"When Sad looks Mad"

I have been meaning to write for such a long time, but as you can imagine, life with three kids doesn't slow down....But yesterday, I came across an article on an adoption website that was titled "When Sad looks Mad"....and it really resonated with me....because as I thought about the content of the article, I realized that so much of Amay's "mad" is actually "sad"....I spend my entire day telling Amay not to be mad about this and that, but I didn't for a minute think that maybe his mad is actually his way of being sad....it was an interesting article...that talked about how kids from orphanages don't know how to express any other real feeling except "mad"...so when food was taken away from them, they didn't get sad, they got mad...b/c it was survival...when someone took a toy away, they got mad b/c it was the only toy they had....if they couldn't fall asleep at night, they were mad at themselves...not sad so that somebody would come and comfort them....so in an institution, there is no feeling of greed, sadness, or embarrassed...it is more of just fight or flight........kids that come from orphanages often don't know how to express anything but mad...not to say that they don't feel anything else... inside them, they are hurt, wounded, and very sad........and now, it all makes sense, that sometimes, "sad looks mad"....and even as adults, we often take out our anger on something that initially made us sad but now has just turned into anger.....so today I ask that those struggling with me to understand our "mad" child, take a minute and look into his/her eyes, and see beyond the anger of lonliness, rejection, separation...and look for the sadness that is deeply buried under......and you will see, that they have been sad for so long and nobody has paid attention...and that sadness has grown into madness.....