Read at Your Own Risk

This is what you get when I don't post for a while - a really longgggg post.
There's a lot bouncing around in my mind so I'm dumping a portion of it onto the computer.

I haven't been very good about blogging lately. The time at which I'm writing this post (5:30am) tells you a little about the quiet time I have on the computer. I'll only have until the first kid wakes up and then it's time to really start the day.

The last few weeks have been challenging. The summer is always interesting with the mix of kids we have at our house and the schedules and activities they have. Right now, in addition to what I consider regular summer chaos, Zeke has been having severe attitude issues for the past 2 weeks or so. I'm not sure if it's because we're not on a regular routine, or because of the visit with biological family, or just a phase he's going through, or something altogether different. I basically can't let him out of my sight. He's been getting into physical altercations and stealing things from other people - including, but not limited to, going through other kids' bags and lockers at Boys & Girls Club. At home it's even worse. He refuses to do almost everything he's supposed to and gets physically violent when he doesn't get his way. We haven't seen this kind of long-term behavior for years. At the risk of sounding selfish, it's really tiring to have to spend 24/7 on constant Zeke supervision so he doesn't hurt himself or someone else, especially with all the other kids. Fortunately, he loves the baby so even at his most violent moments, he'll turn and smile at her then turn back to me and start kicking and screaming. This is definitely not the normal Zeke.

It reminds me of the time about a year after the boys came to live with us. My niece was graduating from high school in Florida. We wanted to go but knew the little boys would have trouble with all the transitions, plus we were driving there and back. So my folks offered to stay at our house with Zeke (age 5 1/2) and Anthony (age 3) so they could remain on the same schedules and sleep in their own beds. Because my parents were still working, they had some people the boys knew come over during the afternoons.

Everything was going really well and we were a few days into our trip when I got a phone call from my mom. Our friend, Becky Hunter, was coming over the next afternoon, and being the good grandma and counselor that she is, my mom tried to let the boys know what to expect the following day. She asked them if it would be fun if Becky came over to play with them the next day. My loving, snuggling, grandma-adoring boys immediately started pushing, kicking, screaming, and fighting my mom.  I think Anthony even tried to bite her. She was really confused until we realized that their bio mom's name is Becky. After discussion with me via phone about the issue, she returned to the boys and asked if they would like to play with Mrs. Hunter tomorrow instead. They immediately calmed down and the next day went fine.

(Note: We've never said anything negative about the boys' birth mom or dad, nor do we mention them to Zeke and Anthony. Other than the emotional reactions we've witnessed repeatedly, we have doctors' documention that Anthony had a skull fracture around 9 months of age and Zeke had multiple physical marks on his face and body. Riley is a different story because it appears he wasn't physically abused so all his memories involve what he saw but not anything that was done to him. He asks me a lot of questions and I try to answer them to the best of my ability.)

All that being said, I'm having a personal delimma on how much/what contact should be had by our children with their birth parents. My first priority is to protect my children, not just physically but emotionally as well, to the best of my ability. We (our entire family) has developed relationships with various members of the boys' biological family. They're healthy relationships for the boys and give them birth family connections. Plus, we just really like spending time with them. Up to this point, we've been able to keep the connection limited to extended family. But the closer we get to the family, the harder it is to keep portions of the family separate. For example, Grandpa Al's funeral.

When we were at Grandma Lori's, Riley was wandering around looking at and into everything. Knowing him well, I was pretty sure what he was looking for. But I asked him anyway. "Riley, what's up?"
He then asked if there were any pictures of his old mom. I talked to Grandma Lori and said it was ok if he saw some so we went into the back office with only Riley and she pulled up a picture on the computer. He stared at it for a few seconds, then shook his head and matter-of-factly said, "Doesn't look familiar."
Then he pushed the button to scroll through other pictures.

Anyway, you can see my delimma. I'm perfectly aware that their mom wants to see them. I'm also perfectly aware that she hurt them, not just physically, but by not doing what she needed to do to get them back when it was still possible to do so. Little kids (and sometimes even adults) don't understand why a mom wouldn't do everything possible to get her children back. I'm not talking about issues beyond someone's control, I'm talking about making lifestyle changes to show that your kids are important to you and that you want to nurture and protect them.

I am really good at "reading" people. At the risk of sounding really weird, I can look into their eyes and see into their personalities. I'd really like to sit down face-to-face with the boys' birthmom and talk to her. At this point, I need to know if contact with her will help or hurt my kids. And we've come too far with the boys to go backwards.
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