Regression
I didn't really ponder mommy-hood much before having kids. I mean who really sits down and thinks about the in-depth battle of parenting before kids. I don't know anyone. I assume most expecting parents (whether your birthed your children or adopted them) are too caught up in the naming of the child, the half-off décor to purchase at Hobby Lobby, and little adorable shoes that arrive in your house to truly consider life after kids arrive. That's why people write their parenting books years after having kids. I'm sure it's not so much as to give advice and their experience as it is so they can WARN future parents of the havoc that is coming into their simple lives.
Maybe you do not agree. I know some people that are all swoony over their children and every moment is pure bliss for them. Please. I don't not live in the pure bliss world. It's pretty chaotic around here most of time.
My kids run in the house and they break things. I get annoyed when they break things. I let them use water in the house. They climb on the counters and I yell at them to get their germy feet off the counters. I laugh when the youngest draws on the wall or furniture because she saw a kid in a movie do it. At least she is telling the truth, that time.
I read about regression. Kids who are adopted or fostered will regress when they feel safe. They have too. It's a "life" law built into you that you must experience all phases of life. If you do not experience those phases/stages at the appropriate time, then at some point, you will go back and experience them.
I assume that is why our 5-year-old has just now hit the climbing stage. She's also at the jumping-all- over-the-furniture stage. We are probably going to need new couches and mattresses by the end of the year.
You would think that regression and letting kids "be kids" would be easy and understandable. After all, they had to grow up too fast, experience too much life, and learn more about life than a 30-year- old should know at an age when they should be driving big wheels and dreaming about the tooth fairy. Shouldn't you pity them? I don't know about pity, but it's not as easy you think when kids regress.
As a parent, you see a 10-year-old. You expect him to act ten. I don't know how 10-year-olds really are supposed to act, but I do think that acting like a 5-year-old isn't acceptable, right? Except for this 10 year old, it is. See his or her brain has only developed to age of five, so they cannot help it. They don't have the brain capacity to think or act as a 10-year-old. I know you're thinking I just told you that they already "grew up" and they know more about life than most 30-year-olds. (Remember I told you, that you needed a brain chemistry degree if you adopted kids?)
Somehow, during trauma - which happens when a child experiences breaks in normal brain development due to his/her circumstances, environment, and life belief system that is INGRAINED in them from the time of conception - so anyway - during trauma, the neurotransmitters might not connect or transmit properly and the brain immediately goes into survival mode, which is in the cortex or the bottom part of the brain and that's where trauma kids live. They stay there. They do it to survive. Their brain records events, pictures, experiences, sights, sounds, etc. that are deeply intact. These are known as memory traces. (side note: did you know you can actually renew a memory trace?!) A brain with trauma is able to function. It is smart and sensitive to all things. Only it hasn't developed the ability to self-soothe. Uh, self-soothing is really important for your whole life. The brain with trauma didn't get the chemicals right. You know, the ones that come from repetitive nurture from loving parents. I could go on, but you probably get the idea. Trauma kids have brains that do not develop the zillion things that a baby requires to grow up healthy.
So letting a child regress, is important for his or her entire well-being and the well-being of society.
As a parent, you have to lower or change your expectations of your child. This doesn't mean you think your child is less than other children their age. It means you let them experience life differently, so they can grow up at their pace. My opinion is that they have learn to FEEL safe first in order to do this growing up. Felt safety. When you go without it your whole life, it's really hard (and scary) to feel it and understand it. Sometimes children with trauma even shut down part of their brain so they don't feel. Not feeling is being in control, it helps to block the hurt.
But it's hard as the parent, because you forget that child has lived their whole life in fear, hurt, and constant survival mode. You live with them day in and day out and you expect them to be "normal". When the child doesn't respond to you or your parenting, it feels like they are rejecting YOU.
In reality, maybe it is, a little bit anyway. They reject adults and authority who have done nothing to help them and have only caused pain or separation. (this can happen in a zillion different ways) They see you as another adult who will cause pain. Because they live in survival mode, trauma kids don't always see the real reality. They see what they think happened or they even place past memories and emotions onto a current event. They may even say things happened in the current event that really happened in the past. The current event may trigger bad memories and cause emotions from that past experience to surface. They cannot separate the two events in their mind. Confused yet? So they reject what they think is bad or hurtful and that rejection is aimed at you.
Sometimes the parents start to put up walls. Rejection also brings out hurts or memories from the parent's childhood. So you have to work through it. What does that look like? HA! Well I have no idea really. It's a daily thing here at our house. If parents keep up their walls, the kids will also put up more walls. That's a lot of walls to knock down and most of the time they aren't easy to knock down, especially as adults. Occasionally there are walls that require professional help, which is why we are on our zillionth intake session tomorrow with a new therapist. Ok. Not really zillionth, but we have been to our share of intake sessions. Intake session: where you go and talk about the child and the family and every single little problem from birth and adoption. It's emotionally draining. Yet strangely, hopeful.
Our family has a lot to work thru. Taking on 3 kids stressed out my brain and there is only so much stress your brain can take at one time. Apparently I maxed out. Brent handled it better than me. It could be said that Brent and I experience our own trauma. You can look it up: WebMD baby! haha!
