She won't let herself enjoy herself...

After 10 weeks of battle...we finally got Little Miss a passport! A once in a lifetime opportunity, and she was so keen to go - she couldn't actually let herself believe it was going to happen.

It didn't go quite like I expected! She did everything she could to sabotage her chances of going on the trip.  Misbehaving...saying she wouldn't go.  Yet she was desperate to go and terribly upset when a passport challenge came up.

It took a long time to get to the bottom of this - but what it turned out to be - every other time she had been promised a trip in her life she had had that promise broken.  For the last 10 years she has been promised every year a trip to Australia - to see where she 'came from'. Every year - that promise has been broken.

It took a lot of talking with social workers/parents etc to figure out that the reason for her challenging behaviour was so that if she didn't go - she could blame herself for the trip being cancelled - not us.

It's such a confusing concept really - but when thought about night after night for weeks it does kind of make sense.

We finally booked our tickets and took off the next day.  Now, on the most part the trip was great.  She was on her best behaviour for my mum!  However, she was the most argumentative and naughty she has ever been with me.  Still not quite at the bottom of this and I don't really understand it.

She didn't seem to be having an 'amazing' time a lot of the time, but since she has been home she has done nothing but talk about her amazing experiences, cuddle her toy kangaroo (belting it into the car...taking it to the shops) and show off the pictures that were taken on her behalf! (she wasn't keen on taking pictures...living in the moment!) She clearly had a much more amazing time that she was letting on.

A couple of times I had to threaten to put her on the next plane home - and as much as I regret stooping to that level it did help with her behaviour!  The other thing that helped with her behaviour...  I got a text from my mums phone asking if I was coming (I was getting takeaways) and I replied with "- no I'm having some time out - sick of someone being a little B...."  She responded straight away saying it was her - and asking what she had done wrong. The text conversation was the first time she had ever really admitted to being at fault with behaviour. Her behaviour came right for the last few days too. Text messages may really be the way to communicate with her, takes the embarrassment out of being confronted face to face.

It's really confusing to me though why she didn't let herself have an amazing time all of the time while away.  She certainly had moments of joy, excitement etc - but it was like when she realised she was she had to hide that by arguing, or sulking.  Maybe she feels guilty that she got to go on such a fabulous trip and her siblings didn't get the opportunity?

Update: The other half suggests that it was because she knows her biological family will never give her the opportunity - so she can't let herself enjoy it as that would be admitting her family wouldn't take her.  She did mention many times - 'this will be the only time I come, i'll never be allowed to come again..."