Trying to figure it out.

For those of you who want to know what's been going on in the Shoe/Brann clan this is for you. If you don't want to know, stop reading now. Turn back. Do not pass go. The last few months have been crazy and depressing around here. In December the twins' mom got our of jail and I took them to her sister's to visit her. She had been in jail for 3 1/2 mos. more or less so except for two letters there had been no contact with her. When she got out she promised them things were "going to be different". You don't know how many times we have heard those words. She was going to have their older brother and sister. She was going to be living nearby and getting the twins every other weekend like she used to. What did happen was that within two days she had left her older two kids with her sister and moved to Springfield with the boyfriend that she had an order of protection against while she was in jail. Crazy! None of the promises were kept. Which is par for the course. Steven especially has had a horrible time coping with his mother's abandonment as he has always been very loyal to his mom. His behaviour everywhere, at school, at church, at home, has become increasingly alarming and hard to handle. I was going to put down some of the scarey things he has done but decided somethings need to remain silent for his sake. Let me just say that if you knew what he had been doing you would be as worried for him as we are. He has started to refer to me has mommy. Something he never did before and has gone as far as to say that he came out of my tummy, not his mothers. That is how upset he is at her, and at the same time he is upset with himself for being upset with her. We are doing all we can to take care of his problems. Right now he is homeschooling with me b/c his behaviour at school got so bad that they couldn't handle him. His teacher is being kind enough, b/c she is a kind woman, to put together his weekly lessons for us to do at home. We don't know at this point what we're doing for school next year. We will have to see how the summer goes. We have started a new counselor whom we see weekly and I am going to call about some special in home counseling. We went to the Dr. today and they have changed some of his meds around. Hopefully this all helps him. So if you see us and we are acting a bit stressed and unhappy, it's because we are. We are not made of steel. We hurt. We get tired. We, or at least I, cry. Because we love these children and want them to grow up to be healthy, happy adults who can function well in the outside world. We do trust that God will help us, be with us, sustain us, but that does not keep us from sometimes getting down. Remember the saying about walking in someone elses shoes? Well don't judge us til you've walked a mile in ours. We would ask that you pray for the twins, and pray for us. We are on a mountain climb and it is hard getting up there to the top.

The Need For Change

I am not happy with the way things are going right now. I feel like we are swimming against the flow and it is hard to tread water. I feel like we are in this all alone. No one really understands what's going on, including us. We are parents to children who are not our own. Children with many difficulties. Children whose future I feel responsible for, and worry about. I feel very little support from anyone outside my own front door. We are in this fight by ourselves. And it is a scarey and difficult fight. Sometimes I feel that I am doing everything wrong but I know I am doing all I can. Sometimes I wonder if God knew what He was doing when He gave us this responsibility. Of course He did He's God.God is in control and will give us what we need to do what is best for these children. I need to change the way I think. I need to believe that He will give us what we need to give these children what they need. I need to spend more time trusting and less time worrying. I know what I need to do, I just need to do it.

Feeling sad today

I think I really just need to cry but who has time for that? Surely soon it will go away and I'll feel better then I do right now. It's just that sometimes it's so very hard. This job I have been given to do. I love them so much and I try all the time, every  minute of every day to make the right decisions, to do the right thing. Sometimes I just get so tired.

Last night Steven has a major meltdown. He's had a rough few months. He seems to have so many problems. I worry about his future more so than Baileigh. She has her issues but nothing like him. He wanted me to take him to bed. It was Baileigh's turn for me to take her. He does this often and Baileigh usually lets me do it b/c if she doesn't he has a fit. But I didn't want her to do that. I love her too and I sometimes feel that she doesn't get her fair share of me, b/c I'm so busy with Steven. So I told him no, I was going to take her. Dayday would take him. And he threw a fit. He was crying, and screaming, kicking his bedroom wall, thrashing around on the bed. So I went in to try to calm him down. To comfort him. But by then he was beside himself. He wanted me in the room, but he was mad at me and wouldn't let me touch him.

Davey took Baileigh to bed. I sat in his room with him while he screamed that I didn't love him. Don't love him? How can he even think that when I have devoted my entire life to taking care of both of them? Finally we laid down but he was still crying. He couldn't stop. I tried to hold him. He didn't want me to. I told him I loved him. He didn't care.

Then, all of the sudden, like turning on a light switch, he was better. He came and lay close to me and let me touch him and tell him I love him. Then he said he knew I did, he turned over and went to sleep.

And now I am sad. And exhausted. And sad. Did I say that already? See? Even now I'm beginning to be better. :)

One of those nights!

Well, on one hand I think it's good b/c I haven't written on here since October 7th. That's almost two months since I've felt the need to blog and vent. But today was one of those days! Busy busy all day long and then when the twins came home it was busier busier busier. I swear I never sat down til supper time and everyone was having one of those nights. Baileigh had a meltdown and morphed into Baby Baileigh b/c she had a thumb nail that was torn down and needed to be cut. You would have thought we were trying to murder her. She kept crying out; "Put me to sleep! Put me to sleep!", which was kind of funny. I had to hold her while Davey worked on the fingernail. When Steven came in to see what was going on she yelled at him to get out. When I told him to go out of the room he decided that Bay's crying wasn't enough, he needed to get in on the action so he started screaming that we don't love him, we love her more, and he took off out the front door, in his bare feet! I went out after him, tried to talk him in, tried to drag him in, he weighs 77 lbs. I can't drag him in, so I left him for a while. When he didn't come in I finally did drag him in. Then he went in his room and started to bang on his wall with his hammer. Davey tried to talk to him but he wouldn't listen to him so finally Davey left for his board meeting at which time Steven moved into the bathroom where he attempted to lock the door, I hit it with my hip and broke the lock. I guess I'm lucky I didn't break my hip. Then I left him to yell while I went over spelling words with Bay. The next thing I knew he was rolling around on the dining room floor carrying on about "that stupid thing!". I don't know what the stupid thing is, but I sat on the floor with him and finally he quit, said he was sorry, repeatedly like he always does, and came out in the front room to have his snack. Life back to normal. And....I just finished the hot tea I made myself four hours ago. It was cold.

