Fostering The Love In Kansas

This blog post started a lot differently a few days ago. I had some hope that I was going to be making a decision not based on emotion but rather one based on facts only.  But after the last few days, I know that my decision has been based on both emotions and facts. But mostly, it has shown me that my gut needs to be listened to. Lately, it has been hard.  Hell, the last couple of months have been hard.  And it's not because of any one thing.  The biggest thing is that I haven't been able to work a full week of work for MONTHS because of Little Man. Between his therapies, school, and appointments.  But the biggest is the amount of mental strain I've been feeling with him and school. Monday I pulled Little Man from school.  I will not be sending him back. This has been building and building.  Jay and I have talked about what Little Man's future will look like - education-wise - once his adoption is finalized and we've always leaned towards homeschooling because

Part of being a foster parent is knowing that the kids that come into our homes have a base level of trauma.  That's just, out of the gate, trauma due to removal.  But then there comes the trauma with the background a lot of the kids come from.  The domestic violence, substance abuse, neglect, etc - it all causes trauma.  We're warned about this trauma but I know in my case, I was never trained for trauma.  I was never trained for the heartbreak that comes with loving a child with trauma. I was never trained to find the help my kiddos need.  I was never trained on how to parent a child with special needs. I never knew this was what I was signing up for. But the damage is done. I have a child with special needs.  And the damage is already done to him.  The more I learn about him and his disabilities, the more I know I was put in his path so we both would find what we needed. The damage done to my Little Man is not repairable.  These last few months have been ones of ups an

I know that the last school year was one of immense trauma and frustration. Not just for Little Man but for his school too.  There was such a lack of knowledge on trauma (and now we know autism) that it caused so much stress for me. But we also were winding down on visits with bio family and so there was a lot of emotions swirling around. I had higher hopes this year because his whole SPED team was new and seems to be much more experienced.  Visits were done, we had a more stable environment outside of school. But the issues with lack of training and knowledge still plague the team. And not to pretend that Little Man is innocent in this, his behaviors have escalated.  His triggers have changed and gotten harder to determine. Not to mention, he could start off having a great day and easily spiral out of control if any part of his day changes. The thing is, we spent the last 3 school years working really hard to get him academically up to par (and excelling in some areas) that now