The cast finally came off

Six weeks after Robbie broke his arm, his cast’s finally come off. We had all been looking forward to this moment. Well, Glen and I definitely had. Many of our walls seem to have some sort of plaster scratch / bump / mark at Robbie’s arm level. And he can start washing himself again (and doing up his buttons, and his tie…). As for Robbie’s attitude towards the cast coming off… on the one hand he’s looking forward to starting football and swimming again. On the other, he’s lost the best excuse he’s ever had to avoid writing at school and to take forever with his homework. Hopefully this will be another way to get back to normality. 

Hope

A few weeks ago, when things were really bad and I was despairing of our situation, I contacted Robbie’s placing authority to ask for help. They decided they wanted a support review and arranged a visit from one of their social workers. I also contacted a private adoption support agency, about which I’d heard good things and seem to have a very good therapy programme. Last week I finally got to speak to the person in charge of it. She told me all about what they do (assessments, Theraplay, Dyadic developmental Psychotherapy…) and I thought it was perfect… until she told me what they charge. £5,000 for the initial assessment and 12 sessions! I nearly fell off my chair.

Well, the support review social worker from the placing authority came today and she says she really wants to support us, so she’s going to make a case for the placing authority to pay for the services of the private agency. I really hope she gets it for us. Last Sunday we had another episode when Robbie repeatedly hit both of us (he got angry over homework, of all things, and it escalated before we could do anything about it). He also used very colourful language (I was called “a piece of s**t” and a “f**king idiot”, among other things). So help is needed. Keep your fingers crossed.

Care package

A strange package arrived a couple of days ago. I knew I hadn’t ordered anything online, so I was a bit puzzled as to what it may be. When I opened it, I found a lovely surprise. Yes, 30 individual portions of Nutella! A friend who knows I’ve been having a bit of a hard time sent it. She knows me well. With such medication (dose not indicated: one an hour perhaps?) I can face anything.

I’ve been looking after myself this week. Taking time off, letting Glen look after Robbie without feeling guilty about it… I’ve even started swimming again. And Robbie’s been behaving much better. That helps a lot.

A nice weekend

Since my last post was so gloomy, I thought I'd do a quick update to say that we had a nice weekend. Robbie had a couple of angry moments on Saturday, but no major incidents. Glen and I went out as agreed and thoroughly enjoyed a lovely dinner out with friends. Robbie had a great time with the sitter too and got to stay up a bit later than usual watching a film with her. On Sunday he helped us with some DIY in the morning and we the rest of the day was spent playing together (Jenga, board games, Lego and Wii). Robbie had a bit of a strop at bedtime but we managed to turn it around quickly before it escalated. Most of next week's homework is done out of the way, so hopefully he'll have no reason to flare up in the week. We need a good run of incident-free days so we can remind Robbie what a good boy he is and how much better life is when we all get along...

Everybody hurts

We flew back from Spain last Friday. On Saturday morning, Robbie moaned about how boring our house was compared to my brother's, where he has his cousins to play with. I played with him for a good hour and then started to unpack our suitcase. When I asked Robbie to put away the toys he got from the Three Wise Men in Spain, he got cross. I gave him a warning but it didn't make any difference, and so I asked him to sit on the sofa for 8 minutes. Robbie lost it and lashed out. What followed was a whole hour of rage. When I finally managed to calm him down enough to talk to him, I embraced him and told him that our problem is that he believes that I hate him; that's why he takes every request to do something like tidy up his toys as a provocation and proof of my hatred towards him. He sobbed and said that he really wants to love me, but he just can't. I said I understood: that I realised that he felt that the two adults he'd loved and trusted most, his birth mother and his foster carer, had let him down and let him go, so it must be so hard to trust me. He hugged me really tight and the mood changed. He was fine for the rest of the day on Saturday and we had a very nice Sunday too, playing board games and watching a film together.

Monday was ok too, but when I got home from work on Tuesday, Robbie and Glen were in the middle of a fight. Robbie had got his homework, and he claimed he couldn't do it. Glen had spent the previous hour trying to help him, but Robbie wouldn't do it. I tried to help and straight away could see that the homework was way below Robbie's standards and something he could easily do if he wanted to. I distracted him by getting him to do his reading instead, but when I tried to get him to engage with his homework afterwards, I got nowhere fast.

Glen went away on a work trip on Tuesday night, so Robbie and I were on our own on Wednesday. He hadn't forgotten about the homework issue and almost as soon as he woke up, he got angry again. I suggested asking his teacher for help, and he almost became hysterical. He knew that both his teacher and I knew that his homework was perfectly within his capabilities, and he didn't want that. In the evening the whole thing started again, but this time I'd decided that I didn't want a fight. I told him to put his homework away and read instead. I then picked up a book and started reading too. Robbie couldn't take the lack of attention and started on me. He first covered the pages of my book with his hands, and then tried to take it off me. I told him to leave me be and get on with what he had to do, and he threatened to hit me. I turned my back to him and he began to poke me in the face with his finger. I asked him to stop, and he started doing it harder. I did my best to ignore him, and he kept on, harder each time. I turned around and tried to stop him, but as I did so he fell backwards and accused me of trying to hurt him. He started to kick me repeatedly. I tried to walk away but he followed me wherever I went. In the end I locked myself in the bathroom while he pounded on the door for what seemed like ages.

Eventually he stopped and I came out. I tried to get him into his pyjamas and put him to bed, but he started kicking me again, claiming I was hurting him. He scratched and pinched me. Finally, I got him into his bed and kissed him goodnight. Robbie asked me if I hate him. I said I didn't. He replied he hates me. I said I knew he doesn't and left him to it, unwilling to engage in any more conversation that could lead to another flare up. Later, he got up again and said he was sorry. I said I knew. I told him he must never hit again. He said I've told him that before and he still did it. I repeated that he mustn't hit again. He asked what would happen if he ever hits again, and I repeated one more time that he mustn't hit again, gave him a hug and sent him to bed. I was in despair. I felt like a victim of bullying and domestic violence and when Glen walked in from his trip I broke down in tears.

The following morning I stayed in bed while Glen got Robbie ready for school. He asked him about the previous night's events. Robbie said he knows that he's going to be sent away from our home and he knows that I'll do it one day when Glen is not around. Glen replied that that's not the case, he is wanted in our home and no-one will change that, no matter what he does to try to make it happen.

I spent the morning trying to arrange some post-adoption support from Robbie's placing authority. They've agreed to arrange a meeting to reassess his needs. I made myself scarce after school until Robbie had done his homework. Then we all sat down for a chat. We said how sad we were to hear that he thought he would be going. I reminded him that last year he hit and misbehaved, yet he was still with us. Robbie said he wants to live with his birth parents. When I said they don't live together he said either of them will be fine. I said he can do that at 18, but until then he'll live with us. Robbie replied that he knows he won't stay with us that long. We said we'd never kick him out and he replied, cold and detached, that he'll kill us. We said how sad it was to hear him say that, and reiterated that he'll continue to live with us no matter what. Then Glen changed subject and took him to beavers. When they got back, Robbie was remorseful. We had a good bedtime and read "Why was I adopted". Whenever the text said anything positive (you were wanted, your parents love you...), Robbie said "no" or shook his head. He still listened, though, and allowed us to kiss him goodnight.

Yesterday morning we had a visit from Jenny, an adoption support worker from "After Adoption", a charity who run the "Safebase" programme. Glen and I attended their course back in October (I've been meaning to post about it but haven't got round to it), and we'd arranged the visit a couple of weeks ago. It had originally been planned as a catch-up on the course, but it turned into a review of our situation. Jenny, who is a social worker and was adopted herself, told us she thinks we need to do something or our adoption will end in disruption. She came up with a plan and is going to contact Robbie's placing authority, our own local authority, and Alice, our counsellor. She offered very practical advice including Glen taking more of a disciplinarian role and me taking a lot more time out. She says we need to go out a lot more and have some respite.

Glen picked Robbie up after school and together they got homework out of the way very quickly. By the time I got home it was all done, so we had a game of Scrabble and then Robbie and I played on the Wii. He won three our of four races, but still got angry with me and blamed me for the one he lost. During dinner Glen told Robbie we'd be going out tomorrow and he'd stay in with a sitter. Robbie seemed fine about this. After dinner we played a game of Ludo and once again he got cross because he didn't win. We managed a peaceful bedtime, but then, just as we were closing the door, Robbie said that he didn't want a sitter tomorrow. Instead of telling him we'd talk about it later, Glen engaged with the conversation. Soon Robbie was in a rage, and Glen started dishing out consequences. Robbie responded by kicking and punching him. I think he was very baffled by the fact that Glen was disciplining him, which isn't normally the case. His internal conflict was verbalised when, as he was punching him, he said to Glen that he still likes him better than me. How confused does a person need to be to say to someone that he likes them at the same time as he's trying to hurt them? I guess even though he was angry with Glen, Robbie wanted him to know that he's still his favourite. Or perhaps he wanted to make it clear to me that even though he was hitting Glen instead of me, I shouldn't interpret that as a sign that his opinion of me had changed. Who knows? Even though we'd agreed I'd step back, I went over and hugged Robbie. He stopped struggling and we were able to put him to bed again.

