Caroline's 65 Year Old Smoker Soul

If you have spent more than five minutes with Caroline, then you've heard me apologize for her attitude by explaining that she has the soul of a 65 year old smoker.  I have said this since day one with her.  I guess you could say there's something about her that is an "old soul".

When we first moved to PA, our new cable package included the Lifetime Movie Network, which was new to us.   On this channel I stumbled upon a show called Ghost Inside My Child.  The show interviews parents of children who have memories and knowledge from another lifetime, including how they died when they were a grown up before.  Crazy, right?!  It could all be scripted, who knows, but it is pretty fascinating and it got me thinking about Caroline. 

 Here are the top ten reasons I believe Caroline has the soul of a 65 year old smoker:

1.  Ever since day 1 she has had a scratchy smoker's voice.  It has become less evident as she's grown older and polished her English, but it's still there.

2.  Her attitude...about everything.  She has this bitter old woman sense about her, mad at the world and bitter about everything.  She always manages to be disappointed about everything.  I could say we were having ice cream and donuts for dinner and she'd still manage to let out a sigh and walk away in her Eeyore manner.

3.  Her sass and sense of humor.  She's straight up HILARIOUS.   Her sense of humor is way more mature than her age.  It makes it very hard to keep a straight face when she says something that's not quite appropriate for a 9 year old to say, but it's super funny.  She is super sassy and acts as if she invented the eye roll.

4.  One time right before Halloween when she was only 5, my mother gave the girls a bag of goodies for them to open up.  Inside was a small rectangular box of Malley's chocolates wrapped up in pretty paper.  She picked up the box, shook it next to her ear and said "Granny, why you get me some smokes?" then proceeded to tap the box on the palm of her hand a few times.  We all just stood there with our jaws on the ground.  Who says "smokes" anymore?  No one in our family even smokes.  This was the first specific incident when I knew there was some serious history wth this girl.

5.  In our hometown there is this super cool 50s type hot dog diner called Dan's Dogs.  We would go there frequently as a family.  All over the walls are pictures of celebrities and memorabilia from the 50s and 60s.  The first time we went there Caroline pointed to a picture of Elvis and asked who it was.  Over the years, every time we've gone she has asked questions about Elvis and found a book they have about him at the restaurant to read while we wait for our food.  

6.  Last year for the Fourth of July we went to visit some family in Toledo.  As we were all sitting around outside eating, my father pipes up and says "Hey, do you guys want to hear a funny story?"  Now this was a rare occurrence because my dad is a pretty quiet guy and is usually one to sit back and listen to other people talk, so all of our ears perked up.  This has got to be a good story for him to want to share, right?  So, he starts telling about a time where he left one of his three cell phones on the top of his car, started to drive off onto the highway and the phone flew off of the roof of the car.  Before he was even finished with what he thought was a hilarious story, Caroline rolls her eyes and loudly says "Good grief Gramps, great story." very sarcastically.   Who even says good grief anymore???  No one in her world, I can tell you that for sure.

7.   This child is OBSESSED with the TV.  It literally does not matter what is on the TV (commercials and all) her eyes are glued to it.  We here in the Bratt household refer to this as her TV comma.  At first I just figured "hey, the kid has lived in a mud hut for the past 4 years so she's never seen anything like this" but it never ever wore off or has lost its intensity.  It just got me thinking that if her "old soul" is from the 50s or 60s, then TV would have been a very new and fascinating thing.

8.  I'd say ever since she was 5 or 6 she would always point out to me when there was a handsome guy on a magazine cover in the grocery store, or on TV.  She was always on point too.  She always noticed, while Charlotte never did, nor did she care.  Caroline has a thing about peoples' eyes.  She's always pointing out if people have pretty eyes, even in person she'll say "Hey mom, did you see that man's eyes?  They were so pretty."  Just not typical for a 5 year old.

9.   She has always been very difficult to parent.  She's just so over being a kid and having to listen to other peoples' rules.  She has this air about her that an adult would have if their parent was telling them what to do.  I'm pretty sure at the age of nine she thinks she could go out, get a job and live on her own.  I'm not 100% certain she's wrong either!  Girl's got tenacity! 

10.   This story: We went to visit my friend Mary's campground one fall day and came away with one of my favorite stories of all time with Caroline. She had to go to the bathroom while we were there so Mary had her go into her parents' house to use the bathroom. Caroline has never met Mary's mom before. She walks through the kitchen to get to the bathroom and sees some junk food laying out like pop-tarts, chips, etc. She turns and looks at Mary's mom and says "Someone in this house is about to get some diabetes." I didn't even know she knew the word diabetes, let alone know how to use it properly! Half of the words in her vocabulary she can't pronounce properly, but diabetes she's got down cold!

