Max had his last day of school today before spring break. I've already yelled at him and, embarrassingly, physically forced him to put his hands down by his sides rather than fidget while I yelled at him. Man that kid can push my buttons.
This is why I've seriously considered disrupting. This is why I went on Prozac. I hated Prozac. I'd hate myself for "throwing him away." I hate this situation.
A lot of times I think he's just being a kid, rather than being an intentional butt head (which, let me assure you, he is sometimes doing), but even that sets me off. It's a problem. I'd blamed it on prior bad feelings before I went on Prozac, but it's not. I feel like I'm over the prior bad feelings from when he was really being a shit with hitting and all. It's just that this kid rubs me wrong. I wish he didn't. Oh how I wish he didn't. I'm so sad that the adoption turned out this way.
And it seems to be just me. Or, rather, just me and Anthony. His teachers love him. Grandparents think he's a great kid. I want to say, "Want him?" How awful. I feel ashamed of feeling this way.
Of course, maybe others would feel this way if they had to live with him. But, maybe they wouldn't. Which, again, is why sometimes it seems like we should disrupt. We won't. It was a permanent decision when we finally started the finalization paperwork.
Before we went to adoption committee for Max - before we'd even met him - we had a couple of conversations with his foster mom. He presented as a neat kid who needed a lot of adult attention. She thought he'd do better in a smaller family than hers (7 kids, including Max).
However, after he moved in, we had another conversation. In this conversation, she confided that she was worried that we were going to send Max back because we'd had such a rocky transition. She said that, in her many years of foster care, she'd had 3 kids "sent back" from adoption placements. She said that all of those kids were kids with serious issues, though, "nothing like Judea."
Less than five minutes later, she told me that it was amazing the changes that happened in her house after Judea moved out. "Everyone was so much calmer. Behavior turned around 180 degrees. I didn't even realize how much stress everyone was under until Judea left."
That's not a kid with fairly serious issues? Enough to disrupt a family of 9 people by his little lonesome?
Yeah.
You have my complete and utter understanding and sympathy and empathy and anything else I can throw in here. It sucks to not totally adore a kid - especially when it's one who seems to do things just to make you insane. It sucks to feel out of control in the sense of, "I'm the adult here and I should be able to push these feelings of dislike away on command!" and oh, man, I totally know where you're coming from. Totally.
ReplyDeleteWow. Thanks for that totally supportive comment. It really gave me a boost.
ReplyDeleteAnthony and I are brainstorming about what to do differently. As we do every month or so...and things do seem to get better, so maybe as long as we just keep plugging away and trying our best. I just wish it weren't so hard!