When I gave birth to JC I didn't want to forget anything so I wrote it all down that same night. That's how I feel about CC now that we are committing to adopting her. I don't want to forget anything about that first day with her. I remember that she had a ton of little bags that we had to carry up to the third floor. I was super nervous because we had never had a child that old before, and I was worried I wouldn't know what to say to her or how to connect with her. I also felt pretty at ease with her as soon as we had our first interaction. I could just tell that she wasn't going to stand over me with a knife while I was sleeping or purposefully break something. As her caseworker was walking out the door he said, "Oh yeah, tomorrow is her 13th birthday." Even then I didn't panic. I knew we could pull it off. And it's funny because if you ask her now why she liked us she says, "because they let me go out with my friends on my birthday." We didn't throw her a party or buy her a bunch of gifts (we did get her a present but she didn't open it until she got back from her friends at 11 pm). She just wanted to be a regular kid with her friends and we let her do that. Ultimately nothing really sticks out from her first three days with us.
It was only a respite placement. They had called me about two weeks before and asked me to take CC as a long term placement until she was adopted by another family. I can't remember why I said we couldn't but I think ultimately we just didn't feel comfortable with that age group. Then they called me on her last day of school and asked for us to take her as a respite placement and we said yes. We were going on a vacation to Maine and staying in a tiny cabin and we just didn't feel like we could take along a kid who didn't even know. In retrospect we should have taken her but we just didn't know what she would be like.
So the day that I met my daughter was pretty uneventful. What I will never forget is the day that she left us. She looked so sad when she was getting in the car and I knew she didn't want to leave. I knew in my heart that she was supposed to stay with us forever and I didn't know what to do to make that happen. We became facebook friends and there was a chance she could come back but it didn't work out because we were going to be gone again in July and she couldn't come with us because she was supposed to be bonding with her adoptive family during that time. I couldn't believe when I got the call in August that she needed a home, today! We had just taken a baby and were having a hard time with the nine year old placement that we already, had but I knew we had to take her. Kristin's first questions was, "What did she do to get kicked out" and I asked it too. When the answer was "nothing" I knew that she had just gotten the short end of the stick yet again and we had to take her. I couldn't have lived with myself if we didn't. Thank goodness I went with my gut. CC was meant to be with us. It's not always easy but we got into foster care to be able to give someone like her a home. She does everything we ask her to do, she gets good grades in school, she is smart, she is willing to try new things, we connect. If we wouldn't adopt her than who would we adopt? And I figure it's only going to get better. Seventh grade is the worst year of most people's lives so if we can make this transition with a seventh grader it should only get better.
