With adoption from foster care it’s the small things, not necessarily the paper signing that’ve made permanency feel...permanent.
For instance, this morning, he was bouncing in the bouncy swing, a bouncy swing that he’s probably too big for. Well. Actually, now we definitely know he’s to big for it. He crashed to the floor and bonked his butt and....(drumroll!!!!!) I. DIDNT. CHECK. FOR. A. BRUISE!!!! I made sure he was okay, OF COURSE. And OF COURSE I held him for dear life. And, OF COURSE I felt bad that I hadn’t checked the weight limit in a while on a thing he’s been using once a week for the past two and a half years. BBBBUUTTTT, I didn’t pull his pants down to look for a bruise right away - a bruise that would’ve meant, regardless of if he was ok or not, an extra trip to a doctor during a week filled with home regularly scheduled home visits, visitations with birth family, etc.. A bruise that would’ve involved the state because OF COURSE it should. Unfortunately, kids get abused in all the kinds of families. Later in the day, btw, I DID search for, and did not find, a bruise.
Let me explain the feeling another way. As a hospital clown I’ve had the opportunity to work at an awesome camp for kids with life threatening illnesses. A camp that’s dressed up like a camp, but is outfitted with a pretty intense medical facility and staff and the highest adult to kid ratio that I’ve EVER seen (and I’ve worked with kids everywhere). Yes, it’s a camp, but the campers have some serious stuff going on.One day a neat thing happened at that camp. Don’t worry, this will eventually lead back to Ahmed’s butt bonking/adoption revelation. One day, instead of being called in to clown with a kid who’d been isolated for days or for a kid who had to leave camp bc their situation was too much to manage, we got called in because a kid. lost. a. tooth. Besides indulging a proclivity for performing drag, it was SO awesome to dress up like the tooth-fairy and go bumble/celebrate A. NORMAL. MEDICAL. THING. GOING. ON. Instead of some big traumatic thing, they, and the adults around them got to yank out a tooth and give them a tchotchke under their pillow.
Hopefully by now you’re picking up what I’m putting down. For those that haven’t yet: It felt so fucking good to hold Ahmed this morning and hold him tight and just know that his butt hurt bc I failed him, as HIS parent; ruining his life not as his state-placed foster parent but as his regular ‘old flawed poppy (that's what he calls me, btw). The responsibility is going to form into a dark cloud someday, I’m sure, but for now, it feels heavenly.
Also: I finally posted to FB after a 2.5 yr fast and was slammed with 300+ likes/111 comments. Posting to FB has made all this feel real, yes, but it was something else that happened at work that explains why. Last week we’d just left a 7 year old girl's room. We'd knocked it outta the park and I was getting attached to this girl (who also had cancer, btw) and her mom (who was always at her side and was taking lots of pictures). Afterwards my clown partner says, “you should go back and give them one of our social media cards.” Our hospital clown program has little business cards for folks to tag us in their social media posts. So I go back in and playfully say something like, “tag! Your it! Tag us back!” and offer the mom the card. The mom immediately goes from after-clown sparkle to dejected and says, “we haven’t been on social media for years” and gestures around the room. I flush with embarrassment and identification. OF COURSE they don’t post their cancer shit on social media. Why would they? For 2.5 years, our family harbored tiny humans and all of the complex feelings/issues that came with raising them. All of your weighing in, even with good wishes would have just made even harder. In trauma-land, it’s survival. Processing via social media takes level of energy.
Okay. Might have emerged from survival mode, however, they ARE still going to wake up at 6am tomorrow. Good night to you all...
