Christmas Oddities

The psychologists were right. Once Christmas Eve arrived, Rose's anxiety dropped. Is it odd to start an entry about Christmas with "psychologists were right"? Well, such is our life. Odd is cool. I will describe some of the oddities of the season before I write a second post with pictures and tales of the amazing days composing our first Christmas as a family.

The first oddity of the holiday is that Rose seems ambivalent to presents. She appreciates them. She gets excited to open them. Yet, unlike most kids, it seems they could disappear completely and she would be mostly unaffected by their absence. I guess by most kids I'm comparing her to my 10-year-old self who eagerly shook every present my Mom set under the tree and begged daily to open "just one."

Thankfully for us, this indifference means she didn't plead to open the gifts from Mom and Dad under the tree in the week leading up to Christmas. Nor did she bound out of her room Christmas Day with the joy and glee with which most children greet that special morning. 

Rose also didn't show the materialistic tendencies I remember accompanying the holiday elation that helped my fly out of my bed December the 25th. Except once, for one small moment, where she asked for more presents when everything had been opened. Yet, her request was small and not at all demanding. She didn't look disappointed when there weren't any more to open. I smiled when she asked because it felt less odd.  

Another oddity is all me. Being new parents, we, er, well, I suck at gift giving. When I was out shopping I saw a suit case. It was pink with little blue polka dots and swivel wheels so you can turn it any which way. Since we have a trip to Disneyworld coming up, I snatched it up. Rose will be thrilled, I thought. 

When she opened it, another oddity showed itself. Rose smiled. She looked at it, she unzipped it and pretended to care about the pockets inside. She kept betraying her disappointment with a beautiful smile, but through her eyes I heard the wahhh-wahhhhhhh. She set it aside and it has sat in her room since. 

My brother-in-law asked if I thought she'd wheel it around the house pretending she was at the airport. The thought still makes me laugh. No, of course, not. I'm not sure why I thought a suit case was a great gift for a child. To make things worse, it was one of the gifts we chose to leave out from St. Nicholas. Yep, odd parents we are, indeed.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

I knew better than to have many expectations for this holiday season with Rose. I was right. Her therapists have confirmed her sudden increase in defiant, rude and altogether unpleasant behavior is related to stifled memories of years of sad Christmases. They said once Christmas is over, we'll see an overnight difference.

Then I wonder, are Rose's behaviors amping up because I expected it--like a quasi self fulfilling prophecy?  Who knows. Maybe it's also because we hired another PCA who started this week. Regardless, we're back in May mode. Re-learning to ignore the bad to further reinforce the good.

At the same time, we're toning down the St. Nicholas stuff. Surprises make her more anxious and seem to increase the negative behaviors. So keep your fingers crossed that we make it through the holiday season in one piece. Next year, perhaps we'll all be in a better place to truly enjoy the holidays.

11th Birthday Celebrations

I don't remember turning 11. I want Rose to never forget her 11th birthday. We filled it with a week of family and friend celebrations to help cement the event into her head.

Since then, things have been a little rocky. For now, for this post though, I'll focus on the happy. 

Here's a cake Rose and Mike made before the Schulte celebration. It was also Aunt Krista's birthday. To save space, Rose drew a rose for her name instead of spelling it out. Not a bad decorator, if you ask me.

 Here are the birthday girls!

Rose's cousin, Abby, made a great gift giver.

 

 I love this picture because of the sheer joy in Rose's face.

A week after, we celebrated again with my mom and aunt.

 

The picture below is a light saber - a real one, except it doesn't cut heads or hands off. Thank goodness.

Then, lastly, Beth, Jason, Lucy and Ben stopped by with cupcakes and gifts. A good time was had by all.

Oddly, we didn't get any pictures on Rose's actual birthday. We celebrated it with just us and also our family therapist, Penni. I made a German Chocolate cake, per Rose's request, and we got her an outfit and Star Wars Legos.

I've noticed a trend lately. With Rose around, we're hard pressed to get photos of all of us, they are all of her. Not good or bad. Just different.

Operation Saint Nicholas

Rose doesn't believe in Santa Claus. She is 10, so I'm not surprised.  When I asked why, though, she said someone told her Santa was invented by the Devil to take attention away from Jesus.

