As happens every year, around Jumoke's birthday in February, Jumoke went into an ugly slide.  Every spring had been more difficult than the rest of the year, each spring nastier than the one before.  But still, I wasn't really looking at this from the point of view that we might have a damaged child.

Tim, however, was looking at it from exactly that point of view.

It was odd. Jumoke rarely messed with Tim. When Tim was home, Jumoke's behavior was much better.  Everyone in the family recieved "pay back" from Jumoke when we crossed him, but Tim hardly ever did.  As a matter of fact, until the very end a few weeks ago, I don't remember Tim every getting "pay back".

Yet it was Tim who said consistently, "There's something wrong here. That boy knows exactly what he's doing."

We watched Jumoke go into his slide, and remembered the other springs.  We prepared ourselves for days on end with no good days.  We thought we were ready to take this spring on and do much better than we had with the previous springs.

But Jumoke was older. And meaner. And craftier.

By the middle of February, I was beginning to wonder how we would hold on till the end of spring.

The straw that began the breaking of the proverbial camel's back was the night we heard Ouseman crying and begging from his bedroom for Jumoke to please stop, please stop!

Tim and I rushed in there to find Ouseman in the upper bunk crying hysterically. Ouseman is 11 years old. He doesn't cry often and when he does, it's quietly. He's a private person when it comes to the more negative emotions, and he won't even share them with Tim.  Because I've sworn absolute secrecy and because I've told him that's what moms are for, he shares his stuff with me. But I know he keeps a lot more stuff back than he shares.

So when we saw him so hysterical, we were very concerned.  He was crying so hard we couldn't get out of him what happened.  Whatever it was, it was just words.  Jumoke had been laying there quietly tormenting Ouseman with words.

What really disturbed both of us was the utter lack of concern on Jumoke's face.  He didn't look like he was concerned about getting in trouble or concerned that Ouseman was so upset or concerned about anything. He looked like a kid laying on his side with his head propped on his hand, watching television.

Tim took Jumoke out of the room and I stayed to talk to Ouseman.  I asked Ouseman why he didn't come and get us when Jumoke wouldn't stop. Ouseman's words changed everything.

"I've come to tell you or daddy what he does to me.  And you talk to him or get on to him. But he just waits till you aren't looking and starts it up again. I know you can't make him stop so I just stopped asking you for help."

That was it for me. 

I didn't care anymore if Tim was right or wrong about Jumoke.  I didn't care if Jumoke was just a naughty Tom Sawyer or a disturbed child.  I didn't care of Jumoke was good for a whole half of every year.

Our son did not trust us to keep him safe.

I was through.

After much discussion, we started sending Jumoke to his Nana's house during the week while Tim worked. Jumoke came home on the weekends. For a while that seemed to help give some peace, but it wasn't long till the weekends began to be as terrible as the weeks used to be.

We found that with Jumoke gone, that Anne quit asking to go to Nana's house all the time. She quit crying and being so moody.

Matthew began coming out of his room more and chatting with us again.

Isaac very very slowly started to be happy again. He still cried more that a 6 year old should, but we noticed it was less often.

Maria was the biggest surprise. It seemed overnight that she went from a clingy, whiny, obnoxious child to the sweet singing dancing little girl we remembered from a very long time ago.

As I saw these things, I was torn.  I could see that Jumoke was indeed affecting all of our home, not just me.  I noticed that I was relaxing more and more.  I began to trace patterns, and noticed that the anxiety attacks started happening 6 months after the boys arrived.

Things weren't looking good.  Tho we had lived with Jumoke for four years, looking back I could see that we hadn't really lived.  I couldn't pinpoint one single thing that made living with Jumoke so difficult. It was more of a being "on" 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The children's stress probably came a lot from the general stress of Jumoke's disobedience and malice, but also partly from his secretive treatment of them.  And sadly, of Tim and I not getting entirely on board with their complaints.

It was as the spring went on that we placed more pieces together into the puzzle. The pieces had always been there, but we had never seen them as parts of a whole.  We saw each piece as a whole unto itself.

The rest of the story is in the beginning of this blog. 

I know Tim would like me to record specific instances, but that is so difficult for me to do.  When I write down specific instances, they become puzzle pieces that aren't puzzle pieces at all...but rather they look like just a whole by themselves. That doesn't make sense, I know.

The only folks we've talked to that seem to know what we are saying is an attachment therapist in our area, a woman from Nancy Thomas' attachment disorder organization, and moms and dads of kids with attachment disorder.

Believe it or not, even with all that under my belt, I still don't know what I believe about Jumoke.

But I do know this.  My children are healthier and safer without him here. And so am I.

Do I miss him?

Not today. I'm still too tired. It's all still too raw.  Even tho my kids are changing back for the better, I still see stuff there that needs to heal up.

Do I care what happens to him?

Absolutely. Even tho I've given up the chance to be part of his future, I care about his future the same as I care about the future of each of these children in my home.

Do I love him?

More than I can possibly say with words.

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As I thought over this short, superficial story of our last four years with Jumoke, I realized that all the little stories and all the odd and defiant behaviors, even the malice and hate and anger...these things alone weren't what made the years so difficult.  Any child with a strong personality and a strong will can do things like Jumoke and even resist being trained out of the behaviors.

The thing that made it so impossible was that Jumoke never learned to love us.  None of us. When a child doesn't love you or trust you, then the situation becomes impossible. There is no logical point from which to parent him or reach him.  And that creates a hopeless situation.

Hope deferred makes a heart sick. 

Love covers a lot of junk.  You can put up with all kinds of dysfunction and brokenness if there is love.

When love is not part of a relationship, all the rules change.  And Tim and I just weren't familiar with rules that didn't start and end in love.

The plain truth is that Jumoke's heart never belonged to us. He didn't know how to give us his heart. We didn't know how to woo his heart.