The Ugly Truth Set Us Free: A Candid Conversation With My Daughter About Dads, Drugs & Divorce

This morning I woke up a little groggy, but happy, having achieved an unusually restful night's sleep. I went through my morning routine before heading downstairs to see what the rest of my family was up to. My husband filled me in on an "issue" the kids were having. Our 10-year-old daughter had taken our 8-year-old son's Kindle while he was sleeping and was refusing to return it to him. My husband, "B", went upstairs to talk to her about it and seemingly out of nowhere, she lost it. She began shouting & crying before throwing the Kindle and retreating to her room...it was an extreme outburst given the situation.

With B, who is the children's stepfather, leaving for work and still learning how to navigate these more intense episodes, I decided it was time to intervene. I walked into my daughter's room to find her buried under her blankets from head to toe. When I finally coaxed her out from under the pile and asked her what was going on, her response surprised me. She said, "You don't understand! You just don't get it! Dad probably gave "E" (her brother) the working Kindle on purpose because I was a mistake! That's probably why he left!" In that moment, feeling her pain as my own, my heart shattered into a million pieces.

Our minds and our emotions work in tangent, weaving together our perception of reality. It never occurred to me that the Kindle was more than just an electronic device in my daughter's eyes. To her, it was the last thing her father had given her; after years of limited-to-no contact, this was the only tangible evidence she had of his love for her. When hers broke and her brother's didn't, it brought to the surface a fear that had been lingering deep within her heart: It was her fault. It was her fault that her Dad had left because she was a mistake. She wasn't enough. She wasn't worth staying for. 

Of course, this wasn't the case. Not at all. For the last four years, I'd been keeping the truth about the split from my children. I thought I was protecting them. What I didn't know was that my daughter's reality, the truth that she had created in her mind, was worse than the actual truth. I knew then, as my daughter exposed her broken spirit, that by withholding the truth I had impeded her ability to grieve. 

Through tears, I told her that the simple answer was that her father had left because I'd asked him to. Why I asked him to leave was the hard part to explain. I struggled, at first, to find the right words. I had been dreading this conversation for so long and felt unprepared. How do you explain to a child that good people often do bad things? 

I'd once told my daughter that the reason her Daddy stayed away was because he was sick. I likened it to a really bad cold. I told her that when someone is sick, they don't want to spread it to others, so they keep to themselves until they are well. I decided to ask her if she remembered that conversation. She said she did. I explained that her Dad was sick but that his affliction was far worse than a cold: he had an illness called drug addiction. I told her that her father was a good man who held a lot of pain in his heart and unfortunately, had chosen to deal with it in an unhealthy way. I told her that sometimes all it takes is one bad decision, just one time using a drug, for it to consume your mind and body. I told her that I had loved him and that I had tried to help him but he'd been unable to win the battle against the drugs.  I told her that when people use drugs, they are unable to make good choices and that our home had become unsafe with him in it. I told her that even though it broke my heart to end our marriage, I had to let it go. I had a responsibility to her, her brother and to myself to create a safe, stable living environment. I had allowed my love for her father to cloud my judgment for far too long. I had to make a better life for the three of us. 

As I shared all of this with her, I cried. Hard. With every sob that escaped from me, she held me tighter and patted my back as if to show me she understood that Mommy had been hurting, too. Once the hard part was over, I talked with her about the most important thing: that she had always been wanted. I told her about how I'd always dreamed of having a daughter and how her Dad and I had planned for her. I told her that we had loved her even before she was born; how we'd listened to her heartbeat for the very first time, how we'd selected her name excitedly and how enamored we'd both been when we were finally able to hold her in our arms; a vision of perfection. She listened intently to every detail and smiled. "God doesn't make mistakes", I said, "He makes miracles." And she was ours. And now she was B's, too. 

We clung to each other for a while as we wept silent tears and let it all sink in. After a few minutes had passed, we talked about love and how not only were there many kinds of love but that we all had the capacity to carry an infinite amount of love in our hearts. We talked about her Dad and how wherever he is, he no doubt loves her and that maybe the best way he is able to show it to her right now is to stay away and allow her to enjoy a better life than the one he can provide for her. We talked about it being okay to love her Dad and to love B, her future adoptive Dad. We talked about choices, promises, commitments, respect, love and everything in between. In the span of an hour, we had traversed a rugged terrain of emotions and furthered the healing of our souls.

As adults, we often underestimate our children. We believe they are too young, too inexperienced, to understand life and the consequences of our choices. We forget that we need them as much as they need us. Today, I was able to relieve some of the hurt my daughter had been holding inside and in turn, she relieved me of the burden I had been carrying. She absolved me of blame and told me she understood. She comforted me as much as I had comforted her. 

Today was a lesson in compassion and resilience. Tomorrow we begin anew, assembling the fractured pieces of our past with those of the present, building a future filled with healing, hope and as always, love.

If A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words...

I came across this photo the other day. It might seem an odd choice, but it has always been one of my favorites. I was taking this photo of my daughter as we were trying out dresses for her kindergarten graduation when my son jumped in. She was 5 years old and had been diagnosed with autism only a few months prior. My son was 4 at the time. I think I love this photo so much because for me, it really captures a moment-in-time representation of the differences between an autistic child and a typical child. Both are smiling, and happy, but one is standing with her eyes covered not wanting to draw attention to herself and the other is saying, "Ta-da! Here I am! Look at me!"

