What if curiosity healed the cat?

We dropped Sunny off with her relative on Tuesday. It was uneventful. She refused to say goodbye which made it extra hard. Even though I know saying goodbye is really hard for a lot of foster kids – they’ve had to say some really goddamn hard goodbyes in their lives – it still felt yucky not to have that closure. No hug, no last kiss on the head. Just… an awkward walk out the door with her averting her eyes and the family watching.

Since then I’ve been a whirling dervish of cleaning and reorganizing. I’m moving art supplies from attic and playroom into Sunny’s old room, and turning it into an office and guest room. We moved her dresser out and gave it to a woman who makes ends meet by refinishing dressers on the side. (I’m delighted by that. It was a gift from a friend’s estate and will see a whole new life now, reinvigorated.) We moved my desk from the dining room up to the new office room. I’ve moved office supplies and craft supplies and wrapping paper supplies. I’ve boxed up clothes Sunny opted not to take with her and old toys of hers and donated them (thank you Buy Nothing and church for accepting and repurposing all the stuff!) I’ve thrown away a 45 gallon trash bag of junk from her room. I’ve rearranged my dining room. In fact, I’ve barely stopped moving since 4 am Tuesday morning.

I’m beat.

This week I acquired a new piece of equipment that helps people with chronic illness pace themselves. It’s called Visible, and it’s a continuous heart rate monitor. It has been tracking my crazy schedule and energy output, and practically yelled at me this morning to slow the hell down.

Accurate. I am definitely out of balance.

The lack of balance isn’t just physical though, it’s mental, too. I’m keenly aware that I didn’t manage to dig up enough compassion for Sunny in the final two months of her stay. I did not always meet her vile moods with the openness and calm that was needed. I stopped trying to coach her and switched to enduring her. I was not outright unkind, but I wasn’t as kind as I could have been either, considering she’s a tragically mixed up ten year old who chose none of the trauma she’s been subjected to and that has shaped her behaviors.

Compassion is one of my most deeply-held values. And I feel like I failed to hold onto it toward the end.

I went to therapy today and told my therapist about how I’m feeling. She suggested that perhaps the guilt I’m feeling is just further confirmation that compassion is one of my values. And then she said perhaps I can approach my reflections with curiosity rather than self-reproach: curiosity about what it was about Sunny that made me unable to live according to my most deeply held values. Curiosity about how I can shape my life so that I don’t wind up in a position again where my values are challenged in my very home.

She’s right. Curiosity is helping a little.

I’ve realized that the twins PB&J and Sunny have both been epically hard for me. We’ve had 17 foster kids and only those three pushed my limits in that way. With PB&J, they had bonded with each other to the exclusion of the rest of humanity. They lived in their own little world and I could not break in. I couldn’t see my affection and kindness reflected back at me through any kind of bond. And while Sunny was quite a bit older than the twins, the situation was essentially the same with her.

Reactive attachment disorder (“RAD”) is a bitch. Raising kids who are unable to reflect your love back is hard as hell. It drains you and doesn’t refill your batteries. After all, isn’t connection what makes parenting possible through the really hard moments? Even when they’re awful, you know you and your kid love each other. When love goes one way (or is only shown one way) it erodes one’s self esteem, it takes soul energy that it doesn’t replace.

Ok, so. I won’t parent any more kids with RAD or RAD-like behaviors. Easy since we have retired as foster parents. Even if I have to work with kids with RAD as a CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) they won’t be living in my house. And ultimately that’s what ate me alive.

My home is my sacred place, especially now that I am not working and home is my only place. Sunny had a black cloud over her head. When she was in the play room lying on the couch and watching her iPad, we all avoided going in that room because it just felt awful to be in there with her. Her mood was palpable. My therapist asked if I’m an empath, and I said yes, and Seth is too. That made me realize just how hard we’ve been fighting not to absorb Sunny’s perpetually foul mood when she was at home. We avoided her bedroom too. It’s like a cloud of funk followed her. And I don’t mean the tween-age body odor that kids her age emit!

I’ve noticed that Sprout has been running around the house like a little freed nymph. She’s in the play room, the sitting room, then up to the new office, and into her own room, then out onto the porch, etc. I think she feels newfound freedom not having her sister lying in the other room poised to yell at her if she goes in that room to get a toy.

In addition to approaching my reflections with curiosity, my therapist also suggested I do some meta-meditation with Sunny as the subject. “May Sunny be happy, may she be well, may she be safe, may she be fulfilled.” She said that while it sounds a bit “woo woo,” it may help me to heal if I’ve shifted my thoughts to such compassionate well-wishes, and started to ingrain those well-wishes into my neural pathways. If nothing else, it will make meeting her again feel healthier. But I think it will also help me feel like I am ultimately a compassionate person again, too.

In the meantime, I’m going to try to force myself to rest and recover and not keep cleaning with such a frantic drive. I’ll try to write in my Silk and Sonder journal, meditate, meta-meditate for Sunny, hydrate, enjoy the fresh air and bird songs, and do something creative. I’ll keep reading my beloved friend Terrance Keenan’s book “Zen Encounters with Loneliness,” which is somehow exactly the right book for me to be reading right now. I’ll keep picking up Mary Oliver’s “Devotions” and flipping to random poems and reading them.

Maybe between the curiosity and the self care activities, I’ll start to find some self compassion, too.