sibling visit

our kids have 3 older siblings. one with the same birth father, all with the same birth mother. their older half-sister and half-brother had only seen them once since they entered into foster care. we hoped to keep them in our kid’s lives. in august of 2004 they were 14 and 13 and living in the same foster home only half an hour away. we invited them and their foster mom over to meet. even though they hadn’t seen each other much the bond was obvious. we think being with her sister reminded our daughter of her mother. they brought early birthday presents and we all went to lunch nearby. the older kids took turns pushing the double stroller and feeding their younger siblings. we made a photo album for them and let them put the twins in for their afternoon nap. our daughter and her sister cried at having to say goodbye. we promised to see them again and realized that even though they’re not together, they’ll always be family, no matter where they live or how much time goes by.
we saw them again soon on a trip to the zoo together. since then they’ve been split up into separate foster homes. we saw their sister last summer but couldn’t arrange to see their brother at the same time. we keep their picture on our kid’s dresser and remind them of all their siblings, including their brother that moved far away that they haven’t seen in 4 years. when they were little they’d say goodnight to the photo each night before bed.

honeymoon is over

during that first summer we would hold the kids in our arms before bed and sing “twinkle, twinkle” to them before putting them down for sleep. we were all adjusting to each other, learning what foods they liked, what their personalities were like. we also had two gentle, medium size dogs that share our home. we knew from the last foster mom that the kids were very nervous of any dogs so we took it very slow. the dogs stayed in their pen and we let the kids control the situation, it took time but eventually they overcame their fear, with us nearby, and began to get closer to the pen. once when we were all at the grocery together we each had a kid in the shopping cart. our daughter kept asking where her brother was and our son would cry if he didn’t see his sister. we began 3 minute time outs for unacceptable behavior. at first there were so many it seemed like they weren’t working but after a while they began to understand, at least our daughter did. our son was slower to realize. our daughter didn’t like to hear “no” and our son would get upset over what seemed to be small things to us but were monumental to him, like forgetting his hat or wanting to change or even check his diaper. when we said “i love you” to our daughter she would reply by saying “i love me.”
our son’s hair was growing longer that summer and we here hesitant about cutting it. we wanted to do it ourselves and heard from the last family that he did not like having his hair cut. we tag teamed and kept lots of m&ms handy the first time. after the first few weeks we saw the kids begin to test their boundaries, acting up and having tantrums. they couldn’t communicate being tired or hungry so we had to go on our best guess. we were used to eating at restaurants several times a week so we tried to still frequent them. it took the kids lots of time outs outside of the restaurants to modify their behavior. and we learned to modify ours as well… we would order for them immediately and keep them busy until their food arrived. we had to limit them to one crayon each or we’d be picking them up off the floor for the entire meal and balloons were out of the question, they would both fight over them and our son didn’t like them tied around his wrist but would cry when he let them go and they flew away. we learned to keep a united front and have mostly always agreed on our expectations and parental styles. both kids would cry for attention or because it seemed to work for their sibling. we realized quickly that it was best to keep to the same routine and schedule. we also enjoyed hearing the kids laugh and giggle together, they are so close, which is why they can be best friends but also get on each other’s nerves. our daughter would make us all laugh, both accidentally and on purpose. she was always the one whose sippy cup would squirt her in the face. we saw their verbal skills greatly improve that summer as well. they had a special language that twins have that we could only understand a word or two of. when our daughter began to comprehend more I would have her translate to her brother. I could make out only a few words.
one of the first things we wanted to instill was manners. we were both been brought up in families where they were important. our son had a terrible habit of burping loudly and seemed to be very proud of it. he probably learned the behavior at one of their foster homes. it took a good six weeks before we could get him to say excuse me. we learned that if we ignored his behavior and showed lots of praise when he did excuse himself that he eventually said it on his own.

