K's Dragon Dream

This morning:
"I dreamed a big, big dragon was chasing me and I was looking everywhere for [Mom]....And you picked me up and hugged me really tight. The dragon didn't see us because it was too tall and we were so small. You protected me, Mom."

Troubled Evening, Part II

Finally, I put M to bed. As he climbed in, he began asking me questions about the guns in the pirate book he'd taken out of the library. Then, all of a sudden, "WIll I have homework in kindergarten?"

"Yes," I said. "Like K-- did. You remember: one piece of paper every week? And she practiced coloring and writing letters and reading and counting?"

He hid his face in the covers.

I asked, "Are you afraid you won't do a good job?"

He reached for my hand, pressed his face into it, and nodded with his eyes closed.

"You'll do great," I said.

"No," he said.

"Well, even if you don't," I said, "Papa and I will still love you, and we'll still be a family."

He then asked, "What happens if I die?"

I used to be a crisis counselor. A red light went on in my head at what I assumed was a connection between poor achievement and thoughts about one's own death. I said slowly, "We'll be sad. M--, are you thinking about dying?"

"Yes."

"A lot?"

"Yes."

"Will you tell me what you're thinking?"

He said, "Not everyone who dies is old."

I felt a little relief. All that had happened, maybe, was that he'd found out a fact of life we hadn't yet told him. I asked, "Does that worry you?"

"Yes. What if a soldier guy comes and shoots me?"

I remembered what Mary told me. I put my arms around him and said, "Papa and I are your parents. It's our job to keep you safe. We live somewhere safe, where there isn't a war happening. Mama A-- would not have let us adopt you if she thought you wouldn't be safe with us. Papa and I can keep you safe. It's our job. You don't have to worry about it."

He smiled a little, hugged my arm, and asked me to sleep with him.

I left his room for the hundredth time wondering whether we should do co-sleeping and for the first time wondering whether we might one day need to watch him for suicidal tendencies.

Troubled Evening, Part I

We had a successful afternoon, I guess. K has nothing discernably wrong with her ear; we left the pediatrician's for the library; we came home and had supper; I ushered them through showers and teeth-brushing and lots of reading. Then the moment came to put them into their beds.

I followed K into her room only to have her turn her face to me covered with tears. "I'm scared, Mom."

"Why?" I imagined monsters. She's been talking about monsters lately, to the point that we've put a bottle of "monster spray" in her room.

"I miss Mama A-- and I wish I grew with her."

I wasn't sure what she meant. "You mean you wish you had grown in her tummy?"

I didn't really get an answer. She said, "I'm scared she needs me!"

I took her onto my lap. "Of course you are," I said. "And do you need her, too?"

She buried her face in my chest and nodded.

"That's okay--" I began.

"I miss how she put me to bed," K went on. "She would gently wrap me in a blanket and rock me to sleep."

I didn't know whether to believe this because K has never, ever used the conditional or an adverb-verb construction in describing anything. Had she heard this sentence somewhere? Simultaneously believing and disbelieving her, I held her and told her it was okay to miss Mama A., that Mama A. took good care of her, that it didn't hurt my feelings for K to want her, etc etc. I also pointed out that Mama A. knew her job was to take care of her and M until Peter and I could come get them, so Mama A had plenty of time to be ready to say goodbye.

We agreed that we would work on a letter to her in the morning.

I left her drawing horses on the floor, practicing.

I feel terribly guilty: I haven't tried to contact Mama A in 10 months. Okay, so I've been busy with life here in America. But still....

Troubled Morning, Part III

K has had an earache off & on for about two weeks. Peter has checked her twice for an ear infection (he's an internist, remember, and we have a home otoscope) and seen nothing, and she doesn't present as a sick child, so we're not sure what's going on. But I called the pediatrician this morning to get her an appointment. Yes, while managing the kids through fighting and chaos and the brainstorming session. Before I called, M said he felt afraid.

"Why, M--?"

He said, "If K-- goes to the doctor, what happens to me? I'm afraid of being alone at camp."

This is his third summer at this camp, which was also once his twice-a-week preschool and four-hours-a-week daycare. He loves this place and the staff so much that he has always had his birthday parties there. I thought, This isn't about camp. This is some deeper fear of abandonment. If K is "cracking open" like Mary says, maybe M is too. So I made the appointment for the end of the day so I could pick them both up with minimal disturbance of the activity schedule.

When we were finally in the car on the way to camp, I told both kids, "I will pick you both up before camp is over so we can take K-- to the doctor."

