You HAVEN'T Failed!!

" Here's the deal, folks - IT AIN'T ABOUT YOU. It's not about your mothering, it's not about your failure (which you DID NOT FAIL, by the way), it's not about a mistake you made, NOTHING. It's about a piece of the kid that is broken. Don't take it personally, because IT'S NOT YOUR FAULT. I know you love this kid, and I know it hurts, and I know you long for that relationship... I know! 

Your role as a mother is to offer that love and mothering role. That's it. To offer it. Your job as a caretaker is to do all the other stuff - discipline, safety, etc etc. That's not the love role, that's the job. We spend most of our time in the job part, desiring so much to do the mothering part. But if they can't do their part, and come appropriately for the mothering part, then we can't give it to them, and we're stuck with the "warden" job role. 

NOT OUR FAULT. Not necessarily the kids' fault either, all the time. But don't take it personally, because you are only hurting yourself - and giving them more power to treat you like shit. Take the emotion out of the caretaker role - it has no affect on YOUR life, on how YOUR life goes - take the one who earned it to the fair, YES!!!, get the other a babysitter, that one's actions are not affecting YOUR ability to have fun....            

- this is what our psychiatrist (new) told us this past week. I didn't just make this shit up.  And if I'm reading it right, this kid will heal or not, we're doing everything we can. But this is about US surviving, OUR FAMILIES flourishing in the midst of this shitstorm."

~ A Fellow Trauma Mama

I heard something early on in this process that I try to remember often. I think pf adoption of a severely traumatized child as being like CPR.


The CPR theory
In a CPR training class that I attended, someone was talking to the instructor about being terrified that they would do it (CPR) wrong. The paramedic teaching the class looked at her and said, "He's already dead or you wouldn't be doing CPR in the first place. ANYthing you do leaves the person no worse off than he was." 

He also said later, that even if you do everything textbook-perfectly CPR may not work. Sometimes whatever caused the damage in the first place is just too much.


I didn't do this to my children. If I did nothing, they would still be "damaged." There is a possibility that even if I do all the right things in just the right way that they might possibly get "better," but there is an equal possibility that even if I somehow do everything perfectly (and we won't go into the fact that perfect is impossible) that it could have absolutely no effect.

There is no right way to do it, and even if you could do everything "right" that does not ensure the outcome you want, or that it will happen when you want it to.

Redefining Success
I have to remind myself often that success for my child does not mean that my child will have what I consider a "perfect life" - go to college, get a good job, get married to a wonderful person, move to the suburbs, and have 2.5 children and a dog. 

Instead, my child may leave home before graduating high school, may get into drugs/ alcohol, may get pregnant, may lose his/ her college scholarship, may get arrested, might have a criminal record that prevents him/ her from getting the job he/she wanted...

I didn't do this to my child. Nothing I can do or could have done would completely rewire his/ her brain. This is not my fault. Nor is it totally my child's fault (although it is his or her responsibility). If we both regret and blame others for the past, throw up our hands, and give up then THAT is our "fault." Yes, I need to grieve the life I wanted for my child, but then I need to move on. I need to redefine "success" for my child. {Finding the Joy}

My son, Bear, wanted to be a police officer or a marine. He wanted to get married and live happily ever after. Instead, he is in prison, and will probably be in and out of prison for the rest of his life. 

This is not because he's a bad person, or because I'm a failure as a parent. It is because he needs structure to feel safe. 

More structure than I, or anyone else, can legally provide.

With hindsight, I can see that it is because of the parenting he received from us that the reason he's in prison was for a non-violent crime (vs a violent one). Some part of his brain is still struggling to follow the values we tried to instill.

The Chaplain
A while back, my dad wrote a novel, and let me help edit it. There was one small anecdote that really resonated with me. In the story, the main character (a soldier) was talking to a young chaplain. The chaplain gave the soldier, who knew nothing about faith, a bible. They never saw each other again.

The soldier started occasionally reading the bible and talked to a few people about it. Eventually, the soldier comes to Christ. 

