One day, my son just stopped listening to me. At first, he developed “selective hearing”: he wouldn’t hear me the first time I said something, but would hear (and usually listen) the second or third time. But then his case of selective hearing developed into something far more serious: full-on defiance, and a refusal to listen.

The problem was worst during the early morning rush. One day I was rushing around getting ready and packing his lunch, and told him, “Charlie, let’s get dressed and go to school!” I’ll never forget his answer: “No! If you don’t love me, then I won’t listen to you.”  Then he refused to eat breakfast, get dressed, or leave for school.

What in the world?! How could he say I don’t love him! Sometimes I feel like all we do is love him. I often feel like kids today are so lucky: when I was a kid, we would go to the local museums once a year with our school. These days, we take the kids to museums and other interesting places regularly – and our lives revolve around our kids. It got me thinking, maybe our kids are just spoiled? They have it so good, but don’t seem to really value or appreciate what they have.

museumAt the local nature center

But he was so adamant that I didn’t love him that I decided to take him at his word. Bee and I have always joked that Charlie’s love language is drawing, so I started a project to make a comic book together. We made up a superhero (the Jester, whose superpower is to tell super jokes!) and mapped out his entire backstory. Then we started to draw comic pages on weekends, starting with pencils and moving to ink and colors. He really loved it, and I got a real kick out of spending time together, doing something that he really loved. But the listening only got slightly better, despite hours on the comic project. At this rate, I’d have to draw comics with him 24 hours a day, just to have him feel loved.

The whole experience was incredibly humbling. I thought we had such a special bond, and he was rejecting it – and rejecting me! It was hard not to take it personally. It felt like he didn’t love me anymore. That’s not me being melodramatic either: on the way to school, he would tell me, “I don’t love you anymore!” 

ADVERTISEMENT

E P I P H A N Y

Then one day I realized that he was telling me exactly what was wrong:

  • “If you don’t love me, then I won’t listen to you.”
  • “I don’t love you anymore!”

It reminded me how I felt like our bond was broken at times. I had read about cases where kids no longer felt emotionally attached to a parent. It happens a lot with adopted kids, and there’s adoption in my family so I had seen it firsthand. The twist here is that his detachment was intermittent and worst in the mornings. He could still be loving and show good listening at times; just never in the mornings, which is when we needed it most.

I started reading everything I could about attachment. A lot of resources recommended spending a lot of time in close physical proximity to your child. That sounded great, but Charlie and I were already spending tons of time together! We usually have an hour or so together in the mornings, before I take him to school. Then in the afternoon I do his pickup and later on, his bath and bedtime too. I could spend evenings with him too though, but that wasn’t really working: the comics project happened in the evenings, and that didn’t seem to be fixing things.

11005054_1407620006219112_191368017_n
a card Charlie made for Grandma

Maybe my expectations were just too high. Maybe it would take months to fix this… or maybe his listening days were just past him? Then one morning, we had an accidental breakthrough. We were running late for school yet again (due to his non-listening ways), and I had reached my limit for being tardy. So I picked him up and just started running while I held him in my arms. He was bouncing up and down in my arms, and his face lit up with joy! He was giggling and laughing, and showing a kindness to me that he usually didn’t show me in the mornings.

That’s when it hit me: his love language is Physical Touch! That’s what he needs to feel loved. We had been giving him oodles of Acts of Service and Quality Time – things that apparently he didn’t really value very much (or took for granted) – but he really just craved contact with mom and dad.

The truth is that we were giving our kids less Physical Touch, relative to the other love languages. Why? Part of it was just the kids getting older. I always loved to hold and snuggle my kids when they were younger, but they got more and more independent as they got older, and they played with each other more as well. Then one random morning, another factor emerged. I was holding Charlie in my arms while we waited for a cafe to open, when he planted a huge unexpected kiss right on my lips. I happened to look up at that moment, and this older woman standing nearby had a look of total disgust on her face! As she shot me the world’s dirtiest look, I understood her point: tone down the PDA with the kids.

I started to do that, and I guess I got carried away because soon physical touch wasn’t nearly as common. I can’t blame this on that one woman, though: I’m just a self-conscious person. If Charlie kisses his mom at the playground, it never seem like a big deal. But if he does the same to me, I sometimes get looks. Even though they shouldn’t, the looks get to me. And now that I have a daughter, I feel like I have to be even more careful on this front.