 Now, before you get all "Well, aren't you a Christian?  How can you reconcile the concept of reincarnation with your faith?"  I don't know!!  It's just not that serious, ok?!  All I know is that the "child" I live with and love, does not act like a child a lot of the time.  It's mysterious, awesome and frustrating all at the same time.  One day I'll get to ask God what was up with that, but until then I'm just enjoying the ride.

Financial Planning According to a Pair of 6 Year Olds!

I came across this gem the other day and had to share it with all of you.  The girls are now 9 and got a kick out of watching this the other day.  I'm so glad they have life all figured out. (LOL)

Celia... One Year Later

Today marks one full year since the day we first met Celia in a courthouse in Ohio.  She was so sweet and quiet, in fact she didn't speak at all for about 2 hours.  Part of this I'm sure was a combination of shock, and awe, nerves, confusion and wonderment, but we had also been told by her first family that she was a very quiet child.  We didn't hear a word out of her until after we left the parking lot of the courthouse and asked her if she wanted to go to McDonald's for lunch.

 What we found out later was that she had not been prepped AT ALL for what was about to happen to her.  I had sent pictures of our house, cats, the twins and us for her to see, none of which had been shown to her.  All she was told was that she was going to go live with another family.  That's it.  We also realized that in her first family the rules must have been pretty stringent (military family) because she associated being a "good girl" with being quiet.  All the time.

 Oh what a difference a year has made.  Quiet would be the last word in the galaxy one would use to describe this child.  She learned pretty quickly that in our family we do loud, we do mistakes, we do emotional, and all of it is ok.  Do I miss that sweet, quiet little lady at times...YOU BET...but I know now that she wasn't allowed to be her true self in her previous placement.  I feel good about the fact that she has bloomed with us.

In the beginning the twins adored their little sister and wanted to help her with everything.  They doted on her and were so sweet.  Yeah that's LONG gone!  As it should be I suppose.  They are real siblings now, they fight and argue over everything and the older two take any opportunity to boss little one around.  Although I have an older half-sister, we did not have the pleasure of growing up together, so the drama of sisterly interactions is all new to me.  With my little brother it was totally different, always physical, rough and tumble, no drama.  With sisters, from the intel I've gathered, it's all of the above PLUS a huge dose of manipulation and drama.  Deep breaths.

I can see both sides of their stories.  Little sisters are annoying.  In fact, I told Caroline she could keep a journal of times that she wants to punch Celia in the face (along with how many punches each infraction is worth of course) and once Celia turns 18 she can go for it.  I don't feel at all guilty about this seeing as Caroline can't keep track of anything for longer than 23 minutes so the odds that she's maintain and know the whereabouts of such a journal are astronomical.  Listen folks, don't judge, if we didn't laugh over here, we'd be crying...a lot.

So, yes, Celia has bloomed into what I can only surmise to be a more true version of herself.  That being said, it's NOT all butterflies and rainbows over here.  She is still hurting.  She is angry, and I can't blame her.  Although she just turned 5 years old, emotionally she is functioning more on the level of a 2 year old.  I think this is because she wasn't allowed or able to process the raw emotions that come with being adopted in the first place, as well as just being a pain the a$$ toddler in her previous family.  Now add onto all of that a tremendous, rational, fear of abandonment, and you've got a very emotional little girl.

Her attachment to me began immediately upon meeting her in the courthouse.  She came and sat in my lap right away when I motioned to her to see if she'd want to.  We sat for a while while I showed her all of the pictures I had hoped he had already seen of her new sisters, home and cats.  It seemed to me that she had been craving a motherly connection for years and since her first adoptive mom wasn't able to bond with her, she just had not had that in her life for the past 3 years.

Her attachment to Mike is still a work in progress.  You see, she adored her first adoptive father and he adored her.  He was devastated in the courtroom, while mom had no affect, zero, it was eerie.  I promise to write more about her disruption story soon which will give you a little better picture of the background here.  Because she felt so connected with this former father, you can tell she struggles with the question "if I let this new dad into my heart, am I betraying the old one?".  Of course most of her anger and feelings of betraying are directed at this old dad as well, who isn't around to take it, so Mike, the poor unfortunate soul, becomes the target of all of it.   She's come a long way in a year though and heart healing takes time.

I'm going to keep it very real here folks.  There have been many a day that the twins have finally started grasping the concept of sleeping in and Celia's up at the crack of dawn and I ask myself "Why did we do this?  Things with the twins were JUST started to get a bit easier!  Why'd we have to rock the boat?!"  Also, although I'm only 33 years old, my soul is much older.  I wasn't cut out to do this toddler thing.  Ain't nobody got time for that.  I prefer to be around those who are able to think rationally.

Of course I wouldn't change it for the world.  God has taken us on such a crazy roller coaster the past year.  It has taught us so much about listening to Him and His will and plans for our lives, even when it doesn't seem to make any sense to anyone else.  I can see this little girl's heart healing right before my eyes and it's all God's doing.  Beauty from ashes.