The Fog is Lifting....and Update on Jerry........

The past 14 days have brought an amazing transformation over 19 month old Jerry. The child that we feared had autism + FASD + ? has woken up in a most delightful way. From cave-man vowel sounds without any consonants (Uuua, Aee, Eee) he has lept to words...car, ma, da, ba, hot, cat. From little eye contact with anyone he has started approaching strangers and smiling. He shows appropriate pain when injured (rather than a blank stare) and is fully engaged in whatever is happening around him rather than watching us all through a foggy blur. He still has all the signs and symptoms of FASD, but the isolating and strange distance he kept for the first 9 months in our family has seemed to thin. What was it? Coping mechanisms for an overly immature emotional system? Attachment issues? A dip in his Cognitive development? No real answer today - but what a thrill it is to watch him wake up and join the family on a new level.

A Break with Patty and Taming the Boulevard...........

Saturday Patty (Weldon's wife) and I took a mommy break, indulged in a set of McD's iced hazelnut coffees and settled into a pedicure session together. NICE.....as moms to lots of little ones neither one of us gets a personal break very often but this one was like an oasis in a rather busy weekend.

Patty getting painted........
Two pairs of feet with fresh 'toe paint' (as my little girls say.)

I really like and support some of the city ordinances for things like animals, trash and children. But there are a few that make me crazy - particularly the one that says 'boulevard grass/weeds shall not exceed 8 inches." Please! How tall are your dandelions? How about those bristly yellow things? We have a classic (30 year old?) push mower and though it cuts grass fine it simply bends tall weeds over and misses them. A few weeks of that and we are in violation of an ordinance and get a note in the mail informing us of our negligence. Last week I took dramatic steps to NEVER receive another one of those letters again and tore out all of the grass/weeds in the boulevard area to create these new garden areas with gravel and small plantings of hardy perennials. It's created quite a buzz on the block as many of us get the notices and hate having to care for these patchy areas that gather litter and dog poop. The joke .....two days into the project I received one of 'those' letters in the mail.....can't wait until they come next week to reinspect. I think the issue is resolved!

Personal Prayer Request for a Monday.......

It's 7:30am here which means that in Seattle my mom, her sister and my sibs are all up and moving toward an exhausting day. Please be praying over them all as my mom undergoes a double mastectomy (5 hour surgery I believe) to deal with the breast cancer that was discovered this spring. We are praying peace and trust and wisdom over everyone involved - and that the things in life that are valuable would be held dear- and that all other things would fall away.

Emergency Preparedness.....

Every family has it's emergencies. E in AK has forest fires and volcanoes, friends who farm Southern MN have tornadoes and I grew up in the coastal earthquake region - emergency preparedness is part of most peoples lives. As city-dwellers we have to factor in the human emergencies as well as the environmental ones. With houses spaced 10 feet apart we end up living what ever drama is currently playing out in the rental properties on either side of us, and have no choice but to care. Which is good - most of the repetitive events we see can be reduced through friendship, accountability (yep - the police) or relocation (them not us)and we are committed to helping bring hope into some pretty ugly and hopeless looking situations.

Today I sat down and talked with my kids about the new escalation over our side fence. I explained the mom's probable addictions, their involvement with narcotics trafficking, her out of control temper and the ways this might impact our lives. Yesterday I involved our family in it directly by intervening when she became out of control with our 80 year old widow two houses down. Foolish? Perhaps, but way worse to let a 30 year old abuse an 80 year old widow and to stand by doing nothing.

So today we talked about it. We figured out together the ways we might be in danger and how to handle each one. We took time to pray for our neighbors hearts and minds and for our own safety. And I reminded the family of the need for 'instant emergency obedience' - which is the ability to follow one or two word instructions without any clarification of discussion. House. 911. In - Now. Upstairs. Walk Away. Away from window. And so on. It's been a season of calm in our neighborhood recently and I don't want us to grow lazy in our ability to respond quickly...when the trouble comes (and I am sure it will) my team is ready.

MOFAS - Article from this months newsletter on parenting kiddos with FASD and loss.........

(Note: This has been shamelessly copied from the MOFAS website. It is from the most recent e-newsletter and just struck me as the heart-cry that I hear from so many of you. I have emailed for permission to reprint and will delete this post if they respond in the negative - but the message is clear - we are not crazy and we are not alone in this sad journey with our alcohol affected kids. I think we all understand..............)


"Mother's Heart- Ambiguous Loss and FASD"

"I read her email and I immediately connected with what she was feeling, so much so that tears rolled down my cheeks before I could dab my eyes to stop them. "There are days when I feel like such a failure. I feel sad and angry and even jealous sometimes of 'normal' families and then I feel guilty because I really do love my son. I guess I just don't know how to feel anymore." This email was from an adoptive mother of a child with a Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) but I would imagine that it could just as easily have been written by a birth mom of a child with a FASD. The loss of dreams and the grief over what might have been, the fears and the coming-to-terms with the lifetime of struggles that families living with FASD often face...it can be so overwhelming some days. Other days are better and they bring a feeling of being incredibly thankful for the opportunity to know and care for such vulnerable, precious, intense, creative and loving individuals.

I have come to believe that the real difficulty for me as a parent of children with FASD is found in exactly that, the ambiguity. Pauline Boss, PhD is a therapist who is known for her work in the area of "ambiguous loss". When loss comes in the form of death the loss is definite and clear and there are rituals and compassion for the grieving. Ambiguous loss is less clear and may be more difficult on some levels to live with.

