Cup of sadness

I often feel like I'm the guardian of my children's stories. Complicated, painful and wonderful stories that make perfect sense to some and no sense to others, stories that twist and turn their way to my door. The stories have characters that are good, characters that are bad and predominantly characters that are complicated.

Mostly it's been easy to share the story, as they say 'if you can remember being told you were adopted then it's too late'. Stories have flowed naturally and easily from the photos on the wall and the names in the books. We've all shared the stories of our jigsaw life and little ears find comfort, safety and value in the 'firsts'.

First time we met, first thing we said, first trip and so on..................

From the outset there have been parts of these stories that are hard to contemplate and consider. Hard for me as an adult but immeasurably hard when they are woven into the biological links, genetic bonds and tendrils of identity. There have been some tough conversations and if I focus on me for a sentence, some conversations that I never wanted to have and left shadows.

This guardian role hangs heavy, so easy to slip, so easy to say too soon or too late. We peel back the layers of the same story. We make sense of the same events with a four year old, then a six, nine, thirteen and sixteen year old. Gently we peel back the nuance as these little people grow and begin to understand, 'could not' keep you safe becomes 'did not', becomes 'would not' keep you safe. It's a cup of heartache we return to again and again.

Then our phone rings and though the back channels that we've built and fostered with birth family and we discover the story has moved on again. The cup of sadness has been topped up to overflowing.

The layers of complexity grow, I call my closest friends and they've no words or wisdom they just know. They help me hold the cup for a little while before I ask my children to drink from it again.  

Again, I blog in vague broad strokes. Take from it what you will.

Blackpool Rock

Lotty asks 'how excited are you to be a grandad between 0 and 100? 0 is not bothered and 100 is total loss of control with excitement.'

I pause, this could be a potential trick, there may be a right answer.

'67?'

She comes straight back, 'Ok, I'm 92 at being an aunty'

We are all anticipating the imminent addition to the family, little girls chattering with excitement at being aunties, giddy about what they're going go do and the plans they have. Generally fizzing.  Conversations turn to birth, how long, when will it start and what will happen.

I tell the story of my brother's birth, then of mine and we talk about the friend who gave birth in a police van we go on and on. All the stories are lapped up.

But then the conversation stops. The stories I want to tell aren't there, their stories. I can't tell if they are thinking the same.

I know dates, weights and locations. No more. I can't join those dots to make a story though. I've some photos for some of these little aunties to be, but not much. I feel robbed of the story of their arrival into this world, the drama, the excitement.
I look at the Giddy Aunts and feel a deep sadness for the lost days. I didn't make a panic dash to hospital, or get a call to come now.  That I didn't walk nervously our of hospital with them, hold them close in the first hours of life, nervously worrying about what lay ahead. Those joys and fears belong to strangers, they're all lost to us, they're lost to them. We've no stories to share and their absence is louder than ever today. I'm not sure they see the gap, not today anyway.

A missing story seems sadder than a sad story.

Like words in Blackpool rock there sometimes seems to be sadness running through our lives that cannot be extracted.

Social Work Games

Peanut and Flossy are playing Social Workers again. 

It's hard to tell what is going on but they are clearly feeling passionate, I lean in and try and interpret the scene. 

Lotty, 11, is clearly working hard to care for her babies. It's not clear but I think the babies have been naughty, or that's what Peanut, 5,  seems to be saying at full volume. I don't like to criticise but her communication and intervention skills are not all they could be and as for her empathy? Well frankly they don't meet the required standard as set out in the professional capabilities framework for newly qualified let alone experienced practitioners. Peanut continues, if they don't behave you'll have to go away she shouts to Lotty. 

It doesn't feel like a sad or happy game, volume in my children's games is no indication of either. It feels like a matter of fact sort of game, it just is.

I heard once that 'I'm down on Social Workers', I don't think I am but I am acutely aware that we're often agents of the state and nobody wants to see us at the front door. Generally, there are no good reasons to see us, even if we're welcome, we're welcome because we're helping in a bad situation or meeting a need that we'd rather wasn't there. We try to be fixers. 