Glen was very shaken. He's not often been at the receiving end of Robbie's violence and anger, nor is he used to being accused of hurting him while he was defending himself. Robbie, as usual, had shifted the blame onto someone else and for once it wasn't me.

We can only hope that post-adoption services come up with something to help all of us. This situation is beyond our capabilities. Despite our best efforts, Robbie is in a really bad place emotionally: he says he hates himself and cannot understand how anyone could possibly love him. He feels undeserving of any love. He's hurting. We're all hurting.

Epiphany in Spain

We've spent the last five days in Spain visiting my family. The night before we left the UK Robbie could not sleep for ages, and got up constantly with some excuse or other. Eventually we got to the bottom of it: first he was worried that that he wouldn't be allowed on the plane with his cast. Once I'd shown him the airline regulations about it, he finally revealed the second reason why he couldn't sleep: what if the house wasn't there when we got back? Indeed it was during our trip to Spain at this time last year that the house flooded. Robbie was very anxious about it, and to be honest so were Glen and I. I explained that is time we'd make sure the water was turned off at the mains, that our neighbours would be keeping an eye on the house, and that a friend would be coming round every day to feed the fish and to check everything was OK and she'd send us a daily SMS report. This seemed to do the trick, and he went to bed reassured.

Our plan to leave all bad news behind with 2011 didn't quite work out. As soon as we'd landed in Spain on January 2nd, Glen got a text from his dad: his mum had been rushed to hospital. As it happens it wasn't as serious as it first looked and she was home by that evening, but it was quite a scare to start our holiday with!

Robbie had a great time for the first three days of the holiday. He spent most of the time at his cousins' having a whale of a time and going to bed late as Spanish children do. Yesterday we took him with us to see some friends. He wasn't happy about it as he just wanted to stay with his cousins. Although we explained that he can't stay there all the time, he was still in a foul mood all morning. In the afternoon, my sister-in-law took Robbie and his cousins to a show and then to the Three Wise Men parade, both of which he loved. Glen and I stayed behind helping my brother assemble and set up the toys that the kids would find when they got home, and later joined the rest of the family for the end of the parade. Five minutes after we'd arrived, Robbie erupted.

I'd asked him to zip up his fleece as it was 3 degrees outside, and he'd refused. He started shouting at me and saying how mean I was and how much he hated me. One of my relatives told Robbie that the Three Wise Men don't bring present to children who misbehave. Robbie couldn't understand and, like a fool, trying to get him to calm down, I translated it for him. It couldn't have had a worse effect. Robbie went into "I'm naughty and I don't deserve anything good" mode, which in turn leads to "I have nothing to lose, so what the hell" and he lashed out, screamed, ran off in a packed street... the works. I ended up having to hold his hand all the way back to the car, which of course meant he accused me of hurting his hand (as well as being mean and hating him) the whole way there.

We drove to a café where we were meant to have a nice hot drink before heading to my brother's to find our Three Wise Men presents. It was an opportunity for Robbie to snap out of the mood he'd got into and Glen had had a word with him in the car about it, but Robbie wasn't able to and refused any food or drink. In fact he spent the whole time with his back turned to everyone. His cousins saw him in a completely different light, and this annoyed me. Glen and I decided we should go back to my parents' and forget about finding the presents that evening or spending the night at my brother's. Robbie said he just wanted to go back to the UK and never return to my home town.

As we neared the door to my parents' I realised that this would leave a bad taste in our mouths and a bad memory of the trip and Epiphany. I also knew that, despite not wanting to reward Robbie's hideous behaviour, his self esteem and proving to him that he isn't bad were more important. So I gave Robbie one last chance. He said there was no point in joining the others as he knew they would get lots of presents and he'd have none for being so naughty. We replied that the Three Wise Men are very wise and they don't judge children for having a bad day, but for how they've behaved all year. Robbie said that he had been bad all year, but eventually he relented.

The Three Wise Men had indeed been good to Robbie and a pile of presents awaited him. His mood soon changed, and later he apologised to us for his behaviour. In the end he decided to stay at his cousins' one final night and we left him a happy boy again.

I was happy that we'd managed to turn things around but very disappointed by the way things had gone, how quickly he'd snapped and lost control and how fragile his self-worth continues to be. Last summer our stay in Spain was the start of a complete behaviour change that led to a very settled few weeks in the autumn, and I had hoped (ever the optimist) that this short stay would do that too. Clearly it's not, and now we have to add Epiphany to the list of occasions (Christmas, boxing day...) that Robbie hasn't been able to enjoy or allow us to enjoy during this holiday (New Year's Eve was hideous too as Robbie was vile to me all evening). We fly back today and school starts again on Monday. I wish I could say we're starting the new term rested, settled, and feeling positive. We're not. But maybe the routine and structure of going back to school will help. Who am I kidding? If school's starting again, so is homework. Sigh.

Happy New Year

So, 2011 brought us a flood, having to stay in rented accommodation for over 7 months, three cancelled holidays (two of ours, one when my parents were supposed to come and visit), cracked ribs, a broken arm, threats, violence, and huge steps backwards in attachment terms. In contrast we also had the adoption order granted and many wonderful moments too. We also achieved nine weeks between late August and November when everything was perfect. I don't know what 2012 will bring (apart from the Olympics) but I hope it's better than this year, and that we can get back to that place we got to during those nine weeks in the autumn, at least for some of the time.

[Oh, and I really hope that the Madonna album and tour turn out to be good].

May all your dreams come true in 2012. Thank you for reading. X

So, that was Christmas

Last year we managed a very good Christmas despite the fact that Robbie had been with us for only eight months. So even though the lead up to it wasn't looking great this year, I had high hopes for this Christmas too.

We had a good Christmas eve busily preparing for Santa's arrival: we made biscuits for him and left them on a plate with a glass of milk, spread special reindeer food in the garden and left a carrot for Rudolph. Then, at dinner time, the Ghost of Christmas past came to visit us again. Robbie started crying, saying he was missing his foster carer (but refusing to speak to her on the phone when we suggested it). We did the best we could and he seemed to cheer up, but when I put him to bed for the final time (he got up endless times with a million excuses to check under the tree) he told me he wasn't looking forward to the following day. It was way too late in the evening to engage in conversation, so I told him I was very much looking forward to Christmas day and that I was sure that deep down he was too, regardless of what he said. It made me sad to hear him say that, though: I knew he wouldn't allow himself to enjoy Christmas the following day.

Christmas morning and afternoon were great: Robbie slept until 8 (yay!) and loved all his presents, which we opened in a structured way like last year. This worked really well again: open a present, do something (assemble a toy, breakfast, bath, getting dressed...), open another, do something else. This kept up going for a while and meant that every present was exciting and not just one more in a pile. Glen cooked an amazing Christmas lunch and afterwards we sat to watch the Queen, Top of the Pops and a film together.

In the evening, we went over to see some friends. We're very aware of how different our household is to his foster carers' at Christmas (they always had lots of people and other children around) and thought it would be nice for Robbie to have other kids to play with. That went well until we started to make our way home. Robbie was cross that we'd chosen to walk (our friends live 10 minutes away from our house) and that we'd had to leave (even though it had got late) and that was enough to set him off: by the time we got home he said to Glen that he didn't want me anywhere near him, and sure enough he refused to give me a goodnight kiss. Tough and rational as I try to be, I was heartbroken that he couldn't bring himself to even kiss me on Christmas day.

By boxing day the misery had set in. Nothing we said or did was good enough. He told us he wished we hadn't adopted him. Glen snapped and told him a few home truths about how few children are adopted after they turn five years old. We both told him that, sad as circumstances are, and sorry as we are that it ever happened to him, he simply cannot spend the rest of his life feeling sorry for himself. We reminded him that he is wanted and he is loved. Later, once he was calm, I asked him if he'd meant it when he said he wished we hadn't adopted him. "Sort of", he replied. "I wish I could live with my mum and dad". You can't argue with that. I was missing my own parents too. Why shouldn't he? It was just another reminder that, at the end of the day, we are "third best". If Robbie were to be granted a Christmas wish, he'd wish to live with his birth parents first and his foster carers second. He knows he can't live with either set anymore, so he makes the best of what he's got. I think we know this will be the case for a few years yet, if not forever. It just would have been nice not to be reminded of it.