bonding leave

my bonding leave began at the beginning of july, 2004 and lasted 7 weeks. i could have taken 12 weeks but needed to be back for a project. luckily, i was paid 50% salary, a practice that had just begun that year. my partner took 3 weeks vacation after my leave so the kids had 10 weeks of transition to their new home and parents. it was the most fun and work i’d ever done... spending the day with twins on the verge of turning 3. it was summer so we spent lots of time outdoors. we received a small wading pool for a gift. they loved it. i lost 13 pounds just from pushing the stroller for an hour a day for seven weeks! we roamed around the nearby neighborhoods. i taught them their colors by finding them on our walks, we saw birds and dogs and cats and babies and flowers and buses. i let then feel pinecones and leaves and flowers. i wanted them to sense everything. my first trip to a nearby park was scary. i had to keep my eyes on the two of them and in order for me to keep them playing together i had to join them on the play equipment, so i had fun too. i helped them climb and overcome fears and praised them when they made their way independent of me. they were hesitant to venture. we weren’t sure if it was their age or their background, probably some of both. during the transition we took them to a kid’s play park and they weren’t interested in any of the small rides or even the toddler swings.

each afternoon they’d take a nap, they were always so good about sleeping. even now that they’re 4 and a half they stay in bed in the morning until we come in, even though they're awake. we’ve tried to teach them to get up at night if they have to go potty but so far our daughter is such a sound sleeper that she sometimes just wets the bed. and our son’s potty training has been slow (more later) so he sleeps at night with training pants on. during their naptime i’d catch up on my stuff, or their stuff… we had to find a preschool for september and a pediatrician. i also spoke to one of the dads of the kid’s next oldest brother, whose family was the first long-term placement for the twins. he had lots of great advice about discipline methods, time outs, the state foster care system, similarities between the kids. for instance, our son would rock himself to sleep, bumping his head on the crib, so we put a bumper on the crib for him. their older brother still did the same thing at age 4. i did some research and found that babies will rock to comfort themselves but the behavior usually stops by age 2. our son was almost 3. he has since outgrown it completely.

also during this time we had monthly visits from the kid’s social worker and a visit from the court appointed lawyer for the case. our visits with each always went smoothly but still made us slightly nervous. the lawyer had to check to ensure that we had enough milk in the fridge, among other things. she needed to know that the kids were eating properly. there was also a death in the family during those first few weeks so many of my relatives flew out from the east coast. they got their first chance to meet the kids… and they brought presents and shared some outgrown clothing with us. the kids were so wired from all the excitement that it took much longer to get them to go to sleep that night. one of my nieces has 3 boys so she and our son grew quickly attached. we’ve since learned that he has that effect on the ladies and he uses it to his advantage… until he learns, as with his teachers, that it doesn’t work for him.

all in all, bonding leave was such a great time for me and totally overwhelming as well… learning to juggle a family in 7 weeks. as it drew to a close we celebrated the twin’s 3^rd birthday with a big bash. I went back to work only half there, with my mind wondering what they were doing each hour of the day with daddy. which is a good time to point out that my partner and I decided somewhere through the initial transition period that he would be daddy and i’d be papa.

first night

the first overnight was july 4th weekend. and the following friday they would come to live with us permanently. we picked them up after school, they fell asleep on the more than an hour ride to our house. when we got home we showed them around the house and showed them their room, all their new toys and clothes. our son loved the new cars and our daughter loved trying on her new shoes. after a while we took the kids for a ride in the double stroller around the neighborhood to meet some neighbors and show off our beautiful kids. we went out for dinner and came home to begin the first of what would become a nightly ritual... bath, book, bed... we bathed the kids together, with lots of bath toys, and our son had no complaints, only fun. we got them changed for bed and watched finding nemo. part of their nightly ritual at their last foster home was warm milk before bed. we continued that. we then carried them both to bed, kissed them good night and told them i love you. we checked in on them later and were amazed at how soundly they slept, even the fireworks didn't wake them. i drove them back after that first long weekend. they watched as i drove away and cried, it broke my heart. as i got closer to home and realized they wouldn't be there i was the one crying.

