One Good Day in a Row

We had one good day in a row yesterday. Bill and Y are actually speaking to each other again. I guess four days of ignoring each other has helped. Also, I believe the routine of school and acrobatics practice twice a week is better for Y. He still gives us problems at bedtime. I think maybe he has insomnia. Will have to get him some melatonin and try that soon.

On our way home from acrobatics on Thurs evening, I told Y that we would have another session with our therapist and his translator after school on Friday. Oh, boy! He started telling me all the things he wanted to talk about the next day. Half the time he spoke broken English and the rest was Russian, but he insisted to me that he spoke English the whole time. Most of his complaints were about Bill, or controls over anything; but, he did tell me sometimes that maybe I did things he didn't like "just little bit."

A few minutes after 3pm Friday, Y arrived home and was greeted by several wagging tails. He did not immediately say, "Hello," at least not that I could hear from the laundry room. I yelled, "Hello!" back to him and his response was, "What?" with all the insolence he could muster. I told him that was not the proper way to greet me. He insisted he said hello and not what.

I told him we had to leave in 20 minutes, and he wanted to know if the whole family was going, because if Bill wasn't going, then he wasn't going. Bill had already told me he didn't want to go because he seems to think Y will hold back if Bill shows up. No amount of talking can convince Bill that the complete opposite is true. So, I had to usher Y out the door a few minutes later, getting a complete litany of 'why do I have to go and he doesn't' among other serious offenses we have committed in his eyes. He kept it up the whole ride over there. When we arrived, he immediately walked over to the translator and gave her a big hug. I immediately brought up the fact that he recoils whenever Bill or I touch him. He said he doesn't like people touching him. Our therapist told him she was throwing the flag on that one, because he had just initiated touch with the third person in the room! Then he said he doesn't like me and that's why he doesn't like me touching him. I told him that I was only trying to help/comfort him when he was upset, by touching his knee or shoulder. I told him that acting like the Exorcist was not an appropriate reaction, and it would no longer be tolerated.

He quickly began to tell the translator things he wanted us to know. He started with the fact that he is grateful to us for traveling to Ukraine to adopt him and bring him back to America. A feather would've blown me over at that point! Wonder why he keeps saying he wants to go back to Ukraine every time an argument happens? He also said that sometimes he feels like he is part of a family, and sometimes he doesn't. I told him that was normal, and sometimes I don't want to be part of a family, either. Then we went over the controls on everything issue, AGAIN, and he was told that we did not agree to remove any controls at any time. Eventually they will be removed, but not any time soon. He asked if the controls could be removed when he turned 18? He's finally getting it! I am totally convinced that the reason he spoke about gratefulness and only asked about controls once is because he spoke to a fellow blogger's daughter last weekend. They were adopted at roughly the same time, and we shared a plane ride home from Kiev. I'm sure someone else telling him that their life was much better here than before helped him realize that his options in Ukraine are very limited at this time.

We also talked about getting himself up in the morning. Beginning Tuesday he will be required to use his alarm clock to awaken himself. If he wants to be considered an "adult" then he has to act like one. He is also required to write the time he leaves the house to catch the bus and the date on a calendar posted outside his bedroom. We told him he has to do that or wake one of us up to let us know he is leaving. He opted for the calendar deal. We told him it was for safety reasons, what if someone came and snatched him off the street? We wouldn't know about it until around 4pm when he would be late getting home from school. Y then asked us to follow the same type of rule: He wants to know when we're leaving, where we're going, what we're going to do, who we're going to be with, and when we'll be back. Then he gets to tell us "Yes" or "No." LOL! We told him that we would tell him we were leaving and when we'd be back, but we would not ask his permission and we may tell him other things, but that he could not require us to tell him those things. He said he is afraid that we won't come home and he will not know until the next day or maybe several days. I can sympathize with him, so we will try to assuage as many fears as we can. Eventually he will learn that he can't get rid of us.

Our therapist also told him two stories about girl clients of hers ages 14 & 15 who didn't want to follow the rules, do their homework or their chores and made many bad choices before they came to therapy. She said it took several months for each of them to come to the decision that following rules and doing homework/chores provided them with a lot more freedom than they got when they misbehaved. She then asked Y if he understood why she told him those stories. He said, "Because you think I'm a girl!" Mr. Smarty Pants. She told him many boys she has counseled have done the same thing, it didn't matter that the stories she told were about girls. He then answered that maybe he was a little bit like both of those girls. Maybe.

We also asked the translator if she would be willing to spend a few moments calling Y's birth father in Ukraine to ask a couple of questions: did he get the package Y sent three weeks ago; did he know about someone threatening Y that if he did not leave Ukraine that his BF would be sent back to jail; can he tell us anything he thinks we should know about Y's earlier life. Y kept insisting that it was not our business to talk to his BF even through a translator, but when we told him the questions we wanted to ask, he said "Okay." Y thought all we were going to do was tell his BF that he was bad and we wanted to send him back to Ukraine. (You know, if you only listened to the words Y uses, you'd think this kid really really wants to go back to Ukraine. But, I know that he is really afraid of being rejected/neglected again.) We hope that the translator tells us she believes his BF, whatever he says. We hope that we can safely decide to let Y have more contact with his BF, or at least regular contact (ie, a phone call on the 1st Sunday of each month). We may eventually be willing to give him Y's email address as well. We will be going to her house tomorrow around 2pm to make the phone call. I really hope Y's BF picks up the phone this time. After the translator and he talk, then we will allow Y to speak to his BF.

Again, on the way home, Y was getting belligerent in asking many questions again and again and again about controls and phone calls and Bill. He continually interrupted me, so I told him I would no longer answer his questions because he was being aggressive and rude. I also told him that we could cancel going to the translator's house on Sunday if he didn't behave. That shut him up pretty quick. Just need to know what his motivation is!

Y and Bill were actually quite pleasant to each other. Bill did not smoke in the house (at least while Y was awake and home - and Y told me he knows Bill is smoking in the house when he's gone), and Y decided not to spend the entire evening in his room! I took the doggies for a walk by myself because Y's leg was still bothering him from acrobatics the evening before. When I got back, he asked me to help him with a new game that was not loading properly. Then I went downstairs to give "the report" to Bill. I told him about Y knowing about the smoking and he said, "I'm trying!" Well, there is no "trying" - either smoke outside or don't smoke! It's only a 30 foot walk, Bill! I told him everything I wrote above, too. Y came downstairs and told me he found a movie that I would like, and he put the big TV on to show me. The boy knows his Mama! "Speed Racer - The Movie" was playing. Y even sat down to watch it with me (well, at least 50% of the movie. He can't sit through an entire movie. I don't think it's possible. Maybe he's ADD or something. He also entertained himself, two dogs and two cats during the movie by using a small laser pen and making them chase a dot around and around and around for about 30 minutes until they were all exhausted.

I never did get his game to load properly, so when it was time for me to go to bed he asked me to help one more time. I told him Papa would have to do it because I was going to sleep. "One minute, Mama, please!" I know how long his 'minutes' last. I held firm and a few minutes later he was downstairs asking Bill to please come help. Bill couldn't get it to work, either, so I guess he'll have to uninstall and reinstall it today.

Hopefully we can make this two good days in a row.

Natalie

TX