Prior to our grandsons coming to live with us through Child Protective Services, they spent two weeks with a foster family. The foster family took really good care of them and sent them both off with a book of memories to share with our family. These books contained a schedule of what the boys did on a daily basis, doctor visits, dental visits and what the boys liked to eat. The foster family even included pictures from Easter Sunday which included an egg hunt. These books read like a manual on how to ensure our grandsons happiness. There was something huge missing from the books, how were the boys adjusting to being away from their parents. All questions have answers and unfortunately for us the answers would be coming to us sooner than we were ready for them.
Since these were our grandsons we were under the impression that they would come live with us and all would be well. We had no idea just how wrong we were until one afternoon at naptime. Both grandsons were put down for a nap. Instead of taking naps the boys began to fight and both end up in tears. So we go into their room to find out what is going on with them to find that the youngest grandson has a gash on his cheek and the older grandson standing in the center of the floor staring out the window. We asked what happened but since my oldest grandson's speech is unclear we didn't get an answered we understood. The youngest grandson ended up with stitches in his face and from that day forward our grandsons had separate naps. This told us that the honeymoon was over.
That moment in time was a snapshot of life with the boys. We were heading to get to a moment where we would honestly consider having the state come back and get the boys. We came face to face with feces smearing and had no idea how to deal with it. The boys room is my former home office. I had moved much of my things out of the office but still saw that room as my office. That changed when my oldest grandson painted the carpet and walls with feces. We would have many episodes of fecal smearing but the one that had us on the edge of giving up was when my grandson literally pooped on the carpet like an animal. At this point we had people coming out to see the boys and check on their behaviors and they too were at a loss. Our faith in God is what kept the boys with us because if we made the decision they would have left long time ago. We also started working on becoming licensed kinship foster parents. Sharing our experiences with the boys and learning about what children experience in foster care helped us become more patient and to begin looking at the boys living with us in a different light. We began to see the silver lining in the big dark cloud and that was great for all of us.
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