the transition

we worked out a transition plan with the social worker. i wanted to take bonding leave for as many weeks as possible before mid-august. the social worker wanted to see how comfortable the children were with us before commiting to a date. we decided that we would see them as much as we possibly could in the next few weeks so they could move in by early july. we visited them on weekends at their foster home, spending mealtime and bath time with them. our son hated baths then, i tried to help the foster mom give him a bath but all he did was scream. my partner had it easier with our daughter, she loved bathtime. we made a plan to bathe them together and have lots of bubbles and bath toys... but i'm jumping ahead. we took them for afternoons to various parks and play areas. we had to stay in the county. we would pick them up at school and spend the afternoon with them, then bring them home for their nap. we bonded quickly. we also had to get their room ready during this time, which meant cribs, clothes, toys, sheets, blankets, books, car seats, etc. we registered online and notified our friends and families. we also went to an appointment with the audiologist. since both kids had several ear infections as babies and since our son still seemed to have hearing difficulties. our daughter had a much better attention span for the testing. results were poor for both kids. they would need to be retested once they were in our home.
it was on one of these afternoon trips in the car, with the kids in the back, that we first realized how lucky we were that they found us and that we found them, that we they were our family and we were meant to be together.

the call

we got the call on june 3rd. we had been chosen for foster to adopt placement of the twins. we were so happy, having been on pins and needles, patiently waiting. the social worker told us that they thought we could give the children everything they needed for a healthy, happy, loving life. once the decision had been made we needed to travel to the other county with our social worker to meet with the children's social worker. it was our one time to review all records of the the case and hear about the the children's lives in much more detail before we made our final decision. i don't want all aspects of the case to be public but will provide some details. the mother had 6 children before she was 30. her rights were terminated for 3 children, one child died before her 1st birthday, the ruling was SIDs. the 3 older children had the same father, the younger 3 had a different father. she was allowed to take the twins home because they tested negative for drug exposure. but in the 20 months she had them social services was called in 10 times. the final time they were removed from her care due to severe neglect. the county felt that no other family members were capable of caring for them so they were placed in foster care. the first long term placement was with the dads of their next oldest brother, who was 3. the couple had 2 other adopted sons. these were the foster parents who had the twins evaluated, which led to their elibility to attend the school for developmental delays. due to the extraordinary stress of caring for 5 children under 5 years of age the couple decided to have the county find a new home for the twins. the next long term placement was was with a couple that had one biological son. they intended to adopt the twins but after a few months it appeared that the mother wasn't properly caring for them. the school notified the social worker and the children were removed and placed in their current home. a very loving home of a woman who had been a foster mother for many years, she had even adopted a daughter who was 11 years old. she had as many as three foster children in her home and was happy being a foster parent, not interested in adoption. nothing that we found out that day changed the decision we made. we made arrangments to meet the foster mother and then went to visit the kids at school. they were shy with us and we decided to stay close by and observe them.

waiting

once the county had recieved our home study we were contacted by phone to answer some additional questions. we were also given the opportunity to learn more about the twins. we were told there were several families being considered and that the commitee meets once a week to review all potential placements and decides which will be a best fit. these children had been in foster care for one year at this point, which included 6 placements (some were emergency placements of one or two weeks pending a longer term placement) and two other placements hadn't worked out so the county wanted to be sure that this placement would lead to adoption. the twins had developmental delays and were in a school for children with learning disabilities for 4 1/2 hours each day. they had been attending the school for 9 months. we were told they had a half-brother, 13, and half-sister, 14, both in permanent foster care since they were about 6, and a brother who was 5. this brother had been adopted by a gay male couple. the twins were first placed with this family for 5 months. they were placed with a black family for about 2-3 month after that. we weren't told yet why those placements didn't work out. we were told that the boy did't talk, it was unsure if he was mute or deaf, he was scheduled for a hearing test. both children had many ear infections as babies. there was possible drug and alcohol use during pregnancy but both children tested negative for drug and alcohol exposure at birth. they were removed from the mother at 21 months due to severe neglect. the mother's mental health was questionable and schizophrenia and bipolar disorder were heritary in her family. the girl was almost potty trained and the boy wasn't yet. they weighed about 28 pounds and each slept in a crib. since we are both white we were asked about african american role models for the children. we both wanted to include african american role models in our children's lives. when we hadn't heard from the children's social worker after the first week i was persistant in finding out when the decision would be made. she valued my persistance and informed me that the meeting had been delayed. patience once again!