Whoa. Now, I am not one to use a blog to publicize my religious beliefs. I also try to be open-minded about beliefs contradicting mine. This presents a struggle because I don't agree with what Rose was told.  So if you agree with it you might want to stop reading.

I guess that reasoning was better than, "Well, Santa, just didn't like you" when asked by 7-year-old why Santa has never visited her. Yet it seems worse than just saying: "Santa isn't real, honey." Why bring Jesus and the Devil into it at all? I am freaked out by people who throw out religion in that way. Seems cowardly.

Plus, when Roes repeated it I could tell by the tone of her voice she didn't really believe it. She was just parroting something to protect herself from the real reason why Santa never visited. Rose is smart. She knows why.

I don't have the heart to tell her the total truth, either. I don't think she's ready for it. Or maybe I'm not ready. Instead, I told her Santa Claus came from the story of Saint Nicholas. Saint Nicholas was sainted by the church because he treated children kindly, I said.  (Then I chuckled to myself because they way I explained the saint made him sound like a pedophile, but I digress.)

"Well, I believe in Saint Nicholas, just not Santa," she said. Of course I know she just wants to be liked and seems inclined to agree with anything to achieve that goal. So I am determined to change her agreement to belief. Here begins Operation Saint Nicholas. Not to fill her life with more lies but to bring a little much needed magic and wonder to it. She'll decide on her own what she believes and doesn't.

After all, what better to boost a child's self esteem than gifts from a kindred spirit regardless of the stickers she's earned or the number of friends she has.

My plans are a little hazy, so feel free to add new suggestions:
Step 1: Have her watch Miracle on 34th Street, the old version - Check.
Step 2: Ask a male coworker/friend to send a card to Rose from Saint Nicholas
Step 3: Leave a few other small gifts from the Saint between now and Christmas with the same handwriting on the tags as the card
Step 4: Allow Rose to open Christmas gifts from Mom and Dad Christmas Eve once we're home from the Schulte's celebration again with the same handwriting from steps 2 and 3.
Step 5: Place Saint Nicholas gifts under the tree for discovery Christmas morning in the same handwriting as steps 2 and 3.

Think it'll work?

Jealousy

Today I worked while Mike's company was closed, and the Norman Rockwell holiday continued. They went swimming, joined me for lunch at work, and then spent the afternoon at the Science Museum.

It feels strange to say this after the drama of Sunday, but I was jealous of Mike's day with Rose. When I got home, I spent some quality time playing dominoes with her. Here's a video of Rose explaining our creation.

Daughter Goes to Work with Dad Day

I could have alternatively called this post, "whoops, we didn't confirm our babysitting in time." Thankfully, Mike's work is accommodating so Rose got to be a chemist's helper for the day. Er, well, she got to play her DS, read, and watch movies.

She was so excited to go and wear a dress she asked, yes asked, for the following three photos.

The first was too goofy, she said.

The second was perfect.

The third was because Mom wasn't in the first two.

Thanksgiving

Monday, Rose confided in me that she felt like she'd become too close to us, which scared her. She would rather live with foster parents. She also said she feels more comfortable with people who treat her poorly.

I listened and sympathized. I told her I can't imagine what she's been through, but she can't be emotionally abusive toward her new family. She agreed. We strategized she could excuse herself to her room when she was feeling that scared.

Then the mood passed. Since our exchange everything has seemed more normal, almost Norman Rockwell-esque. We had a first Thanksgiving. It was awesome. Instead of getting everyone out of the house in time for the official Turkey Trot in Minneapolis, we relaxed.

We watched the Macy's Parade. Then, we leisurely held our own Turkey Day 5k. Rose ran about a half mile before she joined Mike and the dogs while I finished my run. It didn't have all the camaraderie of the one in the city, but it was less crowded and more enjoyable overall. Plus, I didn't gain another shirt I'd have to toss out later.

After the exercise we went to my family's get together where ate too much and enjoyed the company of family. We ended the day playing Simpson's Clue. Gotta LOVE how Rose was trying to act annoyed by my photo but you can see the joy in being the center of attention.

When a real tornado seems unremarkable

There is a piece of this year I have struggled to document and hesitant to write about. I didn't want to betray the family intimacy. I wasn't ready to really process it. Yet, I feel somewhat ready now and feel this year would be remiss if I didn't.