M began to cry. He is not a crier unless he is feeling really afraid, sad, or betrayed.

In the front seat, with my heart aching, I asked him what was wrong.

He said, "I'm afraid of camp. All the new people. I'm afraid without K--."

It's Monday. He has become aware that new campers, if there are any, start on Mondays.

I sighed--I hope inwardly. I pulled over into a parking lot and stopped the car. Then I got out, opened M's door, and put my arms around him. He had tucked himself into a ball.

"You're very good at making friends," I reminded him. "Remember last week? And the new camp you went to before our vacation? You always make friends. You have inside you everything you need to know."

He said, "I'm still scared! I'm going to be alone while you're at the doctor!"

I put my finger under his sharp little chin and tilted his head so he could look at me from under his dark, wet lashes. "Can you listen to me?"

"Yes."

I explained--again--that I would pick up him and K at the same time and he would not be alone.

"But what about when she sees the doctor?" he asked.

I said, "I will go with her, and you'll come with me."

It still took a few minutes until he said he was ready to finish the drive to camp, and he looked pensive when the counselor took him out of the car.

Troubled Morning, Part II

The kids and I sat down to breakfast. As we ate, I pulled out a parenting tactic I hadn't used in a long time but probably should have: the brainstorming meeting. I wrote on a piece of paper ideas for helping M stay in his room and not bother K if he wakes before she does. We all contributed. We crossed out the ones we didn't like. The remaining are these:
-M and Peter trade bedside clocks, 'cause Peter's is easier to read (M's idea)
-K put a sign on her door reminding M to stay out before 7 AM (M's idea)
-M keep more quiet toys in his room so he can play without bothering K (my idea)
-Peter and I teach M how to wake K gently (my idea)

As of this writing, we have done the first two. I am alone with the kids tonight and I forgot in the midst of bedtime issues (more later) to get M to choose some toys.

Peter and I cope with sibling spats by eavesdropping but not interfering. If a child asks us to step in, we try to give the asker a tool to use on his or her own; e.g. "If he is cheating, you can stop playing with him." However, when it comes to disobeying as fundamental a social rule as taking your hands off someone when they tell you to, we step in. Also however, we don't step in when we haven't witnessed the transgression. Hence my choice to bring the kids together by writing up the list.

It has always been a sign of trouble that M should be physically aggressive with K. We don't know whether he was actually violent his morning--it might have seemed worse to K than it really was because he caught her unawares. She sustained no bruises or other marks. Still, our rule is "'Stop' means STOP!", and he didn't stop. That's unusual. The only other times he's done it have been when he's been angry with her for leaving him; say, for going to kindergarten without him. And for doing something that scares him; say, going to kindergarten.

So we had this reasonable, civilized discussion. It was lovely. Then the kids got out of hand again while preparing to leave--I had to separate them again. And then we got into the car.

Troubled Morning, Part I

I could hear the yelling through two closed doors. K: "Ow! Stop it! Ow! Stop it! Ow! Stop it!" I heard Peter going down the stairs to the kids' rooms and figured it was taken care of.

It wasn't. The yelling escalated. When I peeked down the stairs, I saw M running out of K's room laughing, trailing his big blue blanket.

"M--!" I called down. "What should you be doing?"

Rather than answer, he laughed harder and ran back into K's room. I heard screams and giggles, a play situation far out of hand.

I came downstairs and did what they are now getting used to: I walked into K's room, gently took each child by whatever limb was available in the heap, and separated them. I walked M to his room and said very carefully, "I'm sorry, M--. You have not made a good choice by being in K's room. I will help you get dressed by shutting your door. You may come out when you're dressed." He immediately marched out to the bathroom, the one place I would allow him to go. He made sure I saw him flush and wash up before he returned to his room. Then, with an expression of great dignity on his small face, he allowed me to shut the door. I remembered my conversation with Mary and thought, He took control.

I crossed to K's room. When she saw me reach for the doorknob, she broke my heart by pleading, "No! No!" but I thought, Surely she knows by now, after a dozen iterations, that a shut door is the consequence for raising hell with her brother when she should be getting dressed. She is yelling at me just because she can't stop yelling. I repeated to her the message I had given to M, then I shut the door. I heard her scream with what I assumed was indignation and perhaps sadness for her own bad judgment. I heard a small object "thump" against the door. Then I went back upstairs to get ready for the day myself.

