In Pursuit of Minnows (Late Summer 2007)
September 23, 2007. Peter wet himself for the third day in a row. Yesterday, while catching minnows at a nearby creek, he peed his pants while boring his gaze into Pat’s mother and us. It seems whenever we let negative behaviors like wetting pass without consequence, Peter interprets our inaction as weakness to be exploited. For the last two mornings we ignored the wetting on the advice of our new Red Hook pediatrician. She is a sensible, well-meaning woman, but like most doctors we encounter, lacks experience with post-institutionalized children. She can’t imagine Peter pees with purpose and so she offers a plausible explanation. “Maybe his sleep pattern has changed. It happens at this age,” she tells us. “He may be overtired and not listening to his signals.” We’re so desperate to believe one of Peter’s problems is “typical” that we take her advice and try ignoring the problem. I recall this conversation vividly as I confront Peter about his renewed interest in extramural peeing. I tell him I’m aware he’s wetting because he went without consequence the last two days. The kind doctor no doubt would reproach me for saying so, but I know my child. He scoffs and hides his face so I can’t see him relish in the moment, his smirk re-enforcing the terrible truth Pat and I have known for some time: we often are at war with our son. The Normal Frontal Lobes (us) versus The Flying Neurons (him). When pushed to speak about the reason he’s begun wetting again, he looks up and says, “I like to upset you.” “Does it ever upset you?” I ask. “No, I like it.” He walks off without looking back and crouches behind the kitchen island. I soon hear him crying. I peek over and find him sobbing with great shuttering waves of shame, knees drawn up to his chin as he rocks, repeating to himself how sorry he is, that he’ll try harder. I start crying too. “Come here,” I say, picking him up. I expect limp, dead weight but he wraps his arms tightly around me, squeezing my neck for dear life. I think he understands, for the moment, that he’s his own worst enemy. Peter can be the boy who wants carte blanche to disrupt our family at every turn as well as the boy who desperately needs and craves love. There is an epic, primal war waging inside him. The stakes are so high it dwarfs the battle he’s waging against us. If I think too much about which boy will prevail, which of our Peters will emerge to face us as his body and mind edge toward manhood, I’ll lose what’s left of my mind. And so I squeeze him back and surrender my fear in favor of this rare, connected moment.
Chapter 19: Something’s Not Right
Somewhere around the six-month mark, Pat and I realized denial was no longer a rational pursuit. By this time Peter was attending preschool three mornings a week and I was grateful for the break. It gave me the opportunity to focus on Sophie without the distraction of Peter’s increasingly more difficult presence. During this time we still clung unsteadily to the “give it time” theory, continuing to hope that Peter’s odd behaviors would eventually resolve. Clinging to this possibility made about as much sense as running a marathon with one shoe but we weren’t yet ready to face reality. It didn’t help that everyone we turned to, doctors, preschool teachers, family, and friends, urged us to practice patience. He needed time to heal, acquire language, and discover a sense of self.
Another reason we didn’t move sooner was that although his puzzling behaviors and social interactions were worrisome, they didn’t scream out for attention. The bed soiling hadn’t stopped but it hadn’t escalated either. He was acquiring language, but at a slower rate than Sophie, who was chattering happily and nonstop. Peter still only had a few dozen words but more importantly, he had a habit of stringing them together in a way that didn’t quite seem right. For instance, he called the bathtub “bath tonight” and referred to the sink as a “drink of water.” It was easy though to dismiss these language mistakes, especially since he was still transitioning from Russian to English.
His preschool teachers were happy to have him even though when pressed, they confessed that he kept to himself and wouldn’t join in with the other children. He also didn’t follow directions, even simple ones. I remember these kind-hearted women almost whispering these confessions, as though it were impolite to discuss a recently adopted child’s lack of progress. “But he’s no problem,” they’d say, grabbing my hand warmly. “And he’s cute as a button . . . those eyes!”
Tiny and Wearing Madras (Peter's spring preschool recital, May 2005)
Then there was the sitting down behavior, a precursor to the tantrums and rages that still pepper our daily lives. Whenever Peter was upset, because he didn’t want to do something that was asked of him, like stop a preferred activity, or leave before he was ready, he’d drop to the floor. It was the strangest thing. He’d sit with his legs straight out and his hands resting rigidly in his lap, silent as the night and staring blankly ahead. And he wouldn’t budge. One of us would have to hoist him, one-armed, and carry him like an unwieldy mannequin.
These were warning signs, certainly, but except for the bed soiling, they felt manageable. Peter was a little boy who was obviously having trouble adjusting and who was withdrawn and reliant on maladaptive behaviors to express his needs and frustrations. We accepted this and tried our best to embrace the adage that patience and love were the greatest of all healers.
