[zebramom]

I'm me. Married 17, almost 18 years. YIKES!

We have a son age 13, adopted from foster care 8 years ago, and a new daughter 5, coming to us from a disrupted adoption.

I am a big time advocate for kids, and like Crick, I never shut up. Love ya Cricky.

As you can tell by my signature, I blog on the Foster Adoption blog.

We live with the alphabet soup diagnosis here, and my 13 year old is in treatment foster care right now after 2 residential treatment center placements.

[blondeboss]

Hi my name is Stephanie. My husband and I have been married 12 years this month. We waited to have a family for 10 years due to infertility and lack of money. When we were ready we decided to adopt than to take the gamble of treating the infertility(never had a cause, everything is "normal"). We adopted through Foster Care.Our boys arrived in 2005 and were adopted last July,2006. What a ride it has been.
Our oldest is 10 with a wide range of emotional problems. He was labled Cogn. Impaired with an IQ of 52. Wow were they wrong!They were severly neglected, so no one ever worked with him. He was also extremely lazy. (Was not even potty trained until 7 years old when taken into care.) Now 11/2 years later he is in a reg. classroom and even on the honor Roll!!!!He still has an IEP but we have learned a person can fake an IQ test if they are unwilling to cooperate.(the school did not think so)He has a fire fascination as well. Has burned down at least 1 bio families home in the past.(poss. 2 or 3) Tried to burn down ours last Fall. Ended up setting shirt on fire. 3rd degree burns on abdomin with a skin graft. (we were completely unaware of this past till adoption day. Still wouldn't have changed our mind though.) Oh yea, we found over a dozen burnt matches in our house, melted in the carpet, but none caught fire.We believe God was protecting us!!!! We see a great Psychologist now, thanks to our children's hosp.
Our 5 year old is a complete delight. Not nearly the complications as his older Brother. He was removed from home a lot younger and I believe it shows.
Well I wrote a lot, sorry. Love to share story and hopefully help anyone who needs support. Bottom Line- as scary as these kids can be, they need us!

[feathermom]

Hi all! I'm new to the forum and was looking for a group that specifically deal with old kids. My family recently( one week ago today) was awarded custody of my 13 year old newphew. He has ADHD and Oppositional Defiant Disorder. He also has extreme distrust of and disrespect toward women due to issues with his bioM over the years. As we did not have to go through the licensing process because this is a relative placement, I haven't been through any formal or even informal training. I once thought I was a great mom (have 2 sons, 21 & 17 and a 12 yr old stepdaughter), however I am now feeling like I'm demanding too much and am under constant stress. Gosh, and it's only been a week.

Calgon...take me away!!!

[GivingHope]

My name is Rena, my husband and I have been married for 15 yrs on Sept 13th.

Our daughter, Desirea is 23yrs old. She was the easy one. She is the proud mom to our grand daughter, A'Kylea who is 1 1/2 yrs old.

Our son, Kyle was 14yrs old when he passed away 2 1/2 yrs ago in an accident. He was ADHD and a hand full. We were always having to find new ways to keep him busy. His love was baseball.

Our nieces lived with us as foster children for 9 months in 2001. They were reunified with their father.

We are just about done with our home study. Looking to adopt siblings 3 - 7 yrs old.

[feathermom]

Here's the rest about my family.

I'm newly married. We're rapidly approaching our 1 year anniversary on 9/12. I have 2 bio sons, 21 & 17, who are the lights of my life, along with my 12 year old stepdaughter. It's so awesome to have a wonderful family and have another girl in the mix.

In January my brother asked me and my husband if we would become guardians of his son. Very, very long story but "S" is now here. He's 13, has been in foster care for approximately 4 years.

We've also got 2 dogs and a cat in the mix in our house.

Who said life's not fun?

[scandi]

HI, I adopted both my boys from Texas foster care. I am in MN. I am a single parent. Both have RAD and PTSD but varying degrees. My oldest came home at 6 1/2 and my youngest (with one disupted adoption) came home at age 4/12. Looking to add again to my family. Waiting for info on another child from Texas.

Both myself and my older son love to scrap book. My youngest is the entertainer.

[cpipitone]

I have been married 18 years. We have one BS who just turned 15 and is mildly Asperger. We also have one AD who is 12 and pick a label - it's been on her. Besides ADHD/ADD, PTSD, Bi-polar, Anxiety, Depression, OCD, budding borderline personality disorder, her big one is RAD.

She came to us two years ago and we finalized May of 2006. It is still a very bumpy ride.

[sunnyandi13]

Hi, I'm Andrea, married to a wonderful DH for 9 years this month and fmom currently to a 9yr old boy and (almost) 11 yr old girl. We have just been assigned an adoption worker, after fostering our two for over a year. TPR has been completed and we've given our intent to adopt. Don't expect finalization to occur before the new year.

Both ours have PTSD, AD and suffer effects from horrible neglect and abuse. After being bounced around in relative care for 5 years, we're the longest home they've had in their short lives, so needless to say our biggest struggle is learning how to live as a cohesive family. Every day is a challenge, some days it is a ray of light, other days it's a freight train at the end of my tunnel, but we take it one day at a time.

