The hardest thing on the hardest journey is finding yourself re-walking ground you thought you had passed, often at great effort. Whether an evil fairy carried you backwards in your sleep, or you took an exciting short-cut that turned out to be a backwards loop, or you just happen to be living with a child with multi-factoral multi-year trauma.
I tend to be reasonably stoic about miserable experiences with a very “I can survive anything, solve any problem, and am always right” attitude (except for hiking up long inclines. Then I have a very “come back for me on your way down, I’ll just wait here attitude!”) As long as I feel movement, my self-image of “a survivor” will not let me quit. Inversely, feeling stuck and without control to move myself out of stuck or make changes creates the greatest overwhelming despair and panic.
October was awful. October is ALWAYS awful, but somehow we always seem to forget. (Part of the goal of this blog is to remember things – “parent brain” is a real thing where parents immediately forget how fucking hard parenting something was – for an example, see anyone with a second baby! Especially right about that two-year/three-year age gap!). And this year’s October was uniquely awful so it took a while to remember that the constant escalation and just miserable interactions were likely related to October. We have a 7 yr old with age-appropriate snottiness, talk-back, rudeness, whining, and boundary testing, but ptsd-meltdown response and/or delayed emotional growth 3 yr old tantrum response to any equally appropriate parenting response or boundary setting. It is so UNFAIR and HARD for her to overcome years and years of just delays. (As I was typing this a crying spell happened because the game she is playing told her to point to a wrist. She doesn’t know what her wrist is. She guessed her neck, her armpit, her shoulder, and then flopped. Apparently, she ALSO does not know shoulder or armpit – she could remember neck when pressed a little. Who knew?).
BUT, October 30, dawned following the first night of sleeping through the night in a month, and we all breathed a sigh of hope. It’s like a switch, whatever the bad thing was, her body’s memory ends on October 30.
Halloween was a joy, with my neighborhood coming together to give all the kiddos a Covid-safe super fun night of trick-or-treating. My Moanna and The King (Hamilton) were the cutest EVER, and both had signing costumes and both were great at performing their characters.
X3 received some pro-social feedback when both her cousins said they did not want to play with her because she would not stop screaming and we, as parents, breathed a hopeful breath for the motivational power of peer pressure.
The first week of November was maybe the best week we’ve had as a family in ages and ages. On Tuesday November 3 (remember Tuesday? There was some little election thing happening too, I think) things were a little hard because she did another big emotional drop of prior trauma disclosures to her therapist and we got to go our fourth round with CPS interviews, and she felt fragile and easily escalated. But she also was interested in the election, and watching the results (literally like 1 state before she had to go to bed!) and talking about Trump and Biden, and her fears if Trump was reelected and trying to figure out what a president even IS or DOES, and why adults cared, but going ALL IN on caring too. It was so amazing and heartwarming to have those conversations and have a moment that is positive AND something other than “you are safe”. The kind of thing you imagine having when you start thinking of parenting and what kind of joys will make the pains worthwhile.
And the rest of the week was good too! X3 had early night nightmares every night, but soothing back to sleep was fast and easy, and she was not as snotty/escalated/intense every single day like October. Most importantly, my partner did not look like he was going to die when I finished work on Friday!
And then it all hit. Friday the 6th seemed fairly normal and nice. Bedtime was normal. We moved into the early nightmares. But then there were more than usual. And then the endless wailing “moooooommmm”. But not going back to sleep. For hours. AND HOURS. Yelling, demanding attention, refusing to do her work to calm, to remember “then” vs “now”, being angry when I reminded her, until everyone in the house was awake, then WAILING that no one was very happy to be awake.
And then… hungry. SO HUNGRY. Despite beings stuffed full at dinner and having a pre-bedtime snack and drinking a complete water bottle. Clearly, NOT ACTUALLY HUNGRY, this is all flashbacks to when she WAS afraid and food insecure. She had to take food back to bed before she could even try to sleep. Note, she did NOT finish eating it – despite repeating over and over and over “SO HUNGRY”.
Then I had a baby to get back to sleep (another 30-40 minutes). Then of course kids are up at normal time, despite complete lack of sleep, so a whole day of crabby kids, one of whom is now the rawest nerve with an EXHAUSTED MOM.
The entire week was that. She now sleeps with a bagel under her pillow, but of course since we did that, she is not actually worried, so just wakes up in the morning and eats it in bed spilling bagel crumbs everwhere.
Last night I was up seven times with my kids, five of them with X3, the last time being almost two hours. And we are so tired that sad/sympathetic/empathetic is long gone. Her brain is so constantly activated she can’t do any work herself. So everyone in the house is exhausted, everyone is frustrated with her, she knows it and is in a shame spiral, and gets more and more out of control.
I feel like I already lived this. Wait, I DID. She hasn’t needed to sleep with food for over two years. She hasn’t been up all night since she came and we slept with her every night for five months, until she knew she was safe. We cannot go back to this. We just CANNOT. We are so tired and so sad and so frustrated. We are so sad for HER but we are also so sad FOR US. Other people’s needs can drown you, and hers are pulling her and us under. It feels like there will never be forward progress, and it’s beyond horrifying to go back to the beginning.
I cried and yelled meeting with her therapist today – her therapist noted we are living in military boot camp, where they torture you keeping you up all night, then expect you to function at maximum capacity during the day (parenting a second child, working a full-time intense job, having a relationship, living in a fucking pandemic). Because every solution she has WE HAVE BEEN DOING FOR TWO YEARS. The truth is, this child needs a village. She didn’t choose to be abused, neglected, and hurt; we didn’t do any of those things. We chose to try to help her move forward with growth and love and safety, WITH THE KNOWLEDGE THAT SOCIETY EXISTS AND THERE IS A TRAUMA INFORMED PROFESSIONAL VILLAGE. We had plans, backup plans, when things changed we pivoted and found new options and took advantage of every opening. BUT WE THERE IS NO FUCKING BACKUP FOR THIS. IT is ONLY US (and my seriously saint-level sister).
She needs trained therapists, she needs her daytime chaos and intensity spread across skilled paras, and therapists, and OT, and trained special educators, so that we can have a tiny break so that when I then have to stay up all night I have had the tiniest moment to breath first. There is no village. Covid took the village, and selfish people who can’t wear a fucking mask or stay away from parties, or stop hanging out with friends, or going to bars, or going to church, or having weddings, or funerals, have taken away everything our family needs to survive. Of course we won’t actually DIE. But we are all being scarred, most of all the little person who needs, and deserves, a chance to grow into the human she was meant to be, not the bundle of rage, nerves, worry, sadness, and self-loathing that has been forced on her. Right now, the kids are not ok, and neither are their parents.