It's been 2 and 1/2 years since we brought our son Amay home from India. Sometimes I still think about the first week of being home with him. The horrible feeling of not knowing what to do with the "stranger" sleeping in the other room. The helpless feeling of being a "new" mom to a child that was four years old. Things at home have been better...a lot better. Lately, however, he has been displaying a lot of anger and defiance towards me. And I know a lot of moms, adoptive or not, can relate to kids not doing what they are told to do. As for me, I am used to having the other two kids who "usually" do what I tell them to do without a full blown tantrum. Amay, on the other hand, has reverted back to his violent behavior towards me. The puzzling part of all this is that he only does it to me. I can't understand why he is so angry at me, but most of his tantrums end with him hitting me, then telling me that he doesn't like me and lastly but the most hurtful one, "YOU are a bad mother!". My husband has told me over and over again not to take it personally, but I can't help but become limp with every word in that sentence. All the anger directed at me cripples my every effort to make things work. God knows that I am trying, and learning to love him, and trying to see past his trauma. But adoption has made me Human. Sometimes I forget that I am a mom to this angry child. Sometimes I forget the natural feelings of being selfless as a mom. He often becomes violent and then tells me I am a bad mother and then asks me for a hug. And sometimes, I don't want to hug him. I want HIM to hug me. I don't want to make him feel better. I want HIM to make ME feel better. And that is not what a mom should ever feel. A mom should always put her child's feelings and needs above her own. But sometimes it hurts so much that I want him to make it all better. I want him to take the pain and words back. Sometimes I want to be angry for all the effort I make that just results in me being a "bad mother". And I know that early child trauma changes a child. And it effects him and will effect him for the rest of his life. I. KNOW. IT. ALL. Most adoptive moms know that their child has been through trauma. But no adoptive mom can go through every anger tantrum remembering the child's trauma. Sometimes adoption forces me to become Human and to feel human emotions. And human emotions often can be scary. As a mom, your job is to comfort and love your child. But as a human, your instinct is to survive. And adoption sometimes tugs at my survival instincts. There are days that I don't want to love, to comfort, to learn from my mistakes, to be patient, to do any of it. Somedays I just want to survive.
While discussing some of the anger issues with my adoptive moms group, one of the moms, who also happens to be a therapist, told me that anger is a secondary emotion. That there is always something behind anger. That we don't just become angry for no reason. And of course, there is a lot of truth to that. And I know that Amay isn't angry at me as a mom to him. Perhaps he is angry at what mom means to him. Perhaps "mom" means abandonment. Perhaps "mom" means a safe place where he can be angry. I actually don't know what causes him to be so angry at me. And the truth is, sometimes I am so angry at him. And so when the adoptive mom suggested that I, too, look for a reason to why I am angry at him, I realized that there were so many reasons that I have kept bottled up in an attempt to be the mother he deserves. But as I thought more about my anger, I realized that adoption has made me human. And I am trying so hard to be a mom to him. During his violent tantrums, I want to love him because that is what moms do. But the "human" part of me just wants to yell and not deal with the deeper issue of trauma. For the past 7 years, since the birth of my first child, I have been just a mom. I have been selfless, loving, caring, and everything that a mom does without questioning her efforts. But lately, as Amay regresses, I have been in survival mode again. I desperately want to feel like a mother again. I desperately want to soften my heart and feel the joy of being a mother again. I desperately want not to be angry at him for "disrupting" my normal and making me feel incompetent as a mother even to the other two kids. I desperately want to feel a "biological" connection to him. Most adoptive moms will say that anger, attachment issues, and such are normal during adoption. And I agree. I agree they are normal in adoption because adoption makes us human. Anger and having to "learn" to love your son is by no means normal in motherhood. But it is if you are just human. It is normal to have to "learn" to love another human that says you are a bad mother. I get it now.
When all is quiet and I am no longer in "fight or flight" mode, I sit in my bed and think about the amazing awesome blessing that sleeps in the other room. And I feel like a mother again. And it is the best feeling in the world. I love him so much. There is a part of me that is glad that it hurts me so much when he says mean things to me. Because 2 years ago, if he had said that he hated me, I could have cared less. He was a stranger to me and I hadn't even really accepted him as my own. And that is the brutal truth. And now, 2 years later, his anger seaps through my heart and rips it apart. My husband often tells me to let the pain go, and I know I should. But I can't. I want to be the best mom I can be for him. And if his words continue to hurt me as much as they do, I know that one day I will be the mom he deserves. I will continue fighting those words in my head and dig deeper to heal his anger. And though it feels horrible, it is therapeutic to know that it hurts so much because i love him. I love his soul and I love his little heart that needs so much healing. I am lost as a mother because I don't know how to heal my son. I am angry as a human because all of this hurts. Adoption has made me human, and I had forgotten that moms are human too.
While discussing some of the anger issues with my adoptive moms group, one of the moms, who also happens to be a therapist, told me that anger is a secondary emotion. That there is always something behind anger. That we don't just become angry for no reason. And of course, there is a lot of truth to that. And I know that Amay isn't angry at me as a mom to him. Perhaps he is angry at what mom means to him. Perhaps "mom" means abandonment. Perhaps "mom" means a safe place where he can be angry. I actually don't know what causes him to be so angry at me. And the truth is, sometimes I am so angry at him. And so when the adoptive mom suggested that I, too, look for a reason to why I am angry at him, I realized that there were so many reasons that I have kept bottled up in an attempt to be the mother he deserves. But as I thought more about my anger, I realized that adoption has made me human. And I am trying so hard to be a mom to him. During his violent tantrums, I want to love him because that is what moms do. But the "human" part of me just wants to yell and not deal with the deeper issue of trauma. For the past 7 years, since the birth of my first child, I have been just a mom. I have been selfless, loving, caring, and everything that a mom does without questioning her efforts. But lately, as Amay regresses, I have been in survival mode again. I desperately want to feel like a mother again. I desperately want to soften my heart and feel the joy of being a mother again. I desperately want not to be angry at him for "disrupting" my normal and making me feel incompetent as a mother even to the other two kids. I desperately want to feel a "biological" connection to him. Most adoptive moms will say that anger, attachment issues, and such are normal during adoption. And I agree. I agree they are normal in adoption because adoption makes us human. Anger and having to "learn" to love your son is by no means normal in motherhood. But it is if you are just human. It is normal to have to "learn" to love another human that says you are a bad mother. I get it now.
When all is quiet and I am no longer in "fight or flight" mode, I sit in my bed and think about the amazing awesome blessing that sleeps in the other room. And I feel like a mother again. And it is the best feeling in the world. I love him so much. There is a part of me that is glad that it hurts me so much when he says mean things to me. Because 2 years ago, if he had said that he hated me, I could have cared less. He was a stranger to me and I hadn't even really accepted him as my own. And that is the brutal truth. And now, 2 years later, his anger seaps through my heart and rips it apart. My husband often tells me to let the pain go, and I know I should. But I can't. I want to be the best mom I can be for him. And if his words continue to hurt me as much as they do, I know that one day I will be the mom he deserves. I will continue fighting those words in my head and dig deeper to heal his anger. And though it feels horrible, it is therapeutic to know that it hurts so much because i love him. I love his soul and I love his little heart that needs so much healing. I am lost as a mother because I don't know how to heal my son. I am angry as a human because all of this hurts. Adoption has made me human, and I had forgotten that moms are human too.