I'm also "mom" to a dog, a turtle and a few fish.

[PabloandCarlosMama]

Hi, I've been lurking on this forum for several weeks now, and wanted to introduce myself and family. I'm a single parent/new mom in Minnesota. I adopted my sons, ages 8 and 12, from Guatemala, and we've been together for almost seven months. We are dealing with attachment issues and all kinds of issues. This summer, my older son spent five weeks in the hospital for depression, PTSD, RAD, and is now in residential treatment. We have a long road ahead of us, but things are moving in the right direction. My younger son is also working with a therapist, and is building attachment with me.

I've been learning a lot from your posts, so thanks for being online.

[Mkuhlmann06]

Im Michelle and have been married almost 18 months. T was placed with us as a preadoptive placement in July. He came with ODD and mood disorder, however during the 6 week transition and the past 6 weeks in our home, we haven't seen behaviors exhibited for either of those diagnosis. We know we're still honeymooning... but he is doing well at school, he's on no meds, he's making friends, and starting to attach. So we'll see...we're hopeful, but waiting for the explosion...

[4mykidz]

My husband and I have been married for almost 10 years. He has a bio Daughter 22 and a bio Son 18, I have a bio Daughter 17 whom he adopted when she was 11. Together we fostered and adopted and adopted 3 kids. I work full time and he is a stay at home dad.

Our son J came when he was 12, finalized at 13. He is RAD, has FAE, serious depression issues, ODD, and has been a huge challenge. He is currently living in a residential military school and doing better. He will be returning home on December 8th.

S came home at age 6, finalized at 8. We were her 7th placement, some foster and some adopt. We very nearly gave up on her several times. She is Bipolar with FAS, and had terrible violent rages until we finally found meds that helped. She is still a major challenge.

D was 4 when he came to us and is S bio sib. We pursued him a year and a half after S came to us because we found out his adoption placement disrupted. We were his 6th placement, 4 of which were supposed to be adoptions. He is also Bipolar and ADHD. He was very likely drug and alcohol exposed in utero, but does not have any of the symptoms like S does, at least not yet. Finalized on him last August.

We are closing out our foster license for now. I hope to do foster care again, but not for several years. My plate is very full.

[pshamrick]

I'm Pam, grandmother of 15 at age 50.
Of the 15, I am raising 3 full time, working full time and usually pulling my hair out full time.

I raise D. from newborn to age 5 when he joined his daddy just out of the Navy. D is happy, but wants to come back to me. His dad says no, so we just have to live with it. He's 10 now, lives 250 miles away and I get him one weekend out of every month. I do the driving both ways.

I have B. age 11. He came to us 12/26/06 and has ADHD, FAS and ODD. We are learning each other and are now getting along fine. We have set backs when he sees his parents. He understand much more than most kids, but still believes he is going back to them.

I have A. age 4. She is Bio to the 11 yr old. She came on 12/26/06has ADHD, FAS and ODD. We are still struggling with the ODD. She is fine as long as she doesn't see her parents. She don't want to go back to her parents.

I also have K. 3mo She is the Bio to both the 11yr and 4 yr. We've had her since day 2 when we picked her up from the hospital. She really don't know the parents. We can tell that she is FAS. We expected it because we knew the mother was drinking and taking drugs the first 4 months of preg.

These three have 2 hrs parents visits on Wed. and Sat. and on Sunday get another 4-6 hours that they are not taking advantage of. They say the 30 minute drive is too far. We go back to court in Jan (with me on DSS's side) to get FULL CUSTODY and maybe ADOPTION.

Since things have smoothed out, I am withdrawing from the everyday chat. I will probably hit bumps and peek back in from time to time. All of your advice has been very helpful and I really needed it because I didn't know how deep the water was or about the sharks. THANKS AGAIN FOR YOUR HELP.

[momraine]

I have been married 15 years and the rest is in my sig. My youngest is RAD and has an eating disorder and so we are in intesnsive therapy right now to deal with that, he and I are staying close to the hospital for the next few weeks to get through the program.

[Bippette]

I'm moving over here. Here's a list of my kiddos


F - Boy - Age 9, came to us at age 3, adopted at age 6. Rx of ODD and Bipolar and attachment issues.

L - Girl - Age 8, came to us at age 2. Bio sis to F. Rx of attachment issues.

M - Girl - Age 5, came to us at 4 days old, adopted at 13 months. My one "easy" kid.

C - Girl - Age 4, our only bio. She was a surprise as we were not supposed to be able to have bio kids. She's profoundly gifted, and this makes her VERY difficult to parent.

J - Boy - Age 18. Came to us 3 months ago. Had AML leukemia when he was 15. His Mom moved to another state shortly after he went into remission and wouldn't take him with her. He's been living with various families the last two years. They let him live there, but didn't parent him. He asked to live with us 3 months ago, and its been a roller coaster. He has a 15% chance of living to be 20 years old, and he came to us addicted to Marijuana. He's in rehab, personal counseling once a week and family counseling every two weeks. I love him to pieces, but he rips my heart out on a fairly regular basis.

[crick]

Welcome! Did you move far!

As you no doubt hear all the time and want to smack em when they say it..."you have your hands full don't you honey?" *ducking*...