in name only

The past (more than a) week has been similar to what I think it might be like to watch a train wreck in slow motion. Our daughter has been making one bad decision after another (not like the bad decisions many kids make. Bigger bad decisions) and my husband and I will start on a course of hopeful correction that we think is great and realize as it starts to gain momentum, that it is a really bad direction and we are unable to stop it. Kind of like a train heading towards a crash. We have tried giving our daughter a way out, thinking surely she wants OUT of this situation she has (single handedly) created. We are trying to stop the train from complete destruction.

And I cannot figure out why she doesn't take the opportunity.

Except that I DO know why she doesn't take the opportunity. I just don't want to admit it. Admitting it seems to...... permanent.

She will walk around the house ignoring us completely. No. Like C O M P L E T E L Y ignoring for DAYS. Then each morning I will watch as she skips down the sidewalk, happily, talking nicely to every Mom she sees on the block on the way to the bus stop. There is a name for this in our little world. It's called "Mommy shopping".... Moms of kids with RAD know this well. This is when your child treats you with disgust and (I'm just going to be honest here) hatred, BUT, is extraordinarily wonderful to every other Mom out there. I used to resent these other Moms that would "get" this sweet behaving child of mine, then I used to feel humiliated and embarrassed that I was never on the receiving end, then I finally saw it for what it really was..... it's nothing. It means nothing.

I'm not supposed to take this personally.

I'm not supposed to react.

To any of it.

Except that.

I love her.

And I want her to love me back.

I have tried to not want this (her loving me back). I have tried to not care. I've also tried to accept what is happening. Or really - what has ALREADY happened. It might truly just be that my daughter may never care.... Well, care MORE than she cares right now. There is something there..... but, it's faint.

When you don't have a trauma past this seems impossible to agree with. We all care deep down, right? No. That is wrong. We all want to be loved and connect right? No. Not if our brain was damaged because of trauma and things aren't working quite right.... if parts are damaged or no longer working or certain pathways just never developed properly. Surely we can love someone out of this? No. There is actually a book out there titled "When Love is Not Enough".

That is why she won't take the opportunity.

This is not me just being a frustrated Mom. This is me trying to accept what happened to my daughter when she was a baby. This is me trying to be a better Mom to her.... Because if I can accept that maybe she isn't capable of wanting to make things right when they are wrong. If I can accept that she doesn't feel bad for stealing from a girl at school, or pushing her Brother down, or lying to me..... If I can accept that she isn't capable of feeling that that is WRONG and feeling remorse and wanting to make everything better between us...... If I can accept THAT, then I can be a better Mom. To her.

Maybe I can love her differently. Maybe I can love her in a way that is safe for her and not the way that comes most naturally to me.

Maybe if I can accept things.... better ...... maybe that can be the WAY I love her. Maybe that won't be as scary for her.

What I know is this.

It's hard. It's hard to be a mom in name only. It's hard to get the hardest job in the world and not get the most rewarding along with it. It's hard to want to be connected with someone who doesn't want it back, and it's even harder when that someone is your child who really needs to trust that you have their best interest at heart. It's hard when you know you child is hurting and they do not want you to make them feel better.

There are not enough tears.

Today we saw a tiny ray of hope after a long stretch of dark, it's the "faint" that is in there....... and honestly, that's why I'm "here" because when I'm in the dark places sometimes I can't even write....But, anyway..... I grabbed that ray just as soon as I saw it, and calmly and as unemotionally as I could, started leading my girl back to the light again...

xo
K.