The Five Little Ducks Blog

One week ago, we made the final trek out to our nieces’ foster carers’ house and brought them home.

Since then, I have tried to write a couple of times, but I struggled to find the words that adequately summarised how I am feeling. So here goes.

I knew in my head that this was going to be hard. Living it is different. I had imagined collapsing in a heap and crying once the girls moved in, but that has not happened yet. I suppose that is a good sign. I had imagined that Miss A and Miss L might hate us and have difficulty learning to trust us or even like us, but they have been OK. Of all of us, our new daughters have probably had the easiest time adjusting to the placement. The cracks are showing elsewhere.

My husband makes jokes constantly about needing alcohol. I can see that he is struggling to learn to love the girls and to be patient with them. Mr E, who used to be such a sensitive, difficult child has miraculously grown up in the last few months and is the easiest child to manage in the house. I miss him. I feel like I barely get to see, play or talk with him all day. Perhaps he is coping because he has kept his position as the “top dog”, eldest child. He seems content in himself. Miss R, my beautiful two year old daughter who was the sunshine of my life is falling apart. She adores her new sisters and has enjoyed playing with them from morning to night, but she has been bumped from my firstborn daughter to my third. Today she could not stop hitting Miss A and Miss L, even when unprovoked. I keep having to sit her in the timeout chair as a consequence for hurting others, but my heart is hurting for her.

How am I coping? When I got up last Wednesday, after Miss A had only slept 6 hours the night before and had constantly had me up and down; internally I was a wreck. I did not want to show these girls love. I regretted my foolish, naive, noble heart ever allowing me to do this. I wanted to send them back, knowing that their lives could be ruined forever. I felt like all the joy had gone out of my life. Thankfully Miss A needed her 4 year old vaccine so my husband took her out for a couple of hours, and as I played with the other three children, I realised that it was going to be OK. Once our nieces started daycare, I would get breaks, and have time to breathe and rest. I had been praying that God would give me a real mother’s love for these children. Now I pray that God will give me His love for them. I have to choose to love these girls, and one day the real thing will come.

I have found that looking for things that I “like” about our nieces is helpful. Miss A can often be heard singing to herself. As a singer myself, I can appreciate this, even if it is the same lines from “Let it go” or “Baa Baa Black Sheep” repeatedly. Miss L has a funny “Cookie Monster” voice that she uses sometimes when she is grumpy, or when she says “Ok, mummy!” I like kids to show a little bit of pluck. When she bursts into tears at bedtime, I genuinely feel sorry for her. How many beds has she slept in, or houses has she lived in, or carers has she wanted to call “mummy”? She is a fairly happy child, but there must be turbulence in her little soul. Miss A is prone to sulking when I give her an answer she does not like or I ask her for help that she does not want to give. I have found that ignoring the sulking completely is the best thing to do, and that she bounces back fairly quickly. A couple of times when I have upset her, she has “punished ” me by pulling out the hair-do I have lovingly done for her (she usually requests “Elsa” hair for a single plait and “Anna” hair for two plaits).  Miss R always hated me brushing or trying to pull her hair back, but now that she has two sisters, she happily joins the queue to have her hair done. I think that this is becoming a special time for the girls as they sit on my lap to have their hair styled.

Today the girls have gone to a contact visit with their maternal grandparents. I have been counting down the days to this visit because I knew that I would have about four hours of peace. One of the things that I have found hardest about these children is that they never zone out or switch off. My children are happy to potter around entertaining themselves. Mr E can become quite immersed in imaginary worlds. He is allowed to watch TV once a day, and for the duration of a movie or program, he is completely engaged. Miss A and Miss L appreciate having the TV on but they lose interest very quickly and seem to only want it on in the background. They rarely sit to focus on a game. They enjoy playing outside, which I love, but a minute barely passes before I have to go and investigate the cause of tears. Sydney has also been hit by an early summer season. We live in a fibro house on a busy street with a large, sunny yard with no trees. Perhaps the heat is bothering me. Perhaps the heat is bothering all of us.

Miss A had been really looking forward to her contact with her grandparents. She chose paintings to give them, we made muffins together for her to share with them, we talked pleasantly about the upcoming visit. Today she realised that I would not be attending the visit with her and she became very upset, saying she did not want to go. She told me that she wanted to stay here with me forever. She still went to the visit without too much drama.

I know that our home is the best place for these girls to be. I believe that one day, it will all work out. We just have to live one day at a time.