The part that got me was not the soldier, but the chaplain. In the epilogue of the novel, it shows the chaplain, now much older, talking to someone higher up in the church (forgive me for not knowing who that would be! *grin*). The chaplain guiltily confesses that he had always wanted to be the one to help someone come to Jesus. 

No one had ever fallen to their knees in front of the chaplain and accepted Christ. He never realized how many seeds he had planted or knew if those seeds had bloomed. He just assumed that because he never saw the flowers that his work had been in vain.

This touched my heart because I feel like that chaplain. I want to "fix" my children, on my time schedule (now!) and to know that all my effort made them "all better." I have to accept the fact that what I do may not have an obvious effect, but 5, 10, 15 years from now my child may make better choices because I was in his or her life.

My child may make 1000 wrong choices for every right one because that's the way his/ her brain is wired, but he/she is still making that one right choice.



Grieve 
Give yourself permission to grieve for the loss of the children you dreamed about, planned for, and the lives they should have had. If you haven't read the story Welcome to Holland, I strongly suggest taking a minute and doing so.



Forgive Myself 
Not only did I need to grieve that my children didn't have the life I'd hoped for them, but I had to acknowledge it was not my fault. I did everything I reasonably could. Often more than I should.

Yet one of my children did not heal.

Deep down, I felt guilty about this. Especially because I knew I had never really emotionally bonded with this child. In fact, I don't like to be around him. As a mother, especially as an adoptive parent, I was supposed to feel nurturing and loving toward this child, right? What kind of mother am I?

I had to acknowledge that not feeling nurturing and loving toward my abuser (and yes, that is what he was) is perfectly understandable. Yes, he was a child who did not always have control over his actions. That does not change the fact that it hurt and scared me when he lashed out at me and my family. 



Detachment

If my spouse had treated me the way my son did, everyone would criticize me for not leaving my husband. Because my abuser was my child, everyone told me I could not leave and, in fact, I was shamed for not being more loving and nurturing. 

Loving someone who doesn't love you back is not healthy. Despite what society says, not feeling attached to an unattached child doesn't make you a bad parent. Being expected to love your abuser is crazy. 

I sometimes think I was better off than many of my friends because I met my son as a raging teen who was incapable of being loving toward me, so it was a little easier for me to distance myself from him emotionally when making decisions.

 My friends who met their children when they were younger tended to love their child unconditionally and therefore, it was much harder for them to step back from their child and not take things so personally. It was admittedly easier for me to make tough decisions like reporting my son to the police or school and not picking up the phone when he called collect from jail for the 3rd time that week (costing an average of $20-$30 a call).

As I began to heal emotionally after my son moved out, ironically, I began to feel guilty for not feeling guilty! *ugh!* Then I would reread this post for the thousandth time.

Detachment Parenting an Older Child with Special Needs

You're not obligated to a life of thankless servitude just because you are a parent. You have the right to see your efforts appreciated. Show your family that you're worth more than that. Value yourself and you’ll immediately feel better.

"Detaching with love" We use the term “detach with love” to remind us that detaching is a loving action. Detaching doesn’t mean pushing people away or not caring about them. Detaching isn’t angry or withholding love. It’s letting go of controlling and worrying and putting responsibility back on the individual. It's redefining success for your child. Detaching is similar to setting boundaries. It puts healthy emotional or physical space between you and your loved one in order to give you both the freedom to make your own choices and have your own feelings. {Finding The Joy}

I Still Felt Like a Failure

For a long time, I still felt like I was a failure. That I sacrificed all my money, time, family, and health for my child(ren) and had nothing to show for it. 

If it helps, know that these feelings did pass. Looking back, I realize that some of these feelings were depression and PTSD and some were residual guilt over not meeting society's (or my own) expectations for a "successful" child. {Continuous Traumatic Stress (CTS), Caregiver/ Compassion Fatigue, PTSD, Secondary PTSD, }


Healing
I wish I could tell you that there are "10 Easy Steps to a Happier Life" and they're all listed right here! But I can't. The reality is that this healing process took time. I needed lots of support from people who "get it," therapy, medication, rereading this post, retraining my brain, growing a thicker skin... time.