The game continues, Lotty's perceived 'non compliance' is testing Peanuts patients and the tone is turning threatening. Lotty, is arguing the toss, quite convincingly, but she needs to be careful Peanut is holding the cards in the game. Social Workers hold all the power.

Children play out what they see, what matters to them and their play can often be a window into their thoughts and feelings. Social Workers have been involved in most of my children's lives they've never played Social Workers until now.

I keep listening to them but I'd rather they weren't playing Social Workers.

No easy answers

In one of my day jobs I speak to teachers and help them develop their understanding of the impacts of  loss, trauma and separation on children. I’m usually invited in on the back of adoption but I quickly move past this with my first slide and broaden it to a whole range of children.

I talk about children who experience abuse, of many strains, children cared for by adults other than their parents, children in the Looked After system, children who experience the death of a parent or loved one, children who experience mental ill health or live with someone who does, children who experience the imprisonment of a parent, children whose parents separate or divorce. I could go on, and usually do, indicating that the children who experience these challenges and are adopted are only a small fraction of those impacted.

Eventually the teachers ask is there anyone who hasn’t been impacted by trauma, loss and separation left? It’s an interesting question and the reality is that probably not, but the degree, implications and subsequent support are perhaps the key issue. 

So with that in mind I go about my day. 

This week on Twitter I was included into a very long conversation thread that drifted into this issue, along with many other issues to boot.  

For many of the adults looking after the other children that I listed they had no choice, circumstances and other such meant that they care for children that have lived under the shadow of negative experiences.

Are their needs greater than ours or ours theirs? Of course not. But we have many things that they do not. A voice. The goodwill of many people that can help us. The Adoption Support Fund. A statutory right to see our needs assessed, lobby groups, conferences and research that benefits us and our children. Adopters are uniquely privileged, we are universally seen by wider society, media and politicians as saintly and deserving. If you’re an adopter it’s not uncommon to be told ‘what you’re doing is amazing’, ‘I could never do what you do’ and other gushing statements. For us this is a choice, many of us didn’t ‘really’ know what we were getting into, but we chose this path none the less. You could argue that for some it was no choice but a last resort but that confuses the issue. Doesn’t it? Probably.

I’m not suggested it’s all creamy but I know enough to know that we have more in our favour than many others. Neither am I suggesting that we should sit back and rest on our laurels, of course we should push for better.

I often think what it would be like to care for my children in different circumstances, to be the cause or to have been a bystander to my children's trauma, the system may not look on me as favourably as I struggle with guilt, shame, mental ill health, challenging circumstances, your own trauma etc. 

I do know that some would prefer money spent on adopters and not on families that struggle. I do know that some would prefer the opposite. I'd like to hope that those who hold the purse strings also hold both ends of this spectrum in tension.

How do we rank need? Are some more deserving of public funds than others? Well I guess there are multiple views on that. When thinking of my child’s life path would money have been better spent on early intervention, or resourcing foster care and foster carers or providing support to adopters or on universal services. The reality is that money is spent at each point with varying degrees of success and to fund one is to not underfund another, as far as I know that’s not how public funds are used or how the system works.

The reality is that the need is greater than the available resources, that being so we are then left in a terrible position where most services could do with more money.  Need is graded and some get access to services and some do not. As adopters we're unique but that does not necessarily mean we receive or deserve a prioritised access to service. I'd like to live in a society where children's need are prioritised regardless of who cares for them be a single mother with mental ill health and a chaotic lifestyle or a middle class family in the leafy suburbs.  Is that the case? I'm not sure I'm in a position to answer that.

What upset me, or frustrated me, in the twitter conversation was that it's a debate that can't be boiled down to 140 characters. Confusion reigned as different people's threads blurred and messages mixed.  It wasn't a uplifting exchange.

I've read and seen enough to know that though the needs of many adopted children are profound and life long but that doesn't make them unique and in the grand scheme represent a small portion of the whole need that is present. 

There are no easy answers.

Dysregulation Hangover

I had a hangover once when I was 15. I remember vividly the subtle blend of seasickness, feeling like I'd been  hit in the face with a frying pan and of someone using my mouth as an ashtray.

