Taking Sunny to the Viewing

Ultimately we decided to go to the viewing, but not the funeral. We flew in that morning then flew out the next morning. The travel schedule was grueling, especially since I'm still trying to recover from a nasty cold.

I told Sunny we were going to visit his foster family, see his baby brother, see some of his bio relatives and say goodbye to Mommy ___. "But isn't she dead?" he asked. I told him they were going to have her body in a coffin and it would look like she was sleeping. He could say goodbye to her body if he wanted, or if it was too sad, he didn't have to.

We met his caseworker outside the funeral home. She said she would help us out if there was any tenseness, but she didn't expect there to be any. In fact, everything went well.

However, being a fan of a show like Six Feet Under can give you a warped view of these types of events. I'd forgotten that most embalmings look horrifically unnatural. Mommy ___ looked like she was grimacing in pain, not sleeping. She seemed so much more vibrant and beautiful in the photos.

Sunny circled toward the coffin, looked for a few seconds, then ran back to us. Then he asked us to hold him and walk him to within a few feet of the coffin. He did this a few times, solemnly, then something flipped in his head and he ignored the coffin's existence; from then on, he just interacted with other people and ran around the funeral home laughing and giggling.

There were many of his maternal relatives there. Most of them had taken care of him at some point when he was a baby and a toddler. He remembered them, especially his grandmother, but he didn't go up to them and hug them. He was a bit shy around them and hid behind us until he was used to their presence. He did eventually hug his grandmother. The exception was when he saw his first, original caseworker. As soon as she walked into the door, he yelled her name, ran up to her and flung himself into her arms.

It went a lot better than I expected. I put out of my mind accusing thoughts as to why so many of these relatives hadn't stepped up for him. I just smiled and introduced ourselves. I hugged his grandmother, who was very emotional. She told my husband she wanted us to adopt his baby brother and keep the boys together, and that's what her daughter would have wanted. I got to hold his baby brother. Sunny was very shy around him, but I persuaded him to give his brother a handshake and a delicate baby hug.

We've been telling Sunny that his baby brother might come live with us. We'll know more soon. The baby is staying with maternal relatives for now, but is under state custody.

Sunny asked to leave after about 20 minutes. We stayed just a little longer, some of it outside the funeral home going over stuff with his current caseworker. There's an added layer of complication surrounding his (and his baby brother's) biological father. I can't say anything good about him, so for now I won't say anything at all.

Later on we went to visit his foster family. A non-adopted foster sister that Sunny was very close to had moved on, back to her mother, and his foster mom thinks they'll probably never see or hear from her again. But they had two new placements as well. Sunny had a fantastic time there. For him, it probably felt like the real purpose of the visit.

We went to see our family therapist about all this. I'd liked him on our first visit, but I'm changing my mind after this second time. He doesn't seem to engage with Sunny very much, he spent too much time congratulating us for being smart parents, and he said "kids that age have no concept of death". What? Of course he does! Before this happened Sunny had been asking all kinds of curious questions about death. I think we may need to find a new therapist, even if we have to pay for it.

I'm still recovering, physically and emotionally. I'm starting to look up some stuff about babies. But I don't want to hope for anything and have it fall through. And my feelings about having a baby are complicated. I know a lot of people would be overjoyed at the prospect, but we started off with older child adoption because that's what we really wanted... I don't dislike babies at all, I just find older kids a lot more fun to be around. Plus, they go to school! For his brother, we'd have to work out daycare or a PT nanny or an au pair, and since he isn't qualified as special needs, we wouldn't get any subsidy checks and it would mean a big change for some important financial goals.

I really do hope it happens, though. For both brothers, it would be so good to grow up together. We'll see.

I got about 15 minutes of video footage of the viewing and his foster family visit. I think that's going to be important to Sunny when he gets older, whether or not his brother comes to live with us.