Adjustments

Four months and two weeks and still no consistency for my LS. No one expects to hear from birth mom even after she's released from prison; and LS holds firm in her desire to never be with the person who has caused the most trauma and hurt in her young life.

Birth dad, who has only had sporadic contact with LS, but is someone who is stable - has a job, a home, a fiance' - is being considered the primary permanent placement resource. In order to establish a strong parent-child bond, visitation was increased from every other week to every week and the venue modified from an office setting to a more relaxed and natural community setting. Additionally, the location of the visits was changed to be more local to dad - about a ten minute commute from his place of employment - since there were claims that both location and traffic caused him to miss previous visits. All these adjustments were made to move toward a positive outcome of family reunification.

Increases in and variations to the visitation plan made it necessary to involve another team player - a visitation social worker whose sole responsibility is to schedule, facilitate, and supervise the visits. Because the distance between our home and the visitation site is now much greater, and the time has been modified to fit dad's schedule, and because there are other children in our home with appointments and commitments; it was impossible to adjust our family schedule so that I could be the transporter to and from visits (as well as have a bit of face-to-face interaction with LS's dad.) This was an adjustment that was unwelcome since I prefer to drive my children where they need to go and journey with them through whatever-the-situation.

Yesterday's scheduled visit was a perfect "case in point." After picking up LS and driving ninety minutes to the visitation location, the case worker called to say that dad was not going to make it to the visit; some reason was given, the case worker spent some fun time with LS, then put her back into the car for ninety more minutes to return home. This was another unforeseen adjustment, and one for which we hadn't planned. Removing the potential barriers - distance, time, location, travel time, traffic - (and in the process requiring everyone involved to adjust) was supposed to alleviate cancelled or missed visits, of which we had had many opportunities to contend with early on. At those times, I was there with LS; I was the one to hug her in the waiting room, the one to hold her hand as we walked to the car to head back home, the one to reassure her that her daddy would be able to receive the picture she'd colored "just for him" the next time, the one to stop for milkshakes to drown our sorrows.

This morning it became apparent that the bulk of the adjusting had fallen on the very small shoulders of our LS. Her usually perky and smiley self, was today replaced with a sulky and sad-faced little girl. Dressing, packing up, eating, teeth-brushing all took much prompting; her mind seemed to be somewhere far away. Behaviors - the mildest of which was finding her poking around two of her brothers' bedrooms (which are strictly off limits to the girls) while she was to be in the bathroom - unusual for her, and the equally unusual denial of poor choices and just flat out defiance, became obvious signs of distress.

While it is one thing to make changes and expect adults to adjust and function, it is an entirely different - and unacceptable (at least to this mom) - demand to place on a small child who has made uncountable adjustments already in a very short time.

This cannot continue. And if it does, if my LS is called upon to suffer any more, those in authority are the ones who are going to have to adjust to this irritated momma bear.