Yesterday was spent traveling home to Kansas after my endoscopic surgical procedure in Indianapolis. I awoke this morning at 5 AM with a migraine—no surprise there, after general anesthetic, a little extra stress (although I wasn’t really worried about this at all) and a completely out-of-sync sleep schedule. My throat still hurts but it is better. I had dinner with my doctor the day after my surgery (he's a long time friend), and he mentioned he wasn’t sure the big tube would fit down my throat … so that tells you how tight it was. No wonder my throat felt so violated!

Dora spent four days with a neighbor. Dora couldn’t afford to miss school, and she’s been singularly unpleasant to be around, so we opted out of dealing with that while I was having surgery. As expected, she worked her magic on the neighbors; the mom was effusive in her description of what a delight little Dora was to be around. Dora headed out to school this morning with a nicely decorated Valentine’s Day box. Dora has not said one word to me about it; although I suspected the class was doing them. It wasn’t up to me to beg for the privilege of helping her make a box. I was virtually certain Dora would play the “I need a Valentine box but my mom won’t help me” card. Who knows how she actually presented it to the neighbor. There was a time when it would bother me, but that time has passed. I finally have accepted the fact that is it totally unrealistic to expect the average neighbor or community member to understand the real dynamics when they spend four days with a child who puts on her best face and stuffs all the real negative feelings down deep. I've seen the honeymooning Dora, and she's very good at her shtick.

My husband picked Dora up at the neighbors last night while I went out to do horse chores. Upon my return, I heard Dora crying. I asked what the matter was, and she said, “NOTHING!” So I said, “OK. I’m here if you want to talk, but I’m not begging you to do so.” It turns out Dora was crying over having to leave the honeymoon ideal of the neighbor’s home, only to return to this Land of Accountability and Realism. I offered to rock her but acknowledged that I was the problem for her. She opted to deal with it alone.

This morning, I asked her to describe to me why she was crying. She said, “For some reason, when I go to another house they are nice to me and I want to live with them!” I asked her if she thought she just had the bad fortune of landing in “mean houses” or perhaps might her behavior have something to do with it? Additionally, I asked her if she thought things would get difficult at the neighbor’s home if she stayed there long enough. She said, “Yes, I would get mad.” I reminded her of my husband’s comment that, “Wherever you go, there you are!”

Dora is not happy about how her life is unfolding but she is still not willing to be the one to fix anything. When I asked her if she had any interest in working on it, she immediately said “NO.” So there you have it. Onward ho!

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