What Does It Feel Like to Parent a Child with Trauma Issues? Sia's music videos (Part Two)

This post is also available at my new website Trauma Mama Drama.  If you enjoy reading my blog, remember to update your feeds, emails and bookmarks with the new link, because eventually I will only post updates on the new site's blog.

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I felt emotionally hollowed by the video for "Chandelier," but the video for "Elastic Heart" gutted me. "Chandelier" puts me in the shoes of my step-kids and reminds me that the kids' behavior comes from a place of sadness, anger, and terror.

The video for "Elastic Heart" accomplishes this as well. However, Shia LeBouf's performance alongside Maddie Ziegler's adds a whole new emotional dimension that I did not anticipate when I started watching the video. I have had a hard time explaining to friends and family exactly what it feels like to parent my step-kids. I try to describe the pain they feel and inflict on me, the sadness and anger I feel over the whole situation, the commitment to keep trying even when it seems impossible... but my words fall far short of accurately conveying the reality of parenting children whose early-life experiences extinguished their ability to trust their caregivers.

Husband and I were overjoyed when his kids came to live with us. They were in an unsafe environment, and our home would shelter them. They would be safe with us. We would be able to fix their problems as long as they remained in our homes. But we did not understand that they would fear our safe environment full of love and kindness and predictability. To them, we weren't giving them a safe place.  They didn't even understand that concept. No. They interpreted all of our rules and structure as confining them.  We were trapping them and trying to force them to accept our love when they saw that love as a threat. To them, our house wasn't a home... It was a cage.

So, Middle and Little fought against us. Fought against our love. Attacked us. Over and over again.

And every time we thought they were starting to accept our love, starting to feel safe... Every time we thought, "Okay, Crazy Time is over. Now we can function as a family and have fun together. We can go to big events and the kids can handle it. Now we can get back to normal," something would happen and would realize they still have so far to go to heal. Feeling safe and trusting us evokes their feelings of insecurity*.  

In their minds, our safe environment threatened them, and our love couldn't be trusted. And even after almost two years, they still don't feel safe, they still don't feel like we will love them unconditionally. When they get scared that their world is going to be turned upside down,  "Fight, Freeze or Flee" kicks in, and they resist our attempts to bond with them. 

Husband and I are pretty lucky because they are young and they are too small to do any serious damage most of the time when they get angry enough to get physical. We are lucky because their violent outbursts have been rage reactions, not premeditated plans of attack. We are lucky because we have a wonderful therapist and behavior program and they are no longer physically violent or orchestrating mental manipulation on us (and each other) all day, every day. And I am thankful.

But when my kids do unsettling or violent things, I feel frightened. Their behavior can be scary on many levels... At least once a day I worry this will never get better, and that is terrifying.

The simple truth is, the intensity of their emotions can reach very scary levels. And sometimes I snap at them.

And sometimes, I do want to run away.

At times, I've felt that well-meaning friends and family have actually secretly wanted me to run away. People have asked me to really consider if I could handle parenting the kids.  If I really wanted to parent them. I've been reminded that no one would blame me for walking away from my situation. That I shouldn't be putting Oldest through all this drama for kids that "aren't really mine." And I have honestly pondered those things countless times, because the last two years have been the hardest two years I've lived.

But... I stay.  I stay, and try to comfort them when they are in the clutches of the Reactive Attachment Disorder minions.  

I stay, and do my damnedest to therapeutically parent them so that they can heal.

Here, Shia LeBouf enacts "playful" part of parenting with PACE 

(the acronym stands for Playful, Accepting, Curious, Empathetic; Daniel Hughes

established this method and his books really helped me feel more positive about parenting

Middle and Little).  Who'd have thought such an unlikely star would illustrate therapeutic parenting so perfectly?

I stay out of love for Husband.  How could I leave him to do this immense job all on his own?  How could I run away from his children when he so openly and readily accepted my biological daughter who has her own difficulties with behavior?  How could I abandon the man who has shown me so much love, who has redefined my definition of love, who would never abandon me if our roles were reversed?

I stay out of love for myself.  I couldn't forgive myself for walking away from these beautiful children who have seen more horrible things than I have seen in my 31 years.  Who have repeatedly been mistreated and abandoned.  Who so desperately want to love and receive love openly, without fear, who want to "fit" in our family... But just can't bring themselves to believe we won't hurt or leave them.  How could I live with myself if I just added to their mental distress?  I couldn't, and I know I couldn't.  So, I stay for myself.

I stay out of love for Oldest.  While it is true that in the beginning, the chaos that her step-siblings brought to our house caused her great distress, we have revamped our parenting style and put into place some steps for her to take if she feels scared when Middle or Little has a meltdown.  The "negative behaviors" Middle and Little expose her to are teaching her how to deal with peer pressure and other things that kids have to deal with as they grow, things I've always worried she wouldn't get a chance to learn with her genetic disorder.  She has someone to play with most of the time, someone to share things with. She loves her little brother and sister... and that is a good thing.  The chaos of our home can be distressing at times, yes, but having a family with two committed parents, where she really gets to see the unconditional love Husband and I have for our children, balances that out.

