Being an adoptive Mum is...

...watching the whole school celebrate my older son's achievements since he started there.  One example his teacher gave was that he met his whole term targets in one week!  We were immensely proud parents, sitting at the back of their special celebration assembly

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...is having to put hideous home-made snow angels on your perfect Christmas tree and then realising you are going to have to put them back on again next year, and the year after that, and the year after that.... ;)

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...updating Twitter / Facebook / MySpace, etc with "It comes to something when it's a Friday night and I'm in bed by 6.30!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...finding one of those soft play children's centres and being able to 'let the children go' in the safe environment.  Took me several visits to relax for even just a few minutes; even now, months later I'm still on tenterhooks if I haven't seen them for a while.  It has given me a chance to do some reading - yes a book, with words and everything!  I now read a book in 5-6 weeks instead of a day (pre-children) lol

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...noticing that your youngest one finally smiles at you when he sees you

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...passing "The Tests." (Author unknown.)  Follow these 14 simple tests before you decide to have children:

Test 1 - Preparation
Women: To prepare for adoption:-
1. Draw on a permanent smile for showing all SWs
2. Go out lots (it’ll be the last time for some months)
3. Write down all those "helpful" comments  from your friends about children, fold carefully and shove up their ****
4. Learn all you can about adoption and frighten yourself
5. Decide it cant really be that bad and get through placement!

Men: To prepare for children:-
1. Go to a local chemist, tip the contents of your wallet onto the counter and tell the pharmacist to help himself
2. Go to the supermarket. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office
3. Go home. Pick up the newspaper and read it for the last time

Test 2 - Knowledge
1. Find a couple who are already parents and berate them about their methods of discipline, lack of patience, appallingly low tolerance levels and how they have allowed their children to run wild. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's sleeping habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behaviour
2. Enjoy it. It will be the last time in your life that you will have all the answers

Test 3 - Nights
To discover how the nights will feel:
1. Walk around the living room from 5pm to 10pm carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 6kg, with a radio turned to static (or some other obnoxious sound) playing loudly
2. At 10pm, put the bag down, set the alarm for midnight and go to sleep
3. Get up at 12pm and walk the bag around the living room until 1am
4. Set the alarm for 3am
5. As you can't get back to sleep, get up at 2am and make a cup of tea
6. Go to bed at 2.45am
7. Get up again at 3am when the alarm goes off
8. Sing songs in the dark until 4am
9. Put the alarm on for 5am. Get up when it goes off
10. Make breakfast
11. Keep this up for 10 years. LOOK CHEERFUL.

Test 4 - Dressing Small Children
1. Buy a live octopus and a string bag
2 Attempt to put the octopus into the string bag so that no arms hang out
Time Allowed: 5 minutes

Test 5 - Cars
1. Forget the Mercedes. Buy a practical 5-door people carrier
2. Buy a chocolate ice cream cone and put it in the glove compartment. Leave it there
3. Get a coin. Insert it into the CD player
4. Take a box of chocolate biscuits; mash them into the back seat
5. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car

Test 6 - Going For a Walk
1. Wait
2. Go out the front door
3. Come back in again
4. Go out
5. Come back in again
6. Go out again
7. Walk down the front path
8. Walk back up it
9. Walk down it again
10. Walk very slowly down the road for five minutes
11. Stop, inspect minutely and ask at least 6 questions about every piece of used chewing gum, dirty tissue and dead insect along the way
12. Retrace your steps
13. Scream that you have had as much as you can stand until the neighbours come out and stare at you
14. Give up and go back into the house

Test 7
1. Repeat everything you say at least 5 times
2. Repeat everything you say at least 5 times
3. Repeat everything you say at least 5 times
4. Repeat everything you say at least 5 times
5. Repeat everything you say at least 5 times

Test 8 - Grocery Shopping
1. Go to the local supermarket. Take with you the nearest thing you can find to a pre-school child - a fully grown goat is excellent. If you intend to have more than one child, take more than one goat
2. Buy your weekly groceries without letting the goat(s) out of your sight
3. Pay for everything the goat eats or destroys

Test 9 - Feeding a 1 year-old
1. Hollow out a melon
2. Make a small hole in the side
3. Suspend the melon from the ceiling and swing it side to side
4. Now get a bowl of soggy cornflakes and attempt to spoon them into the swaying melon while pretending to be an aeroplane
5. Continue until half the cornflakes are gone
6. Tip the rest into your lap, making sure that a lot of it falls on the floor

Test 10 - TV
1. Learn the names of every character from the Night garden, Barney, Teletubbies and Disney
2. Watch nothing else on television for at least 5 years

Test 11 - Mess
Can you stand the mess children make? To find out:
1. Smear jam butter onto the sofa and yoghurt onto the curtains
2. Hide a fish behind the stereo and leave it there all summer
3. Stick your fingers in the flowerbeds and then rub them on clean walls. Cover the stains with crayon
4. Empty every drawer / cupboard / storage box in your house onto the floor & leave it there. How does that look?

