The Adventures of Adoption and Parenthood

Yesterday, as I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed a voter for the President-Elect told those who didn't vote for him to "suck it up and put away your safety pins." Well, I ask you, if the claim is that the President-Elect is not racist or xenophobic, as many of his supporters claim, and the majority of his supporters aren't either, as they claim, then why aren't they too wearing safety pins. There are people in this country who are very afraid. They have brown skin. Their children are being bullied in the schoolyard. White men are shouting at them in the streets. They are being beaten. They are being molested. They are told to go back where they came from. Hate crimes are up. There are people in this country who are very afraid. They are disabled. There are members of the President-Elect's cabinet who have been quoted as saying that the problem with American education is that the disabled go to school. They are treated as sub-human. Hate crime...

*** Spoiler Alert - I may give away some things, so don't read if you haven't watched *** The new show on NBC, This is Us, is resonating with the adoption community, particularly those families who are transracial.  In the last 2 episodes, Randall, the adopted black son who completes the "triplets" in the family, discovers that his mother knew his birth father since the day she left the hospital. Randall struggles mightily with this knowledge and his identity as a result. The show focuses on Randall's struggles and just touches on his mother's agony. It's clear that she was wrong from the outset. And there is very little sympathy spared for her in the show. It's Randall we are worried about. Last night I laid in bed in a puddle of tears as I watched the latest episode where Randall works through his feelings as best as he can with the help of a trippy mushroom shake. We see his memories of his dad working so hard to give him the foundation he ne...

Dear Elected Officials: I write to you today with growing concern over the talks of repealing the Affordable Care Act. There is no doubt that some things with the law are not working as intended, but there are many things that are working in the law. A repeal would hurt millions of working Americans financially and medically. Medical care is expensive even with the Affordable Care Act, but a repeal would make it wholly unaffordable for millions. Families would be forced to make the difficult decisions between putting food on the table or purchasing much needed medicines; going to the doctor or paying the rent. Millions will literally risk deteriorating health conditions because they have to keep a roof over their heads and food in their children’s bellies.  Juliana at age 18 months I want to tell you a story about my youngest child. Her name is Juliana and she is 4 years old. My husband and I adopted her from China when she was 20 months old.  At that age, she c...

It took me a long time to figure out that I was a special needs parent. I don't know if it was denial or if I just felt that my kids's collective issues didn't really count because my friends with special needs kids seem to have much more severe needs than mine. But it dawned on me in the last few days that I am a special needs parent. And a certain amount of grief goes along with that. Not for me. It's not a pity party kind of thing. But as you watch your kids list of special needs grow and grow and the list of their medical professionals grow and grow and the daily diary you track of various things grow and grow, you wonder when it will stop. When will they stabilize? When will the list of growing symptoms stop? When will the puzzle begin to come together? How much more pain does my child have to go through? Segunda, as you know if you follow this blog, has Hypophosphatasia, which is a metabolic bone disease. It's progressive. Her symptoms are: Curved long bo...

The Cost of Medical Care is many-fold isn't it? It's not just what you shell out of your bank account. It's the hours and hours spent working with billing offices and insurance companies and third party advocates. It's the upset stomach and splitting headache when you take another call from another physician's office asking for another evaluation for your child or your spouse or you and knowing that you have to put on your boxing gloves and head to the mattresses. It's hours and hours and days and days of missed work to shuttle your child, spouse or you to the appointments they have. Our youngest child has two rare bone diseases. One of them affects her metabolic system as well as her bones. This disease is called hypophosphatasia. We have learned about it little by little because it is very rare. Mostly what we have learned has been anecdotal from the amazing patient community who so willingly shares their experiences with the disease and the burgeoning tr...

3:47 a.m. Segunda starts in with the sugar vomits. I grab her and fly out of bed and we make it to the toilet. There she stands hugging the bowl, hair in her face, vomiting up bile. "Mama, my hair all wet." I wiped her face with a wet cloth and held her hair out of her face until she was done. "Sorry, Mama." Do you want to feel small? Listen to your toddler apologize to you for throwing up. It is disconcerting to stand over your 3, almost 4, year old holding her hair like she is a drunken sorority girl in the wee hours of the morning. "Mama, my belly button hurt." "Are you hungry?" Nods head. We headed downstairs where she took baby sips of Glucerna and ate two teensy bites of dry toast. She promptly threw up again. "Mama, want go up tayahs." Husband laid out a beach towel on the bed just in case. She threw up one more time in the toilet and then slept for an hour and a half. Meanwhile, I laid in bed and cried and cried an...

There are advantages to waiting to have kids until you are older. You can afford all of the lessons that they want. You can go on vacation. You can contribute to your 401(k). And if you're really lucky, you can save for your kids to go to college. Before I launch into the downsides, I have to apologize for all of this. I feel guilty even having problems with what is going on in the world and in particularly the US. It's appalling. So, I'm sorry. But here goes ... Having kids when you are older means that you go through perimenopause when your youngest child is a toddler. Having a threenager and a menopausal woman in the house at the same time is a recipe for disaster. My particular threenager is VERY destructive. She draws on everything. Let me repeat that. She. Draws. On. Everything. Couch, table, floor, chairs, ottoman, wall. She used to have an easel and she spent her time drawing on everything but. She has coloring books and colors on the chairs instead. She has...