Fortifying the Walls

Once upon a time we had a beautiful new house. That was last year when we bought it. We have had so many blowouts over the last year in our new home and there is a ton of damage to the boys’ room. So this was today’s project. To turn this:

Into an actual room. Now we have thought about how to do this on many occasions and we just landed on using some old plywood because, well it was around to be completely honest.
DISCLAIMER:

We are well vetted parents and ensure that we meet all safety standards for our children. We had to implement an alternative fire safety plan, which was completed, prior to covering the windows . Due to their cognitive capacities the boys would be unable to escape a fire out a window on their own anyway. Dcf and our local police department have been out to see the room and have given their approvals.

So many tools! And I don’t even know how to use half of them! But lucky for me my wife is amazing and has worked hard to make me not completely useless with home renovations! I wore these for about 5 seconds and that was a terrible choice. I have so much sawdust in my eyeballs, ears, nose, hair and pretty much everywhere else possible.

Now this is the wife in question. She is really awesome and quite honestly the best wife anyone could ever want. She is the absolute best person ever when it comes to making things happen. We get these ideas and she makes them happen, every time.

So we began this mission at like 10 am. We did not finish until 5:30 pm ugh. I tried like hell to make these panoramic shots work buuut just like home improvements, photography is not my strength-at all.

The Finished Project! At least before allllllll their toys came back into the room. (The beds look the best they ever do because I made them.) 

To so many, this may seem like a ridiculous thing to do. First off, its ugly as can be and it was a pain in the butt to accomplish. Second it is difficult to clean and makes decorating almost impossible. Third well gosh look at it! Barf.  

For our family the top priority is safety. When the boys were able to bust up the walls it was just not safe and plywood is a lot stronger then drywall. Our eventual plan is to be able to take it down and refinish the room in its entirety but until that time the plywood stays. Maybe we can decorate it at some point.

Help and Support for Parents of children with special needs inc. Behavioral Closed group · 1 member Join Group This group is for parents who struggle with handling the intense behaviors their special needs children display.

What Does This Mean?

These kids have never had a room of their own. They have never even had a home of their own before ours. They moved around so much it is disgusting. You can read more about that here…. . When we bought our home last year we included the boys in every step, including signing the paperwork. We thought it might help them to adapt to family life, adoption life and living in a home with their family.

Unfortunately, that is not quite how that happened.

The last year has been a huge mess. A. HUGE. MESS. School has been a MESS. Behavior at home has been a MESS. Pretty much everything has been a HUGE MESS. I am a firm believer that matter what happens there are always teachable moments. Now don’t get me wrong, I have also been a huge, giant, ridiculous mess. My emotions have been a very unhappy tornado. Some days are even hard to get out of bed but today I did.

Malikai hung out for a bit with us while we worked. He tucked himself under the beds and peeked out to “help” when he felt we needed it. His help was typically telling us things we already knew and pointing out things we could see. He also did help set up and break down which is a big deal for him.

Today while working on this project, Malik came into the room to check in from his assigned activity. While he was in there he asked for something, and was very quickly told not to ask for anything because we were spending our entire day fixing their room. Then, he paused just a moment, and then he did something amazing; he apologized. He said “I’m sorry you have to do all this” and gestured around the room.

If I could have taken a picture of my face in that moment it would have been this, literally this. He moved on after saying this, as though it was just a thing to acknowledge and say. To us though, it was incredible. This child, this broken little boy, this child who we were told could not survive in a “real family”, this child with the tallest walls I have ever seen, is ready to accept us fortifying these walls for him. This is our Ohana, we are tired, but we are proud of every bit of progress.