Just 5 days before this picture was taken, we'd learned that Mike's dad, Grandpa Schulte, had lung cancer. After learning that, we sat outside the VA Hospital debating if we should meet Rose or delay adoption. Yet, Grandpa insisted we proceed, so we did. We were very happy when this moment arrived. Grandpa was wise.

Seven days before this picture was taken, we learned Grandpa's cancer was terminal and seven days after this photo, Rose moved in for good.

Then, it seems, time flew as we became engrossed in learning to parent Rose and coping with the emotions she brought with her. It almost became easy to ignore our fears and sadness about Grandpa. Almost. The school suspension helped. So did the formal adoption on July 19th.

Yet, of course the cancer didn't go away despite all the other things going on in our lives or how much we wished, prayed and hoped it would. So we tried to ensure Grandpa and Rose had as much time together as possible.This was their first meeting.

The tornado of May was pretty unremarkable in comparison with the emotional tornado we were swept into, but it provided a nice distraction, once again, as did our trip to South Dakota, the start of 5th grade, and Rose's baptism.We purposely held the baptism in the Schulte family church.

Grandpa was able to attend the baptism, but he was very weak at the end of August and had to get home to rest before we could get a picture with him. He told us in September he wished he could have been more involved. Grandpa was proud of his new granddaughter, and he had always been a man of faith.

Grandpa's wisdom encouraging us to push on was more helpful than he could have known. One night, in late September we wrapped up dinner with Grandma and Grandpa. Rose and I hugged our goodbyes as Mike stood by the door in typical, "I don't hug" fashion when Rose said, "Dad, how come you don't hug your dad." Mike responded about men not hugging and Grandpa said, "Come on." So Mike when and hugged his dad.

I looked at Rose and marveled at her ability to create a hug between them and felt certain without her, it probably wouldn't have happened. I know I wouldn't have said anything even if I felt I should.

The third week of October Grandpa lost his fight with cancer. Two days before his passing, the whole family gathered for October birthdays. I didn't take pictures of either event. Needless to say, despite the bright spot Rose brought to our lives this year, this loss is a very dark cloud we continue to live with: the loss of a wonderful father, father-in-law, grandfather and friend.

A cloud even darker than the one that plopped a tree on our house.

Things hurt more when you're attached

We regressed to May levels of anger and defiance today.

It all started this morning when I asked Rose not to wear her PJs outside under her snow clothes. I know, I know, not something you'd have to fight a kid on.

I really didn't fight though. When she said "no" and in typical 10-year-old fashion marched into her room to defy me, I was calm and said, "Rose, I want you to wear your normal clothes outside." I reminded her she had said she was going to work on listening.

"I don't care." She retorted.

"OK," I said, still calm. "You seem to need some time in your room to adjust your attitude."

She refused to go to her room. She decided to hound me. I was proud I stayed mostly calm most of the time, but when she berated me with "You're not my mom" "I hate this family" and so on and so forth, I nearly broke down. "I just want you to go to your room." Is all I kept asking--in a tone that hid my sense of defeat at that moment.

Sure, she was just angry. Yet, these words stung more than they had in the past. I can only assume because unlike in the spring, I do feel connected to her. It hurts to know this connection is possibly only on my side and/or she seems to take pride in hurting me emotionally. Even if she is only 10 and wounded.

Mike was getting us bagels during this argument, and when he returned home I was able to better ignore her taunts and attempts at negative attention. So she did retreat to her room, finally. I retreated to mine, and I felt as if a weight was placed on me. I crawled into bed and wept. I couldn't leave the bed until 2:30 when I had to because I'd promised to help my sister who recently had back surgery.


Now I sit, spent and exhausted hoping this strange regression will not last long. When I put Rose to bed tonight she admitted she was scared but couldn't say why. I told her I think it's because she feels herself growing closer to us and she's scared we'll reject her. So she's trying to reject us first.

She blew my guess off. Who knows, maybe that's not what's going on but only what I hope is going on cause I'm really attached to this kid.

Overreacting?

