walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2]


walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlgiht Wood

Manipulation and control issues manifest differently in children with a traumatic past.

The curtain rises on a new scene. Andrey is sitting in my lap waiting for a blood draw. His veins are iffy, and a nurse and a doctor are collaborating to find a good one. The needle hasn’t touched him yet.

He starts to squirm and whimper, but I can tell from the position of his mouth that he is not afraid. He’s masking for attention. It’s an expression that we’ve learned to recognize – a cover that others take for gospel truth and adorable charm. This child wells up in crocodile tears because he sees two sympathetic, doting faces looking at him and crooning.

The crocodile tears are bait, though. He sells it, and they buy it – hook, line, and stinker. I mean, sinker.

I try to explain this to the professionals that are oohing and awwing and poor babying him. It’s awkward because he’s right there and I don’t want to sound like a mean mama to him or to them.

But I’m the one that is going to take him home, and they need to understand what’s happening.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2]

So I tell them. This isn’t genuine. Please just – no, it’s not that – do you see this facial expression? He’s not –

Oh, it’s okay, they say. They brush me off and pat his arm. They are searching for a vein, this arm, that arm, rubbing his arm, holding his hand, back to the other arm, maybe that one’s better – and they continue smiling and sympathizing. He reads, You poor baby. Your mommy just doesn’t understand, does she?

But they’re playing the game…and it’s really not okay. When they were finally done and looking the other direction, I caught him smirking.

Fifteen minutes of overstimulation and poor boundaries led to more than a week of violent acting out, upheaval, and other misbehavior in our home.

But it’s okay. They weren’t there for that.

The blood draw finished, we go to the room where he gets to pick out a small treat from an overflowing box of made-in-China trinkets. I tell him to pick one out quickly; Dad and many siblings are in the tiny waiting room and we have things to do.

“Oh, it’s okay – I told him he could have two,” the doctor says.

Oh, perfect! Thank you so much for telling my son that the limits I set do not need to be enforced! Thank you so much for showing him that you are an authority over both of us. I’m sure you’ll be happy to pay for anything that gets broken over the next three weeks and also several therapy appointments? Those must be complimentary in your services, right? And you’ll be there when it’s not just his parents that set limits, but also when there are park rules, class expectations, and traffic laws…right? Right?

Hmm. Yeah…probably not.

And you know what he did? He took three (3) trinkets from the box. My husband found them as we were leaving.

He took more than he had permission from anyone to take, because limits didn’t matter.

So. It’s not okay. If we are at the grocery store and I tell him he can only have one treat and he steals more, it’s not okay. I’m grateful that we had the teaching opportunity over some cheap plastic toys and not over candy bars from the store, or worse.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlight Wood

I spoke to them about it. We love this office and their staff, and we know that we are really on the same side. However, the week we lived through after that appointment was not acceptable and had to be addressed. Our fence had been driven though, and needed some steel reinforcements.

It was around the same time I wrote about being on the same side, and the things God impressed on me then were still very fresh:

A gentle answer brings a gentle response.

We confront successfully when we move from the mindset of someone being in trouble to being corrected in love.

We’re not perfect; we’re all learning together. We’re on the same side.

And I really tried. I tried to explain what our family went through the following week and how the boundaries that Andrey needs are essential. I acknowledged that they were not treating him any differently than our other children, but explained that he must be treated differently because his needs are different.

You don’t treat a child with cancer the same way you treat a child with a cold.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2]

image courtesy Nancy Thomas Parenting

I was met with the disturbing combination of condescension and defense, being blown off and berated. I was shocked and disappointed…and we had to go back in a few months for another blood draw. Yay.

We waited and researched. Made some phone calls and sent out some emails to people who know far more about attachment issues than we do, and they were not only a wealth of information but also full of sympathy and encouragement. Anticipating our next appointment, we took what we gleaned from our resources and wrote a letter.

It was professional. It was kind. It was…educational.

It was our line in the sand. The substance of it is below. Adoptive parents are welcome to modify and use it.

We are learning that both Andrey and Reagan respond best to a very business-like, calm manner from people in the community. As we discussed before, any “doting” that happens to them from adults other than their parents will backfire in their attachment, and our family will likely deal with outbursts of increasingly negative, disruptive behavior for days afterward. We are helping them learn to be authentic in their interactions with others instead of triangulating with other adults, and if they are able to manipulate adults with superficial, “cute,” or otherwise masking behavior, it reinforces that insincerity.