Thankfully, Robbie snapped out of his mood in the afternoon and we had a lovely time building Lego and watching TV after that. Since then things have been much better on that front, although Glen and I have both been unwell (me: stomach bug - I'll spare you the details, Glen: tonsillitis). We went to the fracture clinic yesterday and it looks like we'll be allowed to fly to Spain after new year to spend epiphany there, so we are all looking forward to that.

I really wish Christmas had turned out better, but it's not all been bad: we've so enjoyed playing together, reading Mr Men Christmas books (Robbie loves them still), watching Christmas films onTV and the cinema (Arthur Christmas - brilliant!), and the excitement of Christmas eve and Christmas morning. It makes me sad to think that this may well be the last Christmas that he believes in Santa. We've had such a short time to enjoy such special moments. I wish we had memories of him opening his presents when he was three or four. Still, we may not have been part of Robbie's past, but at the end of the day we have the present and the future. And somewhere out there, his birth parents must have been wishing things had been different and they could spend Christmas with their children too.

Feliz navidad

I hope you and yours have peaceful, quiet, lovely merry Christmas. X

Fear of attachment

Three weeks ago I was feeling really down about Robbie's lack of attachment to me. He was rejecting me at every available opportunity and making a point of it. Since then, things have got a bit better and Robbie is a lot calmer, although at the moment he's a little all over the place with the excitement of Christmas and the lack of structure that school holidays bring.

Someone asked me recently if the fact that I looked after Robbie when he broke his arm had earned me a whole load of "attachment bonus points": after all, I was there for him, took him to hospital and made sure he was safe. I may have earned a few, but not many. Robbie called out for Glen, and wanted his daddy there. When he came round from the anaesthetic after his operation, it was Glen he reached his arms out for. When we were trying to decide who would sleep next to his bed at the ward he wanted Glen, and when we swapped the following night Robbie made his disappointment quite clear.

Whenever we're out shopping, or in any public place, Robbie will avoid being left on his own with me, and he always chooses to go with Glen if he's given a choice of activities. This is not malicious. There aren't any evil stares or victorious looks as he does any of this. He simply feels safer in Glen's company. I think if it was malicious I'd cope with it a lot better, just like I can when he's angry, because I can normally see the hurt behind the anger. But the fact that it's subconscious defeats me. Clearly, he finds it too scary to get close to me. Like last Sunday, when he was so sad after bringing out the Christmas decorations and couldn't bear any attempts at closeness from me. Sometimes, these subconscious rejection moments feel like drops on my forehead. Like Robbie's waterboarding me with rejection. On its own, each drop amounts to nothing, but one after another they become unbearable.

In the past I used to blame myself for the things that went wrong. "I should have done this differently", "I mustn't do that", "am I a good parent?". Now that we're doing it better, attuning, being curious and empathic, picking fights and only giving consequences when absolutely necessary (well, most of the time anyway), the fact that he still can't attach to me feels worse, because I can't see any room for improvement. If I'm doing it right and it's still not good enough, what happens next? What else can I do?

I spoke to Alice, our attachment-focused counsellor, about this and she thinks that Robbie's beginning to feel deep feelings for me and those feelings are too scary. She thinks that Robbie only had such strong feelings once before: for his birth mother. And because the last person he felt that way about hurt him, neglected him and disappeared from his life, he's frightened I'll do the same. She says we need to continue to have as many positive interactions as we can and keep in mind that it's still relatively early days. She also told me that the one thing that Robbie knows, and is proof to him that we won't let him go, is that he's still with us. The longer he's with us, the more he'll believe that he's here to stay. In the meantime I'll have to continue to be strong and try not to let the rejection get to me. Also, there are glimpses of hope: last Tuesday, without thinking, Robbie held my hand as we were walking. It lasted all of 15 seconds before he caught himself doing it and quickly let go of my hand, but for 15 seconds he allowed himself to bring that barrier down. Every attachment nugget counts, and I cherish them and do my best to hold on to their memories when then next drop of rejection drips onto me.

Who’s the daddy?

We went to the fracture clinic today to have Robbie’s arm X-rayed and checked out as the doctors ordered. All is well, but we’ll need to go again next week.

Every time we see a doctor or nurse we get the same question: “who’s dad?” We reply that both of us are. Then we wait a couple of seconds for the penny to drop and the conversation moves on. No big deal. No-one bats an eyelid. When we were considering adoption, one of our biggest worries was how other people would react to two men bringing up a child. We’ve yet (and I hope it never happens) to encounter any hostile reactions. At least to our faces, or in front of Robbie, which is what matters to us. 

The ghost of Christmas past

Robbie had a very bad day yesterday. He and Glen had a huge argument that started over nothing and blew up into something massive. Glen piled on the consequences and Robbie felt under attack, so he lost it. Glen got kicked in the groin twice and when I tried to intervene in a calm and empathic manner I got kicked in the groin too. It took both Glen and Robbie a good couple of hours to calm down and there were a few smaller flare-ups, but we managed a good-ish evening and Robbie went to bed relatively happy.

This morning Robbie was fine. We cuddled up and played in bed for an hour and after breakfast we all did jobs around the house. Despite his broken arm (which doesn't seem to be bothering him at all now) Robbie was in a really helpful mood too. He even wrote (well, typed - he has broken his left arm and is left-handed) his birthday present thank you cards without moaning about it!

Because Robbie doesn't like the Christmas decorations to go up until after his birthday, and also because of last week's accident, we still hadn't decorated the house for Christmas. So this afternoon we got all the boxes out. At first it was like a gay adoption Christmas postcard: Glen was cooking a nice dinner while Robbie and I put the nativity together. Michael Bublé sang carols in the background. We opened the box of decorations and all of us started putting them on the tree. Then Robbie pulled out a few decorations that he brought last year from his foster home. They went in his room, where he wanted them. When he found his cuddly Christmas polar bear, he hugged it like it was a long-lost friend. Nothing was said, but I could tell a door had been opened and the ghost of Christmas past had entered the room.

As we finished dinner, Glen excitedly mentioned this would be our second Christmas together. At first Robbie seemed pleased about this, but then he started to look really sad. I asked him if he was thinking about previous christmases. He nodded. We told him Christmas is a funny time, both happy and sad, when we are with people we love but also miss the ones we cannot be with any longer. Robbie started to cry. We tried to comfort him, but he couldn't take it and chose to get off the dinner table and sit on a nearby chair. As he pretended to be unable to hear us (but took in every word) Glen and I empathised with how hard it must be. We also said it was ok to be sad, and how we miss our parents at Christmas. Eventually Robbie allowed Glen to pick him up and hug him. When I approached, however, he pushed me away.

For the rest of the evening, Robbie continued to seek sympathy and cuddles from Glen but found it too hard to be anywhere near me. He didn't even allow me to kiss him goodnight. For once, I actually managed not to take it personally. I have no idea why he rejects me in this way and wish he wouldn't, but the only emotion I felt as it happened was sadness. I felt sad for this little boy who wishes that he could still be living with his foster carers (it's them he misses, not his birth parents) but can't. I think he also feels bad that he feels this way and wishes he wouldn't, like it's some sort of betrayal towards us. We always make a point of telling him that it's ok, and that just because you miss someone doesn't mean you don't love the people you're with. He was with his foster carers for almost three years. He's been with us for 610 days. I'll keep hanging on to the hope that when he's been with us for as long as he was with them, he may feel about us the way he feels for them.

Sad as this evening has been, I hope he's got that feeling out of his system and he can allow himself to enjoy Christmas. I would hate for him to feel this way on Christmas day.

48 hours in hospital

After all the birthday activities on Friday and Saturday, last Sunday we were unsure whether to go to the New Family Social Christmas get-together or not. We hadn't been for ages, though, so we decided to go after all. We met our friends Stuart and Jonathan and their son Connor on the train and we all travelled together. The kids joined all the other kids and went off to play in the park while Glen and I caught up with a few people we hadn't seen in a while and met new people too. It was very nice to also meet the children that some of the people we've offer chatted to (online or in person) have now been matched with.

Glen could only stay a couple of hours and after that he left to take a train up to Scotland, where he was due to be working from Monday. Robbie and I stayed behind. Almost as soon as Glen had gone, I had to give Robbie a consequence (his first eight-minute one since turning eight the day before!) for disappearing without telling me where he was and also not wearing his coat outside, as I'd asked him to. He accepted this, as he knew he'd disobeyed two clear instructions, and waited patiently until his eight minutes were over.

