The Boy, My Son: Part One

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You came back? You came back!

You can see I've been futzing with the layout a touch. Don't worry, it will get there.

Where was I? Oh, yes. The Boy, my son.

Most of you who are reading this (who am I kidding, the three of you reading this- hi there Heather, Yvonne, and Char!) already know the situation. He's been home for three months now, and I have to tell you, I wasn't sure we were going to make it through that first month and a half. It took a while for us to all get used to having each other again and to build our routine back up. He was still in his long term care (ltc) mentality. At any given moment he would explode, obscenities flew with scorching accuracy, and no thing or human was safe from his tiny and fierce temper tantrums. And so it went until suddenly-

Last Friday we had a breakthrough moment. It was our pizza and movie night, and the dinner was set up buffet style. Now, in our family we serve food from youngest to oldest. The rose got her plate, and I went into the kitchen to do something. The next thing I know there's world war three going on in my dining room. It was the same as it ever was: a simple misunderstanding had suddenly exploded into mayhem. After physically interjecting myself and redirecting the tiny volcano, it was explained that all he had wanted to do was go next and the older boys were telling him to wait his turn. See? I mean- that's not uncommon between siblings but his reaction was.

Have you ever had a moment when a thought hit you so intensely you could see it as clearly as if you had a photo in your hand? It was me, in the kitchen, listening to him crying on the other end of the phone because kids had been bullying him.

I fekkin hate that place.

"Did what just happened remind you of how the boys treated you at the academy?"

You guys that child broke down like I haven't seen in a long time. For years he's been crying out of rage and anger. These were the sobs of a child broken. The older boys were stunned. "You don't know what it's like to be away from your family for such a long time!!" I just wrapped my arms around his scrawny little shoulders and held him. I told him he was safe here, that he didn't have to worry about those boys ever again. That his brothers just misunderstood. And look, didn't he have his pizza after all? We talked about his experiences and how we all needed to be more mindful of how we treat each other. The rest of the night went smoothly.

And what followed?




Well- guess you have to wait for the next blog post.

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