Rose proudly told me she kissed her "boyfriend" at taekwondoe. I suddenly and unexpectedly turned into my mom and said, "You are 10. You are not allowed to kiss boys. You need to be respectable." Even reading the word respectable in that context freaks me out. I don't know that I even believe that. It had just been so ingrained in my psyche throughout puberty and teenage years that poof, it just slipped out at the mention of a kiss.

Knowing I was irritated, though, Rose said, "it wasn't even a real kiss, Mom, just an air kiss." At that point I wasn't sure if I believed her. Then I didn't leave her side at taekwondoe--even when she went down to the stretching area where parents typically don't go.

I felt out of place in the stretching are--the lone adult being eyed suspiciously by the children. She hissed at me "this is embarrassing." I couldn't agree more. It was awkward for me, too, and "boyfriend" wasn't even there, but I stuck it out. I was sending a message. I swear. Or really, I was in no mom's land unsure of what to do. I needed a drink.

In fact, as I nurse a beer now, I wonder, am I over reacting? It was just a kiss, maybe even something as harmless as an air kiss. Yet, setting our boundaries seems important. I just need to find middle ground between my response and my mom's response.

The Third Job

Welcome to the game show that has become our life.

What is this? It's a snap shot of June 2011. The stickers represent the number of days Rose managed to get dressed, brush her teeth, put on deodorant, eat 3 meals and put on jammies.

And this is October 2011 - stickers mean the same as in June. Yay, Rosie girl! 

Mmm-hmm, for those of you who know Mike, those are Star Wars stickers.

Best of all, now all these behaviors are coming second nature. Now we can shift the rewards to polite and considerate behavior and away from tasks expected of children Rose's age. If only it weren't so hard to quantify unlike concrete tasks like brushing teeth. So we're trying to figure out the perfect reward system. Feel free to post with ideas.

This experiment has taught me positive reinforcement is tiring. The last thing we often feel like doing by the end of the day is measuring accomplishments. Especially when it feels like it's not working.  As the pictures show, though, it was working. It's just slow and painful, so the gains need to be measured and rewarded. Friday we go buy Rose press-on nails--the reward she decided she wanted if she could get this many stickers.

Then the bar needs to be raised so expect us to be a little more stressed again.



And a few more Halloween photos

For better or worse this Halloween was way better than I could have expected. No melt downs. No fighting. Just costumes, trick-or-treating, and candy eating. Rose came hope happy and chilly where she promptly crawled into bed to be cozy beneath her heating blanket.

Here are a few photo memories.

Rose, without the wig

Ben, Rose, Lucy (Spiderman, Water Bender, Vampiress)

Grrr

Trick-or-Treat

We didn't stop here.

A few more Halloween photos

If at first you don't succeed, try, try again

Rose is starting to ask, yes ask, for photos of herself. Mostly she lets her uncles get photos of her, but she's starting to change her mind at home, too. Here is a photo she asked for in her Halloween costume.

Rose the last water bender

I've tried to analyze the implications of this development. I've come up with everything. Maybe her self esteem is improving. Maybe she is starting to believe this is real so photos documenting her life make sense now. She did admit that for the first time in years, she's happy, and it makes sense to not want photos when you're unhappy. Regardless, I'm just going to enjoy this new development and share its benefits with you.
Here are a few more happy photos:

Rose chose the biggest pumpkin



Rose was happy to pose with Mike's smaller pumpkin


A side benefit of having a daughter who is unwilling to take photos is that Mike, who used to be just as camera shy, now willingly takes photos. I'd assume to set a good example?

Stay posted, the after photos are on their way.

Twins

Over breakfast today, Rose said she'd name her kids Mike and Amy. The boy first, girl second, unless she can have it longer.

Have what longer, I asked.

Sex. She said. To have twins, you need to have sex longer.

<mom stifles giggles and calmly says> Actually, it is all based on the egg, Rose.

Oh.

Hello stranger

Rose came with PCA hours. PCA = Personal Care Attendant. The state decided Rose's need levels are high enough to mandate the PCA helping us. In our case, Rose was allocated 21 hours per week.

When Rose first joined our family, we thought we wouldn't need those hours. We'd be super parents. We would handle it all. Whoops. Turns out we do need breaks even if we're even ok parents.