There are special challenges to dealing with attachment issues in a setting like a medical appointment. For example, we generally do not allow other adults to touch Andrey and Reagan because it is confusing for them in the bonding process, but they obviously must be touched by medical staff to have their vitals checked, blood drawn, etc. If this can be done in a very matter-of-fact, professional manner it does not usually lead to any behavioral fallout. The best case scenario is that conversation and eye contact with Andrey and Reagan be limited as much as possible (they both have often tried to seek out eye-contact with strangers while avoiding eye contact with Vince and me) and that verbal encouragement or comfort comes from their parents only.

Please let me know if you have any questions about any of this. I apologize again for not making this clear before; it has taken us many months to discover this much about them, and every week brings new challenges and experiences to learn from. We appreciate your care for our family and for working with us to help Andrey and Reagan heal in body, mind and spirit.

It was too much, apparently.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlight Wood

“We want to be a warm, welcoming place for Andrey so he feels safe and cared for,” they said.

Except…he needs to feel that from his family, not acquaintances and strangers. And he won’t feel that from his family when the boundaries are pushed by other adults who are picking his scabs off. This makes him anything but safe.

He would happily go home with any of their staff because they’re still playing and putting gas on the fire. Helping him attach to his own home and family is the issue we are concerned with.

“We can’t let our office feel like they have to walk on eggshells every time your family comes in for a visit,” they said. “Everyone would feel like, Oh no, they’re here, no one give him any eye contact!

Seriously.

Our requests did not fit the bearings of their office and would make the staff uncomfortable.

“Maybe our office just isn’t the best fit for them,” they said. “I just really want what’s best for Andrey and Reagan; they really deserve that.”

I’m convinced that condescension is the ugliest form of pretense. It is a wounded ego oozing from an unteachable heart.

In our home, I said, sometimes we walk on eggshells all. day. long. Not a day goes by that we are not walking the line.

But our odd little family with our odd little needs would cramp their style. It was time for some…pruning.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlight Wood

So, adios. Curtains.

We walked the line right out of that pretty little office and straight into a new one, and our special needs don’t cramp their style at all.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlight Wood

It’s okay. We can still root for each other.

We can be on the same side without being on the same team. Some of us are clearly playing different sports.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment [part 2] @ Copperlight Wood

Did you miss part 1? Find it here. Part 3 is here.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment in adoption [part 1]

walk the line: adoptive thoughts on boundaries, trust, and attachment

Oh my goodness, did you read that? Part One of Three. My friends, we are moving on from simple posts and delving into the realm of…a series of posts. I know. I think it’ll be okay; let’s just roll with it.

Grab your popcorn or coffee (or both) and enjoy. This is not just for the adoptive parent. This is not just for the prospective adoptive parent. This is not just for the person that comes into infrequent contact with adoptive parents or their children on the third Sunday, Tuesday, or Friday of every month.

This is for you. This is for me.

This series will address some of those questions from the fishbowl that no one wanted to ask in the last post. Here is our heart-deep battle with the curtains drawn aside. Our home probably looks different from many others, though adoptive parents will find many similarities.

IMG_4330

We’re not perfect. We’re learning. And we’ve noticed that the only people who are convinced they have it all figured out are those who have never adopted…or had kids at all. Been there?

So I ask that you peek in our fishbowl with eyes of grace. Because we do, too.

The curtain rises. Six children, two cats, and one mama are in various stages of play, school work, and chores. Welcome to our living room.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment @ Copperlight Wood

We’ve had some extremely clean floors lately.  They’re just lovely. As you may have noticed from this post, our standard operating procedure around here is to assign extra chores to kids who need some extra discipline, and it’s beautiful two-fold: in theory,  the house gets a little cleaner; in practice, small hands are kept busy and (mostly) out of further trouble…for the time being, at least.

One of our favorite assigned chores is scrubbing the floor. The wonderful thing about this is that most of our floor is made of beautifully large squares of faux tile that make this an easy assignment with clear boundaries to delineate.

I point them out and count them as I walk the line: one, two, three, four. Turn left: uno, dos, tres. Multiplied, that’s twelve easy squares. A child can see exactly where he’s supposed to scrub. Simple…right?

Enter the child healing from attachment and control issues.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment @ Copperlight Wood

He scrubs half of the squares he is supposed to, and 93 others outside the lines. He’s thinking, “Will this work? Can I make the rules? What if I do this – it’s not what you said, but sort of what you said, and I’m still doing my own thing? Can I be the boss? Because, look! I did extra!! Doesn’t that count?”

Nope. Negatory, dude.

