I felt it important, for the record, to state that Benny Michael
cried today. He fell down, not bad at
all, but he cried, and came running over for a hug.
And I find these little crocodile tears to be important, but
first, I will relay a conversation.
Paul and I had Benny in our presence for 2 or 3 days, and we were
touring Fr. Michael’s parish, and Benny took off in a dead sprint, went around
the corner, and skid out over the rocks.
He fell down and scraped his elbow and face. He winced, looked back at us, got up, and
stomped off, his head hanging low and blood trickling down the length of his
arm and down his face. I was horrified,
and went I went off to find him, the priests said, “See, African children do
not cry. We are strong, and feel no
pain.” I stored this in the back of my
mind, and have been pondering it for a bit.
A few days after that, it was Sunday and we were leaving Father’s
parish and I paid a man in the car a compliment, nothing big, but somewhere along
the lines of, “I am sure you are working hard at your studies,” because he was
talking about his college grades. There
was some laughter after the compliment, and friendly banter between the other
Ugandans, and Grace says, “Oh Allison, forgive my friend, we are Ugandan, we
never hear anything nice said to us growing up.
He does not know how to take compliments. I apologize for him being
rude.” I went on to explain that it is
not rude to not know what to say, and that I would make sure, that by the time
I left, he would be used to receiving compliments.” At which they laughed more and continued on
laughing about their childhoods.
And now little Benny Michael.
Michael cried today because he knew someone cared. He cried today, not because it was hurt – no scratch,
no blood, fake tears. He cried because
he was frustrated, his ego was a little bruised and he knew that someone was
paying attention, someone cared, someone could comfort him. He did not magically start having
feelings. He did not magically become
weak. He cried because he understand
that I cared, that I was listening, that I could not take away his pain, but
that I would be there with him through it.
I read, in an international adoption book about bonding, and it
said that the scariest place to walk into is a quiet orphanage. In Eastern Europe, there are orphanages full
of babies that are quiet. The places
themselves are over worked, and the children’s needs are met on a rotating
schedule. Regardless of when they cry,
or when they are wet, or when they are hungry, they get fed and touched on a
clock. They learn from their first weeks
there, that it is useless to cry because there is no one to hear them. If they cry, nobody will come, nobody cares,
and so within a few weeks, the crying stops.
Are these children suddenly not hungry, or wet or afraid? Of course not, they just learn quite quickly that
the instinctual response to cry in order to have needs met does them no good. This is a little like the “cry it out” method
of getting kids to fall asleep alone in their own cribs – we let them cry until
they realize that nobody will come, and they will get used to not having fears
comforted or needs met, so they will stop asking for their parents at
night. I have heard that it works
wonders, and Benny has surely never gotten up from his bed since I have known
him. Anna, however, comes into my room
whenever she wants, cuddles up next to me, snuggles, whispers sweet things in
my ear, and she is 5, and I love it.
Anna comes in because she knows that I am there to comfort her, talk to
her, and pray with her. I am sure that
if she knew I did not care, and she woke up and needed something, she would
take care of it all on her own, she is quite independent with a lot of things –
getting dressed, making her lunch, getting breakfast.
I imagine that African children are no different. They are not stronger, no less fearful, no less
hungry or sad. They just learn that no
matter how afraid they are while they walking
along the side of the freeway to school in the dark, or how much it hurts when
they fall down and are bleeding, that it does not matter. There is nobody to hear them, nobody to
comfort them right then and there. Are
the moms in Uganda bad? No, the children
are respectful, well disciplined, march to orders. Moms and dads here both work hard and barely
scrape by, and in a village, a child’s life is rather dangerous and precarious
anyway. So maybe this combination just
makes for a different type of bonding – the love is there, but reigned in,
harnessed, and shown in brief spurts.
Mothers have told me that I need to discipline more or he will never be
hard enough to survive being an African male in today’s village. Luckily he won’t have to.
Don’t get me wrong, my children are normally well
disciplined. I am more of a teach
implications to actions, cause and effect, punishments that teach the reason
behind the rules, type of mom. It does
not always go as planned, they are not perfect, nor am I or my style. But guess what? Benny fell, and he cried today. I have been teaching him how to hug also, and
when he came running over, he threw his arms open so I would hug him. And when I got upset with him for throwing
his football through the open gates of the compound, straight out into 4 lanes
of traffic so that it rolled across the road and down a drainage ditch, I got
on his level, and told him that his actions were not nice, in my very best mad
mommy voice (which makes Paul laugh) and that I was very upset, and I put him
in time out. And he looked at me, and he
cried real tears, and felt sorry for himself, and only wanted to hold my hand,
which I would not let him do until time out was over. This was a huge step, and a great sign
because when I got mad at him a week ago for biting me, he laughed and hit me
and ran away. During his time out, he rolled
on the floor, and laughed, while kicking the wall.
So score one for our bonding.
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