It Never Gets Easier

So my intentions when I first opened this blog was to highlight all the happiness pertaining to my daughter coming home after being away from me in foster care since 2006. She came home in June 2011. Almost her entire childhood was spent being raised by strangers while I came for visits bearing gifts purchased anywhere I could find them to quell the guilt inside of me.
She is sixteen, and I don't need to tell anyone what it was like being sixteen (if you have already been there) or tell you what it is like to be around someone who is sixteen. At times, being around a sixteen year old is utter joy, while other times it is more like being in the chair at the dentist right before he drills your molar and you realize he forgot to shoot you with Novocaine.
Yeah, it isn't much fun most of the time, but then again, it is the most fun I have ever had in a long time. My daughter is full of attitude I wish I had when I was her age as she tells me exactly what she thinks when she thinks it. I like that about her. I like that she has become comfortable enough with me (in a sense) that she wants me to know when she is upset about something (whether or not it pertains to me).
I would be lying if I told you I didn't second guess my decision to bring her home after the five plus years of her being away from me. I would also be lying if I told you I hadn't locked myself in the bathroom and sobbed while standing in the shower.
I haven't blogged about anything pertaining to this whole fiasco because I don't think she'd be too happy that I aired her crap on the internet for the whole world to see. I certainly would not have been happy if my own mother had done that to me years ago. Then again, my mother was very good at sweeping things under the rug when I was a teenager.
It was kind of the "let's ignore her, she'll get over it."
I don't ignore my daughter... I know it pisses her off now, but I have a feeling in five years she will thank me for it.

Do you think you got enough attention growing up or not enough?

Thanks for listening.

Getting Back Into Being A Mother

(Excerpt from a blog on The Great 80's - it applies here)

In the 80′s, my heroes (heroines.. whatever) were people like Laurie Strode (the protagonist in Halloween, played by Jamie Lee Curtis). She was fearless when protecting the little boy she was babysitting against that monster, Michael Myers.

Madonna! I fell in move with Madonna because she broke new ground for adding sexiness to music (along with some sluttiness – my mother loved that part… not.) She was sassy, controversial and took chances.

My daughter is nothing like Madonna, but at 16, I am noticing something about her. She sticks up for the underdog. She stands up for the kid that gets picked on. She sides with the bullied girl.

I put my daughter through hell from the age of 9. I got sober in 2006, when she was 11. But those years of me finding myself, staying sober and focusing on my program, were still no walk in the park for her.

She stood strong. She kept her head high. She never gave up on me, even though for years I had given up on her.

My other two daughters, who are older than my 16-year-old, deserve a mention here as well. They have been through their share of hell courtesy of me… something I am not proud of. They didn’t have the chance for a mother to be there for them in their formative teenage years. My middle daughter pretty much got her smarts on the street. My oldest daughter trusts no one.

One thing I notice in all of them: they stand up for what is right, and most importantly, stand up for themselves.

I struggle from time to time with the right things to say to my kids. Sometimes the guilt creeps in.. it swallows me like wounded prey.

This is bad. Guilt is an evil, worthless feeling that consumes the most optimistic of people.