A while later, as I was chatting with a couple about their "new additions", I saw Robbie crying and clutching his arm. He was very distressed and couldn't see me even though I was right next to him. I scooped him up and tried to find out what had happened. He said his wrist hurt. I rolled up his sleeve and saw that his wrist was at an odd angle. Still holding on to him, I went to find Stuart, who is a nurse. He took one look at it and said that we needed to go to A&E.

Jonathan, Stuart and Connor joined us as we looked for a taxi. The driver took us to a nearby hospital in a matter of minutes and he wouldn't charge us when we got there (faith in human kind restored!). In the taxi, Robbie explained what had happened: he was going down a slide in the park when another boy started running up the slide. To avoid crashing into him, Robbie leaned to the side and fell over. He landed on his hand, and that's how it had got hurt.

Once in A&E, we didn't have to wait long to be seen. After a quick consultation with a nurse, Robbie was taken into X-ray and the results came back straight away: both his radius and ulna were broken. Not only that, but one of the bones was really out of place and his arm would need resetting, so we would need to stay overnight until they could put it right under anaesthetic. We said goodbye to Jonathan, Stuart and Connor and thanked them for staying with us. The nurse plastered his arm and found us a bed. I have to say the A&E staff were brilliant. They were very nice, kept me informed of what was happening, and got Robbie to the ward in less than two hours.

I rang Glen every now and then to keep him informed of our progress. Once he knew we'd be staying at the hospital, he got off his train and started making his way back to London. Robbie kept calling out for him and was very pleased when I told him he'd be joining us.

I kept Robbie distracted with games and films on my iPad (I'm starting the campaign to canonise Steve Jobs right now, some of the beds on the ward had TVs, but Robbie's didn't and the iPad was our salvation) until Glen arrived. He brought some food (we'd got to the ward after dinner time), a Star Wars magazine, and a teddy bear (which I'd suggested). Robbie also spent quite a bit of time playing with his bed controls. The bed went up and down like a yo-yo!

A doctor came to see us later in the evening and explained that, in the morning, Robbie would go down to theatre and they'd try to reset his arm. If it was possible to manipulate the bone back into place then they'd do that, but if they couldn't then they'd need to put a wire in or open his arm and do it manually.

Every single person we saw (nurses, doctors, the radiologist, the anaesthetist...) asked Robbie to tell them how he came to break his arm. I thought this was very good, as from the way he was telling the story it was clear that he was telling it as it happened. It struck me that if the break hadn't been an accident and someone had told Robbie what to say, it would have been obvious. I guess that, sadly, the staff are used to injuries to children that are not the result of an accident. This reminded me that, as a matter of fact, this was the first time that Robbie had been to hospital since the traumatic night when he was taken into care years ago. I kept my fingers crossed that he wouldn't remember that. He didn't. Another thing that struck me is how little we know about his birth family's medical history. We were asked on several occasions about allergies and reactions to anaesthesia in the family, and all we could answer was "not that we're aware of". We had to explain Robbie's family history a number of times to justify our answers. And yes, on several occasions we also had to explain that both of us were Robbie's dads.

Robbie was a very brave soldier throughout the whole experience. When in high spirits, he was very pleased that he wouldn't be able to do any writing at school. When the pain got bad, he was clingy, teary, and kept saying he wanted to go home. He didn't go to sleep until after 11 that night.

At 6 a.m. on Monday they came to give him a drink as he wouldn't be allowed anything else for a few hours. Then came the distressing moment when they put a cannula in his arm. The nurse didn't seem to be able to find the vein, and it took a good 15 minutes for it to be finally done. Robbie was scared and hurt, and the blood all over his arm didn't help one bit. Glen was still sleeping, so I distracted and comforted Robbie as best as I could. A couple of hours later, Robbie was taken to theatre. He had to walk some of the way and his main concern wasn't about the operation, but about whether people could see his bum (he'd reluctantly agreed to wear the hospital gown)! We were allowed to go in while he was anaesthetised, and then asked to wait outside.

An hour later we were told that Robbie would soon be in the recovery room. The doctors had managed to reset his arm without having to put a wire in after all, and they'd put a new plaster on, right up to his armpit. We waited until he came around. He looked so fragile, lying on the hospital bed. Half-conscious, he opened his eyes and reached out his arms for a hug from Glen. After that, Glen and I swapped places and I gave him a hug too.

Once he was fully conscious he was taken back to the ward. After a while he was able to drink and then have something to eat. Then we waited for a doctor to discharge him. The doctor came by in the afternoon and told us he'd like to keep Robbie in for another night to monitor the swelling in his arm. We had all been looking forward to going home, so this wasn't great news. He also said that because of the way the bone had broken, Robbie should go to the fracture clinic back home next Tuesday.

Here, I have to make a pause from the (already long) account of our stay in hospital to explain something I hadn't written about before: during the summer I took on extra work and booked us on a trip to New York for five days just before Christmas. It was my way of trying to provide a good ending to what had been quite a crappy year (flood, house, broken rib, difficult behaviour...). I kept this secret from Robbie until last month. Since I told him, he's been looking forward to it and singing songs with New York in the lyrics non-stop. We bought a kids' map and guide which he's been studying, and he's been telling everyone about it. We were looking forward to sightseeing, the lights, the ice rink in Rockefeller Center, shopping and had even got tickets to the Christmas Spectacular show at Radio City Music Hall.

You know what I'm going to write next, don't you? Indeed.

We asked the doctor whether the fracture clinic could be put back and also if Robbie would be allowed to fly. The answer to both questions was "no". His cast would have to be split to be allowed to fly and because of the way it's broken, the arm needs to be restricted from all movement. He reiterated that he needs to be seen early next week for more X-rays. So our holiday was cancelled. We were gutted. Robbie said it was his fault and Glen and I should go anyway. We replied that accidents happen and we weren't going anywhere without him. He was hurting, tired and frustrated. The latter two applied to us too.

Since we had to stay another night, Glen went out to get some underwear and change of clothing for all of us while Robbie and I watched another film on the iPad. Dinner and the rest of the evening were a bit sombre, all of us quite deflated by the news about our holiday.

On Tuesday morning we were told that a doctor should come and discharge Robbie around 9.30. As it happened, she didn't turn up until 4.30 p.m. Time went quite quickly, though, as there were lots of activities in the ward. First, someone came with paints and craft stuff and got the kids to make a big picture. Then they brought out an enormous screen and put a film on. After lunch, they wheeled out a Wii console and the three boys in the ward played Mario Kart for the next two hours.

Even though they'll never read this, I must say a huge thank you to the staff at A&E and the children's ward at the hospital. They were fantastic: dedicated, caring, professional. They looked after Glen and me as well as Robbie, and went out of their way to make our stay as comfortable as possible.

Robbie was finally discharged at 5.30. We collected all the paperwork and started to get him dressed. That's when we realised that Robbie's shoes were missing. We and the staff spent the next few minutes looking for them everywhere until we concluded that someone must have taken them. And so, in quite a surreal scene, half an hour later Glen and I took turns to carry a barefoot Robbie on our shoulders to the station (there wasn't a shoe shop anywhere near), onto the train, and finally to the car, which miraculously was still where we'd parked it on Sunday morning.

As we drove home from the station, Glen and I joked about how, after everything that had gone on, we were expecting to find the house flooded when we got there. It wasn't. But the fish tank we bought a few weeks ago had leaked all over our new sideboard. The fish were ok. The sideboard now has water damage. I don't have the heart to call the insurance about it.

I kept expecting something else to go wrong (it was after all Tuesday 13th - in Spain it's "bad luck day", similar to Friday 13th here), but thankfully we managed to finish the day without any further mishaps.

Robbie spent Wednesday at home and went back to school on Thursday, where he received a hero's welcome. His cast is now covered in signatures and drawings, and his pain has decreased a lot in the last two days. He even danced at the end of term school disco yesterday afternoon!

Birthday celebrations

Robbie turned eight last Saturday, his second birthday since he came to live with us. To celebrate, we took eight of his friends bowling and then for something to eat on Friday evening. The kids behaved relatively well. There were a few squabbles, but nothing that couldn't be sorted. Glen's experience in managing groups of children with the beavers came in really handy!

The organisation of the birthday party wasn't without difficulties. For starters, two of the children Robbie had invited decided to go to another birthday party that was taking place on the same day. Needless to say, Robbie found this hard to take ("they like him better than me") but we pointed out that some children had chosen his party over the other boy's and we also allowed him to invite another two kids in lieu of the ones who weren't coming. The other issue was that Robbie wasn't altogether sure whether the party would happen at all. Readers with long memories may remember that his birthday party was cancelled last year as a consequence of some very violent behaviour. This year I told him that because he'd been such a good boy he'd earned his birthday party and nothing he did would change that. He found that both hard to hear (as it reminded him of his shameful behaviour of last year) and hard to believe, so I was determined that the party would go ahead no matter what. As it happened, despite some serial rejection and challenges, his behaviour wasn't extreme, so we didn't have any cause to regret our promise.