10946458_638533109590056_701126483_nPlaying horsey with each other

Over time, the kids started to crave more physical contact, but I didn’t recognize any of the signs. They were constantly asking to be carried as we walked around town. I usually said no, because then they’d ask to be held the time. Plus I thought to myself, “Dang, kids these days are so lazy!” It never once occurred to me that they were asking in part for more physical contact. All of a sudden, it hit me that the kids were asking for more physical contact: they’d ask for tickles on the couch, horsey rides on the floor, and snuggling during bedtime. I was inadvertently starving my kids of physical contact! While researching all of this, I discovered that there’s a book on all this, called, “The 5 Love Languages of Children.” I read it, and it solidified for me that kids also have specific ways that they feel loved.  (There’s a version of this book for adults that’s also great, and that really had a huge and positive impact on my relationship.)

The book was a huge revelation to me. I hadn’t realized it, but both of my kids really value Physical Touch. (So much of the attachment literature mentions the importance of physical touch, that I wonder if it’s especially valuable with kids that are struggling with attachment.) I lent my copy of the “5 Love Languages of Children” book to a friend, whose daughter was driving her crazy with constant tantrums. Once she figured out that her daughter wanted more Quality Time, her daughter stopped throwing tantrums and started listening much better!

In the end, we made a bunch of changes at home.

* Morning snuggles: Before when Charlie woke up, I would give him a huge “morning hug” and then he’d hang out on the couch by himself for a while. Now Bee or I try to snuggle with him for at least 5 minutes in the morning.
* Tickles: We read a book about a tickle monster, and so now I’ll joke that there’s a tickle monster around and to watch out. Then I will tickle him and he will laugh like crazy! I still worry that he doesn’t want to be tickled, but if I don’t tickle him after a while… he’ll ask if I’ve seen the tickle monster around.
* Carrying: I scoop up the kids a lot more now, especially during dropoff and pickup. I try to be creative with it – I’ll dip my daughter in a fake tango, or pretend to be a vampire trying to eat my son. I do limit the carrying though, to one block or so – just because they’re getting heavier and my back is getting creakier.
* After-school hangouts: Bee and I try to spend time doing things with the kids on the floor, like drawing or building LEGOs. But now we also try to work in things that involve physical contact, like horsey rides and tickle-fests.
* Bedtime: I used to focus on just reading to Charlie while we lay next to each other, but now I make sure to snuggle him under my right arm while we read the book.

IMG_0886
morning snuggles with mama

I also came up with the world’s silliest game: rock-a-bye baby. I will cradle one of the kids in my arms and sing rock-a-bye baby to them, as I rock the kids back and forth. Then during the last line (“and down will come baby, cradle and all”), I’ll tickle them like crazy. They start laughing at the second line in anticipation of the tickles. It was meant to be a throwaway game, but they beg for “rock-a-bye baby” all the time now.

The net result of this has been stunning. Charlie feels loved and has started listening, morning stress fell dramatically, and we started to be on time every day – and even early! And it wasn’t just mornings: Charlie listened to us a lot more during the entire day. We had been feeling like he had two personalities: a good Dr. Jekyll and an evil Mr. Hyde. Now that he’s securely re-attached to his parents, it feels like Mr. Hyde has faded away. He loves us and wants to make us happy, and it shows in how he listens. It’s been a total game-changer in what was threatening to become a difficult year of parenting.

C O N S I S T E N C Y

I learned that it’s important to be consistent with the attachment exercises and physical contact. Earlier this week, Charlie had a regression in behavior and went back to saying that I didn’t love him (and not listening, being mean, etc.).

My first thought was that he was being ridiculous: last week we took the kids to a cabin upstate and had a wonderful time. Then when we got back, we took both kids to a book reading/signing with Mo Willems, one of their favorite authors. That’s when I realized that I’d done it again. I was giving the kids the love languages they take for granted: Acts of Service and Quality Time. And what they need – especially Charlie – is Physical Touch. And when I checked the mental databank, I hadn’t been giving the kids much physical contact the last few days because of the road trip + travel. We’d been in a strange location, so the routines got all thrown off.

IMG_1436
Meeting Mo Willems!

That’s when I instituted a more formal system: I make sure to deliver three “touch points” to Charlie every day. I snuggle with him in the morning, carry him a block on the way to school and then nestle him in the crook of my arm for bedtime. This way, it’s a lot easier to avoid multiple days of limited contact – like what happened during our road trip. This has made his behavior much more consistent, and our attachment as secure as ever.

I feel so lucky we were able to restore my son’s attachment, and that he’s become a better listener again. I understand better now why they call it the “Effing Fives.” I’m sure other issues will come up this year, but I hope that with a secure attachment, we can overcome anything together!

Securing a Disrupted Attachment part 1 of 3

1. The 5 Love Languages of Children by Mr. Bee
2. The Surprising Power of the Snuggle by Mr. Bee
3. Parenting with Unconditional Love by Mr. Bee