All I can tell you is that it does get better. There will come a time when you won't feel like a failure. Because You HAVEN'T Failed!! 

Kintsukuroi - More beautiful for having been broken

Every misstep, every failure, every success, every learning experience, has made me a stronger, better person. My rough childhood, my experiences as a teen and becoming an adult, my education and work experiences as a social worker and in childcare, my love of research, parenting neurotypical biokids, parenting severely mentally ill adopted teenagers...

 

I haven't failed. This was part of the journey. Yes, it often sucks (especially in the midst of it all), but it has made me appreciate my life more and it has made my life richer. I have made deep, intense friendships and relationships that would not have been possible without this journey. I have grown stronger in ways I never knew were even possible.

Self-Care
I gave this advice to someone else recently, and I try to remember to take it myself!

You are a good mom doing the best you can in a difficult situation. 

That being said, this is a hard life. 

I know it sounds impossible sometimes, but SELF-CARE has to be your first priority!

But My Child NEEDS Me! 
When my kids first got here, I was empathetic, calm, and patient with them- probably TOO patient.  I stuffed things down, let it roll off my back, and GAVE and GAVE and GAVE... until there was nothing left. Nothing left for my child, for the other children, for my marriage, for my family, and most of all, for myself. I was so burned out and overwhelmed that we were all miserable.

You can't help anyone if you're so emotionally drained that there's nothing left. 

These are some of the things that helped me fill my "tank."

Finding the Joy
Self-Care - Caring for the Caregiver

Stop Walking on Eggshells
Handling Continuous Traumatic Stress(CTS) - When Your PTSD is Not Post/Past Yet**
Handling Child to Parent Violence (CPV)

Prioritizing Yourself, Your Family, and Your Child -- In That Order

We get a lot of pressure to dedicate all our time and energy to heal our child. We have to resist that pressure.
There are a lot of well-meaning people who say you "SHOULD" (or "should not") be doing ____________ for your child. These people have no idea what living 24/7 with a child with an attachment disorder is like (even those who have experience working with special needs children). They don't know YOUR child and how your child is with YOU - plus they work at most an 8-hour shift with your child, then they get to go home!

None of them take into account the needs of the rest of your family, your other children, your marriage, or you. They don't know your "backstory." Their priority is the one child, not your family as a whole.

One thing I learned the hard way: 

You can't sacrifice the family as a whole for one child. 

There was no way to know when we started what would help my child(ren) and what wouldn't make a difference. At first, looking back, I beat myself up over what I did do, what I didn't do, and what I could have/ "should have" done differently. 

Over time, I accepted that even if I'd done everything perfectly my child still may not have healed.

 BUT THAT'S NOT THE POINT!

Hindsight being 20/20, I look back and realized that I let the rest of the family suffer to help this one child (or in our case 2 children). I let my health fail. I became overwhelmed to the point that I couldn't function. 

You can't take care of anyone if you're shut down.

Over the years, my other children got almost none of my attention. I did finally figure out how to Find the Joy and get my own needs met so that I was capable of meeting theirs, but I didn't figure that out as soon as I wish I had. As the kids became young adults, I started to find out some of the things I'd missed and that they had suffered from the lack.



Unconditional Love vs Unconditional Caregiving
In a seminar, one of my favorite RAD Gurus, Katharine Leslie, brought up these points about parenting a child with unhealed RAD (who was therefore not capable of returning any love or affection):

• There cannot be a Secure Attachment when: The parent receives little or no positive response from the child, and often the child is neglectful of and abusive to the parent. Without either one's needs being met, and unable to "exit" the relationship, there can be little to no feelings of attachment (leaving resentment and apathy).
• Providing unconditional love to a child without getting anything in return will make you physically and emotionally ill. (If this were a stranger or a celebrity it would be called stalking!). Instead we should practice unconditional caregiving. Relationships 

My job as a therapeutic parent is not to love this child unconditionally, but to help my child learn how to be in a relationship. 

