortunately for us, she's the one in charge of ICWA issues.
So our newest hobby horse is one I want some input on from anybody here who has experience. Heck, anybody who has an OPINION.
How would an "informal" adoption work? I've known of similar arrangements families have made, where without a strictly legal arrangement, people for their own reasons would simply raise a child that wasn't their own.
We would get our baby back. It also wouldn't necessarily be like that forever. Birth mom is still determined that we are her parents, and we concur. It would simply be a matter of waiting until such time as that woman is out of that position, and then re-trying. Or maybe filling out the paperwork again in 5 years or something WITHOUT checking the Native American box. The main thing is that it would bring us together with her so we stop missing her babyhood.
The main negatives I see are financial, like not being able to claim her on taxes, or legal, like the chance that somehow to government decides to take her away. If we're not her parents, we have no standing to object. I also wonder about things like health insurance and stuff.
So anybody with any knowledge or experience of such a situation is cordially invited to read the last few posts to get a handle on our situation, and then feel free to comment, stating why or why not such an arrangement would be a good idea.
Labels: Adoption, ICWA
Let Me Count the Ways...
Okay, so you've been briefed on the broad outlines of how the Indian Tribe is tangling our hopes for adoption. But as I've mentioned in passing over the months and as Yoda said to Obi Wan Kenobi's ghost as Luke took off to save his friends: "There is another."
I speak of the advanced pregnancy of "Melanie". I have promised a post on the events of last week regarding "Melanie" and I will deliver, but not here. Here I simply want to discuss the events of this morning.
I was vaguely aware that The Wife was talking to somebody on the phone. No idea to whom or about what, and didn't much care. I was drifting in the twilight zone and was feeling pretty comfortable. I had planned to take today and tomorrow off anyway as far as my boss is concerned, so tomorrow is soon enough to get back to work. Suddenly, I hear words that I had to replay in my mind several times and still couldn't make sense of them coming out of The Wife's mouth: "nigger name". Wha? Huh? Um...am I still dreaming?
I woke up fast then and got the scoop. "Melanie" has decided on a name for her impending daughter. The baby's father's mother was apparently trying to talk "Melanie" out of giving her granddaughter a "nigger name". Now, first of all, I know what this name is and it's a beautiful name. Second, I had NO IDEA that the father's family was like that. Oh, I knew they weren't well off, and collected a lot of government benefits for healthy people, and kept their yard looking like a junk yard. But this is the final step toward my actually believing that these people are honestly full-blooded members of that mythical tribe known as "white trash".
Oh, dear. Dear, dear, dear. No child can be allowed to be raised under the careful tutelage of a woman like that while we are able to influence anything at all. No way, nohow. Uh uh. Not happening until we've done our best to prevent it. And she WOULD be the one to raise the child...the father is pretty shiftless, refuses to hold a job and is pretty much an example of why some women shouldn't be allowed to choose the men they sleep with.
And if his mother was the same type and didn't want anything to do with a grandchild like most women in her position, there probably wouldn't be a problem. I have it on good authority (but not outright said to me) that "Melanie" would love to have us adopt her daughter. But she thinks (and she may be right) that if she doesn't parent the child, then the father's family would get next dibs, and she also knows that that woman would seize the opportunity.
So now we've collected two situations, each entirely different from the other, in which we want desperately to adopt a child, the babies' mothers both want us to adopt their children from birth, and outside influences are seemingly dead set against us adopting either child. As an aside, if we were to adopt BOTH children through a miracle of God, they would also have identical initials. And both mothers appear to me to be roughly the same personality type (though our black/indian birthmom seems to have more fight in her where her children are concerned).
I wonder...how many more adoption situations can we get ourselves into where we want it and the birthmom wants it, but other people decide it won't happen? It could become like a hobby or something. Counting the ways where people intervene in a good thing just because they can.
Do I sound bitter? I am, a little. "Nigger name"? Call me innocent, but I sort of thought that was the kind of thing that was last said out loud in the 60s, outside of those white power groups you see on TV trying to parade through Jewish neighborhoods with swastikas. I'm going to have to get out my copy of "American History X" and watch it with new eyes. This stuff really DOES happen.
In what bizarre world would the law put a child in a home like that before it would put the child in our home? And yet after our experiences fostering and trying to adopt, I know that "Melanie" is most likely right. That would be how it would be likely to play out.
Sigh.
Labels: Adoption
New Hope
I have new hope on two fronts just lately...
The first point of hope regards what I've been told in the past regarding my feet. Specifically, I was told by the University of Minnesota sports medicine clinic that I have arthritis in my feet, and that this would bury my running habit. I had no reason to disbelieve this, so I gave up my habit without even a whimper. Well, okay, a few whimpers. But I was pretty proud of how I calmly gave up the main driver of my good health.