On Saturday Robbie opened his birthday presents and we had a lazy morning playing with some of his new toys and watching TV. Then we joined a group of his school friends at the local theatre for the annual charity Panto trip. It was a huge success and the kids loved it. Robbie was very excited when one of the actors read out his name and wished him a happy birthday!

After that we made our way to a friend's house as it was her birthday party. Many of our friends were there and Robbie got even more presents. We ended up staying longer than we'd planned. As we were about to leave, someone asked Robbie if he'd had a good birthday. "Last year was better", he replied. As I took Robbie home (Glen stayed behind), I asked him about his reply. I should have known better. Robbie was very tired and he'd found it hard to accept what a good day he'd had. Me asking about it was all the trigger he needed to sulk and try to spoil the day. I didn't rise to it, though, and even though he went to bed in a bit of a grumpy mood I managed to avoid a serious confrontation.

Considering only a week ago Robbie was on a relentless reject-a-thon, we were very pleased with how well the birthday celebrations had gone. Then Sunday came. And with it came an unexpected traumatic event. But that's too long a story to write now, so I'll save it for the next post.

Letterbox contact from birth father

Three weeks ago, while I was working in Spain, a contact letter arrived from Robbie's birth father. This was out of the blue. He is supposed to write in September, but since we'd not heard from him we'd assumed he'd chosen not to write. Glen told Robbie that a letter had arrived and Robbie said he didn't want to read it. After the traumatic reaction he had to his birth mother's letter we didn't want to force the issue, so Glen told him that we'd read it when he was ready.

Three weeks have gone by and Robbie hadn't acknowledge the letter since it arrived, so a couple of days ago I brought it up again. The reason I did this is that both Robbie's birthday and Christmas are just around the corner, and I didn't want the letter to be hanging over us or, worse still, for him to ask to read it on his actual birthday or Christmas day. When I mentioned the letter, Robbie said he didn't want to read it. I said that was fine, and asked if he'd like to see the photos that his birth father had sent. This obviously felt less scary, and Robbie agreed. We looked at the pictures and after we had, Robbie said we might as well read the letter.

Glen read it. He skipped a few bits that we thought were inappropriate, like where his birth father acknowledges Robbie's achievements at school and in sports not as a result of the effort he makes, but as something Robbie's inherited from him. Robbie was absolutely fine while and after the letter was read to him. There was no reaction at all. He didn't look sad, or angry. He just said it was a better letter than his birth mother's. He then changed subject and it hasn't surfaced again in anything he's said or in any behaviour at all. At least for now. Maybe he's getting used to the idea of contact, maybe the memory of his birth father isn't as painful as that of his birth mother. In any case we were very pleased that it didn't serve as a detonator for another emotional bomb.

Re-balancing the scales

48 hours. That's how long the peace lasted since my return to the UK last Monday. There was a huge outburst on Wednesday evening, during which Robbie tried to punch me and announced how much he hates me. Glen spoke to him: why does he do all this? Why to me and not to him? "Because dad hates me".

Once he was calm I empathised with how hard it must be to think that your own dad hates you and reiterated how much I love him and how much I know he loves me - regardless of what he says when he's angry. I reminded him that at the end of the day, after everything that's gone on, he's still with us and he'll continue to be. I added that all will be well once he truly believes what I make him say each morning: that his dads love him and we don't want to be mean to him. He replied that we should change that to just "dad" (me) as he already believes that of daddy (Glen). I agreed, but added that deep down I think we both know that he believes it of me too, it's just that he needs to get angry with someone, and that someone is me. The main reason why I said this was because more and more I think he says this for effect, to get a reaction out of me, or just because it's his stock answer, rather than because it's actually true. But true it may be. At the end of the day he doesn't flare up with Glen and there's something really wrong in his attachment to me. I suppose we should be grateful that at least he's attached to one of us.

I spent a sleepless night turning it all in my head. Something's gone terribly wrong in our relationship. He thinks I don't enjoy his company, and I think he doesn't enjoy mine. Because of this, I'm feeling more and more stressed. I am tense when he's around. I know that anything I say will be taken as provocation, an excuse to blow up. And the funniest thing is that I'm fairly sure Robbie feels the same way I do. He is tense when I'm around and he thinks I analyse everything he says or does to look for something to pick on, when I don't. When I picked him up from football practice on Wednesday evening he asked me why I'd picked him up rather than Glen. It wasn't meant in a nasty way, I genuinely believe what he was saying was "why did you come? You know this'll only end in tears". And he was right.

Glen told me on Wednesday evening that it's heartbreaking to watch Robbie and I tear each other apart, hurting each other emotionally in such a way. I thought long and hard about this. I'm meant to be the one Robbie models his emotions on. Instead it's the other way around: Robbie consumes me and I live for him. Whether I have a good day or a bad one depends on how his day was. If he's angry he makes me angry. If he's happy, I'm happy. I've been letting everything else in my life slip and barely spend any time doing things for me. This cannot be the case anymore. I need to regulate myself so he can model his emotional state on mine. For that, I need to give myself a break and also have some "me" time. I am only human. I cannot be there for Robbie all the time. I will make mistakes, and that's OK. I can only do my best, and that will have to be enough. I don't need to sacrifice my entire life for him. Yes, I am Robbie's dad and that's a big part of my life. But it's not the only part of me. It doesn't define me.

I talked to Glen and we've decided we need to change things in our routine. Glen needs to spend more time doing routine stuff that I normally take on and winds Robbie up (homework, discipline) and allow me to have more time to do fun things with him. I chatted to a fellow adopter about this later in the week and talking to her made me realise that something should have changed when I returned to work but didn't: I took on the disciplinarian role when I was the primary carer whilst on adoption leave. Because I spent a lot more time with Robbie then, this allowed me to balance things by also spending time playing and having positive interactions. Since I've been back at work, I have remained the disciplinarian, but have less time to balance it with fun stuff. Looking back, the good period we had after the summer came after he and I had spent two weeks in Spain doing fun things and away from routine and homework.

The last couple of days have been much better: I still picked him up from school, but Glen took care of homework. Whenever Robbie's tried to flare up with me, I've remained calm. I've also made time to play with him as much as I can. Last night we had a change of routine and after his swimming lesson we had fish and chips and watched Harry Potter together, which he loved. I said I'd enjoyed watching it with him, and could tell he found this hard to hear. When I asked him if he'd enjoyed it, he couldn't answer. He found it too hard to accept that he had. But I know he had, and that's what matters. He had a late night, which felt special, and should be OK as he has nothing to get up for and can sleep in. I'm feeling more optimistic and hope we can keep this up. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

A year since my return to work

Yesterday I was at office, catching up with all the work that hadn’t been done while I was working away, and I just felt like walking out and telling my boss that I quit. Then I realised what the date was: exactly a year to the day I returned to work.

I used to enjoy my job. I found it interesting and rewarding. Nowadays it provides a nice break when things are bad at home, but other than that I hate it. The people are just as nice as they were before I left, but the job itself is much more demanding and there’s a lot more pressure as things have got tighter (like everywhere else). The bottom line is I don’t care about it the way I used to. I have very different priorities now, and it just seems to get in the way.

I have (many times) considered  reducing my hours or going part-time so I can spend more time with Robbie, but it just doesn’t make sense. The way my job works I’d only end up doing the same amount of work for less pay.

I really shouldn’t moan. I have a job. In the current climate I’m lucky to. 

Absence doesn't always make the heart grow fonder

I've been working in Spain for the past week. Things weren't great with Robbie before I left: he'd gone back to seeing Glen as the goodie and me as the baddie. He even verbalised it, saying he likes Glen better. When Glen talked to him about this, Robbie explained that I'm mean and I want to send him away. I believe this all boils down to the fact that I'm the disciplinarian, and Robbie perceives discipline as a sign of being disliked. Part of me thinks that he's also using this to see if he can "break" me. I think he thinks that if he rejects me I'll change my ways in an effort to be liked and nobody will discipline him. We have tried to get Glen to take on more of a disciplinary role, but it doesn't seem to work. Even when Glen disciplines him, Robbie projects his anger about what Glen is saying on to me, and blames me for whatever's happening.

