Successes and Trials

First the good news, and to me it is really, really good:

I took Blondie to the doctor today for a check up. As you may remember, she is on growth hormone shots. Well, she has grown an inch in three months. Hooray! She is now nine and a half years old, and is 46.5 inches tall. She only grew 1.5 centimeters from January to July, but then grew 3.3 centimeters from July to October. Since we started the shots in May, I'd say they are definitely working.

The bad news is that she is begging her friends for food at lunch time. I may have mentioned this last year, but I'm not going to go back and search my blogs to see. Anyway, her lunch companions complained about her last year and her teacher sent me a note. I send her plenty of good food that she says she likes, but she just can't seem to stop begging her friends. I was really hoping that it wouldn't be an issue this year.

We figured it out two ways. One is that her tummy is starting to round over again. Both girls were a bit chubby when they first moved in with us, and our social worker called it the "foster pudge" or something like that. Anyway, since moving in with us and getting off medication and tons of sweets, they have slimmed down and look really nice.

Now Blondie has gained four pounds in the six weeks since school started. Considering she only weighed 44 pounds to start with, that's a lot, and not a good thing if she keeps up this rate of weight gain. So I called her teacher and alerted her to the problem, hoping that she can encourage the other children to tell Blondie no when she begs for food. She just doesn't need it. Yes, she does have food issues, for good reason. It's a very difficult thing to help her with. She doesn't sneak any food at home or overeat at home. She's doing it all when I'm not around so it's impossible for me to control. Big sigh.

She's also been telling the boys at school that she "loves" them. The poor thing has been moved so much, and everyone says "I love you" until she has no idea what love even is. We asked her yesterday what love was, and she said it was when you hug and kiss someone. I asked her if that meant that if I went across the street and gave our neighbor a hug and kiss that would mean that I loved him? and she said yes, it did. Whoa. Boaz and I had a heart to heart talk with her and tried our best to explain that love comes from the heart and we don't just feel it for anyone and everyone. And that it has also probably made the little third grade boys at school uncomfortable when she was shouting "I love you" as they ignored her and walked away.

Sometimes I think this is bigger than I am. It's just hard. I don't know how to get through to her. It was so much easier with Babygirl. She believes what I tell her, takes it to heart and puts it into practice. Blondie doesn't believe what I say, or just doesn't care. I give her instructions, and then I think things are settled, because that's the way it always worked before. But then weeks later I find out she's doing the exact opposite of what I told her. Just like the shower gel in her hair. I don't know if she'll really stop following the boys saying "I love you" just because I told her it was a bad idea. I just don't know.

I care about her, I want the best for her, I love her, I want to help her. But it just won't work unless she cooperates. She has to make the decision whether to follow what I tell her or ignore it. I still think that time will make the difference and someday she'll probably trust me and listen to me. I'm just discouraged right now.