Fighting for Answers | Category Archives: attention seekingattention seeking Archives

Breaking hearts, practicing tough love with our son

Breaking our hearts to practice tough love with David. He called home for the first time since he was placed in detention. Full of tears, and a story about how he banished the bad version of himself. Breaking Hearts During the first hearing, he didn’t want to talk to us. During the second, he said hello. He isn’t happy there in the detention center. Nothing to do and in bed by 6pm. He claims they won’t let him read or do anything. And he can’t visit with peers. We can go visit him for an hour on Sunday. In order to visit, we have to give 24 hours notice. He told me that he wasn’t getting his medicine. I talked to the staff and they said he wasn’t in compliance. So tomorrow, I’ll find out what that means. Because he needs his medicine and will have all sorts of problems

Visiting David

Last week we didn’t get to see David because two of us were sick. This week, I am still not feeling well, but we went anyway. He was in a mood. Not sure why. He wanted to play basketball, and I couldn’t. He wanted to play badmiton, and I couldn’t. Part of it was because the other residents were in the gym. To me there is an expectation of privacy. I shouldn’t be part of their world directly because I am not staff. Just like they shouldn’t be part of mine. Regardless, unless staff tells me it is okay, I am not actively participating in activities with kids I don’t know. And even if I had the okay, not sure how comfortable I would be. So David was in a mood. Refused to eat. Didn’t want to cooperate. Asked every five minutes what time it was. He also talked about

Reciprocity

One of the difficult things about raising a child like our son, David, is that the love that we feel for our son will likely never be reciprocated. It isn’t that he doesn’t bond with people, he just doesn’t bond with family. It is a facet of the attachment disorder. He is more likely to bond with a complete stranger, at least briefly, than he is to develop a bond with us. This is our reality. Just as we can’t force him to modify his behavior, we can’t force him to feel any kind of love or feeling toward the family. As a piece of that, he understands that telling someone, “I will take a knife and stab you” is not appropriate. He shows no remorse for saying it. To him it is no different than saying “the sun is shining”. It’s tragic really. The only thing that he regrets