Incredibly Loud

     If you read my last post you know that last Thursday night was not a pretty one in my home. As I reported I was at the end of my rope, My eldest was way overtired and my husband was still at work. My son, you may already know, has a tendency to scream whenever he feels like it. As you may also know, It is not a pleasant sound. It is kind of blood curdling to be honest. On a good day, it happens multiple times but can be mostly ignored but on a bad day, it is a constant. We like to think of it as the sound track to our lives. It is like a combination of heavy metal and hard core rock at the highest volume possible. As you can imagine, it is pretty painful to listen to.
     Back to Thursday night. There I was alone with all three children, exhausted and sick and he was screaming on the top of his lungs repeatedly. At that point, I pretty much felt like I had no other course of action but to scream back. Yes I know, counter productive, against everything they teach me in behavior therapy, but seriously as I said, END OF MY ROPE. So pretty much, you have the picture. It went something like this, he let out a few big screams and I would scream back at him saying "I CANT TAKE IT ANYMORE JUST STOP ALREADY!." As I said, not a pretty picture. I really couldn't think of anything but getting him to stop.
     Here is what I was not thinking of, and probably have not thought about enough, my other kids. As this screaming fest was going on, my four year put is hands over his ears, clenched up his entire body and screamed "I can't take the screaming any more!". He was referring to both me and my son but it occurred to me at that moment, that while I can control my screaming, my oldest can not. I started to think about the impact this screaming is having on my other kids. After that, my four year old spent the rest of the night telling me he hated his older brother, he is so mean, he only loves me, his father and his little sister not his brother and so on and so forth. Here is the thing, I don't think that kind of talk is unique to our family and our situation. Every body hates one or all of their siblings and parents at some point in their lives. The difference that I can see, and that I fear most of all, is that while usually kids get over it and grow to be close and love their siblings, my kids may not. They will have this resentment and anger towards their brother, and truthfully their parents, forever.
     While it is hard as a parent to juggle kids, home life, marriage and work it is exponentially more difficult to juggle a special needs child in that mix too. The nature of the beast (so to say) is that he/she really truly runs your life. Every decision that you make from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep in some way revolves around that child. How is it possible that your other kids won't feel shafted, no matter how much you try to over-compensate. Couple that with the resentment they are going to have towards that sibling, as well as the discomfort they may feel about him and it is a really scary future.
     So while most of your kids will hate each other one day and love each other the next, I spend all day worrying about the future. Will my other kids ever get over it. Will the screaming (and other difficult behaviors)  impact them in ways that I can't see and won't be able to see until it is too late? Will they gain from this experience and grow up to be better people for it? Or will they grow up angry and sullen and hate me and their brother. It is really pretty scary to think about.
     The truth is, that we have countless opportunities to screw up our kids while we are in the business of raising them, but I sometimes feel like the scales are already not tipping in my favor.