Once that happens, if that happens, only THEN can we can develop a loving relationship.


Some Other Things That Helped Me

Detachment Parenting the Adult Child

EMDR Therapy
I worked with a therapist who specialized in trauma and I did some EMDR therapy to help with my PTSD (both from living with children with severe trauma and some from my childhood).  Learning about my own issues, including my own attachment disorder, and accepting and dealing with them has helped a lot too.

Medication 
I'm mildly bipolar (Bipolar II). I don't take meds all the time, but when I need to, I take them.  

Date Night/ Respite with Someone Who "Gets It." 
We are incredibly blessed that my mom, who mostly "gets it," takes the kids overnight almost every Saturday night, keeping them through church services the next day.  Honestly, Hubby and I rarely do much more than rent a movie and go to bed together, but it's a chance to recharge our batteries and remember that eventually the children will grow up and leave home, but our marriage, and each other, will still be there. But only if we prioritize our relationship (Keeping Our Marriage Strong).

Love Languages  
Discovering my love language (and those of the rest of the family) was huge for me.  Knowing what I need (Words of Affirmation), made it possible for me to focus on getting it.  I tried to teach my family to give me what I need, and they do their best, but they are overwhelmed and of course, some of them are RAD! It's not fair (and unrealistic) to expect them to be able to give me what I need. 

Hubby is the son of a "strong, silent type", I think my father-in-law said the equivalent of a sentence a year to me, and while Hubby's not that bad, and is a great listener, Words of Affirmation is definitely not his strong suit.  I went outside my overwhelmed family to get what I needed.  I went to the internet, wrote and read blogs, found support groups, went to seminars and trainings... I also helped and mentored others.  It made me feel good about myself, and they gave me the words of affirmation that I needed.

Set limits
Once I knew what I needed, I stopped giving so much that I had nothing left.  I’ve always been a rescuer, giving even beyond what I could afford to lose.   I had learned the hard way to stop doing it with others but felt that shouldn’t apply to children, especially MY children.  

I soon found that the kids not only NEEDED the structure and boundaries that I set by saying “No,” but they also did better with them – they felt safe which allowed them to trust enough to feel loved.  
 

"Saying "no" is not being negative.  Negative is saying "yes" to things that are destroying you."  

Stop Walking on Eggshells!  

I strongly recommend reading this book! The first half of the book helped me develop empathy for my children by explaining why they did what they did, but the second half gave great practical advice in setting boundaries.  

Find Support from People Who "Get It" 
You Are Not Alone!! It really helped to have the validation of others, and for a long time, I constantly sought it out before I finally felt OK about this path. I found a forum for those who had adopted special needs children and through that made friends in the blogging community (Life in the Grateful House and Welcome to My Brain), joined a local adoption support group (COAC), then BeTA (Beyond Trauma and Attachment), and finally Facebook groups. Now I admin a FB group called Parenting Attachment-Challenged Children and try to support others. I also belong to several FB support groups for those of us parenting adult children. 

This is a good post reminding us that we are an AMAZING PARENT!

Choose joy 
Every day I try to focus on the positives.  It's hard as heck, but it is important.  I vent, but I try to limit it to a maximum of 3 vents, even less if I can.  I needed lots of validation that what I was doing was the right thing.  Over time, I eventually began to believe it, and that makes me feel better about myself.

I look back at the Godincidences (kind of like reviewing my blessings) that came out of what frequently seemed like tragedies at the time.  I try to focus on how many of these “tragedies” have made me a stronger, better person.  Most importantly, I focus on the positives and Choose Joy, like the little old lady in the nursing home:

A 92-year-old, petite, poised and proud lady, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o'clock, with her hair fashionably coifed and makeup perfectly applied, even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary.

After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready.

As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. "I love it," she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy.

"Mrs. Jones, you haven't seen the room ... just wait."

"That doesn't have anything to do with it," she replied.

"Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn't depend on how the furniture is arranged... it's how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it. It's a decision I make every morning when I wake up. I have a choice; I can spend the day in bed recounting the difficulty I have with the parts of my body that no longer work, or get out of bed and be thankful for the ones that do."

"Each day is a gift, and as long as my eyes open, I'll focus on the new day and all the happy memories I've stored away ... just for this time in my life. Old age is like a bank account ... you withdraw from what you've put in. So, my advice to you would be to deposit a lot of happiness in the bank account of memories.

Her five simple rules to be happy:
1. Free your heart from hatred.
2. Free your mind from worries.
3. Live simply.
4. Give more.
5. Expect less."
Not easy, but Wonderful Advice....for all of us.

An amazing post about not letting grief steal your days, and one way a woman keeps mourning about the lives her RAD children could/should have had from stealing the joy in her life.

Grateful Journal
I know several people who post a "grateful journal." Every day, they write down what they're grateful for. It helps them focus on the positives, even when the negatives are overwhelming.

Helping someone else
Sometimes it is not about what we, or even our kids, need. Now I work with other parents on a similar journey. Yes, everything didn't work out the way I wanted it to, but how not to do it might be what I need to share. Helping others has helped me with my own recovery from this journey.

Let Go {At What Point Do You Let Go?}

Many of my friends are struggling with children who are chronologically on the cusp of adulthood, but do not have the skills needed to be successful... in fact, most of their kids are determinedly on a rapid, self-destructive path.

It sometimes felt like I was in the middle of the ocean holding my son like a lifeguard.  We did everything we could to teach my son to "swim," and he just couldn't learn.  For as long as I held him up, he hated me, was actively fighting me, and was absolutely convinced he could do it all on his own. 

I knew his struggles could drown me and they almost did many times.

I knew that the minute I let go, he would flounder for a little while, but inevitably, he would sink to the bottom of the ocean.  

How do you let go, knowing your child will most likely drown?  At the same time, I knew I could not hold him forever.  I finally realized that I had to let go. {18 Is Not The Finish Line}

Redefine "Failure"/Success
Hubby and I purchased a company right before the recession. We did everything we could to save it and save the jobs of our employees, but after several years, just before the end of the recession, we finally had to give up. My husband was (understandably) upset -- kicking himself for purchasing this company, feeling guilty because it had failed, and for causing our family to be in overwhelming debt.

I think it helped a little for him to step back from looking at this as a failure on his part because it didn't turn out the way he thought it should, and instead look at all the good things purchasing the company did:

• We employed people during the recession who otherwise would have lost their jobs and been unable to support their families.
• Not working for someone else gave me the flexibility to take my kids to work with me or leave work early if they needed to be out of school (which was often) and to take time off to go to the endless meetings at the school.
• It gave me affirmation of my own abilities (during a time when it felt like all I was hearing was that I was a horrible person and parent).
• It gave us both experience running a company that we used in the future to qualify for better jobs.

The Starfish Story

Statistics:

Our kids have a LOT of things going against them. If we helped them succeed in even a few areas then they are better off than many of their peers. 

• Only 50 percent of children in traditional foster care graduate from high school.
• Almost 80% of inmates incarcerated in our prisons have spent time in foster care.
• 40-50% of former foster youth become homeless within 18 months after leaving care.
• 60% of youth earn incomes below the poverty line.
• 65% of children in foster care experience seven or more school changes from elementary to high school.
• Only 1-3% graduate from college.
• 25% of foster youth will be in prison within two years of emancipation.  
• Four of five (80 percent) young women become pregnant too soon.
• Kids who've been in foster care are diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) at six times the general population and double the rate of veterans returning from war.
• Eight of ten (81 percent) males have been arrested compared to 17 percent of their peers who were not in foster care. Jail And Prison: Foster Care And Mental Health Statistics

Good Advice Given To Me By A Fellow Trauma Mama:

The fact of the matter is this - [Your child] is going to drown no matter how much you do for him. The only difference is that you are going to drown right along with him if you continue doing the things you're doing. He is very clear that he doesn't want your help. He is even making things worse in his zeal to get you off his back. As long as you are giving help and advice, he is convincing himself that he knows better, is smarter, and can handle it all himself - and hating you for it. 