 



Autism & Adolescence in Girls

I couldn’t tell you with absolute certainty whether or not there is any difference in having “the talk” with a young typical girl versus a young autistic girl as I’ve only had experience with the latter. My daughter has a fear of aging as she relates it to having to be separated from me so she was very reluctant to confront the changes that were happening in her body whenever I attempted to broach the topic.

Over the course of a number of months, I made many unsuccessful attempts to open up the dialogue with my daughter. When it became apparent that her body was changing rapidly and that there was no remote control I could use to pause or activate the slow-motion mode, I knew that I would have to change my approach if I was going to prepare her for the inevitable. I decided to switch gears and treat this like I would if I were giving a presentation at work.

I started out by asking myself the following:

1) Who is my audience?

2) How can I deliver this information in a way that will reach them?

3) What kind of incentive could I use to motivate my audience to eventually participate in an open  conversation to review the information shared?

Next, I carefully thought about each question and answered them, as follows:

1) My daughter is uncomfortable engaging in face-to-face conversations about topics that relate to her personal feelings or issues she considers private. She tends to do better starting out with written communication and feels more confident when she has some control over the what/when/where of a situation. At only 9 years old, she is also rather young and therefore, information should be delivered in a manner that is age-appropriate.

2) My daughter is a voracious reader so I decided that this would be a great way to reach her. She would have the control to read at her own pace, at the time of her choice and in the privacy and comfort of her bedroom. In order to find the perfect book, I did research online and reached out to other mothers of young girls for their input and recommendations. Eventually, I chose “The Care and Keeping of You Collection: A Collection for Younger Girls”. It is a great set designed for young girls that includes two books, two companion journals and a personal calendar. The books and journals address not only the physical changes but also the emotional changes that a young girl may experience as she goes through puberty. Since my daughter likes puppies, I purchased a set of 6 small, magnetic bookmarks with puppies on them that I used to mark the sections I felt were the most critical for her to read. I also bought some fun pens to use for her new journals.

3) Finally, I decided to throw in a little incentive (or bribery…call it what you will) to get her to actually crack open those books so I bought her $15 gift card to Barnes & Noble (her favorite store). I then put the book collection and the pens in a gift bag and gave it to her privately one night. I wouldn’t say she was especially thrilled when she opened it, but she agreed to let me show her how I had marked each of the sections that I wanted her to read. I told her that she could read it at her own pace and that I would not pressure her. Now it was time for the incentive; Since we don’t have many opportunities for one on one time, I told her that if she had read through the sections I had marked and agreed to talk to me about it, then we would go on a Mommy-Daughter date to Barnes & Noble so she could spend her gift card and get a chocolate milk with whipped cream from Starbucks.

One week later, we were having our date and I was able to ask her what she’d learned and answer questions that she had. We enjoyed our Starbucks and reading time following our conversation and afterward, went shopping for some of the supplies that she needed to get started.

Fast-forward a few months and she was pulling me aside to tell me that she’d experienced her first menstrual period. She could not have been more calm about it! I was so impressed with how she handled herself when it finally happened. I tried my best to make her feel special without making it a big deal since she doesn’t like that. I bought her a special little purse for her supplies to keep in her backpack, a little lip balm she’d been eyeing at the store for a while and cupcakes that I told her, between us, were to celebrate her awesomness at having dealt with everything so maturely.

This experience taught me a lot about tailoring my parenting to the needs of each individual child and that they will be more receptive to communicating when I speak their language.

Can’t stop time no matter how hard we try!

Wendy

If I could take “It” away…would I?

I have had those days with my daughter during which I feel completely helpless, frustrated, and I hate to admit it, imprisoned by her autism. I should probably clarify on the imprisoned part. I just mean that while I am all for encouraging her to push beyond her comfort zone (that’s how we grow, right?), there are times when it's unavoidable that as a family we must sacrifice to meet her needs. On some of those particularly tough days, I often wish I could just make “it” go away. But then, there are moments of brilliance; so many moments when her uniqueness and her incredible mind blow me away that I wonder, “If I were to take away the “bad" would I be taking away all the "good", as well?”

Of course, if I could lessen the obstacles that my daughter, and our family, face due to her autism, I would. I’d give (almost) anything to lift her social fears, to even out her emotions, to reduce her anxiety...to just make life a little easier for her; but would taking away her autism make her less "her"? That often leads me to ask myself, "If a cure for autism were announced tomorrow, would I want it for my child?" The answer is that I truly don’t know. Every day I pray for a cure. Every day. Yet, there is a small part of me that prays I never have to decide to proceed with a cure or not because my firstborn, my sweet girl, is not some kind of experiment with which I’m willing to gamble the results. She is a complex human being, wonderful and loved just as she is.

So, I ask you this:

If there were a cure for autism, but the findings showed that 15% of those administered the cure suffered significant regression or became catatonic versus 85% being fully “unlocked” from their autism, would the potential benefit outweigh the risk?

If there were a cure, what would the odds need to be in order for you to choose it for your child?

I ask because autism isn’t just some illness to be prevented. It isn’t the flu or chicken pox. It may not define who our children are, but it certainly is part of what shapes who they are, how they think and how they perceive the world.

Maybe it would be no different than prescribing medication for anxiety or depression where it just kind of takes the edge off improving clarity, coping skills, etc. All I’m saying is that there is a lot to consider. My hope is that there will someday be a way to prevent autism from developing in utero and that any cures developed for those presently living with autism would not eradicate the essence of their spirit.

Big questions, not enough coffee.