Recent content by Seattlepapa

Believe me, I understand being alarmed--I am, too. As far as we know there wasn't a history of sexual abuse in his past, but honestly--who knows? He lived for 9 years before coming to live with us. I have these issues in my biological family tree, so I'm very tuned into what's possible and what...

I have been in contact with the counselor and she hears my frustration--she's going to meet with him a couple more times before all of us (parents and child) meet with her to come up with a plan of action. Needless to say, he's very embarrassed to have to talk about this, but we're not pulling...

Thanks to both of you for your responses. To clarify things--no, they are not blood brothers. They've been adoptive brothers since the youngest was 6 (we've had him since infancy) and the older was 9. The reason I mentioned "only 3 years" as the age spread is because I know full well that it's...

I have a challenging dilemma. I have three sons, each adopted. Our youngest is 12 and we've had him since he was a toddler. Our older two we've had for 5 years; they are now 15 and 18. Over the past year we've caught the now 15 y.o. and 12 y.o. in "awkward" situations, where we could tell that...

I've found that I rediscovered my late grandmother's Southern Baptist vernacular of "Dadgummit" and "For Cripes' sake!"

We're pretty tight about screen time at our house but our kids have adjusted well (they're adopted, two of the three adopted at ages 9 and 13). We have select tv shows that we watch as a family during the week (typically a single show for about an hour--maybe three shows a week). We do Friday...

First off, congratulations on taking on something that is certainly a challenge. My advice as a teacher is that you'll want to communicate clearly to the school and even ask them to evaluate her to see exactly where her deficits are. Ask if they can do a DRA (developmental reading assessment)...

We do a 50/50 plan. Our children get $10 a week (we live on several acres with gardens, so they also have outside weekend chores), with $5 in a "spendable account" and the other $5 in a savings account.

I find that the logical part of my brain stays intact as a parent. I was a teacher for 10 years before becoming a parent (a toddler from Russia then, 4 1/2 years later, two older foster boys). It felt "sudden" but my skills as a structured teacher helped the transition into having kids with real...