Cue sound effects. Sobbing and whining. It wavers for a second as he checks to see if I’m paying attention. This is a child headed for Broadway, already working on his first Tony.

Meanwhile in the next room, Reagan is standing on a chair where she had been playing with the other kiddos. She needs to get off the chair now, but she, too, is sobbing and whining, refusing to…just…sit down.

That’s all.

She’s squatting, her bottom only an inch from the seat. Without words, she is begging for someone to help her get down.

And no one helps. No one even offers.

It is so hard for people to understand, because it doesn’t make sense in the eyes of traditional parenting, but those of us parenting children who come to us via adoption are parenting children who have hurts that people can’t see. If our children had a visible wound, then others could see it and would understand not to ‘pick the scab’ off so to speak. Our kids have wounds that others can’t see, so they don’t know when they are ‘picking the scab off’.

  • Amanda, adoptive mom

We’re not cruel; we’re refusing to play. We know that she knows what to do: sit down, slide off. We know that crooning over her or helping her do something that she is able to do herself will just throw gas on the fire. (Remember: just because it’s wet doesn’t mean it will put the fire out.)

What is cruel is that for almost seven years it was easier and faster to do everything for her – brush her teeth, get her dressed, move her where she needs to go – and when we brought her to the hotel she had no idea how to even sit in an adult-sized chair at the restaurant. Regular, non-baby toilets terrified her. She was an untrimmed plant that ran wild, but spindly.

walk the line:  some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment, part 1 @ Copperlight Wood

So we work all the time, every day, on small skills. Zipping. Snapping. Feeding herself without most of the food landing on the table, the clothes, or the floor. Using a real napkin to wipe her hands on at meals, instead of running sticky fingers through hair for the same purpose.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment @ Copperlight Wood

She has learned so much and she knows what to do now. The battle is deciding to obey, and then actually doing it.

It’s a universal struggle that, if we’re honest, we adults are not immune to.

Another day, two more extra chores for the boy. I vaguely say “Scrub under and around the table,” and he is fine – by my reckoning, he does about 25 squares worth. He’s happy. He’s done. Next chore please?

The next one is more specific: This area, I tell him, pointing out the lines of an easy 3×4 rectangle, only 12 squares.

This is met with feigned panic and torture. Shocked sobbing at the injustice of it all. Whining and crying for ten minutes while scrubbing only part of the assigned area (and quite a bit extra). Ten minutes of constant wailing becomes almost like unheard white noise in the background until it’s abruptly ended with a chipper, “Now can I be done?” that betrays the smoke and mirrors.

I check. From the sheen of water on the ground I can clearly see that he scrubbed exactly two-thirds of the assigned area, and most of the rest of the room.

The boundaries are terrifying. Someone is laying out rules…and it is not him.

walk the line: some thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment @ Copperlight Wood

He thinks he is seeing a cage, but what he is really facing is a fence to keep him from going over the cliff.

It’s not limited to children from orphanages – some adults struggle with this, too. They started as children who never matured in the way of boundaries. In trying to ram their way through fences on other people’s property, they give themselves headaches when they meet someone who walks the line.

Hoping to find a pushover, they are sorely disappointed when they find themselves over the cliff instead.

It’s often revealed in the double-standard.

I can feel this way and be tolerant, but if you disagree with me, you are intolerant. I can say what I think because this is a free country, but if you say something I disagree with, I’ll call it hate speech. And, by the way…you’re the one that’s judgmental and narrow-minded.

Heads I win, tails you lose.

I refuse to play. I won’t croon, I won’t cry, I won’t enable, and I might not even argue. I’ve learned to set a boundary and walk the line, and not let others cross it.

But I might laugh as they keep trying to drive through the fence.

walk the line: thoughts on boundaries, trust and attachment @ Copperlight Wood

Curtains. Part 2 is here. Part 3 is here.

_______
Related resources:

anxious for nothing

 
I love bread dough. There is something instinctively comforting about warm, rising dough that is as fluffy as toddler cheeks. I love the ppfffffff sound of punching the dough down after the first rise and then dividing it into little loaf portions and tucking them into their pans.  I love folding in mozzarella and sauteed onions and so many herbs that they fall out when you lift the dough into the big loaf pan.

I love watching it rise.
 
And…I really love eating it. Hello, my name is Shannon, and I love, I adore, I highly esteem, I less-than-three carbs and gluten. Don’t tell our naturopath. 

 
Baking bread used to be so intimidating to me. Silly, hmm? It was unfamiliar territory and seemed like a big process. I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to tackle it.

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

– Philippians 4:6

So tackle it I did, and then got a little braver. I learned to play.