But then the other shoe fell off. About six months after the adoptions, Peter abruptly abandoned his passive approach to living in our house. Almost as though an alarm bell sounded inside the deepest recesses of his brain, our son awoke to the sounds of his own primal screams. His demons became loosed and consequently, our family’s course, laid from hopes, dreams, and a pinch of folly, took a turn toward a future we never expected or imagined.
One early Sunday morning when the bulbs had bloomed but the grass was still brown, Peter ran into our room and uncharacteristically jumped in bed. Despite the darkness that still blanketed the day, the house was awake from the rumbling of a springtime storm. Sophie had already beaten him to the punch and was lodged deep under the covers, hiding from both the thunder and the high-pitched howl of the wind whistling through the newly leaved trees. Peter wiggled his way between us in search of a spot where he too could disappear. Despite the children’s fear, I was grateful for the banging storm, for the intimate opportunity it offered.
Because it was still mostly dark, I didn’t notice anything unusual when Peter stretched his arm out from under the quilt. But I quickly smelled the odor. “What the . . .,” I gasped while Pat fumbled for the lamp switch. To our horror, the light revealed what we already suspected. Poop, coming from Peter. And it wasn’t a simple accident. He was covered in feces. He had taken his own waste and smeared it all over his body and pajamas and into his hair. He was completely covered in poop.
Sophie started crying as soon as she realized what happened and this caused Peter to run screaming from the room. The place on the bed where he lay was fouled and so were Sophie and I. Because Pat was unaffected, he sprung into action while I remained stunned and on the verge of getting sick. “Get him,” I groaned as I fought back the urge to vomit. Lifting Sophie gingerly from the bed, as if she were injured, I carried her into the bathroom. Stripping her pajamas in the tub, I scrubbed her delicate skin under water as hot as she could stand until the germs fell off and her sobs subsided. After wrapping her in a towel, I handed her over to Pat as he long-armed Peter toward me.
Early Spring 2007
It was a morning I’ll never forget. By early afternoon the house was sanitized, as were the human occupants. I remember sitting at the breakfast bar, sipping strong coffee while I stared numbly at the rivulets forming and reforming on the windowpanes. I couldn’t manage much more. Peter was busy rifling through our junk mail, stacking the flyers and advertisements into a big messy pile, and Sophie was engrossed with her Little People farm. Every once in a while the blare of Cock-a-Doodle-Doo would rouse me from my thoughts and I’d turn and smile toward our daughter. Surfing the Internet from his perch on the coach, Pat too would look up and smile briefly. We had so much to talk about and were biding time until we had some privacy.
Before we put Peter down for his nap, we explained very simply that he would be spanked if he ever did that again. Unsure whether he knew the English word, we gently but firmly demonstrated the spanking process. “Peter know,” he nodded solemnly. “Peter know.” I don’t know whether he knew or not but two days later he delivered an encore performance. Enough was enough. We’d been tolerating the “poop on one end and pee on the other” bed routine for six months. Every possible solution we tried to stop the behavior, including putting a potty in his room, either backfired or didn’t help. Not charts, not rewards, not consequences. And he had upped the ante substantially.
So as promised, the second time around we spanked him. It felt like a defeat, certainly. During all the years I dreamed of becoming a mother, my imagination never took me to a place where I resorted to spanking a toddler I’d brought home from Russia only six months earlier. But I also never dreamed of parenting a child who willingly covered himself in feces. I was at a loss, and so was Pat.
It’s not that I think children should never be spanked or that any parent who chooses to spank is a borderline abuser. But spanking our kids? That was different. Sophie and Peter had been neglected and half-starved and who’s to say they hadn’t been physically or even sexually abused? We just didn’t know. But we also felt like we had no other choice. Perhaps the worst part of all is that the spanking worked. He never did it again. As we would soon discover, Peter experiences some kind of psychic release when he’s thoroughly punished, whether spanked or disciplined in some other way, which by far is the more usual scenario. It’s almost as though he’s hit rock bottom but doesn’t realize it until a strong punishment intercedes to alert him. Only then can he pull himself together and resurface.
Looking back on this phase of our lives, I now understand that Peter wasn’t able to hold himself together, that the strain of keeping his behavior and impulses in check was too great for him to bear any longer. The honeymoon was over. Maybe by that point he felt secure enough in our home to shed the perfect robot routine. Conversely, maybe the sudden change in course signaled his inability to cope with the demands and nuances of family life. To this day I’m unsure which is the more probable explanation or whether there’s even a third or fourth consideration that would shed light on the shift that occurred.
