The roller coaster

Lately I've been thinking about how prepared I was to bring two children into our family. The answer...not very. After a rough week with one of the kids, I realized that I underestimated the challenges that we would face. I had done enough research to know what could happen, but I had not considered the possibility that it would happen more than once.

I'll explain.

When we picked up the boys this summer, we knew that there would be a lot of potential adjustment issues for our entire family. In my mind, we would fight through the difficult times and, after a period of time, we would be a cohesive family unit. What I was not expecting was the roller coaster. The ups and downs. Finally feeling like we'd made it through the worst, only to see one or more of the kids regress.

Talk about feeling defeated. I questioned what we had been doing. I grasped at straws to figure out a new approach.

What finally worked was to completely change how I handled each child. I started reading a great book (Raising Your Spirited Child) and took some of their suggestions to heart. I paid very close attention to the triggers for each child and worked to prevent outbursts before they started. It doesn't always work, but things have gotten much better. The other solution...time. As more time goes by, we will better understand each child and their needs.

I do wish that we had known that we'd live on a roller coaster for awhile. When social workers talked to us about the transition period, it would have been helpful to know that we would have periods of peace in between the extreme chaos. It wasn't until a few weeks ago, when I talked with another adoptive couple, that my experience was validated and I learned that it would not be a hill to climb so much as a mountain range to get past.

You know what though, it will get better. It already has. One day, we'll look back and realize that this is simply a blip in our family story.