Thing is, I finally HAD to get a second opinion. Running was the thing that had helped me get off the bottle. I've recently (again) had a few problems with that. It also was the thing that held my CF lung problems at bay (or so I believe). It was also a sacred time, the time when I had only myself and my breathing rate and heartbeat to think about. A time when I could listen to my favorite music without any jeers that I love 80s rock (and even 80s pop, including Michael Jackson and Tiffany). In short, running was a part of my life that I wasn't able to give up easily.
They took more X-rays, and on my new doctor's interpretation, there is hardly *any* arthritis in my feet...much different from what I was told before. I'm of a mind to get copies of the X-rays they took at the U and have my new doc look at them...but it's
working. You see, I went out to run Saturday night, since it was a mild night. And it was GREAT. My wind is completely gone after several years of no running, of course, but that feeling of having ran was the same. I probably can't run consecutive days, but my feet weren't feeling too bad after a day. I can RUN. Expect more on this subject in the future.
The second front on which there is new hope is the adoption thing. We found out today that a birth mom saw us on adoptionprofiles.com. A birthmom in Minnesota. I've spoken with her most closely-linked social worker and heard the details this afternoon, and it sounds ideal for us. The baby is a boy, about 1.5 months old as of this writing. He's a remarkable baby. He was born without any ventricles in his heart.
That's right, he was born, as near as I can tell, without the bottom half of his heart. And yet he's still alive, and according to his social worker, thriving. This child needs a chance in life. I am the man to give it to him, and The Wife is the woman to give it to him. If that wasn't enough, he was born with two thumbs on one hand. This struck me, against my expectations, as pretty cool. Then my mom told me that this is a genetic trait in some families in the area my folks come from, which sort of wrecked a cool mythology I was building up for myself and my future(?) child.
Anyway, it looks like The Wife and I will possibly be visiting the birthmom tomorrow night. Who knows? Maybe we'll be bringing home the latest member of our family.
Cool, huh?
I love my life.
PS. I'm put in mind of the frog-and-cricket orchestra that attends our backyard in warmer times of the year. What do you suppose those critters are doing right now?
Labels: Adoption, Running
Black Belt in Tae-Husband-Do, and Shame On Society
Yeah, that's right. I be bad. I bought The Wife a brand spanking new laptop today. With a Wi Fi hub, to go with the built-in card in the laptop. This means that theoretically she should be able to go anywhere within like 100 or 500 or some damned number of feet from the hub and still be able to surf and do email and stuff. I am a marital god.
Not only for that, though...but for the reason I was able to do that. And that reason is that I got the taxes done and filed last Saturday and got our state return back today. Yeah, that's right all you procrastinators out there. While you're slogging to the mailbox to drop your snail-mail return on April 15, I won't even be able to remember how much we got back this year. Bwahahaha!!!1!
Ahem.
Now that I have the pride worked out of my system, I'll also say that the rest of our refund (which was considerable this year for various reasons), along with my yearly bonus and most of what The Wife is pulling down in her new job (which is more than we thought it would be) is ALL going to opening up room on our credit card.
Because we just can't wait on our agency any more. We've contacted another place who does NOT demand payment until there is a match...and they talk like they might actually be able to come through for us, or at least talk to us once in awhile for reasons other than to demand more money. That song is getting so OLD. They also have given us firm dollar ranges for various types of matches. I'm going to like working with them. Thanks to Mary for hooking us up.
The only thing that's depressing--and this is NOT a knock on this particular outfit but I guess against the world in general--is that they have to split out their cost by race. Until the last 5 or 10 years, I thought we had mostly moved beyond this whole race pile of crap. But, as the Democratic primary scrap advertises to the world, I guess race is still very much with us. And you get a discount on black babies. Like I said, I don't blame the agency. Apparently it's like that everywhere. The freaking MARKET determines it. And that means all of us.
How sick is that? Who CARES what color a child's skin is? It's a tiny little miniature person who depends on you for everything at first. It grows, it loves you, you love it back. It gradually demands independence more and more, it grows to disrespect you and demand the keys to your car. It pleads with you for college money, then learns to respect you again by age 30 if you did your parenting right. Then you get to laugh at it when it has children of its own, and you get to spoil those children rotten so they demonstrate to it how evil it had treated you. "The Lion King" lied to us. THIS is the TRUE circle of life.
If it is black, white, yellow or purple, the only important thing is that you get the last laugh on it. Am I being cynical? I guess I am. I have that right. Most people just get to go for a fun roll in the hay when they feel it's time to have their own. It's a lot more expensive than that for us.
And yet it's less expensive if the child is black, a little more if it's "bi-racial", and you pay a premium for *drum roll, please* CAUCASION. Somehow I think that if we get a black child, I won't want to point out that little detail of their adoption. It's not something that would be likely to help their self-esteem, I don't think.
