Our Guestblogger today is Marjorie Shaw an adoptee in a closed domestic adoption. This is the autobiography of her search for her lost self as an adoptee in a closed adoption. We are delighted that she has given us the opportunity to post her manuscript on our website in segments on Mondays and Fridays. © 2006 All rights reserved

Chapter Twenty- Eight - The Final Chapter - “A Family Found” (continued from here)

Judy forwarded another email she received from the wife of my second cousin in LaCrosse.

Hi Everyone,

I hope I have these email addresses correct. (I think I should keep them outside the computer, because I tend to lose what might be more current.) We did not know that Bob was in the hospital and would continue to live on 7th floor until his death. The last we talked to him was in June. (We always sent him the Cubs baseball schedule and then he called to say, "Thanks". His voice sounded strong, as it always was rather booming. We talked quite a while and he turned down my offer to bring him some meals. He used to go to the Arterial Bar/Restaurant to buy his "tickets" for football and baseball. He was always there on a Wed. a.m. and enjoyed visiting with his cronies. He would leave with a quart jar of home made soup. (The reason I know this is that an investment club that I was in met at 8:00 a.m. once a month on a Wed.} After I resigned from the club, we only kept in touch with an occasional call to him or from Rick. In June when we talked, he said that the owner of the restaurant brought soup to him at home (Charles St.). He felt he was well watched over by neighbors, St. James priests, and the kind minister down the street.

I have written several times over the past few months about the stress of parenting an adopted child with special needs. My adopted child has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as well as across-the-board learning disabilities. The combination has made third grade just oodles of fun. Right now, dealing with my special needs adopted child’s many issues is the largest stressor in my life.

We have now reached the halfway point of third grade, and things are not looking good. I spend an hour on homework with him each day, and I have to walk him through every single step because of his learning disabilities. He cannot read long passages or process multi-step questions. He also reads by the word, not the phrase, and frequently “forgets” what he read by the time he gets to the end of the paragraph.

Saturday night I saw down with my family to watch a biopic for Temple Grandin. I have been reading about Dr Template Grandin for years and years. I expected to love it ... and I did. It is a must-see movie.

Temple is a highly successful 62-year old woman with autism. She invented a career for herself in the cattle industry. She has transformed how autism is seen and how cows (and many other prey animals) are handled.

The movie quickly moved from "4-year old Temple being diagnosed with autism" to "33-year old Temple with a masters degree  in animal science."  

Sensory integration disorder was clearly explained. This is such a hard issue for people to understand. I still remember issues that happened in first grade. So I explained SID to Natasha's  first grade teacher. Seriously... the teacher thought that I was making it up... to excuse Natasha's bad behavior. (ARGH!)

I am three and a half years old now, but look about five because of my height. I have inherited your athleticism. I love to dance and currently am taking ballet and tap. I have already caught up with the second year students, although this is my first year. I can’t wait until we perform this summer on stage.

My favorite activities are reading, puzzles, coloring, dressing like a princess, and dancing. Even my big brothers occasionally succumb to dancing with me when I beg.

Shhhhh...Fostermommy is turning 70 this year (2010) in May. We are hoping she doesn’t come across this blog anytime soon and there is a good chance she won’t. Towards the end of summer 2009, her agency gave her three new placements. She is currently parenting three teenage girls and one seven year old boy. This is her first boy, and her first elementary placement in over a decade of fostering. Needless to say, she is one busy fostermommy. Between IEPs, sick runs, nightmares, homework help, rocking her new “baby” and a chronic teen runaway (boy crazy), she has not had much spare time to browse. The only way we are getting blogs from her is by having her email them to us occasionally, then one of us post it for her. That is why we are taking this opportunity to invite you to help fostermommy celebrate her 70th birthday.