What's wrong with letting him know that you are going to step back and let him handle things, but that if he needs your assistance with meds (or whatever you decide the boundaries to be) that you are willing to help in any way you know how - but only if he asks. Maybe after a few months, he will concede that things aren't going as smoothly as he thinks.

His perception of how he's taken care of himself all this time on his own is only a small indicator of his distorted thinking. The one thing I've learned (the hard way over and over) is that their reality doesn't really have to be based on the facts, and when it isn't, there is no reasoning with them. I know it is so painful to watch, but this is real life and unless you have guardianship (and lots of times even when you do), he is legally able to make his own decisions - which he's been doing. YOU are doing all the work on improving his life and he's fighting you every step of the way. Let your husband field the phone calls and advocate for him - I think he will find out quickly that helping [your child] isn't as easy as it may seem. 

Walking Away

This post is mostly about encouraging and helping people to accept and handle parenting children with trauma/attachment/severe mental illnesses and the guilt that can come from it. But I also want to say that

Sometimes you need to walk away and that's OK. 

Sometimes what is right for you and your family is to sever ties and focus on healing. Sometimes what is needed is firm boundaries. Every child, every relationship, every parent is different and their needs are different and can change over time as well. What works for me and my family may not be right for you and yours. I hope that this post has helped you with your choices.

{Marythemom: If you do decide what you need is to walk away and work on healing then feel free to comment on this post (I won't publish your comment) with a way to contact you and I can connect you to support groups intended for that purpose.} 

The Future
Our adoption of these children may not have turned out like we wanted it to but a lot of good things came from it as well. Plus, it's not over yet. I don't know what the future will bring for my children or myself. 

UPDATE: My children are now 25, 23, 22, and almost 20. Every day I see new evidence that something good came from this "experience." 


Bear(25) is about to get out of prison. I fully expect him to be in and out of prison for the rest of his life but I still see him as a "success" story. 

When he came to us at age 13, he was an improperly diagnosed and medicated, raging, aggressive, self-destructive delinquent. We were told by experienced professionals that if he even survived past the age of 18, that he would be violent and dangerous, would drop out of school, join a gang, and hurt a lot of people. We were advised not to adopt him and to run as fast as we could in the other direction. 

I still don't know if we did the right thing for our family by adopting him but he is still alive, graduated high school, has not committed a violent crime, and still maintains some connection to us (mostly wanting money or help, but it's more than we expected).

Kitty(23) is engaged to be married, has no children and is not pregnant, is living outside of our home, and usually has a job (although not currently). She is happy.

Bob(22) recently graduated from college. She is working on her portfolio and I have no doubts that she will have a job soon. She is in a healthy relationship. Kitty has asked Bob to be her Maid of Honor and Bob accepted. I won't say the girls are best friends but Bob has come a long way from hating Kitty's guts and Kitty has come a long way from resenting Bob for the things she has that Kitty does not! Bob is an amazing young woman with deep empathy and understanding that I believe she wouldn't have if we hadn't adopted.

Ponito (almost 20) had a rough time but I see more and more positive growth from him. He starts community college in a few days and I have hope that he will get a handle on his ADD and emotional troubles and be highly successful (I believe he and Bob will achieve the more "typical" definition of success - college, job, marriage, children). He and Bob are very close. Probably much closer than they would have been if we hadn't adopted (I'm assuming there would have been a lot more sibling rivalry than there is).

***

I hope this post helps you.

These are some posts that helped me:

**SELF-CARE! - Caring For The Caregiver**

**Finding The Joy**
**Prioritizing Yourself, Your Family, and Your Child - In That Order**
**Handling Continuous Traumatic Stress(CTS) - When Your PTSD is Not Post/Past Yet**

**Detachment Parenting An Adult Child**

Check out more posts about parenting the "Adult" child on the right sidebar-->>