When I came into the kitchen a few minutes later, I found Peter engaged in conversation with K, who was still in her pajamas. She had disobeyed me. Worse, Peter had not backed me up. Apparently she had brought a broken toy upstairs (the object she'd thrown at the door?), and Peter was examining it instead of saying like a broken record, "After you get dressed. After you get dressed." So I said it, followed her downstairs, and put her in a 6-minute time-out (one minute per year of age), for breaking the rule, "In your room means in your room." Then I came back upstairs.

As I climbed the stairs, it dawned on me that K might have broken the rule out of fear. Maybe she'd pleaded when I shut her door because she was afraid to be alone in her room. Damn! Don't you remember she said once yesterday that she was scared to be alone? She's dropping her guard and telling you she's scared! And now look what you've done to her! I berated myself, then consulted with Peter. He agreed that he should have backed me up, and he agreed that she probably wouldn't have disobeyed if she hadn't been driven by fear. Shit.

M came upstairs, dressed. Peter, not noticing he'd gotten dressed, began angrily, "M--! What did Mom ask you to--" I cut him off and pointed out that M had done it. Peter apologized to M and began getting his breakfast.

When K's time-out ended, I stood behind her and repeated, "In your room means in your room" in my growly "time out" voice. Then I came around to the front, took her into my lap, and asked whether she'd been afraid to be alone in her room.

She nodded and hugged me.

I apologized for shutting her in. I told that, next time, I would ask first whether she was afraid.

She hugged me tighter.

I reassured her that, even if she were alone in a room of our house, we would never leave her alone in the whole house. "If you listen, you can hear me or Papa in another room."

She stayed still.

Now that I had her listening, I thought it a good time to ask, "Why were you yelling this morning?"

She answered, "M--woke me up. He jumped on me, hit me, and pulled my arm. He kept hitting me even though I told him to stop."

I thought, That explains the yelling I heard first thing. Then I thought, What the fuck is wrong with M, that he's doing this to her? I said, "Honey, I didn't see it, so I can't do much about it. But I can talk to M-- about it, and I will do it right now."

She hugged me again. Then we got up from the couch and went to the kitchen.

It's All About Control

I spoke yesterday with a local adoption professional, whom I'll call Mary, about finding a therapist for K. Here, in a nutshell, is her assessment of what's going on.

Kids adopted older than infancy who have been through the trauma of losing control of their home life--for instance, moving from birth family to orphanage to adoptive family--desperately want to regain control. Often, when they have good pre-adoptive care, they develop the survival skill of controlling their world through behaving well. That is, they learn that observing and complying with their adult caregivers gets them the love they need. Our kids' history fits this model. Remember, they were in a foster-care-style orphanage with loving older foster sibs and a gifted caregiver.

What happens a couple of years after adoption, especially if the attachment is good, is that children's control cracks. Anxiety, fear, grief, and anger leak out. I can think of a few reasons the loss of control might happen: cognitive development allows children deeper understanding of their history; academic demands increase as children progress in school; changes in home life occur that might not even be significant to the rest of the family. In K's case, I think a combination of all three factors is at work. She is six years old, which is a common time for all kinds of cognitive growth. Academically, she's moving into math and especially reading skills that require effort. And here at home, she experienced the end of kindergarten, two weeks of a new camp, and a week of vacation all in quick succession.

Mary knows our family's story well enough that she doesn't think K's issues are caused by attachment problems. K's attachment, in fact, seems to be good, or at least good enough that she's using it to tell us she's troubled. I mentioned here earlier that she's been complaining of sadness and fear and has been drawing pictures of herself crying. She's also reported stomach and earaches (with no apparent physical cause), and she tells us she's waking during the night afraid of monsters. She seems to trust that we'll make it all better, whatever the problem. Or at least we'll listen.

So what is she so sad about? What she's articulated is, "I wish I grew in your tummy." As I've mentioned here, we did not adopt because of infertility; we have no grief for not having birthed either child. She comes by this grief on her own. I think it's sadness for not having been close to me in that way, not because she thinks adoption is wrong or bad.

K has also reported missing her Russian caregiver, Mama Alla.

What should we do? Mary said that we should indeed seek therapy for K, and she recommended some mental health practitioners she knows. She also advised that we make sure to tell both kids at times of stress, "You're safe. We're still your mom and dad. We know things feel different because of , but you're still safe and we're still a family." She says that doing so will help them realize they don't need to be in control.

Mary also says that we will probably have to go through these episodes many times, so we should make sure we take good care of ourselves, too.

Revealing Vacation

We're in our annual week-long family trip to northern New England. And, while it's been physically easier than in previous years because the kids need less hands-on care, it's been emotionally harder. K has been crying for home just about every night; M has been misbehaving when he's with anyone but me. Both kids love being with their grandparents and cousins, but apparently being somewhere that isn't home is quite disorienting for them.