Test 12 - Long Trips with Toddlers
1. Make a recording of someone shouting 'Mummy' repeatedly. Important Notes: No more than a 4 second delay between each Mummy. Include occasional crescendo to the level of a supersonic jet
2. Play this tape in your car, everywhere you go for the next 4 years

Test 13 - Conversations
1. Start talking to an adult of your choice
2. Have someone else continually tug on your shirt hem or shirt sleeve while playing the Mummy tape listed above

Test 14 - Getting ready for work
1. Pick a day on which you have an important meeting
2. Put on your finest work attire
3. Take a cup of cream and put 1 cup of lemon juice in it
4. Stir
5. Dump half of it on your nice silk shirt
6. Saturate a towel with the other half of the mixture
7. Attempt to clean your shirt with the same saturated towel
8. Do not change (you have no time)
9. Go directly to work

Congratulations, you are now ready to have children. ENJOY!!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...trying to make a cup of tea:  9.00am Trying to get to make one is your first challenge, how many times do you boil the kettle and get no further?  Three times?  2.00pm Made it  - yayy!  And then trying to remember if you put the sweetener in it.  Wow you made a rather sweet cup of tea and can get a mouthful of... no there's a squabble going on... hold that thought / cup!  3.30pm Hmmm... I'm sure I made a cup of tea, where is it?  9.00pm Tidying up, under the newspaper on the side in the lounge, you find... a cold cup of tea, how many days has that one been sitting there? lol

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...having your own sticker chart so that YOU can celebrate your own achievements: getting everyone where they should be in the morning, making lunch, not shouting (well maybe not shouting too much!), getting to drink a whole cup of tea (maybe even whilst it is still warm - okay I'm pushing it a bit there!)

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...like 'off-road parenting':  through a ditch that is so deep that it appears to be night, in a vehicle with no suspension, where the brakes have failed, the steering is not working, the roof leaks...  All the time those on the road above can be heard to be commenting on how easy and enjoyable their ride is and how they are looking forward to arriving at their destination...  Meanwhile the AA man I have called out has merely offered an instruction manual for a vehicle that bears no resemblance to mine and he refuses to join me in my vehicle to find out what the problems really are...  Oh, and I have just spotted a steep drop ahead, will we survive it?  Is the vehicle strong enough?  As I said, there's no brakes, so here we go.....
Thanks xanthe from AUK message boards for that great and very real description!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...getting emotional when your middlie brings home from school a party invitation - her first one!  OMG I am soooo happy!  And I am soooo pleased for her!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...learning the hard way to dramatically lower the expectations of yourself as a Mum that you had before you adopted.  E.g. thinking that when they arrive you will have them stay at home and bond, like the books say, and then realising that you desperately need respite and so sending them to nursery / school can't come soon enough!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...feeling like adoption has ruined our relationship, has lost me (supposed) friends too and makes some people treat me like a leper.  I'm sure there is some good stuff in there too, that's why I'm doing this blog, so I can see how things are changing / improving, to give me hope

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...trying not to laugh when they get words muddled up: helicockter, hair plips, pippas (slippers), wee and a poo (winnie the pooh), Mac dah don (McDonalds), swans (scones), calves (scarves).  It is bad not to correct your daughter when she says hair plips, cos she is so cute when she says it?

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...seeing photos of YOUR children on one of the birth family's facebook pages, with them saying how much they love them and miss them - and feeling sick, especially because there is nothing you can do about it.  The photos were taken before they were placed with us and so are not our (intellectual) property.

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...speaking to other adoptive mums about this blog and about how it makes them feel normal.  It is something we don't feel very often.  I think that we all feel most of the things I have posted, but we don't talk about them too often as we don't want to admit the weakness that we / society perceive comes with the feelings.  But we DO have the feelings, they are NOT weaknesses and they ARE normal given the circumstances

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...trying very hard to add some funny and nice stuff to this blog. it does happen but its few and far between. although when nice things do happen there often seems to be a bittersweet twist to them

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...feeling guilty (yes the G word again) that I am typing my blog when the littlies are asking me to play with them

Being an adoptive Mum is...

