This is the third blog in a series that discusses the traits that an adoptive parent of a special needs child must have. The parent must be mindful that recovery and restoration from the child’s past may not be immediate and that some damage may never be fixed. We all like to think that lots of love and the best that modern medicine can provide will make things right. The problem is that it just doesn’t always happen.
We have adopted five maternal brothers. The oldest four came to our home about four years ago. One of the children is the hardest to handle and gets a great deal of our corrective attention. Some of the behaviors that get him in trouble have been happening for a long time and do not seem to be getting better.
For instance, if he wakes up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, he decides that no one is up so the coast is clear to do anything that he wants. One of the things that he likes to do is get into our pantry and refrigerator and eat only sweet things or all of something that he particularly likes.
Then he will get things that he is not allowed to touch and play with them to his heart’s content because no one is there to stop him. As an example, one night he came downstairs, climbed the pantry shelves, and opened a can of cake icing. Once he got it open, he ate out of it with his fingers making quite a mess.
Then he went exploring into my wife’s purse and found a contraband item, her ipod. The next day, it was not working properly because he had punched all the buttons, and the ipod and Nancy’s purse had icing all over them. Another time, he got out one of our cell phones, turned it on, and pushed a lot of buttons. We realized something was wrong when someone asked why we had called them several times in the middle of the night.
Punishment in various forms has not stopped this behavior. We are getting expert help and here is what we are doing. We have installed locks on the pantry door. That worked until he figured out that we kept the key on the top of the refrigerator, climbed up the kitchen cabinets, and used the key.
Now we have the lock on the pantry and we move the key around. We also bought a cheap motion detector and have it on in the kitchen late at night. We also have him sleep on an air mattress on the floor in our bedroom. Sometimes, he will try to sneak out but we are light sleepers. By the way, we put him in bed in his room, and then move him to ours when we are ready to go to sleep.
With all of these safeguards, the system is beat occasionally, but very rarely. We have had to patiently wait this thing out. We think that it will stop someday. We are tempted to get impatient and wonder why it has taken so long.
Our child lived in a situation for over four years where he had to forage for food. He still thinks that he has to be his own boss to get everything he needs. He also seems to still be testing us to see if he really belongs here and if we will really keep him forever. We believe that our love will outlast the despair that ruled his life once upon a time.
We lose our patience sometimes, but we will never give up on him. Eventually, way down deep in his heart, he will believe that.
Related Blogs:
Adoptive Parenting Traits, Part 2