Old and New Places

June 25 was the 8th anniversary of the day I brought Z home from the shelter.  I recently drove near the shelter and thought about that day.  Now, those thoughts are all mixed in with the feelings about her leaving us and going to the National Deaf Academy.  And for me the feelings get all interwoven with old feelings about my sister going to the state hospital when she was 5 years old.  The emotions about how scary it was when Ch. was born and if we would have her very long are mixed in there.  And when Ch left for college, it did feel like I didn't have her for very long.  I know that Z going to residential placement is not permanent but it just feels like I don't get to have my kids for very long at all.

I don't know what Z remembers about the shelter or about the day she came home with us but I remember it clearly.  She was at the shelter about six weeks.  We had just gotten licensed to do foster care and she was one of the little girls they called me about.  They were looking for someone that knew ASL because she had no sign language at all.  I had always signed at school with my kids so I had the basics.  It's weird but I just knew it was suppose to be Z, didn't even really think about the other little girls.

 I have to say it takes more time to buy a car than pick up a child from a shelter.  They took me into a small conference room and I signed some papers.  Maybe ten minutes!  And they bring in Z.  She's tiny and dressed in a pink dress that's too big and shoes too big.  But it's obvious that the staff had tried to dress her up and fix her hair the best they could.  They handed me a plastic trash bag, the tiny bathroom size, with her belongings.  A couple pair of long pants, long sleeve tops, a washcloth, some socks, that's it!  I wasn't even told until we were leaving the shelter that she wasn't toilet trained, had to stop at Target on the way home and get diapers and a couple outfits and a pair of shoes.  We hit Nordstrom the next day at the "big Mall" as Z would soon call it.  The woman in the kid's shoe department was one of Z's biggest supporters for years and I guess we supported her also!

I will never forget how Z just took my hand and walked out to the car with me and home we went.  She didn't have any language to ask who I was, where are we going, was she coming back, she just held my hand.  She seemed happy to be at the house and we started learning signs that day.  "More" and "eat" are always good signs to start with.  She learned 100 signs the first month she was with us, I kept track on the refrigerator for the judge.  She learned 'bandaid" in those early days and we went through boxes of band aids that summer to keep that signing going.

I don't know if it was women's intuition or maternal instinct or whatever but I knew from the time I got the phone call about Z  that I would do whatever I had to do to keep her with us.  That three year battle to adopt her is another story.  Now we are faced with her leaving us to go to a residential treatment program for maybe a year.  I can't imagine what she will feel being left there and I can't imagine how I will come home without her.  I'm sad that she has to go to yet another new place. But this time she has a home to come back to, soon I hope!