I didn't anticipate how exhausting this would be.
Don't get me wrong. I love it. I just didn't anticipate infant-level needs combined with nine year-old level needs. That's what trauma does, though. In some ways, his development is on an even keel with his age-level peers. In others, he has had seriously arrested development.
In the infant and toddler years, there's a trust that is supposed to exist between a child and a caretaker. That trust is a foundation for everything because it allows for the risk-taking that accompanies learning. When that trust doesn't exist - when parental responses are inconsistent due to moods, intoxication from drugs or alchohol (and the skewed judgment that comes with both), parental anger issues, emotional abuse, and simple neglect, that foundation doesn't exist. It can't be built upon, and any attempts to do so result in disasters ranging from misunderstanding to tantrums.
He has to learn that not all adults lie and fail to do what they say.
He has to be taught how he will be treated, and what's fair to expect. He has to be actively taught that he can make mistakes without getting beaten or locked somewhere, and then he has to complete that lesson by seeing for himself that we follow through and tell the truth.
He has to be taught about sharing - not because he wants to have everything to himself, but because he has never had anything, and traditionally what little he had has always been snatched away at some point. He has almost been coddled in this way, with people making excuses for him once he had his own things rather than teach him how to share. No one has taught him that there can be a handful of things that you never have to share, but those things aren't stuff you bring around other people because you can hurt people's feelings that way.
He has to be taught table manners from scratch... that he doesn't have to take huge bites and eat lightning fast because no one is going to snatch the food from his plate. He has to be taught how to sit at a table and eat a meal with a family - wait till everyone is at the table to eat, don't put your knees up, ask to be excused, ask for someone to pass something to you rather than reach across their personal space. He has to be taught how to use a knife. He has to be taught to not put his face down to the plate and suck the food off of it when he cannot get his food to make the leap onto his fork or spoon.
He has to be taught that other people have feelings, and that just because he is in a sour mood does not make it okay for him to treat the people around him like garbage. This is a HUGE one for us. He has never before had anyone to model this for him. If someone else was in a rotten mood, he was expected to bear the brunt of it without complaint. We are working on teaching him that not only was it awful that anyone did that to him, it is also awful if he does it to anyone else. Some days he remembers and uses some words rather than acting out. Some days, the feelings are too much and he struggles.
He has to be taught that being educated and intelligent is not a bad thing. He is slowly coming around to this. We read at least a chapter of Percy Jackson every night (we've just begun book three), and he is deciding that he no longer despises school with every fiber of his being (I'll take it after the emotional wrestling match we had the first few days of school). I'm working on getting him to understand that education and intelligence are his key to being able to provide for himself instead of always and forever depending on someone to provide for him. It's going to take a while, but it will happen.
He has to be taught balance. He wants to be entertained and paid attention to every waking second of the day after having been pushed aside and ignored every waking second. He doesn't know how to deal with quiet moments when his own head rears up and gets the best of him. He wants constant interaction to chase all of that away. Hopefully with counseling and some structure at home, he will be able to work through that. It's a difficult road... at 42, I still struggle with being quiet in my own head occasionally.
So I'm tired. It's a productive tired - we are making progress, and so is he - but holy wow, I'm exhausted.
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