Control Issues

If I can’t control this child at least I can master this bush.

That will make me feel better………..right?  right?  hello?

The Therapy Session

I decided to do a joint appointment with my son at the therapist’s office tonight.  I

had given up on him seeing the therapist alone because he refused to talk to her.

Instead, he had decided what he would take from these meetings was a running

tally of how much we were spending for each appointment where he did nothing

but just sit there and not talk. Then, later whenever he would ask for me to buy him

something and I would say I couldn’t afford it, he would say, “my point EXACTLY,

if you hadn’t paid for those 9 appointments @ $175 each then we would not be

having this problem, and I would have the X-box game I want.”  At these moments

I don’t know whether to applaud his multiplication skills, reprimand his smart

mouth, go for the never successful quoting of the life lesson that there is more to this

world than just “his needs”, or to simply grimace and grit my teeth which have

already become nubs from always defaulting to this decision.

Anyhow, since my current dealings with him were reaching new volume levels and

starting to incorporate swear words (on my part), I decided that we could both use

a little therapy. In my optimism (misguided thinking) I thought that if I laid down

the  gauntlet by admitting in front of him that my ‘swearing & yelling’ was not right,

perhaps my son would be willing to make a team effort along with me to improve

our home life.

As we walked into the therapist’s office I took a seat on the couch leaving the cozier

looking chair for him.  Just as I was getting situated he lopes over and proceeds to sit

on top of me and refused to move.  We’re not talking about some cute cuddly way, it

was alarming actually.  I wasn’t expecting it so I hadn’t moved my hands quickly

enough and he ended up sitting on my hands and due to him being bigger than me I

couldn’t get any leverage with any other parts of my body other than to just sort of lift

my “lap” up and down trying to knock him off.  He had pressed his back onto me so

my face was squished making it impossible to speak much less even see the therapist.

From her perspective it must have looked like some strange animal mating scenario.

Horribly embarrassing.  I’m surprised she didn’t yell out that she didn’t do this kind

of therapy.

After I was finally able to shake him off me, he then proceeded to lay on the couch,

take his shoes and socks off and go to work on some long standing toe jam.  What

the heck!!  (See, I said heck where another word here would have been much more

soothing to me, but I’m trying) I had never seen him act this way in public.  The

entire appointment he used this strange baby talk.  As all of this was going on I was

wondering if I should correct him, ask him to sit up,  put his shoes back on thus

risking coming across as the kind of mom that is controlling, therefore, undoubtedly

becoming the “reason” for his behavior, or did I just sit there maintaining eye

contact with the therapist thus being deemed either the cool mom who doesn’t get

hung up on the small things or would I become the other end of the diagnosis,

“no-wonder-your-child-is-impossible-you-do-nothing-to-discipline-him” kind of

mom.  You know what I’m talking about, right?

So, instead of dragging you through any more details of this appalling appointment,

let me just share with you what I learned. DIS-ENGAGE, yes, that was the big lesson.

Just step back from the behavior.  Not saying to ignore it because then you are still

engaged due to your effort to ignore.  Disengage meaning it has nothing to do with

you, let yourself mentally release yourself from having any responsibility or duty to do

anything about your kid’s behavior.  And you know what?  The more I try it I realize it

works!  The therapist was right.  By disengaging I can get MYSELF back.  I separate

and put distance for myself from the irrationality of his behavior.  Once I allowed

myself to do this it gave me an amazing sense of freedom.  It made me feel strong and

capable because it was MY decision to put the distance there.  Another plus of this

new paradigm was by gaining this distance I then saw how that put the onus on him

to become more responsible for his actions.  It was nearing the end of the session and

the therapist gave the signal by standing and saying, “okay, then”.  I said, “OK, can

you put your shoes and socks back on now” to my son.  Not surprisingly, he opted

instead to start to play with the flexible arms of her floor lamp, instead of swooping

down and repeating his name numerous times and then lower my voice to an animal

like growl to put his shoes on, I simply said “I’m going to the car” and I turned and

walked out.  I heard him say, “mama” in a really small voice as I exited the room.  In

that moment I realized that by “dis-engaging” I gave him the gift of being embarrassed

by his own actions, because there was no audience except for the person whose

property he was hurting, and thank God at least most of these ADHD kids are smart

enough to know they don’t want to look stupid, and standing there twisting someone’s

floor lamp into a topiary he was looking pretty stupid.  So, he put his shoes on

lickety-split and off we went.  Unfortunately we’re  not riding into the sunset where we

live happily ever after, we are  inevitably only off to our next battle which will most

likely be happening within the next hour.  But for this moment, in this particular day,

chalk one up for mom.