Categories: uncategorized
Date: 31 March 2007 09:26:27
The hard part.
I am struggling to keep Tiddles as part of the family.
At the moment it's easier - a week and a half ago I took a day off work, bundled him to Southampton Airport and sent him flying off to my brother in Scotland. He's staying there a month, all bar five days over Easter when the two of them are coming down here. But truth to tell, it was that or foster care.
The sense of relief at him being away is a mind-blowing indication of how stressful life has become with him living at home. The knock-on effect on Smudgelet is also more than noticeable. Were it just for me, then I could muddle through the next four years somehow, but I cannot let this effect Smudgelet's childhood so intensely. On several occasions in the last week Smudgelet has quite innocently uttered the words "I'm just so happy - it's been a lovely day today" and has not quite made the connection - whether it's the influence of his older brother that he's better without or whether it's me being so less stressed.. probably a combination of the two.
A friend gave me a good talking to about letting go of guilt and about drawing a line in the sand and letting him know that he crosses it at his peril. She said something which struck me: "You've become empty". She then tried to backtrack because it sounded so negative, but she was right - she echoed a word that I'd used to him. "Your behaviour at the moment is draining me so much that I feel totally empty, as if the joy has been sucked out of me". Harsh, perhaps, but honest. The mind knows that it is mostly a throwback to his early life experiences and a genetic pre-disposition to a certain outlook on life, but how does one stop the heart feeling guilty? How does one come to terms with "What if I had handled that differently?" "What if I had done this instead of that?" "How can I be his mother and not want him here?" "How can I, who took all this on knowing that it wouldn't be easy, who promised to love and cherish him for better or worse, how can I turn round and tell him his home is no longer with me?" and even, I have to admit it, the thought of "How will I explain this to people who won't be able to begin to understand?" I think the hardest bit is the nagging voice that "all teenagers are like this - you're just overreacting"... even though I have met with loads of adoptive parents in the same situation, have heard of numerous adoptions breaking down at this point, have even heard Adoption UK were thinking of running a course entitled "But all teenagers are like that...."
So here we are with three options. One is that we try him going frequently to stay with my brother. I never knew, when reading about angels, that my brother was in that specific catagory of people!!! One is that we move to shared care with social services - a decision I want desperately to avoid. And in two weeks time, unbeknown to him, we go to visit the one boarding school which would be suitable for him and see whether he'd like to give that a try and whether they're willing to take him. But I have to do that delicate balancing act - invest everything I can in keeping him part of the family (though not to Smudgelet's detriment) and prepare myself for the fact that he's now old enough to make choices about how he behaves and that the consequences may be beyond my control, I may have to prepare myself to lose my lovely boy, at least for a while.
As my friend said "One day, you'll be standing up in the witness box in court and you'll still be telling them what a lovely boy he is" and that's the very saddest part of it.