 

 

 
I learned to make new things, and discovered the love of stretching strips of pizza dough over calzone filling, rolling long thin triangles into crescent rolls, and layering other strips of dough together with a ridiculous amount of cinnamon sugar in between. Nothing fancy, just comfort food…but I’m harboring a longing to try homemade hotdog buns soon. We’ll see.

 
Recently we learned to make doughnuts, and I loved cutting out floury circles, and – the best part – little floury doughnut holes. Oh, joy! Oh, bliss!
 
Oh, dentist!

Just kidding. No cavities so far.
 

 

 

 
Playing is messy but so necessary. We need it from the earliest of ages. When we are little and don’t have enough play and touch and interaction, many things that should just be routine are anxiety-provoking, unfamiliar territory.

Fear comes into play. Literally. 

We learned a little – just a tiny bit – about this during some adoption trainings. We’ve learned quite a bit more, as usually happens, through actual experience. 

Our first experience was during our first trip to Spaghettia in March of last year. We gave Reagan some playdoh – all kids like play-doh, right? – and when she squeezed it, she cried. She was scared of it. 

We thought, Hmm, that’s weird, and found different toys to play with. 

We’ve been home together for almost a year now, and we’re learning more and more. It’s tricky; there don’t seem to be any hard and fast rules about sensory issues. Not all symptoms or characteristics may be present. A child can be both hypersensitive and hyposensitive. And – I just love this – “Inconsistency is a hallmark of every neurological dysfunction.” 

Well. Thanks so much. That’s just great.

 
Anyway, we’re doing lots of play. So many things are new and intimidating, and we focus on making new things familiar so they lose their fear. Messy play, creative play, textures, temperatures, movement, sound…sensory play. Of course, we never called it that before. We just called it…play. The only difference is that we don’t take it for granted anymore.
 

 

 

…My object is to show that the chief function of a child – his business in the world during the first six or seven years of his life – is to find out all he can, about whatever comes under his notice, by means of his five senses; that he has an insatiable appetite for knowledge got in this way; and that, therefore, the endeavor of his parents should be to put him in the way of making acquaintance freely with Nature and natural objects.

– Charlotte Mason, Home Education

She loves playdoh now. And not just for eating.
(Kidding. She’s only eaten it twice…I think…) 

 
Tonight after bedtime, Chamberlain came downstairs with a splinter in her fingertip that, while certainly painful, somehow magically did not become so until after we tucked her in. Vince and I took turns poking with the tweezers amid her shrieks and tears, but to no avail…we can’t pinch the splinter out, the tweezers can’t grasp it, and it’s unavoidable…the dreaded implement must be used.
 
You know the one. 

The fearsome sewing needle. (gasp!) 

Say it ain’t so! 

Actually, I’m not saying it at all. I’m handing her a stuffed doggie that happens to be within arm’s reach and what I do find myself saying is, “I think Pup has a splinter, too. How about you check him with the tweezers -” putting those useless things into her right hand, “while I look at your splinter a little more?” 

It was a stroke of divine genius that didn’t come from me at all. And it worked. 

She is engrossed in Pup’s right paw while I am holding her left paw and poking it with the needle. She has no idea I’m even holding a needle. She hardly notices that I have exposed the end of the splinter and she is jabbering to Pup about how he must be more careful in the woods around the rosebushes… 

I ask her if we can trade. She looks at me with surprise and hands me the tweezers and takes the needle that she didn’t even know I had and continues Pup’s surgery. One more pinch on her rosy fingertip and the tweezers grasp the splinter…and it’s out. 

We look at it together. Out in the open, it’s just a tiny little thing.

Cham toddles back to bed. I toddle back to the kitchen, thinking about what just happened…and He tells me: 

You are the one holding Pup. 

I almost dropped the tweezers. What?
He explains. He says that as we learn about these kids…all six of them…and we look for their owies that need healed and the things they need to learn, and we kiss them and cry over them and are engrossed in their need for restoration and growth…He is holding the needle. He is working on us. 

 
There are owies and impurities inside me, and He is calmly, carefully, quietly pulling them out as I jabber on and on to Him about the pups that I’m holding. Things that used to intimidate me are almost normal now, and I don’t even cry over other things that used to scare me, and I’ve hardly noticed because my attention has been focused on these pups.

As we teach and comfort our kids, He is pulling fears out – these little bitty things that cause so much pain – and brings them out to the open so we can look at it together.

He sends us toddling off, free, showing us new ways to play so we can be anxious for nothing…because He loves to watch us rise.