People should be ashamed of themselves.
Labels: Adoption
Gotcha
"Celeste" has been a real pill lately. Unknowingly following in "Josie's" footsteps, she decided that it would be just a peachy-keen idea the other day to pierce her tongue. She has since been disabused of that notion.
Likewise the notion that she should assume that because she's walking with her new boyfriend, limits on walk time are magically erased (she usually is allowed 20 minutes...MAYBE 1/2 hour, and they took nearly an hour and a half).
Likewise the notion that she should feel free, while out on such a walk with her boyfriend who we've just started to get to know, to stop in at a friend's house. When I was around 19 or 20, I too took a girlfriend to a friend's house...it wasn't very innocent. And at 13, she is (in matters such as this) about what I was at 25. No dice, little girl, and playing dumb won't save you anymore now that we know you're probably at least as smart as us (except with regard to things like wisdom and common sense, of course).
I wasn't aware, but apparently her new day-treatment school--the very same one where The Wife is not working--intrudes into her life more than I had thought, and is wonderfully helpful in keeping her youthful exuberance tamped down, or at least pointed in a direction where it won't hurt anybody. She spent today in in-school suspension. This sounds to me essentially like an all-day study hall, which is something that would be guaranteed to piss her off but good.
And as if on cue, as she got in the van with The Wife to head home at day's end, she decided to vent her frustration:
"Celeste:" "Thanks for the day of ISS!
The Wife: Just a second...(flips down visor with mirror on the back to reflect her innocent young face back to her)...okay, now say that again.
Absolutely priceless. I wish I could have been there.
But you know what? The Wife reports happily that it actually shut her up all the way home. Not only that, but when my time neared to get home from work, "Celeste" asked what was for supper. The Wife asked what "Celeste" was planning to make for supper? "Celeste" replied "I don't know. Let me look." She then proceeded into the kitchen, found some stuff that apparently appealed to her, went back out and suggested that she make that. The Wife (after picking her jaw up off the floor, I imagine) agreed, after which "Celeste" proceeded back to the kitchen and began preparations.
When I got home, supper was on the table with full settings within 10 or 15 minutes. WOW.
I made sure not only to make sure this girl understood that I liked the dinner (which was really quite good) but also that I HUGELY appreciated that she took some of the load off of The Wife. I didn't push it past that because it seems that if you push the compliments too hard her BS detector goes off whether you're trying to feed her any or not, and she just shuts it down. And that's something I'm trying to avoid.
Mom doesn't care for "Celeste" a lot of the time. I think she now likes her better than she used to, but overall I don't think it would hurt Mom's feelings if "Celeste" went back home. Then again, Mom fostered in what seems like a whole other era. Then, maybe 1/4 of the kids had severe psychological problems. Over half of them seemed like kids that could really make a go of it if they just got nurturing, structured support. Mom was very good at providing that, and did it often and well. Better than anyone I've ever seen.
These kids seem...more broken. They need a little more TLC maybe than the kids mom dealt with, and they need someone a little more willing to be abused, a little more willing to look for the good side to them. And they do respond, if you give them a chance. "Celeste" is one of those. "Jill" and "Josie" were definitely NOT. They were both as manipulative as they come, and I suspect they'll both end up in jail or even prison sooner or later (though I still have a massive soft spot for "Josie", God knows why. I won't cry very hard if I never see "Jill" again, as awful as it is to say it.)
I worry about the general trend society at large is taking, though. These kids are starting to come thicker and faster than I've ever seen them. Social workers are burning out. There is now an entire county who we categorically refuse to take referrals from (the same county "Angel" came from, as a matter of fact) because the whole social services system there seems so broken that they don't seem to know or care who is even supposed to be in their care, what those people are doing or what is happening to them. It's hard enough to help fix someone with the right supports, never mind when they decide that they don't have funds after all and we just don't get reimbursed for weeks of good care. Life's too short for THAT, am I right?
But The Wife got off a good one against "Celeste" today, and it seemed to really hit the target. That makes it all worth it. We're learning this thing, bit by bit, and we're helping the kids.
Oh. And thanks for the several private emails I received and the kind comments regarding our adoption situation. It means more than I can really say to know that there are people out there who don't know me at all outside this blog and yet keep us in their thoughts and prayers.
Which just may be working, by the way. The entity known here most frequently as "Auntie J", who would indeed by Auntie J if we are successful in our kidquest, called tonight. She knows someone who's maybe looking for adoptive parents. Finger-crossing exercises shall commence immediately. And, Auntie, if you could just give them a little push, or maybe a clobber over the head if it would help, we'd be most appreciative.
Hard as it sometimes seems, I love my life. Wouldn't trade it, and ESPECIALLY The Wife, for anything at all.
Labels: "Celeste", Adoption
