My girl steps forth gripping my hand
Apr 10, 2008 Family, Parenting
Today was homeschool gym stuff for both kids. First Pennie came over to pick up our kitchen-aid mixer and while she was here Madison had an unfortunate accident that resulted in her tearing a scab off her knee (it’s spring after all with bare knees and all the threat that goes with them). There was blood. There was screaming. There was Daddy hopping on his bike to head to CVS and pick up band-aids (Hello Kitty). It was a morning full of drama and pain.
Then ballet class. Madison was so excited to turn four so she could take a REAL ballet class, which happens to be taught by a fabulous unschooled 15-year old of our acquaintance who is a very serious, quite accomplished dancer and who — as the eldest of four — has enormous patience and good cheer. Madison found the class TERRIFYING and alternately wept and whined her way through it. So I sat with her and whispered an ongoing narration about what the other girls were doing and she licked the snot from her upper lip and refused to do anything but also refused to leave.
This is very similar to Noah only a much younger Noah and yes, I see adoption here because it’s so out of character for her but again, it being adoption-ish doesn’t matter (fearful, clingy — literally clamped onto my hand or my pants, a twisted little bit of my clothing gripped tight tight tight in her hand) because whatever’s going on I handle it like this: I stay with her. I try not to get frustrated (or at least not show my frustration). I act as if she will eventually do it so I don’t try to talk her into it. I insist she stretch and at least sit with the girls (even if she needs to lean physically back so she can feel the heat of me nearby) and I am proud but not too enthusiastic when she does it. Because enthusiasm is embarrassing and can cause a setback.
So the other girls whirled and twirled from one side of the room to the other and when it was Madison’s turn to whirl and twirl (her two favorite things to do), I walked with her and one time tried to whirl us together like a squaredance but she cried and fretted and tripped us up. But we tried. And we did walk back and forth when it was our turn to dance so that we could sit with the other girls again. It’s a start. Next time she can wear her new leotard (courtesy of Gram Pam) because as horrible and awful as the dance class seems to be to her while we’re there, she still wants to go.
She just really really really seems to need one of us (me, Brett or Noah with me still being the clear odds favorite, which is sucky because of my sometimes work schedule) to be right there where she can see us. Unless she is the one leaving. Because she’ll head across an open field with a friend, she’ll run down the hall to get a drink and she’ll race across the gym away from us but she has to be the one to leave; we cannot do the leaving without panic setting in for her. This includes sitting her with a group of little girls in leotards and placing myself across the room with the other mommies to smile at her. Even that’s too far when it’s new.
We can get her to stay with Pennie or a grandparent with a long, careful set up across days but a spontaneous playdate with old friends she adores? We have to stay. And something new like ballet or gym where the parents stay but don’t participate? Horror.
I know it can be typical of other 4-year olds — Noah needed lots of time to warm to new situations — but he never displayed the bone-deep panic she does. And it was easier to get him to stretch. Sometimes his worry was sheer stubbornness that I could get around by not fighting it. She holds my hand in a death grip. Her knuckles go white if she’s gripping my pants leg and I shift my weight in a way that makes her think I might leave. She resorts to fiddling with our clothes — her comfort behavior she used to do at every bottlefeeding and that she still does to fall asleep.
So yeah. Adoption. I think her fear of being left has a different resonance and I’m more convinced after the workshops/lectures at the conferece. But I also feel differently — more positive — about them because — as I said before — I no longer think of them as NOT being normal for her. I mean, I say they’re unexpected given her character to explain how it feels different than what can be typical (for some preschoolers) but I do think it’s normal for her. I believe it will get better. I think next ballet class she may do a little more or if not, then by the one after. And this is what I tell her, too, that it’s ok to want us close but that she will feel better about it and that we will be patient.
Meanwhile, we will be there and she doesn’t have to have a playdate without mommy nearby or sit in the circle in tumbling class without Noah cheering her on. Because I think what she’s telling us is that she needs a little more reassurance around that than we realized but that if we give it to her, we will be giving her the strength to step forward on her own someday soon. It was true for Noah who went from cautious preschooler to super-outgoing tween and it will be true for her, too, I’m sure. ‘Cuz kids? I think when you meet their needs a lot of those needs go away. Which is why when they show us that they need something we might have missed, to me that’s a pretty fabulous sign that they’re healthy enough to point in the direction in which they need us to go.
April 10th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Wow. Sometimes I am overwhelmed by your compassion.
April 10th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
I too am in awe of your compassion. I have to ask a really hard question here though.
I believe in the concept that a child is “wounded” by adoption. But sometimes I wonder (and that’s only based on what you write here - obviously your life is much more complex then your blog) if you are quick to label Madison’s separation anxiety as an outcropping of her adoption. Couldn’t it just be that Madison is a kid who has an issue with separation - regardless of the adoption? I know you have Noach to compare to, but what about just Madison - couldn’t it be possible, if the adoption issue was removed from the picture, that she was just a kid who severe separation anxiety? That it’s just part of her nature? There are plenty of “outgoing” kids who deal with separation anxiety (even severe).
What I mean to say, is it at all possible in your mind that maybe it doesn’t *have* to be adoption related?