And, of course, I stay out of love for Middle and Little. I can't even imagine what would happen to them if I left them.  I can't imagine what their minds would do if I left them.  I know sometimes I doubt it, but the fact is they do love me as much as they can... As much as RAD lets them love me. Their expressions of love look so different than my own, and because of that I do forget this simple fact sometimes.

Watch the whole video below... and listen to the lyrics... and think about how children with traumatic pasts want your love but also fear your love...

And another one bites the dust

Oh, why can I not conquer love?

And I might have thought that we were one

Wanted to fight this war without weapons

And I wanted it, I wanted it bad

But there were so many red flags

Now another one bites the dust

Yeah, let's be clear, I'll trust no one...

Well I've got thick skin and an elastic heart

But your blade, it might be too sharp

I'm like a rubber band until you pull too hard

Yeah, I may snap and I move fast

But you won't see me fall apart

Cuz' I've got an elastic heart

And I will stay up through the night

And let's be clear, won't close my eyes

And I know that I can survive

I'll walk through fire to save my life

And I want it, I want it so bad

I'm doing everything I can

Then another one bites the dust

It's hard to lose a chosen one

*For example: Yesterday was AWESOME!  We visited Husband's family and friends, and they rocked some awesome behavior.  Little even talked himself out of a meltdown.  This is an amazing feat in its own right, but considering he had been up for fifteen hours with no nap in a place that essentailly showered him with love and safety all day long, I found his remaining calm when he didn't get the piggy-back ride to the car he wanted absolutely remarkable.  I was thrilled.  

Husband asked the kids if they'd had a good time (clearly they had... They got to go swimming twice, had two picnics, played with dogs and other kids, roasted marshmallows, and played air hockey with each other).  Oldest gleefully cheered, "YES!  Best day ever!  Middle and Little, however, were less enthused.  "My day was in the middle," Middle said.  "Thumbs up.  Thumbs down," Little said sullenly. 

I spent the car ride home quietly preparing myself for the backlash we'd likely face today.  And, so far, today hasn't been so great, but Little has had two meltdowns (short ones, thankfully!) and when I woke Middle this morning I found that she had been scratching herself and there was blood on her face and shirt. Nonsense chatter is through the roof and Middle's deliberate antagonizing of me is full force.  They are also fighting over every single thing... Simple things, like how to pet our cat or over the last time Middle wore the shirt she is wearing.

I celebrate the fact that the great time we had yesterday would have been absolutely impossible one year ago. But I mourn the fact that for my step-kids, big fun means big feelings which, more often than not, means big chaos during or shortly thereafter.

Maddie Ziegler's Performances in Sia's Music Videos (part one): What does RAD feel like?

This post is also available at my new website Trauma Mama Drama.  If you enjoy reading my blog, remember to update your feeds, emails and bookmarks with the new link, because eventually I will only post updates on the new site's blog.

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My step-kids had their first supervised visit with their mother last summer. Their visit would last three weeks and would be supervised by one of Biological Mother's friends. This was a condition of Husband's divorce settlement. We didn't trust the situation much because we didn't know the friend, but she supervised visits through CPS contracts. She sent us extensive documentation proving that she worked for the state as a supervisor, we verified it, and Husband reluctantly agreed to including her on the "approved supervisor list" filed with the court to avoid going to trial with Biological Mom again. We didn't trust that she would actually supervise Biological Mother the way she was supposed to, but we believed that she would at least keep them safe (and we were absolutely right... She didn't really supervise them at all, but they came back relatively okay).

Against our insistence that she not tell the kids about their visit too far in advance, Biological Mother spilled the beans during one of their phone calls about two weeks before they were scheduled to leave.

Pardon the language, but seriously... What the f@#%!?

Middle and Little hadn't seen Biological Mom in ten months, so they were incredibly excited and happy to go on their trip. They couldn't wait to see their mom. While they said they were a little nervous, they were mostly just thrilled.

Now. If you know anything about RAD, you know all about the following equation:

Excited + Happy+ Nervous + Impatient = EPIC NUCLEAR MELTDOWNS FOR DAYS

Things got nuts as soon as they found out they'd be seeing their mom. They reacted against me, constantly. This was when Little's behavior started turning violent against me and I had to restrain him for the first time. This was when Middle did things every time she looked at me to get a reaction out of me. This was when Middle screamed at me to get away from her during one of her fits, and when I tried to comply by leaving the room she charged me, jumped on me so that I bent over, grabbed hold of my hair and screamed, "DON'T LEAVE ME!!!!"

This was when I really reacting against their reactions. For example,  Little and Middle would NOT stop jumping off the 3.5-foot-tall toy box in their room, usually on top of each other in some sort of dominance game I just don't understand.