I sort of think that working through something means you have to face it. That's not fun. You also have to be willing to fail. You have to be okay with your own flaws. So then you have to let yourself off the hook and recognize you are not perfect and your child has to see you as imperfect, because, well like I just said, you're not perfect. Maybe I'm talking to myself now. I am just now figuring this out, so please don't think I am anywhere close to having it worked out. If only you knew how high my expectations were of myself!
I think I've rambled a bit much today. I wasn't really planning to say all that just now. I guess you were my counselor today. Thanks.
My kids run in the house and they break things. I get annoyed when they break things. I let them use water in the house. They climb on the counters and I yell at them to get their germy feet off the counters. I laugh when the youngest draws on the wall or furniture because she saw a kid in a movie do it. At least she is telling the truth, that time.
I read about regression. Kids who are adopted or fostered will regress when they feel safe. They have too. It's a "life" law built into you that you must experience all phases of life. If you do not experience those phases/stages at the appropriate time, then at some point, you will go back and experience them.
I assume that is why our 5-year-old has just now hit the climbing stage. She's also at the jumping-all- over-the-furniture stage. We are probably going to need new couches and mattresses by the end of the year.
You would think that regression and letting kids "be kids" would be easy and understandable. After all, they had to grow up too fast, experience too much life, and learn more about life than a 30-year- old should know at an age when they should be driving big wheels and dreaming about the tooth fairy. Shouldn't you pity them? I don't know about pity, but it's not as easy you think when kids regress.
As a parent, you see a 10-year-old. You expect him to act ten. I don't know how 10-year-olds really are supposed to act, but I do think that acting like a 5-year-old isn't acceptable, right? Except for this 10 year old, it is. See his or her brain has only developed to age of five, so they cannot help it. They don't have the brain capacity to think or act as a 10-year-old. I know you're thinking I just told you that they already "grew up" and they know more about life than most 30-year-olds. (Remember I told you, that you needed a brain chemistry degree if you adopted kids?)
Somehow, during trauma - which happens when a child experiences breaks in normal brain development due to his/her circumstances, environment, and life belief system that is INGRAINED in them from the time of conception - so anyway - during trauma, the neurotransmitters might not connect or transmit properly and the brain immediately goes into survival mode, which is in the cortex or the bottom part of the brain and that's where trauma kids live. They stay there. They do it to survive. Their brain records events, pictures, experiences, sights, sounds, etc. that are deeply intact. These are known as memory traces. (side note: did you know you can actually renew a memory trace?!) A brain with trauma is able to function. It is smart and sensitive to all things. Only it hasn't developed the ability to self-soothe. Uh, self-soothing is really important for your whole life. The brain with trauma didn't get the chemicals right. You know, the ones that come from repetitive nurture from loving parents. I could go on, but you probably get the idea. Trauma kids have brains that do not develop the zillion things that a baby requires to grow up healthy.
As a parent, you have to lower or change your expectations of your child. This doesn't mean you think your child is less than other children their age. It means you let them experience life differently, so they can grow up at their pace. My opinion is that they have learn to FEEL safe first in order to do this growing up. Felt safety. When you go without it your whole life, it's really hard (and scary) to feel it and understand it. Sometimes children with trauma even shut down part of their brain so they don't feel. Not feeling is being in control, it helps to block the hurt.
In reality, maybe it is, a little bit anyway. They reject adults and authority who have done nothing to help them and have only caused pain or separation. (this can happen in a zillion different ways) They see you as another adult who will cause pain. Because they live in survival mode, trauma kids don't always see the real reality. They see what they think happened or they even place past memories and emotions onto a current event. They may even say things happened in the current event that really happened in the past. The current event may trigger bad memories and cause emotions from that past experience to surface. They cannot separate the two events in their mind. Confused yet? So they reject what they think is bad or hurtful and that rejection is aimed at you.
Sometimes the parents start to put up walls. Rejection also brings out hurts or memories from the parent's childhood. So you have to work through it. What does that look like? HA! Well I have no idea really. It's a daily thing here at our house. If parents keep up their walls, the kids will also put up more walls. That's a lot of walls to knock down and most of the time they aren't easy to knock down, especially as adults. Occasionally there are walls that require professional help, which is why we are on our zillionth intake session tomorrow with a new therapist. Ok. Not really zillionth, but we have been to our share of intake sessions. Intake session: where you go and talk about the child and the family and every single little problem from birth and adoption. It's emotionally draining. Yet strangely, hopeful.
Our family has a lot to work thru. Taking on 3 kids stressed out my brain and there is only so much stress your brain can take at one time. Apparently I maxed out. Brent handled it better than me. It could be said that Brent and I experience our own trauma. You can look it up: WebMD baby! haha!
I sort of think that working through something means you have to face it. That's not fun. You also have to be willing to fail. You have to be okay with your own flaws. So then you have to let yourself off the hook and recognize you are not perfect and your child has to see you as imperfect, because, well like I just said, you're not perfect. Maybe I'm talking to myself now. I am just now figuring this out, so please don't think I am anywhere close to having it worked out. If only you knew how high my expectations were of myself!
I think I've rambled a bit much today. I wasn't really planning to say all that just now. I guess you were my counselor today. Thanks.
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Sending my love, Laura