I’m absolutely NOT trying to deny the concept that this maybe/is adoption related, but from what I *read* it seems you place alot of Madison’s “issues” in the category of being caused by the adoption. For the outsider looking in (me), it seems that I lifetime of this could give a child an inner “stigma”. I.e. I’m adopted so I have issues with _______.
I discovered this with my older child who has a degenerative eye disease - with a treatment or a cure, she will be blind by the time she’s 35. I was often making excuses for her behavior (or lack of) because of her poor vision. She caught wind of it and it became, “I’m going to go blind. I can’t see. I can’t do ____ because I can’t see.” Thank G-d we stopped that in it’s tracks and have worked hard to show her that she can do anything a normally sighted child could do. But I am concerned that she will have an inner stigma about it.
Please forgive me if I sound like an ass or if I cause your Jewish Guilt Gene to start flipping out because of this comment.
April 10th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
OK, I am going to step out on a HUUUUUUGE and scary limb here and am worried you won’t even want to be my friend after I write this, but how about: maybe it doesn’t have to do with adoption at all but more just her level of experience in being in a class like this? (or maybe she has been in tons of classes and I am just way out of line)
And maybe it’s just my total ignorance of homeschool/unschool but I really do think that kids who have LOTS of experience in separation/reunion with parents and being with groups of kids WITHOUT their parents are a lot more at ease in a situation like this. Not to say that one is better than the other, there are pluses and minuses and we each make our choices for our kids, but I read this and felt like it had totally nothing to do with adoption and probably everything to do with Madison’s experience in the world thus far. Probably the more she has experiences like this, the more familiar and comfortable they will feel.
But my gut says it is not adoptionish.
April 10th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Susan, you’re not my friend anymore! (I kid! I kid!) The limb is not huge and scary because I absolutely concede you could be right. And I try not to think — how would I feel if I let go of the idea that it’s adoption? And I don’t feel one way or another about it. Like it’s not threatening to think it isn’t and it’s not threatening to think it is. And then I think, “So why do I say it’s adoption if it doesn’t matter?” And then I answer myself, “Because it’d be a pat answer to behavior that seems kinda bewildering in the Madison context.”
But then kids never seem to conveniently conform to pat answers any old how.
Off to give the child in question a bath!
April 10th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
The lovely thing about all this is how you respond - when you meet a child’s need, it often goes away (eventually). So you meet it, whether it’s adoption related or not doesn’t really matter.
But I have to say that I have the opposite reaction reading tis to Susan and aidelmaidel. Because Madison often reminds me so much of Liam at that age (who also rarely spent time away from me, except with his Dad or Nanna, and eventually with one very close friend, before he started school at age 5), but he had hardly a sign of separation anxiety past the age of about one (and very little then). He would run off and not look back, and when he did start school his response to me still being there 15 minutes later was: what are you still doing here? So yeah, to me it makes perfect sense that Madison’s anxiety might stem from a particular experience (say, adoption).
But again, how you handle it either way is what I love about your post.
April 10th, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Interesting and thoughtful story. I can feel your pride coming through even from the title.
Related anecdote: I had a similar experience when I was in high school– a panic attack when I was supposed to go to an art fair to have my work casually evaluated. My mother was incredibly patient and encouraging as I was paralyzed and crying in the hallway outside the event. I had literally backed myself into the wall. She ultimately helped me pull myself together well enough to go through with the event and even feel reasonably good about it. Aside from feeling like an idiot earlier, of course.
I was old enough to feel a little ashamed to have had such a reaction that was way out of proportion to the situation. I’ve always put it down to a perfectionistic terror of being judged and being made fun of, not that I didn’t have reason. I can look back and see a series of episodes at an impressionable age that engendered that kind of reaction. It has taken me years to outgrow that.
It’s interesting to see the kinds of things (including early separation) that could create patterns of severe anxiety. My feeling is that the adults or caregivers’ reaction is key, but there’s no one reaction per child. Strange to say that I feel I can breathe a sigh of relief that you responded so supportively to Madison, treated her with dignity and with respect for her challenge, and best yet, that you *believed* that she could do it. The echo of my younger self really appreciates that.
April 11th, 2008 at 10:25 am
Adoption-related or not, I just want to say that I witnessed the whole thing and that is just not the Madison I know. Dawn, you were amazing. There was not one hint of impatience in your voice or your actions. You were so matter-of-fact with your participation in the class and I was just so impressed. In fact, I’m walking around pretending to be you today while Maya is playing out her baby fantasies. This child acting like a baby is really not fun for me, but I’m channeling you because it seems important.
April 13th, 2008 at 5:53 am
“I think when you meet their needs a lot of those needs go away. Which is why when they show us that they need something we might have missed, to me that’s a pretty fabulous sign that they’re healthy enough to point in the direction in which they need us to go.”
Absolutely! You are wise and doing just the right thing.
My Buddy has similar anxious behaviors in new places. My challenge is to give him time to ease into new places and to be willing to slooooow down. I am amazed at how much he has grown in the past year. I remember hearing a radio doctor say, “the cure for anxiety is greater security”. That made all the difference to me.
April 13th, 2008 at 8:34 am
cloudscome »
thanks so much for that quote! I’m going to put that up on my bulletin board!!!