Going Against Professional Opinions

One of the things that I think is trickiest about parenting kids with issues is knowing when to listen to the “professionals” and when not to. We have spent about 18 months trying to get help from the professionals. Many, many, many times, in retrospect, they were wrong and we listened to them anyway.

Now we are going to do something that nobody agrees with. In a few days I will be able to share with the world what that is. However, they are all warning us that we are doing it without their approval.

Part of this is something that I previously ranted about. It is the tendency for everyone to cover their own butts. So if there is a risk, nobody is going to recommend it.

My question is this: If nobody ever risks anything, then nothing good ever happens. Sure, something bad can happen, but without the risk, nothing good can either.

I look at the situation with the four teenage girls I placed. Sure, it was a huge risk. Yes, now we’re dealing with the oldest one refusing to be adopted. However, the youngest three are going to have a family, not age out, and have a great future.

I know that I practice risky social work. I’m kind of into the thesaurus today, so let’s see the synonyms for risky:

chancy, delicate, dicey, endangered, fat chance, hairy, hazardous, hot potato, iffy, insecure, jeopardous, long shot, perilous, precarious, rocky, sensitive, speculative, ticklish, touch-and-go, touchy, treacherous, tricky, uncertain, unhealthy, unsafe, unsound, venturesome, wicked, wide open

I’ve also even thought that I have bordered on blitzkrieg social work, which is defined as: A swift, sudden military offensive.

My concern now, though, is whether I can do the same with my own children and my own life that I am encouraging others to do. Am I willing to be risky and go against professional opinion when MY reputation and my children’s future is at stake?

The answer is yes, but not without some trepidation (agitation, alarm, apprehension, blue funk, butterflies, cold feet, cold sweat, consternation, creeps, dismay, disquiet, disturbance, dread, emotion, excitement, fear, fright, goose bumps, heebie-jeebies, horror, jitters, nervousness, palpitation, panic, perturbation, shock, terror, trepidity, uneasiness, worriment, worry)

Wow, just reading all those synonyms makes it sound worse than it is!