A little bump in the road

My mom fell and then became seriously ill last week.  She developed an infection in the blood and her organs started shutting down.  Alex also started having PTSD flashbacks and had to be rushed into emergency twice during this last week because with her not in the house he felt unsafe.  He was afraid he would have to go back to school because normally I do not work from home. 

The second time he flashed we were getting off a train by a mall and he ran in and out of traffic until two teenagers chased him down and I could run up and pin him down.  It took mall security and police officers over forty minutes to respond.  The police were worried about his bare feet because I stripped the shoes and socks off before I pinned him to the ground.  Rookies.  Even Alex runs slower in bare feet on a cold wet night.  I have got to stop visiting suburbia.  :)

Anyway, Alex's trips to the ER (the first while my Mom initially went into ER) have allowed me the opportunity to spend a lot of time with her.  And then there are the standing children doctor appointments in the attached children's hospital.  Just yesterday the wonderful speech therapist wished me good luck on visiting Mom after the check-up.  It all went fine.

I am starting to get seriously sick of hospital food though. Today I absolutely insisted on bringing food from home.  The kids were healthily well fed and I got a break from the cafeteria.  We will do that again tomorrow.

I am learning a lot about PTSD.  I knew a lot before because my step-Dad was a vet and I stabilized Alex before but Alex is refining my understanding.  In some respects dealing with the orphanage trauma was so much easier than what we deal with now.  For Alex the "before time" was a category he could fit abuse into but now, with what has happened since he has been home, the monsters have leaked into our life.  If it was a simple issue of "things like that happen there but not here" he would be farther along in healing. 

I think that is an important thing for adoptive parents to understand.  Kids heal better when there is a clear demarcation between the before time and now.  And before all the caring parents jump in and over fix this, listen well - the child has to make the demarcation - and in their own time.  The parent job is to endure - and love. And be willing to calmly talk about it all when the child is ready.  I asked Daria so many times if she had been hurt and it was only when she was on TV that she told.  My daughter is not yet sure about the difference between the before time and now.  She is still currying favor and attempting to be what she thinks I expect.  She is not ready to trust.

Alex, is far from this point.  He tells all and insists on being able to trust.  All of us, even his sister, keep Alex safe in his sense of the world.  It is extremely important that he sees and knows what is happening to all of us.  Alex also sees his grandmother as an extremely important protector.  Even when she did not pick him up from school, she was at home, ready to make his day better.  And she always made him safe.  I am still the Mom that leaves him at school and works in the office.  I am farther away in his sense of the world.  I inadvertently allowed harm to happen to him before whereas my Mom just hugs him and keeps him safe at home.  She is the one that yells at the drivers that do not treat him well.

I am still having to prove to Alex that I will keep him safe.  I walk out of sight and leave him in the care of others who allow him to be hurt.  In his eyes, I fail him.  He does not see all that I try and do to correct my misplaced trust about his safety.

Parents with traumatized kids are very familiar with the child who has to be in the bathroom while you pee or has to literally hold onto your leg while you dig a hole in the garden.  I had an eighteenth- month-old preadoptive placement that did that.  Moving those rose bushes took a really long time.  That is still Alex at some level.  Hence the PTSD response this week. 

We sat in my Mom's ICU room today for a couple of hours.  I had been having people stay at my house while the kids slept so I could be with her (when we weren't already up there) but today it seemed best to let them see what has upset the applecart at home.  The kids did great.  No flashes from Alex but a lot empathy and pain when his grandmother had a few issues during care.  Alex has had issues during medical stays too.  Normal life.

This is just a bump in the road for Alex.  For me, my mother was dying this week.  I have been driven to my knees.  I cannot stop crying.  It looks like my mom will live but there is a long road ahead.  I am thinking about changes. 

While I was covering the things my Mom has normally been dealing with, I can see that Alex is fine in "home school" classes with other kids.  I sit and watch, or wait in the hall outside his new "class" and I wonder - how long has Alex been perfectly fine and the school system kept labeling him a problem? 

Time is so terribly short.  Alex is now ten and he has barely retained first grade academic skills.  His younger sister, has more advance academics skills - and she refuses to do school work!  Alex does not.  At ten I could have gone to college.  Alex is smart, like me.  He just didn't have the access to education that I had.  I worry for him academically.  But he is still trying to learn so we haven't lost the war yet.  Tomorrow I will begin again.