Adoption Journal #7

So, we are entering our last week of the infamous "Pride" parenting classes through the county. Last week's Pride classes focused on discipline. The basic point of the discipline session was that foster parents are not allowed to use corporal punishment with foster children, nor are they allowed to use corporal punishment on their own children if their foster children will be aware. That seems pretty straight forward. The county does not allow for any circumstances in which physical punishment would be allowed by a foster parent. Any questions? Of course you don't. This is basic, whether you agree with it or not. If one disagrees with this policy and chooses to be a foster parent, then that person is choosing to abide by the policy. If one already agrees that corporal punishment is bad, then there is no problem.The class could have spent the discipline session on how to recognize behavioral antecedents and intervene to prevent negative behavior or how to implement positive reinforcement strategies or how to model good behavior. The class could have spent time on how to verbally de-escalate crisis situations or how to create an environment that minimizes certain negative behaviors. These would have all been good for foster parents who will most likely have to deal with behaviors beyond the scope of what most biological parents tend to deal with.What did we do with the bulk of our time? We discussed how we felt about spanking. We broke up into groups to discuss our feelings about spanking and whether or not we were spanked. We answered questions on how we felt about our parents use of corporal punishment. Mind you, we have already been very clear that spanking is not allowed, but the class spent over half of the session discussing feelings about spanking. There might be room to discuss spanking in a lot of forums, but not here. Burning children's arms with cigarettes is not allowed for foster parents, but we spent no time discussing that. once again the trainer failed to treat the class like adults and simply say "Spanking is not allowed under any circumstances, so let us look at alternative, or more positive, discipline approaches." Rather, the trainers didn't want the pro-spanking group to be upset so we spent 1 1/2 hours discussing the rationale. Another missed opportunity by the county. It really is a shame.That being said, we are excited to be near completion of this phase of the process. We spent last week completing our autobiographies to be attached to our application packets. This has been a good experience in the sense that it has allowed us an opportunity to discuss family traditions, traits and habits that we appreciate in our families and also some that we find intolerable. It's difficult to look critically at one's own parents and family dynamic, but it is worth it. I have come away with an appreciation for my family, yet an acknowledgement of the issues I disagree with.We hope this next week goes smoothly as we complete classes 8 & 9 of the Pride workshop. Our application will be processed this week and hopefully we will be assigned a permanent adoption worker within the next couple of weeks. After that we will complete "Bridge Builders" series of classes, specifically designed for preparing us for a foster care license. We also have another application workshop to attend (we have attended the adoption workshop now we must attend the foster care workshop), then get our CPR/1st Aid and finally complete the home study process. We still have a long way to go, but we're making progress.