Healing Through Connection

I have continued to have this blog on my mind over the year and my absence is a representation of what this last year has been for me…below is something that I wrote that will also be posted in another blog (RAD Advocates) in October. I hope to get back into regular posting as things settle a bit in my world and thank you all for your support!:

I have a secret to share about my life, what you see from the outside isn’t really what’s going on.

My home is often a warzone. I go home and I am screamed at and torn down. I am lied to so often that I don’t even know how to find the truth anymore. Many of the lies aren’t even big or necessary, they are over the smallest details just to prove that I’m not smart enough to figure it out. I have started to feel crazy, to doubt my own reality. On a near weekly basis (sometimes more often), I am physically assaulted. I am hit, kicked, spit at, scratched. I’m told that I’m stupid, that I’m a bad mom, that I’m hated, that I should be dead. I’ve had threats against my life and the detailed plan to do it calmly stated behind a cold smile. I worry that one day, it may not be just words any longer. My dog was already poisoned on purpose and yesterday we found my cat dead. I don’t know for sure what happened but I have to wonder how my healthy, happy cat from the morning is suddenly dead. Every day I go home with fear and anticipation of what is waiting for me. I do my best to protect my kids, but they live in fear too. I work hard to shield them, to keep them away so it doesn’t turn on them, but it doesn’t always work. I try to tell them they don’t need to worry about me, that I can handle it but I know they worry just the same. When things get bad, I try to send them outside, to the neighbors or behind a closed door with a TV turned up. I try to do the things that will keep them safe and shelter them from this life. I hope that it doesn’t affect them as much as I know that it does. They’ve been hurt before too… hit, kicked, called names, been told that they don’t matter, had their things intentionally destroyed, threatened. We all live a life that no one sees or knows. We go to work and school each day and put on the smile and tell ourselves we’re okay. We aren’t okay but I made this decision so what choice do I have now?

I know that my life makes people uncomfortable, so I don’t usually talk about it…no one seems to get it and more often than not, people don’t believe me and they think I’m crazy because it’s not what they see. They see charming, sweet, kind…only behind our closed doors does the monster really reveal itself. I try to protect myself from the judgement and I try to protect you from the discomfort. I also feel so very lonely and lost. I feel hopeless at times but everyone keeps telling me, if I just love enough, if I just handle things differently, it will be okay. I’m told that it happens because of me, it’s my fault, and that it’s not the fault of the person that hurts us, that I just need to do better. I’m told that I made this choice and I just need to “put my big girl panties on” and deal with it. I try my best but no matter what I do, it doesn’t seem to work. I try to say and do the right things, I try different tactics…. Every now and then, we have a good day and I start to have hope again. I trust that they mean what they say when they say they want to be better, that they’re going to change, that they won’t keep hurting me….us…sometimes that lasts for a couple days, other times, only a couple hours…but they always go back to hurting. They tell me that they do the things they do to hurt me, that that is the goal. I am worried that my life will only get worse, that my kids will become more scared, more anxious, more angry, more hurt…

I imagine that reading this, you’re worried about us too. I appreciate that. Here’s the thing though…will you still believe me and still worry when I tell you who the person is that’s hurting me?

It is my daughter. I adopted a child who needed a home, a second chance at life, that I thought I could help…it turns out that because of what happened to her before us, she has RAD – reactive attachment disorder. Everything I have written above is our life day in and day out. Do you still care? Do you still believe me? I can hardly believe that a child could do these things either but she does and she will only get stronger, smarter, better at what she does. So many people have left our side because they couldn’t believe it, “she seems so innocent, she’s so young, it just couldn’t be true, it must be our fault, you caused this, you’re lying, it’s because she’s adopted, you just don’t love her”. Will you leave us to? Will you blame us? Or will you choose to hear us, see us, support us, learn, ask questions, trust us?

I share this because this is my story but it’s also the story of countless other families who are raising a child with RAD. Depending on the statistics you look at, 40-80% of kids who are in foster care or have been adopted qualify for a mental health diagnosis and fall on the spectrum of RAD and yet most of you have likely never even heard of it. Not all are as severe as my daughter and some are worse and as parents we are exhausted, defeated, lonely, and fragile. We are pleading for help, for understanding, for support.

I posted in the past my Letter to Friends and Family about my child with RAD and since posting that things only continued to decline. The above post gives some insight into what has been going on and I share it in hopes that it will help develop empathy and understanding for families that are living in the same warzone we were. Sadly, due to lack of resources, support, understanding, our daughter had to be placed in a therapeutic boarding school for the safety of those around her and hopefully to give her a chance to begin to heal. I hope that if you know someone raising a kiddo with attachment trauma, that you will hear them and believe them, provide space for them and be willing to learn about attachment disorder, because we (parents of RAD kiddos) are drowning and desperately in need a life line.