He didn't talk to me at all yesterday, the last day of his pass. We talked for a few minutes on the car ride back to school, but it was hard for me to concentrate on a therapeutic conversation while driving 60-70 mph at dusk on a winding, hilly road with deer popping out.
My therapist would be proud of me saying that. Normally, I can twist myself into a pretzel rationalizing anyone's miserable behavior to me. "So-and-so is acting this way because they are insecure..." even when that behavior is hurtful to me. I can also find my own fault in situations: "Well so-and-so is upset with me because I said/did..." I cut some people a lot of slack, perhaps too much. Cutting slack to someone who is kind and respectful 90% of the time is reasonable and should be expected. If we expected everyone to be 100% all of the time, the world wouldn't work. People who are consistently difficult, hurtful or untruthful...that is a different story. Then you have to decide whether to cut slack or cut bait.
Most sixteen year old boys are assholes, especially to their parents. I feel sorry for the Boy (See? I'm doing it--cutting slack) because a usual teen would be expected to lash out at their parents or give them the silent treatment. Now that the Boy is in treatment, he is supposed to talk about his feelings with us, which given the natural order of things, would be the very last thing a teenage boy would want to do.
(I am not really sure if I should call him the Boy anymore, either. He weighs 175 pounds, gaining thirty pounds since he left home in June. Think 145 pounds is the max limit for boys. Anything more is a man.)
The Boy's pass for the past three days was challenging. I had him all to myself and I am not the adrenaline junkie his father is. The Boy was frustrated the Friday when it appeared that I wasn't having fun mountain biking. We talked on the side of the mountain for about a half an hour (he talked, I listened) and then he stormed off on his bike. Fortuitously (hey, I spelled that right without spellcheck!), the Boy on his rant ride crossed paths with Jason, one of the adults who supervises him at boarding school. The Boy and I were separated for a half an hour before we found each other on the path.
"I fucked up," he said. "And don't tell me I didn't because I did."
"You fucked up," I said.
Friday night, the Boy talked about this experience with Jason. I didn't know at the time, but the Boy was supposed to spend part of Saturday talking to me about how we both trigger off the other's anxiety. In other words, I get anxious to talk to the Boy, which makes him anxious to talk to me, which makes me anxious. I know that this conversation would have been anxiety producing to start, which then means his best coping strategy is to avoid it.
Saturday, he didn't talk to me. We went to breakfast. We went to Glacier. We drove ~200 miles together in the car. He didn't talk. Giving me the silent treatment for a whole day kind of sucked. It was hurtful.
I did learn one thing--how to be present at while hiking and enjoy the scenery even though I was both sad and pissed.
The next things I am going to learn is to tell him, not that he is an asshole, but that it was hurtful that he didn't talk to me all day Saturday.
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