Making Observations and Getting Validations

While we were in Sacramento, we made some contact with various people connected with the boys. Their "adoption social worker" called, as did Thing 1's counselor. We heard from their county worker as well.

We met with the adoption social worker. She came over a couple of days after we got back home. The first thing I did was relate a bit about the issues we had had, particularly with the tantrums. She said that, yes, that was an issue with him at a previous home as well. She seemed surprised we didn't have any history there. I let her know that any time I mentioned it to FFA staff, they seemed dismissive or surprised that he was acting like that. The worker stated that if kids fell on a scale from 1 to 10 of easy to hard, our boys would be 8s or 9s. I don't know why, but I felt so much better after she said that.

We also met with the counselor. He, too, confirmed the tantrums and the issues with obsessive behaviors. He noted that, as we would have a bio mom visit during the next month, we might experience some behavioral issues. Mom, he said, is a very unsafe entity and her presence makes Thing 1 uneasy. Not that he doesn't love her, but he acts out and mom doesn't really have good skills for dealing with them even for a short visit. He said his goal was primarily to work with us on how to work with him.

We were making lots of observations. Like, Thing 2 only really likes to eat cheese and bananas and he walks on his toes. A lot. Which really worried me. Thing 2 would claim he was hungry all the time, but most especially when he was asked to do something. He also asks questions, but not the way I have experienced before with nieces and friends kids. He would ask the exact same question over and over, with the same inflection and tone akin to panic, regardless of the question. We finally had to start telling him that the question has been answered and we weren't going to answer it again.

Thing 2 ran from me on a regular basis. Once, with friends over, we had all the kids playing in the yard. He watched us, growing steadily closer to the edge of the back yard. When he seemed to determine that we were too far to catch him, he bolted. I chased him down but couldn't catch him until he reached the neighbor's yard--across the street. He also had almost no language. He could understand us, but he mainly only could say "no wan' that" and nod or shake his head.