Boss explains, "With ambiguous loss, there is no closure; the challenge is to learn to live with the ambiguity." When I was a little girl playing with dolls I imagined that I would be a loving and competent mother someday to my children. I never imagined that I would question my decisions or my ability to care for them or keep them safe from harm. I never imagined that other people might question my abilities or blame me for the way my children behaved. I never imagined that there would be days when I would feel helpless and overwhelmed and afraid. And I never thought I'd mourn a little on each birthday as I watched them blow out their candles, knowing that the magic age of adulthood would come much too quickly for my children. But I'm learning to live with the ambiguity. Connecting with other parents of children with FASD helped tremendously as it was through those connections that I learned that the feelings I had on those difficult days were normal and those concerns I had about my ability to care for my children or keep them safe did not make me a bad mom, they caused me to develop the skills to be the kind of advocate my kids need. I replied to the mom who had emailed me intending to tell her exactly that, but I wrote only two words. I understand.
~Kari Fletcher, MOFAS 2009"

Two minor life checks this week.......

First: No matter how much more convenient it is for a child to reheat the spaghetti sauce in the metal bowl that it was stored in over night it is a BAD idea to do so in the microwave. Especially when it is set on HI for three minutes. I am thankful that they didn't try the same potato trick that the neighbors one street over did yesterday - cooking an unpicked potato in their microwave until their was a enough smoke that the fire department was called.....see it could have been worse!

Second: Explaining bad bumper stickers to a pre-teen boy with Aspergers symptoms (FYI - high level autism) is a chore in itself and may take several days of effort. This weeks challenge? I had to go all the way back to the 80's to explain why "Cats - the 'other' white meat." Might be about more than just a person who thinks we should eat cats.......,.

Open House..........

One of the things that has become a priority to our family is keeping an 'open home' - always prepared to receive the people God brings into our lives. Some drop in unannounced while others are planned months ahead of time. Either way, we try to keep the house reasonably tidy which means a main floor with little clutter and meals that can easily be stretched.

For the past two weeks we have become a 'date destination' for our friends M and D. In a culture where dating is considered private and can become filled with temptations, we offer a safe place to be with friends, share a meal and spend time talking. And it doesn't get cheaper than this - free food and the endless floor show of little people.

Celebrating Freedoms on the 4th.............

For the past few years our family has gotten up early and spent the morning picking the last of the summer strawberries out at Pine Tree Farms in the White Bear area. You can't see the two little boys very well in this photo - they are riding in their Ergos on my and Robert's backs. What a difference from the first time we picked as a family with only John and Leah to supervise - now we are a family of 13 (including our neighbor Grandpa J.) Today I am thankful for so many of our freedoms ....these are a few of them.

Freedom to play together.......Only two generations ago the freedom for Black,White and Hispanics to pick berries together for fun would have only been a dream.. Grandpa J spent his early years as a migrant field worker - now he sits in a comfortable chair while we pick and the children bring him special berries.

Freedom to love .....for Black parents and White parents to partner together so that children like ours will grow up in loving homes rather than languishing in foster care waiting for same race adoptive parents to come forward.

Freedom from fear...and the safety to say we are afraid. As a family we choose not to be controlled by fear as we have found true strength and confidence in Christ. Joe HATES fireworks and spent the night inside my shirt peering out the neck hole - the other 9 were fascinated.Freedom to worship God....we value our religious freedoms and understand that they are not guaranteed in our world. Just being able to pray before meals still isn't safe in some parts of our world.

Freedom to march and wave our flag as we go to shoot off fireworks at a friends. Neighbors might not like it when we march around our block pretending to be in the military - but no one is taking shots at us or reporting us to authorities who don't think it's appropriate.

Freedom to associate......to share our lives, our cookies and our time with kids and adults who are involved in a wide variety of illegal and immoral activities. Without societies judgment on us, without breaking class or cast or propriety. Being able to show through example that there is hope for change and a future - rather than just despair. Freedom to think about people as more than statistics and to help change those numbers - one life at a time.

Prayer Request for Maisy and her parents.....

For those of you who don't know Maisy this is a very recent photo. She joined her forever family about 5 weeks ago and has been hospitalized since Tuesday with a serious infection. For more of the specifics you can link over to Julies blog here but the basic need is for prayer support. A few years ago, Julie and Mark had a precious son named Evan who also had serious medical issues and who died a few weeks after placement. I am praying that they would not be afraid of the same outcome and would trust in the Lord who loves them and Maisy beyond all understanding.

"So wear less clothes..."

Last week I was lamenting the loss of my closet (to gain the shower) to a male friend of the family. I had found a nice armoire that will meet the basic needs but couldn't figure out how to fit my dresser into the new bedroom configuration - at least with my present desire to loose the early-American-garage sale look. His answer? "Wear less clothes." Stated with all seriousness, but which once said out loud led to a few moments of hysterical back tracking. Of course I understood the theory....own less clothing. But it was worth the laugh.

Which leads to this post. I am not a woman of many clothes to begin with. Now I am facing the challenge (which I now see as fun) of paring it down even more. What if everything in my wardrobe had to be a functional 'favorite' or it had to go? On some levels this is really easy. I like black...so there is the foundation to work from. I am also past the wild spitting up phase that has accompanied some of the more recent babies - so I don't need three changes a day. But thinking through the logistics of choosing the best of my shoes to keep (I love Born and Chaco) so that there are only 4 pairs a season. And limiting myself to two sweatshirts....two sweatpants....two pj's...two skirts. This is going to take some serious work! On a lighter note. Isn't the armoire nice? I am taking out the two top shelves so that I can hang things....though I still think I will need a sweater chest for the bulky things like sweatshirts and sweaters in the winter months.