M has gradually calmed down. I wish I knew why. But K....I'm looking at a drawing that she did the other night, when I left for the evening to attend a class near home. The drawing shows herself with tears streaming down her face and the words (translated from kindergarten spelling) "I feel scared and sad." When I asked her about in the morning, she told me she's been feeling sad all the time "since D--- F--- Camp," which means over two weeks. It might even be longer, seeing as she finished kindergarten just the week before and had been occasionally crying about the ending. I've mentioned that here. She's also been coming up with memories of Russia that we've never heard before.

Lately, we've been having to remind K several times a day to take care of herself and let Peter and me take care of everyone else. "You're only six," I've told her. "Your job is to take care of K--."
She always shakes her head. "I take care of you, too," she says.

She has resumed being worried that there won't be enough food--she piles her plate, packs food to save for later, asks several hours ahead about where and what we're going to eat. She is equally concerned about having enough clothes and toys.

I am going to interview therapists when we get back. It's time. We think we have a girl with depression compounded by her memories of pre-adopted life. We don't want her to grow up filling her black hole of grief with food and possessions, then alcohol and drugs and pregnancies.

One-Minute Parenting

In response to a radio ad we keep hearing about correcting your kid's behavior--no matter how bad--in a single minute.

My solution: Sledgehammer.
Peter's solution: Ether.

We are also willing to consider crossbow and chloroform, respectively.

End of the Day

I'm writing this in the back yard, sitting on a plastic lawn chair. M is out here too, in his black and blue rash-guard shirt & bathing suit and black Keen sandals. He is into black lately, saying it's a "cool boy color." He also loves pink, which gets him into conflict with his sister.

M is picking and throwing grass whenever I look at him. He grins. Sometimes he splashes in our sprinkler-fed wading pool that looks like a pirate ship. Sometimes he chases butterflies. Sometimes he shows me how high he can swing on the swing set. He also catches toads and caterpillars, hunts for ants, and brings me pieces of interesting stuff that show up in the dirt. He had a full day of camp, which included a nap, at a local farm, so he has the energy to do some of these favorite things.

K spent the day at the same camp but in an older group which doesn't get a nap. She's pooped. She is indoors watching an ancient Disney movie, The Fox and the Hound. I chose it one day last week while it was pouring out, to keep on hand for the kids to watch while sipping ginger tea after getting caught in a thunderstorm. I'd never seen this film. I have now seen only the beginning, a key conflict in the middle, and the ending. I picked it out because Peter and I are interested in exposing M and K to as many adoption-related narratives as possible. In this film, the fox cub's mom leaves him in a safe place because she knows she's going to be shot; then a kind owl fosters him briefly and finds him a permanent home with a human. We all cried. Anyway, K, who is rather sensitive to heat, is inside in the cool watching without me. I strongly prefer not to let the kids watch TV alone, but for safety reasons I am out here while M plays in the water. I am leaving K alone for exactly 20 minutes; then I will herd M inside and we'll do the make-lunch-and-take-baths routine so they can be ready for camp tomorrow.

For this two-week stint at the farm camp, Peter and I are coaching M and K to be responsible for more self-care than they used to be. Every evening, I set up what we call The Lunch Factory and help them put together their lunches from a variety of healthy choices. Every morning, each kid runs down a check-list of activities to get him- or herself ready for the day, including loading his or backpack with a list of necessary items. We leave the house at 8:05 AM, ready or not. So far, they've been ready.

K loves this control over her own care, especially making her own lunch. As befits someone afraid of food scarcity, she puts too much in her lunchbox and doesn't eat it all. We don't criticize. She dresses properly for the weather most of the time, doesn't blame others when vanity causes her to make a regrettable error (e.g. puts clips in her hair, then loses them). Her counselors tell me they like her "great attitude." I have seen her play with both boys and girls, cool and uncool.

M packs his lunch until he gets bored, so he sometimes goes a little hungry. Nonetheless, he struts around feeling very grown-up and proud of himself for being one of the more competent kids in his camp group. He is a favorite among the counselors.

The moral of the story: We know all kids like and need as much control as they can have. We believe it's even more important for adopted and foster kids to have control, since they have at times been bounced around like ping-pong balls. Our kids are thriving. When they misbehave, it is never because of a power struggle.

Time to go inside. While I've been writing, M has joined K indoors. I have to get dinner going, get both kids bathed, and set up The Lunch Factory.