Saturday, September 11, 2010

What I Can Now Tell You About Hope

  • Hope is potty trained. 3 full days with no accidents and 5 full nights with dry pull-ups.
  • Hope is very manipulative. She is ALWAYS watching for our reaction. If her lower lip vibrates, it is a sure sign the crying is fake. She deliberately knocks over drinks, dumps out food, and takes other people's property after making sure I am watching.
  • All her rages are fueled by fear. Fear of abandonment tops the list.
  • Yesterday, I gave Hope and GB a snack after school. Hope finished first and left the kitchen. As soon as she left the kitchen, she started screaming, "Mommy where are you? Mommy come here"
  • She can not do anything unless either the Dad, GB or I are within 4 feet of her. She needs us to use the toilet, brush her teeth, get dressed, eat or play. The good news (?) is that she does each of  these activities completely independently and doesn't physically need help.
  • As long as somebody is close enough, she can play independently for long stretches of time.
Hope is good at building!

Hope also likes getting her picture taken!




  • We made her a picture book chronicling her adoption; no words, just pictures. She looks at it frequently, but so far has had no interest in talking about it.
  • Hope still insists I am mean and ugly and her Texas mom is dead. I have a meeting with her therapist at school set up for right after her CSE meeting Tuesday.
  • GB is off to a Mets' game with her Dad, so Hope and I have the whole afternoon/ evening together  :)
  • Corey was right about the sexual acting out- Hope diddles herself in the living room. We are stressing privacy. We have never let the two girls out of our sight, so that is not an issue.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Crap. I *hate* being right.

Integrity Singer said...

I second Corey's emotion. Crap - I hate that she's right. Playing devil's advocate, AB and WG both were very interested in their parts at this age though and neither were they molested or suffering from trauma or abuse. SISSY however, never touched herself and just yesterday admitted that she withholds her bowels for a week or more so she doesn't have to touch herself. And of course, Sissy suffered trauma, abuse and molestation. so there's that...

WOW to Hope being able to play for such long stretches without ganking for interaction. That speaks volumes about her perceived list of diagnoses. as in, maybe not! Sissy and AB could NEVER play for long stretches without interaction even when I was 4 feet away and both are diagnosed as being on the spectrum with ADHD to boot.

i hope today was a good day for the two of you.

Mom 4 Kids said...

HUGS to you! ((( )))

Dia por Dia said...

Yikes. When Corazon was 4 1/2-5 yrs old she did this in public only (grocery cart, public bathroom, daycare, etc.) We started "prescribing the problem" and it stopped after about a week and a half with only a couple of very short "relapses." It seemed to be an "attention-getting" strategy for Corazon so we sent her to a "private" location to do her thing.