Being away has been a good break from parenting for me. Robbie doesn't forget easily, though, and not even distance seems to make the heart grow fonder. Whenever I've said "I miss you" on the phone, he's not been able to say the same thing back. I'll be back tomorrow, batteries recharged, ready to take on the challenge of convincing Robbie that I like him, love him, and want him in our lives.

Being a Gay Dad

Myleene Klass interviews Peter from New Family Social about being a gay dad.

http://uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/im-a-gay-dad.html

There is hope

It may seem really silly, but the message of hope in this video has really given me hope.

Watch it. And if you can, donate.

http://www.barnardos.org.uk/lifestory.htm

Fragile pillars

Since the end of August we've been living a second honeymoon period. Robbie has been simply wonderful. He seems to have learnt to trust us and started to really believe that he's here to stay. His behaviour has been amazing. Of course we've had a few strops, but nothing you wouldn't expect from any seven-year-old.

For the last three weeks, though, Robbie's been behaving differently towards me: I've been getting attitude, he's started to answer back at everything I (not Glen) say, doubting my motives... I was a little puzzled by this and I mentioned it on the phone to Alice, who immediately asked if this had all started happening since I read Robbie the letter from his birth mother. Yes. "You're back to being mum", she replied. Only then did I realise what a mistake it had been for me to read his birth mother's letter. Considering he's previously equated me with her, to hear her words with my voice was only going to further that amalgamation of roles.

Two weeks ago, with Halloween on the Monday, Glen's birthday on the Wednesday, a late Beavers activity on the Thursday, a sleepover on the Friday and bonfire night on the Saturday, Robbie got a lot less sleep than he usually does. By Sunday he was very tired and, because of all the activities we'd packed into the weekend, none of his homework had been done. As I type this, it's obvious that these circumstances could only lead to one thing, but because his behaviour and attitude towards us has been so fantastic lately, we were living in a bubble where all was well, our lovely son had turned a page, and previous issues were a thing of the past. Pop! Went the bubble.

A small incident (me telling Robbie off - very lightly and without raising my voice - for cleaning toothpaste off the washbasin with his toothbrush) led to a huge outburst. I tried to empathise and de-escalate but it blew up in my face: Robbie didn't want empathy, he'd gone straight back to feeling bad about himself and the small telling off was all it took to confirm that he was a bad boy. He therefore needed to prove to himself just how bad he was and reverted to his old tricks: he would get a consequence no matter what it took.

He wasn't the only one who reverted to old habits: Glen started piling on the consequences one after another as Robbie's behaviour worsened. Robbie (now fully back to perceiving me as the one who's out to get him) directed his anger at what Glen was saying towards me. I was also out of practice, so when he kicked me I grabbed him to stop him from hitting. The transition from being his dad to being his birth mother was complete, although I didn't realise this at the time. Robbie lost it. He called me a bitch, which threw me. Then it dawned on me: he wasn't shouting at me, he was shouting at his birth mother. I tried to reconnect, but he said he hated me, had always hated me and never wanted to speak to me again. I knew I had to rise above it, but my face gave me away. Robbie was in panic mode and lashing out beyond control. I withdrew, as clearly my presence was doing nothing to help him calm down.

Glen tried to intervene but got a kick in the groin. A few minutes later, though, he managed to calm Robbie down. Robbie still wouldn't go anywhere near me and continued to say he hated me. With the best of intentions, Glen tried to find an example of something to prove my love for Robbie and he mentioned the Lego minifigures I've been getting for him as treats for good behaviour every now and then. He told Robbie that if I didn't love him, I wouldn't have got them for him. Robbie wasn't in the right state of mind, and he interpreted Glen's words as proof that he didn't deserve his toys. Sure enough, within minutes, his Lego minifigures we're out in the landing and Robbie was calling out for me to take them back. I went up to explain that I didn't want them back and they were his. Robbie wouldn't hear of it, and once again blamed me for taking them away. As I tried to get close to him, he threatened to punch me.

In the end, Robbie managed to self-regulate and calm down by himself. We got him to eat his dinner with us and had a relatively peaceful bedtime. By then, Robbie was full of shame. I tried to address it by standing by the consequences that come from hitting (his DS was taken away for two days) but making light of the situation and saying everyone has a bad day every now and then and the following day we'd start again.

After putting him to bed, Glen and I found it hard to make sense of everything that had happened. I was in shock, and my confidence was blown. My fears of a violent Robbie and a life of managing his extreme behaviour came flooding back. I envisaged a whole lot of trouble ahead, and couldn't see a way out. I barely slept. Everything seemed to have gone back to the way it used to be within the space of a few hours.

The following day, though, Robbie was on best behaviour. We had a really good day and I felt that I needn't have worried so much. I was very proud of him for managing to let bygones be bygones and not sink into his old mood for days, as he used to.

Unfortunately, it didn't last. Every single day since then there have been flare ups for some reason or other. He's had a really bad attitude towards me and interpreted everything I say as a reason to jump down my throat. Saint Glen, however, can do no wrong and Robbie's been very demonstrative towards him, making a point of how differently he treats his Daddy. I know I've dealt with worse before, but for some reason I'm finding it really hard to cope with the rejection, being accused of everything, and the constant tension. It's also very disheartening to realise how fragile the pillars of his calm and confidence are, and how little it takes to shatter them to the ground again.

"I'm going to be like my mum and dad"

The other day, Robbie and I were chatting about nothing in particular when he said something that sounded just like Glen. I half-jokingly said that he's going to grow up just like him and Robbie replied "No, I'm not going to be like Daddy, I'm going to be like my mum and dad". I adopted my Dan Hughes "accepting and curious" attitude and Robbie added that he's not going to hit people like they did, but he will grow up to be like them.

I said that he was right in the sense that you inherit your physical appearance from your birth parents, but you learn your values and how to behave from the people you grow up with. Robbie came back with "well I grew up with them", which I acknowledged to be true, but only for a few years until he went into foster care. I then said that by the time he's an adult he'll have spent most of his life with us, and maybe he'll be a bit more like us.

I don't know if Robbie interpreted this in the sense of us wanting to manipulate or mould him, or as some sort of betrayal to his genetic heritage, but he got into a strop and started stomping and shouting. It wasn't a huge one and I was soon able to distract him, but he definitely found it hard to hear what I'd said.

Adopted children to be given same priority as looked after children in regards to school admissions

From an Adoption UK email I received yesterday:

“Schools minister Nick Gibbs yesterday announced that under a revised admissions code published by the government, adopted children in England (and children who leave care under a special guardianship or residence order) will be given the same, highest priority in school admission places as looked-after children.

“This is a major achievement - one that Adoption UK has been actively involved in making happen through meetings and discussions with the Department of Education and through our campaigning work. It will dramatically change how adopted children and their families engage with the education system and is one step towards acknowledging some of the educational issues faced by many adoptive families.”

Department of Education press release

Adoption UK press release: (Word document)

This is amazing news, and it’s great that the needs of adopted children are being taken into consideration.

A good birthday

As I have documented here before, Robbie has attempted (consciously or subconsciously) to spoil every one of our birthdays since he moved in with really controlling behaviours.

Yesterday was Glen’s birthday and Robbie was perfectly OK. He coped with someone else being the centre of attention and didn’t try to open his presents or control the situation. Another milestone!

Letterbox contact

A few weeks ago we received two letterbox contact letters for Robbie: one from his paternal grandmother and one from his birth mother. We opened them, read them, and were pleased that both had written quite appropriate letters. There was no mention of the past or anything about hoping to be reunited, as we feared there might be. They included photographs and, in birth mother's case, a gift voucher which we've had to return as it doesn't adhere to the agreed terms of what can and cannot be sent. We sealed the letters again and took some advice on whether to show them to Robbie or not. Some people advocate keeping them until "the right time" comes, but in the end we decided we would let Robbie read them.

Last Monday we sat down with Robbie and told him that at the social workers' request we'd written letters to his birth parents and his grandmother. Then we told him that two letters had arrived from him. Robbie wasn't keen on opening them, but we said we should. I read out his birth mother's letter and showed him the pictures that came with it. Robbie listened to the whole letter in silence. When it was finished he looked very sad, but also angry. He started wailing and calling out for his mummy. He was like a baby crying for her. It was very distressing. We tried to comfort him, but he became aggressive when we attempted to hug him. Robbie shouted, slammed doors, and did his best to get a reaction from us. We didn't rise to it, and after a while he sat in the living room. I joined him on the sofa with the excuse of wanting to watch the TV. He allowed me to sit near him and the TV did its job of distracting him. This lasted throughout dinner time but when we put him to bed the tears started again. I empathised with how unfair the situation was, and reminded him that none of it is his fault. Robbie disagreed, saying it was all his fault. He didn't listen when I tried to explain otherwise. He became really distraught. For a few minutes all he did was cry and shout out the word "mummy". This time he allowed us to comfort him, though. In the end we lay in bed with him until he was calm and fell asleep.