"THE BOX"

During this lead-up to their visit, Middle ended up kicking Little pretty hard in the face during one of her jumps. I sat them down and informed them that if they were caught jumping off of the toy box again, I would be taking it to the dumpster and that most of the toys inside would go, too, because we wouldn't have anywhere to store them.

The next day was rough. The kids were all over the place, acting completely bonkers, and I lost my patience around noon. Around 4:00 in the afternoon, I walked past their room and caught Little in mid-free-fall. His intended target? Middle's back. So, I started yelling. And I mean yelling. Essentially screaming. I grabbed the humongous toy box that weighed about 35 lbs and started dragging it out of their room. The kids grabbed onto it and yelled, "No!" and asked to get some of their toys out, but I refused and yanked the box from their hands. When I got to the front door and started hauling it out, Husband grabbed on to the other side.  "Hey," he said, "we don't know what's in there... maybe we should look and--"

"I DON'T CARE WHAT IS IN HERE! IT IS TRASH NOW!"

After I got it to the dumpster, Husband wanted to bring back some of the now discarded toys. "NO!" I shouted.  "THEY DON'T EVEN CARE ABOUT THE STUPID TOYS!  THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT ANYTHING! THEY NEED TO LEARN TO CARE! MAYBE LOSING EVERYTHING WILL MAKE THEM CARE, BUT I SERIOUSLY DOUBT IT!!!!!"

Husband dropped the subject. I left the house and went on a long, calming drive.

Around midnight that night, I started feeling guilty and decided to bring back in some of the special toys that were in the toy box. I went out to retrieve them, but, unfortunately, someone had spotted what must have seemed like a toy jackpot and took advantage. The toy box, and the toys, were gone.

Middle will never get back the bear the judge gave to her the day she came to live with us. They will never get back the special Snuggy blankets their grandma gave to them. It was a truly nasty thing I did, and I can never undo it. Husband and the kids have forgiven me, but I haven't forgiven myself because one of the theories on attachment disorder states that kids who have endured repeated trauma will destroy/disregard/give away their personal belongings as a way to protect themselves from loss. They've lost things and people they love, and if they act like they don't care about their things or give them away, no one is going to take that item as a way to hurt them.  When they do these inexplicable things to their stuff, they are choosing to lose that item. And I knew that when I threw out their toys. But I was so angry that I didn't care.

Anyway. That's how things were going. When Middle and Little left for their trip, I was actually happy that they were going. My thought process was something like, "I need the break. Sure, it sucks that they are going somewhere that might undo all the progress we've made. It's horrible that they might be exposed to more of the stuff that disrupted their minds in the first place. True. But I don't really care right now."

About an hour after they left, I read an article that claimed the music video for Sia's "Chandelier" to be the best of the year.  So I watched it.

I started crying here...

And had to pause the video here because I could no longer see the screen through my tears...

And I lost it all over again at the end.

The whole time I watched this video, all I could think was,  I've seen this before. The facial expressions, the movements, the intensity... I've seen all of this in Middle. This must be what she feels like all the time.

   

This face seemed eerily familiar to me.

And even though the song is about Sia's battle with alcoholism and the party scene, the song lyrics couldn't be more relevant:

Party girls don't get hurt
Can't feel anything, when will I learn
I push it down, push it down...
I'm gonna' swing from the chandelier
I'm gonna' live like tomorrow doesn't exist, like it doesn't exist
I'm gonna' fly like a bird through the night
Feel my tears as they dry...
But I'm holding on for dear life
Won't look down, won't open my eyes...
Cuz' I'm just holding on for tonight
Help me, I'm holding on for dear life

I spent the next two hours sobbing on the couch, alone in my almost-empty apartment (Oldest was sleeping), angry with myself, regretting immensely the way I handled Middle and Little's behavior the days prior to their departure.  Was I actually relieved when they left here a few hours ago?  How on earth was I okay with them going on this visit?! And me... on what planet is my own behavior with them considered okay?!  They are children... hurt children.  And over the last few weeks I've been treating them like unwelcome guests in my home just because they were trying to hurt me in response to their pain. They are children and I am an adult! How could I do that?

This video restored my empathy immediately. I still watch it frequently when I feel overwhelmed with the immensity of my kids' behaviors and emotions. It helps me remember that they have a mental disorder. They're not doing the crazy stuff on purpose... Well, maybe they are doing it "on purpose," but they are not doing it with a sense of control.

Check out the full video below.  Every time I watch it, I'm reminded that my Middle and Little have so much going on in their little minds. Can you imagine going through life feeling like this? Try to put yourself in the shoes of a child whose brain operates at this frequency all the time as a protective mechanism, as a reaction to the life lessons his early-childhood experiences taught him.  I guarantee you will feel more empathetic, which will help you parent your kids in the way that they need.