adoption picnic

on may 6, 2004 we attended an adoption picnic that our social worker had informed us about. at an adoption picnic perspective foster families and waiting children meet. we thought it sounded strange and knew that there would be more families than available children in attendance but decided to try it once, if only for the reason that we could meet face to face with workers from all surrounding counties and could look through books of waiting chidren who couldn't be at the picnic. it was a beautiful sunny day and the picnic was by a lake. after spending some time being uneasy and talking with another couple from our parenting class we decided to look through the books of waiting children. i brought a notebook to keep track of social workers that we met and children we were interested in. we had a one page synopsis with our photo and discription of us and the type of placement we were interested in to hand out to workers. we found 11 children from 4 counties in the books between the ages of 1 and 7. two of the children were twins, a boy and girl, 2 years old, they looked african american. it didn't take long for my partner to notice that the twins were at the picnic. the little girl had her nametag on her back. we watched them from a distance playing with bubbles. we then found their social worker and waited patiently to speak to her about them. we talked to her for about 15 minutes but didn't want to keep her from speaking to other parents. we told her we were interested in the twins and exchanged information. after that we stayed close by the twins, asking there caregivers about them. we then were able to spend the last hour of the picnic with them. i spend the time with the little boy and my partner spent the time with the little girl. they were just so adorable. the little boy didn't speak at all but was smiling a lot and drinking orange soda. we did see him get very upset when the social worker walked away from him. the only thing that calmed him was when i held him. the little girl was repeating words with my partner, "nose," "ear," "eye," etc. they were there with their foster mother's mother, who was deaf. she had taught them some sign language. they had been in the current home only 3 months. the picnic came to a close and the twins had to leave. the little girl was cuddled up next to my partner, she had a hard time leaving. the little boy waved bye to me. that was the day they entered our lives amd most importantly, our hearts. we called our social worker as soon as we got home to give her a full report and the information on the twins. she needed to initiate the paperwork to the other county.

until we meet them

on our last home visit with our social worker she had photos of 2 brothers, ages 8 and 10, that she had just found out about. they were in separate foster homes and the county wanted to place them together. we were interested and wanted to know more. older children have a say in their future placements. the older brother requested a home with a mother and father so the county pursued other placement options for the boys. we knew in our hearts that our family would find us, we needed to be patient and let it happen. in april of that year we were told about another placement, 2 half-sisters, ages 2 and 4, living in a bad neighborhood in another county. sometimes foster homes aren't available in the county where the children are from so children's services has to place them wherever they can find homes. their current foster mother was a fundamentalist christian and slightly too old to be raising young children. the county was worried about the girls living in such a dangerous neighborhood and wanted a safer home for them. they asked if we would consider having only one us us meet with the girls and foster mother, leading her to believe that one of us was adopting as a single parent. they feared that if the foster mother knew two gay men were interested in adoption she would fill the girls with fear. we wanted to be upfront about the fact that we were a gay couple so we didn't pursue this placement. everyone that knew us at children's services really liked us and wanted to find a family for us.