So we went ahead and hired our PCA, who is a 19-year-old college student. We get a few breaks throughout the week to help us better parent Rose in good times and bad. It sounds nice, but like everything, it comes with a few gotchas.

The first gotcha. We have a sort of stranger in our house three evenings a week and one weekend day. After a long day at work, usually starting with a 5 a.m. workout, I need to come home and make small talk with a nice girl who is mostly a stranger. The kicker is, after spending a few hours with Rose, she will try to give us advice on how to parent that I try to smile and nod to without rolling my eyes too noticeably.

The second. Getting organized enough to staff a PCA and meet her needs is actually more work, or it feels that way. Right now, she's asking for more hours next week to buffer the loss of hours since Rose will be out of town over MEA. Adding more stranger time to our lives isn't helping my stress levels. Not to mention, it takes away from a family dynamic, which brings me to the third, and most important nuisance, or gotcha.

The third thing that bothers me about having a PCA is I miss spending time with Rose. I realize it's a blessing to have this much help so I voice these complaints knowing others might love to be in our place. Really, I would, too, if it were a family member. It's not though, and we'll get used to this like everything else in the past 9 months. We'll make it work.

Childhood entertainment.

I wanted to upload the zoo photos and stumbled upon the following collection in Rose's camera. I wanted to do a time elapsed type of slide show, but for free software, this was was as close as I could get.

These are photos from 2, maybe 3 short car rides. None of these are duplicates. These are individual portraits she took. Peace seems to be a common theme, and my favorites are the ones where she's cracking herself up.

Rose visits and LOVES the zoo with Uncle Brian

This is mostly a picture post because Rose remembered to take her camera and because she let Uncle Brian include her in photos! For some reason, I can only download one with her in it right now though.

Thanks so much Uncle Brian, if you read this. Rose talked non-stop about the zoo for nearly 2 hours. I hadn't realized she'd never been to the Minnesota Zoo.

Worry

Today I worry about what the world will be like if Rose can't learn to take responsibility for her actions. What her world will be like, constantly seeing herself as a victim.

Rite of passage with a dash of abnormal

Today we took Rose to get her ears pierced. It was a day of pride for all of us because Rose earned the privilege by completing all of her daily care tasks every day for a month.  We allowed one day per week where she could miss one task. She only missed 3 all month. Our calendar in September was so filled with stickers, it was inspiring.

We were going to wait until next weekend, but it filled with plans. So this morning when she woke up in a good mood, we surprised her with the news. Afterward, everything she did seemed to radiate pride and Christmas Day excitement: getting into the car, putting on clothes, and even opening the doors at the mall. Here are her before shots--beaming with pride.

When we got to Claires, she excitedly talked to the clerk about how she'd gotten her ears pierced before, but they got infected. Before the procedure began the stylist asked, "and you're her mom, right?" Rose and I said "Yes" in unison--smiling at eachother.

Then later, when asked more about the first piercing attempt. Rose explained that it got infected because the back fell off and "her mom" bit the end of an eraser off a pencil and used that as a back. I cringed wanting to clarify that was her birth mom, not me, her adoptive mom, but I let it go since the clerk hadn't reacted.

Yet, as we paid, the clerk said quite sternly to NOT use a pencil eraser as a back if we lose the real one. So she had been listening. Thankfully, Rose had left out the part about the eraser staying on until the real back was found when birth mom tightened the back so tight, Rose's ear swelled up and auntie had to pry it off with a pliers. Or that her 4-year-old cousin pierced her Aunt's ears and was really good at it.

I realize these are sad stories, but of course, I worry how long it's gonna take for one of Rose's stories to wind up with someone calling protective services. I don't really care though and think I will happily let people judge me if it saves Rose the embarrassment of saying she's adopted to strangers. Some day I do believe she'll realize these stories aren't the fond memories she's made them into. Which will be hard enough.

Plus, the day was a huge success, and Rose went to bed with joy filling her face. Here are her after photos. She chose her birth stone--December.

Apple Picking

Rose got to play big sister to Lucy and Ben today at the apple orchard. It was her first visit to an apple orchard, and she really loved it.

Ben, however, I'm not sure liked this photo.

Despite my best attempts in Paint, I was unable to remove the strange girl to the left of Rose and Lucy.