Both Glen and I were in shock. We were expecting sadness, maybe anger, but not the desperation that we'd witnessed. It was as though, for a few moments, the mother that was taken away from him had been back in his life again and then vanished one more time. I felt desperately sorry for Robbie. When I'm upset I want my mum too. I'm lucky that she's still in my life, but even if she wasn't, I could look back on many years with her. Robbie can't. And even after everything she did to him, he still yearns for her, just like anyone does.

We read his grandmother's letter two days later. Robbie appeared completely fine about it and didn't react at all. Luckily, he hasn't asked why there was no letter from his birth father. I'm not sure how he would react to knowing he hasn't bothered to reply.

Meeting readers

The other day I went to a New Family Social event and met some prospective adopters. When I introduced myself, several of them immediately identified me as "Fernando from the blog" (a bit like "Jenny from the Block"???). I suddenly felt like some sort of celebrity, surrounded by these people who knew so much about me and about whom I knew so little. It was very surreal! [Thankfully, Orangegoblin wasn't there. I think that would have been too bizarre! : ) ]


It was also very positive, as they were very complimentary about my writing and appreciative of my honesty and the effort I've made to tell our adoption story. They told me how much they'd learnt from our experience and that because of it they felt better prepared for their own. As I left, one of them gave me a hug and whispered "thank you". I was very touched by this. So thank you too. You know who you are.

"I didn't want to be adopted"

I wrote about loss in my last post, and theme continues. I've mentioned before that Robbie has the losses of two families to adjust to: his birth family and his foster carers. I think he grieves for them in different ways. He feels the loss of his birth family as a hole in his life. He knows he should have stayed with them (in the sense that he knows that most children live with their birth parents) and feels different because of it. It's almost like he knows he's supposed to feel sad about it, but he doesn't really. In contrast, the loss of his foster carers is deeper because he remembers being part of it, and because he felt loved there. Robbie can talk about his birth family because he feels detached from them, but to this day he can't really talk about his foster family. It's too painful for him.

Yesterday morning, as we cuddled up together in bed, we somehow ended up talking about the day we met him. We reminisced about seeing each other for the first time, the penguin cuddly toy we brought for him, and how nervous we all were. I mentioned how special that day is to me, and how much I'd been looking forward to it, when Robbie replied that he hadn't. He said he didn't want to be adopted.

There are so many mixed emotions about it inside of him. On the one hand I know he wanted to be adopted. His foster carer told us how he would often talk about hoping to be adopted, and he clearly was looking forward to it. On the other hand, I don't think he quite realised (until after the fact) just how hard it would be to leave his foster home. I also think he wonders why he had to leave and, to a certain extent, feels rejected by his foster carers.

I was surprised he'd been honest enough to admit to not wanting to be adopted. To lighten the mood I asked him if he felt differently now, over a year and a half since the day we met him. Looking sad, he shook his head.

My heart sank. There we were, cuddling up together as we do on weekend mornings, having just spent the last few minutes being playful, tickling, hugging and kissing each other, like an advert for attachment post-adoption, and inside he's thinking that he'd rather have stayed with his foster carers. I could tell he was being completely honest, too. I didn't let my feelings show in the slightest. For one, I'm secure enough in our attachment now to know that even though he says and thinks that, he is also very happy with us. So I did the only thing I could do: I gave him a hug, told him it was ok to feel like that and added that maybe in another 18 months' time, when he's been with us as long as he was with his foster carers, he may be glad that he was adopted. He shrugged, and we moved on to discussing the bike ride we'd promised to take him on.

Lost link to the past

Yesterday we emailed Sarah, Robbie's social worker, about something and we got an auto-reply that said that she's left Social Services. We've not had much to do with her since we adopted Robbie, but I did email her a picture of him last month and she never mentioned she was leaving. It's frustrating and disappointing.

I feel like we've lost one of the few remaining connections with Robbie's "old life". Apart from the social worker and court reports, his life story book, his foster carers, and possibly being able to ask through letterbox contact, we have no-one to tell us about the time before he came to live with us. By the time he's a young adult, considering how old his foster carers are, Robbie may find that he has a lot of questions and nowhere to find the answers. Large portions of his past - unhappy as it may have been - may remain a mystery. Will this make him feel an emptiness inside? Encourage him to seek his birth family? Who knows.

In any case, regretful as the loss of that connection is, it's hardly significant when compared to losing your birth family forever. I sometimes think about this. You know when you have to replace something and you find yourself thinking it may be a newer, or even a better model, but not quite the same as the old one, which was "familiar" to you? The one you were used to, even if it wasn't perfect? Losing your birth family must be a million times that feeling. And yes, you may find yourself with a new family. One that doesn't cause you harm, where you are valued, and loved, and looked after. But it's not the one you had before. And somewhere inside, your heart must still long for what you used to know. Because bad as it may have been, it was your family.

The milestones keep coming

I genuinely don't know whether it's being back in our home, the outcome of our last counselling session - when Robbie seemed to believe for the first time that we won't ever send him away - or something else, but things continue to improve at massive paces.

Two milestones this week: on Tuesday Robbie forgot his homework at school, so I had to have a gentle word about trying to remember to bring it home. Then on Wednesday he did it again, so I had to be more stern. Robbie accepted this without flaring up at all. He understood (or I managed to get it across) that I wasn't angry about it and that there would be no major consequence for it. He therefore didn't feel like he'd let himself down, and because of this he just apologised and didn't take it any further.

The second one was yesterday: seeing as it was the hottest October day since records began, we decided to go to the beach and took one of his classmates along with us. We had a brilliant time and the boys didn't so much as disagree about anything, let alone argue. Robbie was absolutely fine about sharing our attention with another boy. He didn't feel jealous and was able to share and enjoy his time with his friend and us. It was a wonderful, happy family day out.

I realise that we're on a high and there will be a dip to come. But it feels like when it comes, we'll be prepared for it. It also feels like it will be that, a dip and not a slump. And this is from both sides, Robbie's and ours. Just like he now seems to be able to accept that we're not "out to get him" or "being mean", we also are getting a lot better at understanding his feelings and not taking his behaviour personally.

Note to self: no, of course I'm not breaking my promise to stop blogging our daily lives. Those two were real milestones, and I said I would post about those. Really.

Changes

Alice mentioned last time we saw her that I seem a lot more confident with Robbie. I replied that I feel more confident. At our last session with Robbie, as he hit me, I wasn't afraid that it would give him the impression that it's ok to hit, or worried that he'd turn into a violent adult. I was fully aware that Robbie needed to test me and at was fine. But I think it goes way beyond that session. I've been thinking about this a lot. I think I know Robbie a lot better, and I know what to expect (and how react to it) and not to take his behaviour personally. I'm more confident in the decisions I make. I think I've learnt to put aside the few bad moments, rather than dwell on them, and acknowledge the many positive ones. I've learnt to see the differences in Robbie's behaviour: when he's testing, when he's needy, when he's stroppy, and when he's just cross because he's not getting his way. As a result, I can vary my reaction accordingly and accept his anger when I can see the fear of rejection behind it, or dismiss it when it's just a strop. I'm a lot calmer because of this, and Robbie can tell. I've not suddenly turned into the Jedi master of attachment, though, and I'm sure I will continue to make mistakes. I also know that these things come in cycles and Robbie will feel the need to keep testing and testing. I'd like to think I'm prepared for it.

Most of all, I think I've learnt to see Robbie for the cheeky, curious, strong-willed, bright, vulnerable, wonderful, loving boy that he is and really enjoy his company.

It's taken over 500 days for us to get to this point. Is this how long it takes to begin to feel settled? I think we were beginning to get there at the end of last year and then the flood happened and our world turned upside down. Now we're back in our house (albeit surrounded by mess) things are stabilising.

A sign of these changes is the fact that I don't need to sit down every night and analyse the events of the day as a way to try to process them, think of reasons of the behaviours and how best to deal with them in the future. I'm not consumed with guilt that I should have reacted this way or that way, or known better. As a result, I don't need to exorcise my demons through a daily update of this blog either.

Since August I've been writing summaries of whole weeks or at least a few days’ worth of events. Every night I make a note of the key events of the day so I remember them for my weekly summary. This week I didn't write anything down. Why? Because we had yet another uneventful week. It was the usual: school, homework, reading, games, beavers on Thursday evening and swimming on Friday afternoon. We had a couple of grumpy moments (mostly to do with homework) but nothing to - literally - write about. We had a very ordinary week, like every other ordinary family. And it feels like a dream come true. Never has ordinariness felt like such an achievement. This is what we always dreamt of: having an ordinary family life.