When things go wrong.......

as they sometimes do.
   This is so hard. Sometimes we handle things right, sometimes, not so much. Tonight was a not so much.
Baileigh had been pretty difficult all day long. She gets in these moods where she acts like a mini-teenager.
It worries me to think about what she'll be like when she actually is one if she gets this way now.
I had gone over to Dosh, gone to Dollar General and gotten gas while they were up at the Church mowing with Davey. A little peace and quiet time after our day at Chucke Cheese. 
    Everything was fine when I came home. I brought them both a coloring page for a contest they're having at one of the mini marts.Steven has always been a really good colorer, is that a word?, so Baileigh started saying how he was going to win, and I said that there were a lot of kids entering so the chances of actually winning were slim, but it would be fun anyway. She just went on and on giving Steven a hard time about it.
   Finally she was finished with hers for the night, Davey had gone up to the Church for a minute, or somewhere. He wasn't in the house anyway. Baileigh lay down on the couch and started to go to sleep so I was trying to get her to go change into her pjs and go brush her teeth. She reached out her hand for me to help her up and when she got up I warned her to be careful not to step on Stevens coloring page which was still on the floor. So, of course, Baileigh being Baileigh, she stepped right on it. I smacked her bottom and she was off, yelling at me and saying she hated me and was going to kill me. This was what Davey walked in on.
   And once in a while, the man who never loses his temper, loses his temper, and doesn't handle things as well as he should. Because we all do that from time to time. I do it more often than not. :)  He started trying to strong arm Baileigh, which never works. It just makes her tantrum worse. Then Steven got in on it b/c Davey was being mean to Baileigh. He wasn't being mean. He's never mean. He was just trying to discipline her, but as we both know, but sometimes forget, regular discipline doesn't work well on the twins.
   So, we have one child locked in the bathroom, yes, she locked herself in. Davey sitting in a chair in the dining room, still trying to handle her. Steven's in the front room with me, hands over his ears, yelling at Davey to leave Baileigh alone. And I'm getting upset with Davey b/c he knows this doesn't work.
Finally Davey goes outside. By this time Bay has come down and tells me she's sorry and she loves me. She wants me to rock her to sleep which I do while Steven, who is also calm now, goes to brush his teeth.   
   When Davey comes in he takes her to her bed. Steven hugs him and apologizes and I take him to bed. All is right with the world once more. Except that Davey's not talking to me and I am very, very, tired.

Letter from Mom.

    Today we got a letter from Mom. She is in jail for a few months. I didn't know at first if I really wanted to read it to the twins, but then did because they have the right to know what's going on. It is their life. I was afraid of how it would affect them.
     At first Baileigh was mad. Steven was very quiet. Baileigh has been having anger issues with her mom for a while now. She loves her but she is mad at her. I think both feeling together confuse her, and she doesn't know what to do with her anger so we get it. Thanks. :)  And there were things in the letter that made her angry. Promises her mom made that she finds hard to believe because promises have been made before and not kept, so she doesn't believe they will be kept this time. Why should she?
     The rest of the evening didn't go badly. Steven was fine. Baileigh had some issues but did okay with some extra attention and a large dose of patience.  At bedtime though Steven started crying when I was reading to him. When I asked him why he was crying he said he didn't want to die. I was reading Dr. Seuss, there was no mention of dying so I have no idea where that came from, but he was very upset. I just held him til he stopped crying and went to sleep.
      They did both color pictures for their mother which I will try to mail out tomorrow.
      The whole thing just makes me even sadder. She said she will do better when she gets out. I hope so, but like the children I have heard these promises before and find it hard to believe. I, like the children, would like to believe, but I'm afraid it will have to be proved to be believed. Words are easy. Actions, more difficult.

It makes me sad. :(

     I really never thought it would go like this. I wanted to believe that it would be different. That, when faced with the choice, they would choose their children, but they didn't.  I try to tell myself that they didn't do it on purpose, that it's because of their life circumstances, that it's because of their problems, but I just can't do it.
     There have been people who have said that I wanted this. I wanted the twins to be mine. That's just not true. I love the twins. We love the twins. And we do want them, now.  But, it was not planned.
     What I wanted, all those years ago, was for just one, either one, of their parents, to step up and be the Mom or Dad that all the children needed them to be. And it didn't happen.
     So here we are, 8 years later, and everything is still as messed up as it was in the beginning. And, now, because of the bad choices their parents have made, all the children are having problems as well.
     I don't have a lot more to say. Because it really doesn't matter what I say, nothing changes. We will continue to do what we have been doing for the last 8 years. We will love and care for the twins, and try to raise them to be different. Try to teach them to make good choices. Adults, parents, need to realize that the choices they make don't only effect them, they effect their children, and all those involved.