Am I a Vindictive Witch?

aka How did I get to this point?

Lately I've been feeling really down on myself and my parenting skills. I've been feeling uber controlling and like the Wicked "Witch" of the West. I know Bear needs lots of structure, but I don't like the person I've become in order to provide that. So when people doubt his need or my methods then I angst over whether or not I'm making the right choices.

My love language is Words of Affirmation and I know that makes me super sensitive to criticism. Plus, I'm not getting people saying I'm doing the right thing to balance out the people who say I'm doing the wrong thing, so I start to believe I'm doing the wrong thing.

"The bad stuff is easier to believe. You ever notice that?"

Friday I was talking to my therapist about Bear's latest attempt to get to do an extracurricular activity - his school's mascot is the horse and there is a group of "horseman" that push a huge fiberglass horse around the field every time the team makes a touchdown. Without permission, Bear signed up to be on this team, but hasn't been able to get to a game because of our restrictions). Bear finally admitted a several weeks ago that he was on the team and demanded we let him go to the game. I believe I said no at that time, because, "For one thing you're failing 3 classes and not doing your chores." (There were many other reasons, but with Bear and Kitty you have to be concrete because they don't understand the abstract, and you have to keep it simple or you overwhelm them.)

The following week he did all of his chores and turned in all the assignments he had not bothered to turn in - bringing grades in the 20s and 40s to As and Bs! (Don't get me started on what he's learning about life being able to turn in stuff late and still getting full credit). Of course his attitude still stunk and he made absolutely no progress or efforts to earn our trust so nothing really changed about getting out of the "inner circle." ("Inner Circle" - basically Bear's current level of trust - he must be supervised at all times by those in the inner circle - caregivers who know him and supervise him thoroughly - me, Hubby, Grandma and Poppy). Hubby had said he'd take Bear to the game since he wasn't working, but I went to the RAD mom group so Hubby was "single parenting" and couldn't take Bear after all. This caused Bear to have a meltdown toward me.

This week Bear was down for the count for the first 3 days recovering from his heat exhaustion, and was a total bear (he even acknowledged in therapy that he was treating the whole family badly). Then on Thursday he did all his chores, and Friday he was ready to go to the football game. Hubby was teaching a tough scuba class this week and didn't know until the last minute if he was going to have to work Friday night (football game night). Normally on Friday, I go to therapy while Grandma watches the kids and then we all meet at a restaurant for a family dinner. Usually my sister and her family come too, so this is a family tradition. When Hubby teaches scuba he gets home after all the kids are in bed, most of the time he gets off Friday evening so this is the first time the kids would see him all week. Saturday and Sunday he leaves the house at 7am and doesn't get back until after lunch so we miss him a lot.

Thursday night after getting home from teaching, Hubby told me he wasn't working Friday, but didn't want to take Bear to the game. I was totally fine with that, but didn't want to be the one to tell Bear (after his meltdown last week). So Friday morning when Bear asked me if Hubby was working, I told Bear I wasn't sure. Hubby and I realized that Bear had never asked anyone if he could join the team or if we were willing to commit to taking him. I asked Bear when he'd asked Dad if he could go, to point out that he hadn't actually done so. Totally went over Bear's head. He did tell me that he'd signed up for the team last year (you know, when he was failing all his classes and skipping school almost daily).

Realizing Hubby might be working, Bear tried to arrange to get to go to the game with a family friend. Last weekend in therapy we'd talked about Bear being in the "inner circle" and if he wanted to go places with people in the "first ring" then he was going to have to do his chores, be attending and passing at school, be RRHAFTBALL, and most importantly start relationship building with Hubby and I. His homework assignment was to talk about his feelings with Hubby and I. He did this during this week. Once. I explained that this does not make him automatically eligible to move to first ring. Let's just say this did not make me popular with him.

He tried to call Hubby to see if Hubby would take him, but I wouldn't let him since his bus was already waiting in front of the house. I spoke to the family friend and she did say she was willing to take Bear to the football game. Once. None of her children go to his high school so she and her husband would be spending their date night (and paying $8/each) to watch Bear (and a friend of her family was on the football team).

One of my concerns was that if we let Bear be on the team then we were committing to getting him there for every game (I'm a firm believer in not letting down your team). Hubby works a lot right now and the family friend is only willing to do this once. Another concern is that Hubby is completely exhausted and didn't want to take Bear. So I feel I'm protecting him. Later in the day I found out Bear is failing a class.

So anyway, I was discussing some of this in therapy when Hubby called to say he was taking Bear to the game after all. This didn't thrill me and I expressed that in therapy. I realized if you didn't know the whole story it could look like I was being pretty vindictive toward Bear. I said as much to my therapist and she started laughing and said I do act vindictive and petty when it comes to Bear (maybe not her exact words). This hurt a lot. Especially after listening to Kitty say in therapy what a horrible person I am.

Do I? I admit I don't like Bear very much. It's hard to hold him in positive regard or even like him when he shows so much animosity toward me. He even admits in therapy now that he treats me badly. He triggers my PTSD just by talking to me because I know what he is capable of. He sucks the joy out of the room (literally - if anyone is laughing or being silly or having fun he fusses at them to stop because they are being "annoying."). How do I balance this? All of a sudden I feel like I sound like Kitty - vindictive and vengeful.

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