fost-adopt

we began out "parent resource training," as it's referred to, in january of 2004, three saturdays long. we were the only gay couple, but the facilitator had met several other gay foster parents in her 13 years on the job. there were about 10 couples and one single woman in our class. we learned a lot in our class. we were amazed at what situations were presented to us and at the many different conclusions people came to, about discipline, about dealing with children with delays, both emotional and developmental. we wondered how many men and women who could have children of their own, planned or not, could answer the questions we were asked, or asked to think about. we also had homework, income verification, health records, family history, how we each were raised, how our families dealt with discipline, spent holidays and vacations, our history together, how we dealt with conflict in our relationship, our thoughts about raising children who practice a religion (we don't), about keeping in contact with other siblings. one poignant exercise was to walk us through the feelings of a child taken from a home by a social worker, brought to a new home where they didn't know anyone, perhaps a different language was spoken, other children in the home, other parents, new school, new routine, new teachers, nothing familiar. then to have visits with your parent or parents for only a few hours a week, usually supervised by social workers. then to spend months away from the family that you knew and slowly become a part of a new family, only to perhaps be removed from this new family to return to your family, only to wonder if the things that caused you to be removed with happen again (if you're even old enough to comprehend that). an interesting fact that we learned is that there are over half a million foster children in the united states and one third of this country's homeless are former foster children.
we were assigned a social worker after our training was completed. we were the first gay male couple that she had worked with so at our first meeting in our home i asked about her thoughts toward gay men as parents. we had been told that some social workers bring their own beliefs to the job and might not try to find placements for us. we relaxed when she told us that it didn't matter whom children were raised by, only that they be raised in a loving, caring home. we were, of course, nervous when she visited us for our "home visits" but we quickly learned to like her and feel as ease. we completed all our paperwork in record time and were licensed foster parents by the end or march 2004. our only wait was for the social worker to complete our "home study," basically a short story of who we are and what type of placements we were looking for. we decided that if we were open to sibling groups and children ranging in age from newborn to 10 years old. this would allow more placement options, then we could then decide about each individually. we had to think about what type of delays we would be able to handle. we toyed with the idea of one of us staying at home but later found that impossible.

how it began

in late 2003 we began to talk seriously about having a family. we knew we weren't getting any younger. we both were also fortunate to spend time with my nephew's new baby daughter. we had both grown up caring for our siblings' kids and became resigned to (and saddened by) the fact that we probably would never have the family we longed for. being gay in the late 20th century seemed to present more obstacles than avenues to starting a family. it wasn't until friends on the east coast adopted 4 sons, the first from cambodia, the last 3 from state foster care, that we seriously began to think that we too could realize our dream of raising a family. we researched various methods, international adoption, surrogate birth, open adoption, foster to adopt. we didn't want to hide the fact that we're two gay men and knew that some international adoptions might only allow one of us to legally adopt, then the other would have to adopt back in the states. we found out that in california, where we lived, we could both legally adopt through the state foster care system as a couple. it turned out to be the best fit for us.

who we are

we've known each other for nearly 20 years. we always wanted a family, both being from big, loving families. i'm the youngest of 6, from a large italian-american family... grew up with lots of extended family, nieces, nephews, cousins, etc. my partner (and let me just say that the word partner doesn't fit our relationship at all, he's my husband, though we'll just have to wait for the rest of society to get it) is from a smaller close-knit family. we live in northern california, but were both born and raised in massachusetts. we moved to the suburbs in 2000, the same year i turned 40. the neighbors were hesitant about two gay guys moving in... but over the next few years they got to know us and aren't fazed by it at all. we bought a 2 bedroom house that sits on a corner lot in a tree-lined neighborhood, close to the freeway but still tucked away. over the next 4 years we completed several upgrades, namely renovations to the bathroom and kitchen, and other upgrades throughout the house. we also converted the garage into a family room, which includes a guest sleeper, an office, and a play area for the kids.

welcome

welcome to my blog. i hope to tell a story about our family and how we came to be. we're two men raising twins.