Written by Stephanie
Dawn hates change. This has been a feature of her personality from the time she was little. Like on her 6th birthday, when she had a complete meltdown beecause we got her a bunkbed. It was all well and good–we had achieved buy-in, you might say–until we pulled her and Dani’s beds out of the room.
“Temper tantrum” hardly begins to describe it. And it lasted for hours.
We have unintentionally kicked her resistance to change up a notch, no doubt, by moving so much. By that 6th birthday, Dawn had lived at 4 different addresses. She was really unhappy about the move to the bungalow in Skokie (when she was 3) and kept a picture of the old house–a whopping 4 miles away–on her bedroom door. I’d try to lessen her attachment by reminding her of the ants in the walls, the mice in the basement, and the fact that her room was too small to close the door (her bed was in the way). But none of that ever worked.
The only thing that has helped Dawn let go of that earlier loss was–you guessed it–a worse one. Turns out that 1200 miles between houses is a much worse experience. And making that leap in the middle of 4th grade? Unforgivable.
Ron and I have joked that Dawn will never move again. Not that she’ll live with us forever–no, she’ll send us to a retirement community and keep the house. She doesn’t agree. She has dreams of owning Grandma & Grandpa’s house (with its swimming pool) or of buying a big swath of land. But mostly, she’s planning to go back to Skokie.
And maybe, just maybe, she’ll end up in the same red-brick bungalow that she used to hate.
Our Amazing Forever Family 