I hear from Robbie's school friends' parents of tantrums, moodiness, good days, bad days... and I think "yep, that's us". In some cases I actually think we've got it good compared to some of the things they say!

So I've decided that this is a good place to stop the accounts of our daily life. Apart from those I've mentioned there are other reasons: the time it takes, security and anonymity among them.

I am still committed to writing this blog, though. My plan is to stop the daily summaries and share highlights and thoughts instead. There are adoption books I've been planning to review here for ages, stuff related to media and gay adoption that I think should be shared with other interested parties, and of course there are days (like our last counselling sessions) that I think are still worth sharing. Don't think of this as a cancellation of your favourite soap opera (and sometimes it HAS felt like a soap opera), but as a change in format and schedules. I think the regularity of the posts will depend to a certain extent on Robbie's feelings and behaviour and how I deal with them. If it gets to the point where I need to vent on a daily basis again, then maybe I'll return to that...

I realise that some of the people who read this blog regularly may be disappointed. I hope you'll forgive me. I've been writing it since early 2008 and it's been a huge commitment. When I started writing it to tell the world about what it felt like to go through the adoption process as a gay couple, it never occurred to me that I'd end up writing on a daily basis, or that once Robbie moved in, I'd summarise our daily lives for the next 500-odd days (17 months!). Still, it's been a huge help for me (both the writing and the amazing support from my caring, witty, empathetic, funny and sometimes slightly insane readers). I never knew a virtual hug from a stranger could mean so much. But during the horrible times, they actually helped. I'd like to think that this blog’s helped others too. In fact, if I may be so curious, I'd love to hear from you, my dear readers. I've often wondered about who reads this. I know there are gay and straight people who read this, but who are you? Prospective adopters? Fellow adopters? People who have nothing to do with adoption? Has this blog helped you at all? Put you off adoption forever? I'd love to hear what it's meant to you, if anything.

That's it. As always, I've gone on forever. Why use a hundred words to explain something if you can use a thousand?

And I'll bet that for all my talk of uneventful days, something will happen today and I'm telling you all about it tomorrow. I can't help myself...

Two sides to every story

Take one set of statistics, give it a spin in either direction. Here's the result:

Pink News

Daily Mail

A masterclass in figure-twisting to suit your needs...

Stay away from the comments if you want to have a nice weekend.

Tuesday 13th to Sunday 18th September (days 513 - 518): The guilt filter

A very good week. Glen was away for a couple of days on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Robbie and I were just fine on our own. Thursday and Friday were the usual school, beavers and swimming and the weekend was spent with friends and doing jobs in the house. Despite the fact that he had to do his homework every day, Robbie didn't really flare up about it and got on with it. As a result he found himself with lots of time to play afterwards and we pointed this out to him. In fact, something happened on Friday that I didn't know was possible: after he finished his homework, and seeing that I was busy doing some washing up, Robbie went out into the garden and started kicking his football and then riding his bike by the front of the house. He didn't ask me what he could do; he didn't expect me to entertain him; he didn't accuse me of ignoring him. He just got on with playing by himself for a few minutes until I was finished and joined him for a game. To me, that was his biggest achievement in a long time.

There were a couple of grumpy moments. Robbie is, after all, quite a grumpy child. On Tuesday he was annoyed at having to get changed twice. I'd sent him up to put his pyjamas on and he absent-mindedly put his going out clothes on. When I pointed this out he got cross as it was "a waste of his time". He tried to blame me for the fact that he'd gone up to do one thing and done another, and I replied that I had nothing to do with it. Frustrated, he kicked the air and his croc shoe went flying across the kitchen. It landed on my head. It was completely accidental, but of course Robbie assumed that I would perceive that as an attack and ran upstairs full of shame. I could hear him growling with frustration, but thought it best to let him calm down. He came downstairs a few minutes later and apologised. I dismissed it as a silly accident and said it hadn't hurt at all, told him to be more careful in the future, and then distracted him by getting him to help me with dinner.

I assumed that was the end of that and he wouldn't dwell on it any more, but the first thing he said to me the following morning was: "yesterday I kicked you in the face". Overnight he'd put the incident through that filter he twists all events through and come up with an explanation where he was to blame for something much worse than the actual event was. This is where logic fails. What happens and what Robbie perceives are sometimes wildly different things. He'll find a way to blame himself for anything that goes wrong; because in his head, everything he does is wrong. I corrected him and reminded me that it wasn't a kick, but a flying rubber shoe; that it hadn't hit me in the face but the back of the head; and that it had been an accident and not hurt me at all. I made a joke of it to show I wasn't holding a grudge and he smiled.

On Thursday Glen and I had a session with Alice on our own (without Robbie). She agreed that Monday's had been a really good session, and mentioned how Robbie seemed to be listening to her for the first time when she said that other adopted children blame themselves too. She praised my reaction as Robbie tested me, and said that without Glen there for Robbie to run to, he seems to engage more with me. Alice thinks that we need to focus on Robbie's attachment to me, since I'm the figure that he perceives as a threat to his being allowed to stay with us. So after a couple more weeks she'll ask Glen to stay away from a few sessions.

Monday 12th September (day 512): Low self-esteem and testing my commitment

This morning Robbie reluctantly wrote a card to his friend Jonathan thanking him for coming to Legoland and to the Ben 10 Monster Truck show. Once he got on with it, he actually wrote quite a nice card, and he apologised for saying "mean things" to him too.

After school we stopped in the park for half an hour and then went home. Before we went to the park I made a deal with Robbie: we'd go to the park if he did his homework without a fuss. To my delight, Robbie stuck to his word and he did his homework in 10 minutes without a single moan or trick.

Glen was supposed to join us for our first counselling session in weeks, but his train was stuck and it was just Robbie and I who went to see Alice. We talked about the summer and I made sure to be really positive about how well Robbie had behaved in Spain. I glossed over most of the events of our hellish holiday in Devon to avoid making Robbie feel guilty, but when I mentioned that Robbie had been really pleased to get his infamous puzzle back, Robbie became really withdrawn. I made a point of stressing how returning the puzzle meant that I'd forgiven him for punching me all that time ago, but Robbie was clearly distraught. Alice hit the bullseye: she wondered out loud whether it wasn't a question of being forgiven, but of Robbie forgiving himself. Robbie replied that he's a bad boy, and that's all he would say. Over and over.

It all makes sense. He thinks of himself as a bad boy and, although he didn't verbalise this, it's clear he blames himself for what's happened to him. Every time he misbehaves, and gets a consequence because of it, we confirm to him that he is bad. His self-esteem is so low that he can't imagine why anyone would love him, so he assumes at some point he'll do something so bad that he'll be sent to yet another family. Whenever we talk to him about any of this, he seems to understand what we're saying. But we're talking to his brain. Whilst his cognitive side can make sense of it, his emotional side can't.

Robbie let me hold him, which is unusual during the counselling sessions. I told him that I know he's not bad. I added that sometimes his behaviour is not what it should be, but he isn't bad. I then listed all the people who agree he isn't bad: Nanny, my parents, his aunt and uncle, his friends' parents... I mentioned how sad I'd been in Spain to hear Robbie say he might have ten dads one day because it's very sad that he won't believe that we're his "forever family". I then reiterated how neither his birth parents nor his social worker can do anything to take him away. And I added that nothing he does will ever make him go away. Robbie reminded me that in April I told him he'd have to leave if he ever hit me again. I reminded him that that was something I said in the heat of the moment and didn't mean, like many of the awful things he says and doesn't mean when he's angry.

Robbie decided to put my words to the test. He put my hand in his mouth and bit it. I said that biting me won't make me throw him out. He then bit it again, very hard (he very nearly drew blood). I avoided showing any pain, and repeated that I still won't kick him out. Next, without a warning, he punched me in the face. I smiled, so he punched me harder. I hugged him tight and whispered in his ear one more time that nothing he does will ever be enough to make me send him away.

Alice intervened. She told Robbie that she sees other boys and girls who've been adopted. Robbie looked up and listened to what she was saying, a rare occurrence since he always avoids eye contact wit her. She told him that those other adopted kids also think they're bad, but one day they realise that they aren't, and when they do they learn to be happy and to let their new families love them.

With that, our time was up. We went home and told Glen about our session (I didn't mention the hitting in front of Robbie). Glen reiterated to Robbie how we're his forever family. We had a good dinner and a good bedtime. As I kissed him goodnight, Robbie hugged me long and tight and told me he loved me. I smiled and said I loved him too.