 ...thinking that alphabetti spaghetti was a good idea, to get them interested in eating pasta, helping them to learn their letters and make the food exciting.  Of course then they pick out each individual letter and say "oh look mummy i just found an A" "oh look mummy i just found an R" "oh look mummy...."  Imagine that every few seconds times two children lol

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...thinking that their birth parents got it wrong (maybe not all the time) and so there is additional pressure to get the parenting more right than they did.  And then I get so engrossed in trying to get it so right (even thought I don't know what I'm doing half the time!) that I stress myself out so severely that I am doing myself more mental damage.  I need to remember that I am me, that they are now in a safe place and my parenting skills need to be "good enough" not "perfect"

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...letting your three year old type her 'name' on your laptop because she has been learning how to type at nursery. And then having to redo all the settings she has accidentally changed!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...letting your three year old type her 'name' on your laptop because she has been learning how to type at nursery. And thinking is three too young to be introduced to computers? Next she will be friending and then defriending me on Facebook!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...trying to get a two-year old dressed whilst he is raspberrying your elbow! And realising that it is the first time in seven months that he has pro-actively had fun with you

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...hoping that your middlie and littlie still needs to nap for many more months to come as that one hour to yourself is more precious than money, jewellery, fast cars, fast men lol

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...waking up in the night on the half hour every hour and straining your ears for the slightest noise.  Which is a bit silly really because if they want something they sure as heck make enough noise to wake up the neighbourhood!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...when all the kids sleep all the way through the night on one of those very rare occasions and the pair of you are up all night with coughs and colds - doh!

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...crying when you are ironing (yes I have been know to switch on an iron!) their name tags into their school uniform 10 days after they have moved in and bawling like a little baby the next morning when you drop them off at school because you have had them five minutes and then you have to let them go so soon

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...crying at their school Christmas play because you never thought you would see that day

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...realising that all the expensive therapy and counselling you had after numerous failed attempts at IVF dissolves when the children arrive and your childlessness smacks you right in the face

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...realising that you need life story work too

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...putting the children in the most awful clothes that their birth parents bought for them and willing them to put on a sudden growth spurt, because the second they grow out of them they are going straight to the charity shop - in fact I might just burn them!  The clothes not the kids!  (We are keeping one outfit each for their memory boxes.)  Of course, you can't just buy them a whole new wardrobe the day they move in, apart from the sizeable cost, they need the safety and comfort of things they know - even if 'Essex Girl' wouldn't be seen dead in them.  God, they look so chavvy lol

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...saying the same thing every day at the same time to the same children about the same things.  I know it does take time for things to sink in - but surely????

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...having to make special time with your oldest son even though you don't want to and feeling racked with guilt if you come up with a reason not to do it, but a sense of relief that you got out of it.  Then you see the disappointment in his eyes that you are not doing it with him and spend the next few hours cursing yourself

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...explaining to your oldest son that even though you can't physically see him when he is at school, it doesn't mean you don't think of him or have stopped loving him.  You get advice to put notes in his lunch box which he absolutely loves and shows off to his friends at school

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...a week after the red love heart episode, receiving a badge from your oldest son, with whom you have a very strained relationship, that he made especially for you.  You put it on your bedside table so you and he can see you have kept it and think of him often

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...when your eldest son, with whom you have a very strained relationship, brings home a piece of plastic confetti in the shape of a red heart, gives it to you and says something along the lines of "This is my love heart and I give it to you."  You put it on your keyring as a reminder that he is trying

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...lying in bed with your daughter and she strokes your arm saying "I love my Mummy"

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...draining, traumatic, exhausting, guilt-ridden, harrowing...

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...having your affection bought

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...is having to write a 'nice' letter to the birth family about 'how well' YOUR children are doing.  You cannot write about how you have to hold them at night and in the day whilst they tantrum and rebel against you.  You cannot write about how you have to go over and over with them that they are safe with you.  You cannot write about how they go over and over the same phrase hundreds of times a day because they have become hyper-vigilant.  You cannot write about how the oldest one can at last write his own name and what a fabulous milestone that is.  You cannot write about how middlie's speech is improving leaps and bounds because she is attaching and settling.  You cannot write about how littlie is finally sleeping through the night because for the last seven months he has not been settling.  You cannot write about how much your oldest one hates you and refuses to bond with you because he knows you will be another female who promises you will stay and then will leave him yet again.  You cannot write about the therapy that they and you urgently need because of the abuse THEY inflicted upon these poor little babies.

Being an adoptive Mum is...

...working out that the adoption process puts the needs of the birth family before the needs of the children; the adopters are the poorest relations