March 2005
Unfortunately, the feces smearing incidents, though perhaps the pinnacle acts of his rapid descent, weren’t the only issues with which we found ourselves faced. During this period he also became destructive, ripping wallpaper from the walls in the middle of the night and pulling toys apart piece by piece. “Truck broke,” he’d complain, showing me the various pieces he plucked apart. “Garbage time.” Whenever Pat or I tried making him acknowledge his role, so that he understood his actions caused the toy to break rather than random fate, he would scream red-faced, “Peter no break. Truck broke!”
It was in this manner that I gradually came to understand that Peter had trouble making logical connections. For a long time I thought he was just being stubborn, that like most young children he didn’t want to admit his mistakes or his role in a particular misdeed. But over a period of time I realized that Peter constantly overlooked, even angrily denied, the most obvious cause and effect relationships. Twisting the arms of sunglasses will cause them to break. Ripping the wallpaper will bring about a consequence. There’s no dessert when dinner is left uneaten. The doorbell always signals a visitor at the front door (as opposed to another door). Dishes will break when dropped. Peter simply didn’t register these kinds of unshakeable facts.
Not only was his inability to make logical connections a serious source of concern, it made disciplining difficult because Peter doesn’t learn from his mistakes. More likely than not, he’s destined to repeat tomorrow and the next day the mistake he made today. Maybe on some level he understood this, or at least sensed on a basic level that he lacked the tools to navigate the complex world of family and expectations. Maybe that’s why he opted to take no risks or make even the simplest of choices during those first months home.
May 2007
In the orphanage there were no choices. Peter was never left alone or unattended, not even at night. Fifteen other children slept with him and a caregiver stood watch, or at least remained minimally conscious, throughout the night. Meals were eaten in groups with caregivers combing the aisles to help or maintain order. Toys were kept high on shelves and to the extent they were brought down, they weren’t scattered across the floor so children could pick and choose. Children were given one toy at a time. Use it or lose it. In the orphanage Peter was told when to potty, when to play, when to go outside, when to eat, when to shower, when to sleep, when to be quiet and when it was okay to make noise. It’s the kind of system where independent thought is not encouraged and certainly not required, and where a lack of independence or self-regulation might actually make yielding to the rules easier.
But in a home, he was free, at least relatively. Free to explore his environment, free to make certain choices, such as what he wanted for snack, and free to express his thoughts. The same held true for Sophie but the difference was that where Sophie learned from her environment and adapted, Peter became more bewildered and frightened. He didn’t have the tools.
Once he began showing his frustration, whether by smearing feces, ripping wallpaper or launching rocks at Sophie’s head, other telltale signs emerged. For instance, once he realized there was plenty to eat, always, and that he would never go hungry, he began using food as a weapon. He often refused to eat dinner. Keeping a single piece of food in his mouth, whether a pea or a bite of chicken, he would chew and chew but never swallow. Over time, his refusal of food evolved into a more active assault where he made himself throw up at the table, especially in restaurants. Logical consequences had zero effect. He either never made the connection or he didn’t care. Sometimes Pat and I still catch ourselves uselessly debating which is the more prevalent of Peter’s states of mind, can’t or won’t. It’s impossible to say because the two are inextricably intertwined.
The behavioral regression we began witnessing during this time was further complicated by what seemed like developmental backtracking. His rate of language acquisition reached a sort of plateau and he began exhibiting unusual physical movements. He repeated himself constantly, particularly his name, and always in a loud, monotone voice. Busily engaged in the “crashing, screaming, falling game,” he might for example, hear someone ask for the time. Without awareness he’d parrot the question, “Is it 6 yet?” He also could spin on the middle of the living room rug for thirty minutes straight, oblivious to any action around him. He regularly walked on his toes and flapped his hands. Sometimes he rolled his head so violently he looked like a ragdoll drunk on a rollercoaster.
By May, we knew something was seriously wrong. Despite varied opinions and our own desire to wish them away, Peter’s behaviors could no longer be ignored or casually explained. Instead of lying awake wondering who Peter was and how spooky it felt to live with a child we barely knew, our sleep soon became interrupted by an entirely new brand of torment. Namely, whether our son was missing a few key ingredients, components essential for normal childhood development. Afraid to waste any more time, I made appointments at Vassar Brothers Hospital to have his hearing and speech evaluated and at our local hospital to have him seen by occupational and physical therapists.
The wait and see game was officially over. Peter had let us know, loud and clear, that time would not heal his wounds. Frightened as we were, at least we didn’t miss this last desperate scream for help.
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