Parenthood

Well, I am proud to announce that I am the father of a beautiful 79 year old tween!!  We named her Roetta. (It was supposed to be Rowena, but the country doctor who delivered her was a drunk and misspelled it on her birth certificate)  As most 79 year old tweens go, she came with issues, but we are working through them. 

The official adoption went through in January. It went well at first.  She was in a nice foster home while recovering from a broken hip. Then we brought her home and all hell broke loose. (Fortunately no hips or other brones broke loose)  She so wanted to come home, but after many, many incidents, we decided that she would be best served by sending her off to camp. According to her, it's like a geriatric Outward Bound. But in reality (which is a rare commodity these days)  it is a lovely place where she is cared for 24 hours a day, fed 3 meals (the enchiladas are mui fabuloso) and there are other campers that are...shall I say, "happy campers".  Our little Roetta, however, is NOT A HAPPY CAMPER!

She calls often.  OFTEN.  Her room is too small, she thinks the nurses give her the wrong medication, her TV is broken, she has a fever, she's cold, she's hot, there's cold air coming through her windows and her sink. She doesn't feel well she says often. "What would make you feel better?", I say, as any good parent would say.  "I would feel better if I was in my house".  Like any troublesome tween she is having trouble fitting in with her peers. "They have 'cliques' and they won't talk to me". "No one likes me". "No one comes to visit me" she tells me when I go to visit her everyday.

Other parents at the camp tell me it will get better with time, but my little girl seems to be getting worse. As her disease takes over she gets more and more unhappy and ornery. In better times she was always a meek, sweet little girl. But now she is getting more combative. Because of her disease she can't rationalize that this is the best camp a girl could hope for. Instead, her thoughts take to her to an emotional place that she can't climb out of.

I have often heard that being a parent is the hardest job on earth. And to that I say, "No Shit!"

What would Betty say to this?  "You're a good boy, but you don't need to use dirty words"  And then she would go on and on about how no one will  help her clean out her garage.