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As my depressed son sat bleeding on the floor, surrounded by broken glass, with his little sister and brother crying on the other side of the bedroom door, his chilling words haunted me.
“When I get out of jail,” he said, breaking the silence, “I’ll come back here and hurt you all.”
Sometimes Luka’s depression manifested itself in the form of isolation. Staying in bed all day, not showering, not getting up to go to school.
In others, it manifested itself as anger and aggression. But this time he was angrier than I had seen him before and he was threatening me.
Kristina’s candid conversation with Luka went viral, reaching more than three million viewers.
Kristina and Philip with Luka (left), along with their other son, Ari, and daughter Matea.
‘You guys are going to send me to rehab, right? For you!’
He grabbed a large glass of water and threw it against the wall where I was standing. She shattered all over the carpet. I asked him to calm down and he charged at my husband, Philip, and then spat at him.
He looked at me and yelled, ‘Is that calm enough for you, bitch?’
Even though I didn’t want to, I called the police. I felt defeated and scared. But I held close to his therapist’s advice: ‘Every behavior is an attempt to communicate a want or need. “Luka’s behavior is unacceptable, but it is not personal.”
As a parent, I was wondering how to strike a balance between holding him accountable for his negative behavior (the symptoms) while also being patient with the root of the problem: his mental health issues?
I couldn’t fix it. But boy did I try.
Luka had been in individual, group and family therapy. He had three different psychiatrists trying to adjust and monitor his medication.
He was hospitalized. He participated in support groups with his peers.
“Even though I didn’t want to, I called the police. I felt defeated and scared,” says Kristina.
Luka grabbed a large glass of water and threw it against the wall where his mother was standing. He shattered all over the carpet.
He had full-time support in a residential facility, learning coping skills, working on anger management and expressing his needs in healthy ways, being encouraged in his strengths and talents.
I felt like I had done everything and it still didn’t seem like enough.
Here are some of the parenting lies that hindered my ability to better support my child and how changing the narrative helped us both.
I CAN FIX THIS
When I started to notice that Luka’s character was changing, I assumed I knew exactly what was going on and what I had to do to “fix” it.
In my opinion, the “problem” was a rebellious teenager, and the solution was to love him despite everything, remind him of his strengths, and at the same time give him guidelines and responsibilities so that he could become a mature, kind, confident person. self-sufficient adult.
I was coming from a place of assumption, rather than coming at it from a place of curiosity.
My questions to him at the time sounded like: ‘What’s wrong with you that you’re suddenly failing classes?’; ‘Why are you late again?’ and ‘Why don’t you care?’
Their responses were like, “I don’t know,” “Nothing,” “Whatever,” and “Leave me alone.”
My questions seemed reasonable to me at the time, but every one of them screamed, ‘You’re not good enough.’
My questions were full of judgment. His responses were full of withdrawal.
I was allowing the symptoms of his situation to distract me from finding the root of the problem.
I HAVE THE CONTROL
Looking back, I can see that every time I acted from a place of fear – the very real fear of losing my son – I appeared as my worst self: a panicked mother who is far from clear-headed and only focused on the worst result.
I have realized that in every interaction I can choose between controlling or connecting. I can’t do both, because reaching control takes me out of the range of the connection.
One afternoon, as I passed Luka in the hallway, I sensed something wasn’t right. I caught a glimpse of his forearm and stopped dead. I stopped him before he passed me and gently pulled up his sleeve.
He had blood marks on his arm. Luka had been cutting.
A wave of panic washed over me and everything inside me just wanted to figure out how to take control of the situation.
I made the decision to do what seemed completely counterintuitive and just stay calm. I took a deep breath and told Luka that we would meet him in his room.
I grabbed the first aid kit, sat next to him on his bed, and started cleaning his cuts. His gaze was fixed on the ground, his face expressionless.
Everything inside me wanted to give in to fear and control. Everything inside me wanted to express strongly that I should never, ever do this again. But I reminded myself to slow down my breathing.
In a soft tone, although still completely nervous on the inside, I asked him: ‘How did it feel? Did she take away your depression?
