Swing Low, Sweet Chariot

The crisis of the teen years for older adopted children may call into question adoptive parents' faith in the possibility of healing. Are "the wounds...too deep, the patterns too set, the help too late"? For me at least, such questions are spiritual. They undermine my confidence in the "rightness" of the universe or God.

Could it be that I've had a naive or presumptuous view of my own ability to heal my child? We think that we have the love, we have the staying power to turn around any hurt, any damage. But as the title of the therapeutic book goes, "Love is not enough." Love and discipline are essential, but not sufficient.

I've looked to psychotherapy for help. Certainly therapy helps in exposing the wounds for attention, and in clarifying the dynamics of the parent-child relationship. Understanding the problem rightly may be the key to change. Yet there is no automatic link. The child may not be motivated to change. Therapy is essential, but it, too, is "not enough."

Psychotropic medication helps stabilize behavior or emotions when adopted teens are too big and strong to control physically and too independent to accept supervision easily. Yet medication is a weak link unless you want your child "doped up" or comatose. It, too, is an essential part of the picture but far from enough.

Is healing possible? How does healing occur? In the end I feel confronted by a mystery. The outcome lies in the depths of the adopted child's relationship with significant persons in his/her life, and in the will and spirit of the child himself/herself. In a way, it is finally up to them. They can make the decision to utilize all this profferred help or to reject it. They can decide to go ahead with some self-destructive act or only to flirt with it.

Almost always, there are no quick and easy answers. If a decision is made for healing, usually it emerges only slowly and gradually, in bits and pieces. The healing is never complete. The brokenness is still evident, perhaps in ways that leave individuals still significantly impaired or shorten their lives. But change is noticeable: There is greater functioning, more evidence of positive behavior. It is a long, hard grind for both children and parents.

What leads to that positive choice in the depths of the child? Is it some spiritual force beyond, yet within, the child? Organized religions have long talked of unseen transcendent forces moving the will when the will itself was unable to move. Might spiritual forces be an important ingredient in the mix which brings healing to the older adopted child?

Ricardo was facing the anniversary of his birthmother’s death again. It was eight months after he had been admitted to his residential school and he was beginning to settle in. The staff of the house where he lived provided constant supervision and dependable structure. He was beginning to apply himself in class.

In the weekly group therapy sessions some of his feelings began to show. He actually shed tears in front of other teenage boys. He told the story of how his birthmother was killed, and they listened respectfully. One day he brought his Cabbage Patch doll to the group and cuddled it.

The staff worked hard with him to control his anger. He slammed doors and hit walls, but there was little property damage and no physical assaults. For the most part he was containing himself.

The actual anniversary was on a weekend, and we were planning to visit him. Ricardo announced that he had big plans for the day. He wanted to go to an amusement park about an hour away from the school. Then we would go to a fancy restaurant that the school sometimes used for celebrations. He had asked a staff member to go along with us. It was plain that Ricardo was still not sure he could remain in control, but that he wanted to celebrate all the hard work he had been doing.

The day came and we had a great time riding all the rides. Since it was October, there were no long waiting lines. Toward the end of the afternoon, as we headed toward the big roller coaster, Ricardo announced he wanted to try a special ride at the park. It reminded me of a bungee jump, and we had always said no to this before. But today, well, we just didn't have the heart to deny him.

We paid the extra $20 and the assistants helped Ricardo into the harness, which fit all over his torso and clamped behind his back. He told us later he asked them, "Am I going to die?" They led him out to a platform about eight feet off the ground, he climbed up and laid face down while the assistants connected his harness to cables coming from the top of three high towers.

Two of the towers were in front and formed a kind of arch through which he would swing. The third tower was to the rear. When Ricardo was ready, the cable to this third tower was pulled up until he was perhaps 80 feet off the ground near the top of the tower.

There was a countdown and then, as instructed, he pushed a button to let himself go. Still attached to the other two cables, he flew down towards the ground at speeds of 50 mph or more, swinging between the two front towers. A look of sheer terror was on his face. It must have looked like he was heading straight for the pavement because the bottom of his swing was no more than 8 feet off the ground. As he swung through the towers, swung back and gradually slowed down, he was holding his hand over his heart.

That ride was all we talked about for the next hour and even at supper. We presented him with a card offering congratulations for all the hard emotional work he had done, and we toasted him non-alcoholically. Ricardo told us it was one of the three best days of his life. The other two, he informed us, were when he first made out with a girl and the day he was adopted.

Even as the ride was going on, the two of us realized that it was not by chance Ricardo had made a special appeal for that ride on this day. Whether he knew it or not, the swing between the towers was a metaphor of his life in the past month. He had pushed the button and let himself go down into the abyss of feelings and fears which he half-suspected might kill him. All our children have to do this if they are ever to heal and grow. Their courage is amazing.

Ricardo came through the ride. The harness bore him up. Might we call it the Life force? God? his higher self? To be sure, he still has a long road in front of him. Yet to his parents there are new stirrings of hope.