Broken Bonds

"It takes time to heal wounds of broken love,
  and sometimes that love is for... forever."

 I always wince when people tell me that our little Sarah seems to be doing ok, It's hard for me to explain to others what Reactive Attachment Disorder looks like. It's hard to put into words the things this amazing little girl struggles with, but I'll try. One day a couple of weeks ago, Sarah was having an extremely hard time listening and following the rules. Tyson, being the sweet patient dad that he is he tried rationalizing with her and it went something like this.

"Sarah, do mom and dad love you?" Tyson asked her "Yes" she said, he asked "how do you know dad loves you" she responded "because you're here everyday and not in jail" "yes" he said " that is one way, what are some other things that mom and dad do for you to show that we love you?" and then the blank stare and the repeated "Because you come home everyday" 

That was when it hit me like a freight train she doesn't recognize what love is, so how could she feel it as love. I remember early in my marriage reading a book called "The Five Love Languages" by Gary Chapman, it dawned on me that Sarah does not have a language, but someday I hope that she will.
That being said we have had to face the cold hard truth that this R.A.D is something that can never be "cured" it is not something that we can love away. According to her therapist and many other moms who are loving kids like Sarah, she will struggle with this her whole life to some degree or another. We can expect things to get a bit worse when she is 11 or 12 and that scares the heck out of me, but I know that the answers and solutions will come, but most of all I know that someday because of the love of my heavenly father Sarah's mind and heart will be healed and whole again.

Perfection

"Do not expect to become perfect at once. If you do, you will be disappointed. Be better today than you were yesterday, and be better tomorrow than you are today.” From the Life of Lorenzo Snow

       Yesterday we had a lesson in relief society about what perfection really means, it isn't being the mom who does everything right, the wife who never fights with her husband or having 100% visiting teaching every month. Perfection is achieved through making mistakes. I have learned over the past year that perfection is something that comes from making the wrong choice, seeing how that choice affected the happiness of those around me, and my own happiness for that matter. The steps to perfection come through recognizing our own weaknesses and shortcomings and then overcoming them. You would thing the hard part would be over coming them, but it isn't. The hard part is recognizing them. It is hard to hear yourself say or think something terrible, and then accept that it was not the best choice of words. Life is imperfect, if we were expected to not make mistakes we would never have been sent here on earth. We are made perfect by doing the best we can, by going through trials that bring about change in ourselves, and only through the atonement can we be made perfect.

Miss Madison aka Talk Radio

Madison is a talker these days, she is constantly talking which is why I have dubbed her talk radio. She likes to pick out a portion of a word such as Bicycle and say like cycle like Popsicle..
Her speech is pretty clear but there are a few things she says and no matter how much I correct her she still says them in her own way. Here are a couple of them for your entertainment:

Applecados is Avocados

puffa-cheeto is the puffy cheetos (she says it like cappuccino)

Magnet doodle=magna doodle

Pampakes= pancakes

Scoooota = scooter

Madi-isms are the best! She makes me smile everyday I love my little sass box :)