It was a profound moment, I thought this is hellish I'm not doing that again.
So I haven't been drunk or had a hangover since and I have no intention of ever feeling like that again. Mrs Cs happy I'm always the designated driver. You could say I'm a control freak I prefer to think of myself as dull.

To be honest I was feeling quite optimistic and hopeful about 2016.  Lots of plans and schemes for the new year. Then like a rolling storm it all unraveled in glorious widescreen technicolor with dolby surround sound.

It arrived like a Catherine wheel of emotions, arms and legs flailing, insults spewed and threats made. The whole house kicked in the emotional teeth, things broke, threats made and bags packed, we were all impacted by the magnitude, if you weren't directly involved you heard it. The blue touch paper had smouldered for a day in the lead up,  then this Catherine wheel went off and lasted a couple of hours at it's height.

Mrs C tag teamed me after a few hours and brought it down,  it was over, wailing, sobbing, shower and bed. I say over though the sparks and fire had gone the dysregulation hangover was left.

We're emotionally and physically drained. Then we have an enquiry, what was the cause, could we, should we have seen it coming. But what had lit the touch paper and set off the raaaaaagh? It could have been the build up to Christmas, the lack of routine, the Xbox, the sugar overdose, the lack of exercise, the present jealousy, the this and the that.
I'm tired of trying to work it out, overanalysing.

Who said what and who did what. The scuffle, the kicking, the punching,  the argy bargy. I'd rather not talk about it, I'd rather not think about it but Mrs C and I did. I'm tired of trying to make sense of the senseless.

So, the next the dysregulation hangover remains, we move delicately around the house. I've put work back a day, it's raining outside and a delicate peace hovers inside.

I choose my first words and tone carefully.

'Get lost' is the reply.

I walk away, to tired to fight, nervous, are we going to play this out again?

My body aches from the argy bargy, the tension, the raaaagh, my heart aches from the argy bargy, the tension and the raaaaagh. I think about the future the whats and ifs. It's ok now but what about in a year or five or ten? The hope and expectation I'd had for the year have dissolved and worry and tension lays like a blanket over us all, we become a one narrative family.

We get through the day without incident.

Like all hangovers, it lifts, slowly but surely, 12, 24, 36 hours and we dare to feel better.
I have no intention of ever doing that again but I'm afraid this one is out of my control.

National Adoption Week: Thoughts and Questions

I'm pondering the upcoming National Adoption Week. With all the media coverage and hoopla that comes with it. I wonder how representative it is of contemporary adoption. More to the point I wonder how representative I am of contemporary adopters and how representative our family's experience is.

I wonder if we fit the acceptable narrative of the adoption story. Increasingly and for many years I don't accept the standard narrative as being standard at all.

Across the six children and three adults that make up our family we represent a range of experiences, the usual hat trick of Trauma, Loss and Separation; Child to Parent Violence, Social Service involvement, breakdowns and make ups.  We've got shouting and fighting and laughing and loving. We've had unexpected Facebook family resurgence, incredibly positive birth family contact and some not so easy. We're like a walking case study.

Recently a young couple asked me for advice in relation to their plans and hopes to adopt. I can't recall what I said specifically at the time. It was probably encouraging, telling of the positives and trying to open their minds to the potential challenges. It feels like a well worn conversation.
But since then their question has rolled around my mind.

'We're thinking of adopting, what advice could you offer?'

I'm not sure what to say anymore. I don't feel jaded, negative or cynical about adoption, not at all. Sure, I have lots of questions that I struggle to answer about structures, ethics, process and power dynamics within the world of adoption.  But I believe that children need secure, stable, loving and nurturing parents. Of course that can encompass a broad and diverse range of families/parents/children/beliefs/lifestyles. But fundamentally I believe in lives built on those core principles.
The more I know about adoption and the business behind it the more I feel that my knowledge is limited. I've sat on the adopter side of the triangle for so long that I realise that I know so little about the other two sides and the social care business that controls it all. I see that the voices of adoptees and birth families struggle to be heard and sometimes we struggle to listen to them as it provokes difficult questions. This is increasingly where I'm feeling the need to listen and this is where I'm learning the most. It's fantastic to see this being addressed by The Open Nest with their adoption week conference focusing on the voice of adoptees.

