You're Not Being Kind

It's one of the most heartbreaking things I've ever heard.

For a child who has been through neglect and trauma the concept of kindness is a fluid one. For the child who suffers from years of neglect a hug can be a kindness. For a child who suffers horrendous verbal abuse a soft word can be the kindest. For some children, simply the absence of abuse can be the kindest thing of all.

Not long into our introduction period Mister Man was being especially difficult (understandably so, considering how stressful the introduction period must be for children their age). When one of the children are dis-regulated (or having a blinding tantrum as you may know it as) we have a rule that we don't allow them to be alone. We take them to a quiet place, whether it's the dining room, their bedroom or somewhere similar. We then sit with them and bring them back and help them to regulate themselves, or get themselves calm as we call it. So Mr Man and I took ourselves away to help him to calm down, but he was just too dis-regulated and it was taking a long time.

He screamed in my face. Think Vivian Leigh in Psycho screaming. Proper screaming in my face.

So I had to get stern with him. Not stern in the way you might think, but firmer than I would normally be and he stopped screaming, looked at me with his enormous brown eyes (seriously he looks like an extra from Frozen!) and his face crumpled into tears and he said "you're not being kind".

You probably heard my heart breaking from where you are now. For everything that boy had been through in his life and he though I was being unkind? It really took me by surprise and I didn't really know what to say. There's no real answer to that, because when a child is as dis-regulated as he was at that moment there's no yesterday or tomorrow, there is just right here and right now. And right here and right now he saw that I wasn't being the usual happy, jolly and fun Dad that he'd been getting used to. And he didn't like it one bit.

But when he calmed down we had a chat and he understood that I wasn't being unkind and he gave me a massive hug and said "Sorry Daddy, you're the best."

All I want is the best for these kids and we don't always get it right. I just hope they know that we love them very much and if they see us as being unkind it's because we're trying to help them.