“No, it wasn’t like that,” he replied quietly.
I took another deep breath. My heart was beating so fast that I felt like it would crash against my ribs if I didn’t express the intensity of my fear. But I forced myself to stay calm.
“I’ll come back here and hurt you all.” Kristina feared that this meant not just her and Philip, but also Ari and Matea.
Kristina and her husband, Philip, had to reevaluate the parental ‘lies’ that kept their family in crisis
‘Okay, then let’s decide not to try again. It didn’t work. How about next time, when you’re about to do something to try to feel better, talk to me first? Or if you don’t want to talk to me, call your therapist or a friend. And then one of us can help you find another way to deal with the situation.
Lucas nodded. ‘OK.’
I know we’re lucky but he never tried to cut again.
My son later expressed to me how much safer, connected, and confident he felt facing his struggles when I didn’t approach him from a place of fear. It is normal for parents to worry and want to control the terrible situations our children face. Our intentions are good. But all our “doing” is not always useful.
I decided that when faced with fear or anxiety: Instead of asking what I can do for Luka, I would ask who I can be for him.
PROGRESS IS A STRAIGHT LINE
Professionals told me over and over again that setbacks are a normal part of healing. When I think of a setback, I think of two steps forward and one step back. But Luka’s ride sometimes felt like going in reverse with the brakes failing. I would get my hopes up, only to have them crushed again.
Luka recently described his mental health as a tug of war: some days he feels like he’s winning and other days he feels like he’s losing. If he didn’t want my son to give up on his life, he had to hold on to hope and move on.
Every once in a while, after a really harrowing few weeks, out of nowhere, Luka would have a good day. Nothing remarkable. Just a good day. He got out of bed in the morning. He brushed his teeth. He was not bullied at school. He didn’t self-medicate. He turned in his homework. A good day.
Maybe we’re supposed to go through hellish days to appreciate that average days are actually amazing days.
He had to believe that all the effort put into Luka’s health had not been in vain. But he couldn’t live solely for resolution either. My sanity couldn’t be tied to the progress he was or wasn’t making. My value cannot be attributed to any specific outcome.
Because the outcome was out of my control. And as scary as it was, there was a level of acceptance that had to happen in order to avoid further tension in an already stressful situation.
Sometimes I still have a hard time sitting with the uncertainty.
GOOD MOTHERS ARE DISCONNECTED
During the most difficult times, I felt that I can only enjoy life when the turbulent season has passed and life calms down. Once Luka is happy, I will be happy. Once Luka is healthy, I can start to feel healthy.
But putting that pressure on someone is a lot.
Kristina spent years relegating herself to the background, pleasing people and making sure everyone else was okay.
‘I’m still learning how to be the best support system for my son. “Luka is still learning to manage his mental health,” the mother wrote.
Mothers are often praised for being selfless. But if you look up the actual definition of that word, selfless is defined as “caring more about the needs and wants of others than one’s own, or not caring about oneself.”
How did this come to be okay? How is a father supposed to maintain his sanity if he doesn’t care about himself?
I spent years relegating myself to the background, pleasing people, making sure everyone else was okay and had what they needed without stopping to wonder if I was okay and had what I needed.
I had to choose not to live like this anymore, especially during the most difficult years of being a mother: exhausted, worried and heartbroken. I had to learn to be as generous, helpful, and loving to myself as I am to anyone else.
Parents, never feel guilty for taking good care of the most important person in your child’s life: you.
I am still learning how to be the best support system for my son. Luka is still learning how to manage his mental health. But he is better. We are better. Our relationship is stronger than ever. We still fall into old patterns. We apologize. We forgive. He has good days and bad days, but the most important thing is that he wants to live.
As Luka writes at the end of the book we have written together about our story: ‘Life gets better, but we have to try. We have to choose to keep working, sometimes without seeing any benefit at first. But in the end they arrive. The work will pay off. And it will be worth it. “I’m glad I’m still here.”
I can fix this (and other lies I told myself while Raising my child with difficulties) by Kristina Kuzmic is published by Penguin Life, on May 21.