So, anyway,  what advice would I offer.

I may not offer advice anymore. But I can tell you what I'm learning about the other voices and about my journey.

Day 35 - Bear Coates

Un petit film

Cat Killer

Firstly, this is a blog about a cat. Any metaphorical coincidence is exactly that.

We have a cat that is convinced that I’m a cat killer.

I am not, but it’s over five years since our cat, Kitty, witnessed an incident that convinced her that I killed her best friend Izzy the cat. Once again for the record I did not.

But to be honest my counter transference is starting to twitch and after years of the cat refusing to be in the same room as me I’m starting to lose my empathy. If I walk anywhere near her she will spring from deep sleep to hyper alert in an instant and literally run around the walls until she can get out of the room. You’d think that I was chasing her with a flaming sword while screaming ‘die, die, die wretched feline.’, I do not.

It all started one fateful evening a long time ago. As I entered our garage I was aware of an unusual cat food fishy smell and the tumble dryer making an unusual, whir, thump, whir thump, whir, thump noise. Suspecting little but just a little curious I opened the dryer door. To my infinite sadness I saw Izzy laying still, very still, very dry warm and dead. Carefully, at least as carefully as a man who could care less about cats can, I lifted her out.

At that very moment I paused and looked up to the watching eyes of…………………….Kitty.

For a second I saw the thought flash across her little feline mind, ‘he just killed Izzy, HE kills cats’, then she scarpered.

The hows and whys of Izzy's unfortunate end are tragic and no blame shall be proportioned. Though it is noted Mrs C is yet to talk of the unfortunate event without tearing up.

The next morning and after some thought I broke the news to Lotty and Flossy. Lotty especially loved Izzy who would let her push her round in dolls prams. Stepping into über dad mode I wrapped the cat in a towel and sensitively explained what had happened as I showed them Izzy. I thought this would allow them to have 'closure' and make sense of the unfortunate event. 

The girls took it well. 

After a brief pause Lotty looked me in the eye and asked ‘can we play with her’. Slightly concerned I explained that would not be appropriate. Lotty’s big brown eyes widened ‘pleeeaaase’, increasingly concerned and a little more firmly I explained that she couldn’t.

Lotty’s eyes narrowed as she took a bartering tone, ‘just half an hour’. For clarity I responded ‘NO, stop it, you’re freaking me out!'. She seemed to begrudgingly accept this answer.

Anyway, back to Kitty, in her mind the die was cast and from that day on she has treat me like I am a merciless cat murdering psychopath. At first I had understandable empathy and appreciated that it must have been upsetting for her. However, after over five years of being framed for something I didn’t do and responded to like I did do it I’m starting to change my view on the cat. 

She’s wearing me down.

So why bother being nice? It makes no difference.

Why try to be understanding? I will always be perceived as the cat killer. Acts of kindness are undone by the slightest sudden movement that reinforces the fears and threat. Offers of affection are pointless, soothing noises and gestures are rebutted or misinterpreted as sinister ploys. 

Anyway, a blog about cats.

Pam: Birth Mother, Social Worker & Adopter

Pam tells her story of having her son taken away from her when she was 14 years old.





Later in life Pam becomes a Social Worker and makes the decision to adopt. Eventually adopting six children.





Pam's story of reunification with her birth son.

Loss

I try to make my ramblings upbeat and I can assure many aspects of life in Coates Towers is positive. Of late it seems like there’s been a lot of tricky stuff going on for the kids and us. Re reading my posts I wonder if my blog should be titled ‘How not to adopt’ or ‘101 things about adoption you never cared to ask’.

This is our life at the moment and it reflects my belief that to adopt is to embrace sadness at some level. Even in the most successful, harmonious and straightforward adoption* at its heart lies an unavoidable sadness. We live with this tension and it’s varying manifestations in our lives day by day. It's the cup we drink from.

Added to our measure this week was the death of a close family friend. Over the last 8 years she had been an invaluable and unique source of support, insight, information to Mrs C and I and to Flossy and Lotty. Though her death was anticipated it has come as a shock to the children. Their response is complex it’s their first experience of the death of someone close. Predictably we’ve seen some interesting behaviour and grief manifested in many ways. Complex emotions and challenges to their understanding have left them in a fog of dysregulation.

Our friend, Flossy and Lotty’s birth Aunt, came into our lives in unique and unusual circumstances. We insisted on contact with her against the wishes of our Local Authority, and our Fostering Social Worker pled our case to the judge at the placement order hearing** and it was reluctantly granted. Tentatively we built trust and confidence and slowly, very slowly, she became a friend and then family.

We’d see each other weekly, Mrs C would talk and text daily. The two dimensional pantomime villains of our children’s paperwork became real people, lives, hopes, dreams, mistakes, tragedy and wrong decisions. She was a firewall between us and the less safe elements of birth family and an open door to the safe elements.

She broke the news of birth mum’s pregnancy to Mrs C, the imminent birth of Peanut. Mrs C and her agreed that it was best if Peanut came to live with us and 20 months later Peanut did***.

Flossy and Lotty loved their aunty, she was a tangible part of their lives and history that could not be replicated in a life story book or letter. She was an essential part of our lives she was a member of our family. We were blessed to see the pleasure she took in seeing her nieces grow.

All our grief and loss is compounded by our inability to attend the funeral to share our loss with her loved ones. Mrs C was able covertly to attend her bedside in her dying days and thank her for all she had done. This is the end of a special chapter of all our lives.

We feel blessed to have known her, rest in peace J.

*No such thing

**It’s complicated

***It’s very complicated

Mr Postman

Without doubt some of the most important and significant people in my children’s lives are their biological mother and father. I’ve previously blogged on them describing them as ghosts that lurk in the shadows of our lives and consciousness.

Over the past few weeks other birth family members have begun to step into the light and it has been a very interesting experience for a multitude of reasons.

For whatever reasons we never got the chance to meet birth mum and dad, we said we were willing but it just didn’t come together. Having been filmed for the BBC we knew that we were known to them and had heard through an intermediary there was no animosity towards us. We heard no more for 15 years until this summer when ‘Matilda’ a sibling, younger than Sarah and older than Gracie and Ginger found us.

After the initial whirlwind of discovery slow and careful contact has been made. Culminating a few days ago when Mrs C sat with our children’s birth aunt, a very emotive and profound experience for them both. She was little more than a child at the time of her niece and nephew’s move into care. Hearing the impact that this move and the events and circumstances had on her and the wider family has been a not unexpected revelation. The stories of the lack of information, the differing version of events, the mess and the pain for the wider birth family and the long term damage the removal caused.

In the midst of it all we hear of our annual letters coming to the family, being passed from member to member bringing news and hope.

Mrs C dutifully wrote the annual letters to Birth Mum and Dad, there was a limited response in the early days but even this dried up after a few years.

However, at the forefront of our minds was the benefit that the letters were for our three. So Mrs C persisted even when there was no response.

Thinking now I can imagine what I would write in their circumstance, how to reply, what to say, what not to say, lives lived in stalled grief and continuing pain. What could they write?

Mrs C would agonise over what to write each year, I would watch TV, if I confess avoiding the task out of laziness and confidence in her wisdom and writing skills.

Mrs C saw it very clearly, we're building for the future, maintaining a positive link, offering hope and trying to ensure that a link could be maintained. We were demonstrating to our children our lack of enmity to their parents through our actions.

As the three grew we would show them the letters and they’d help pick photos we included. It was an opportunity to revisit events, reframe memories and bring context to growing understanding. We would promote empathy and respect , listen to thoughts and feelings.

When Sarah got to 18 and having not had a response in nearly 10 years we stopped.

But Mrs C and the Aunt’s meeting this week justified all the work she’d put in; the chore, the conflicting emotions, the disheartening lack of reply. We know now that the letters found their audience and forged a delicate and essential link. We now that they were eagerly awaited and passed from hand to hand bringing news of children lost.

We aware that we are at the beginning of a new chapter and there have been lots of tears. But we are confident that there is no rush our children have their lives to restore and establish relationships with their first family.

I am grateful as I know that for some children and families the hope of contact is incomprehensible, impractical and dangerous.

For us we always knew that this day would come. Thankfully we had already begun to build bridges.