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Have you had therapy? - either for yourself or ideally both you and your son together or separately but as part of the same package? Your feelings might not all be down to how you feel but may be him projecting his feelings onto you - not that I mean he hates you but just that he cannot accept the possibility of being loved. It would help even if you just had something yourself - which would probably be easier to get quickly if you can pay (and its not too expensive) - as it would help you unpack these feelings and find ways of coping with them and relating to him in as positive a way as you can without pretending. I'm sure he would pick up how you feel anyway so I don't think its necessarily a good idea to pretend you feel less for the others. Have you got ASF in your area? Ask for an urgent post adoption support assessment

I second safias good advice above He is most likely already aware of how you feel . In my experience as a fc i have found that some children with disordered attachments / attachment disorder (call it what you like ) can sometimes have the ability to irritate and annoy carers without really doing anything specific. They cannot help it and seem to have to create emotional chaos in others in order to be happy ( again not sure that happy is the right word but able to function at least ). It can leave carers feeling emotionally drained and doubting their own sanity at times because they seem so charming and amenable to others. How old was he at placement ? Was he already v emotionally damaged. The poor lad needs therapy and so do you . It helps to understand where his behaviours are coming from and you need help to handle them. I reslly hope you can access the support you need as a family to make things better for you all. Regards wizzy x

I just want to say that I respect your bravery for being brutally honest on a public forum. Are you a single carer? If not is your partner aware of these feelings? you have done well to stick it out this long but it's not healthy , seek help .

I second everyone's advice, and I'm sure you know what you have to do - you need to get some help/counselling therapy for you both. I had issues with my AD when we first adopted her, aged 9. She was described to us as 'compliant' - but actually her compliance was just one manifestation of her very avoidant attachment, and there were other behaviours that were at odds with this 'compliance' - being dissociative, lying, replicating loving behaviour without any real feelings (which was somehow really obvious), not taking any responsibility, not having any get up and go etc... I just found it really difficult and couldn't get my head around her at all. But I read up on why she was the way she was, went to any workshops I could lay my hands on and slowly began to understand her, which really helped me feel a bond with her. Love developed! But before that, I concerned myself with her practical care and wellbeing, which is maybe a little bit different from 'fake it till you make it'. Now we're seven years in and we have really grown together. She is maybe a little bit 'healed', but still terribly burnt by her birth family experiences. I can see how she triggered things in me which were about my relationship with my own mum. In the past few years I have realised there is some form of FASD in there too and it explains even more about my poor, mixed up, beautiful daughter, who despite everything is making her way in the world. She is able to give genuine hugs too! I hope you can both get some help and work things through. Be kind to yourself. xxx

thanks for the comments. i have also had private messages saying i need to be careful not to overstep the line in case i am reported by AUK or another user. i just want to say that i am struggling, that's why i am posting. reporting me is only going to make it worse by increasing the pressure, so please don't. i came here to get help not to be reported. like i said, he is not being harmed by me, but as others have said, he does see a difference in how i react to him. Yes i am being brutally honest, there's no point coming for help and not giving the whole story. Yes we need therapy and help and we have social services and adoption support services involved with the family. but seeing as i have told them almost since day one that i feel like this and not getting any support, i need to find other ways. i have had CBT, counselling, therapy, TheraPlay, etc etc etc with Peter and on my own. and yet here i am.

You might want to edit your last post - you’ve mentioned a name x

It's okay, Peter's a pseudonym. X

Phew!

SerafinaP I’m very sorry to hear how things are. The best place I can refer you to is the Potato Group. Adopters there will certainly understand and you can receive more confidential support than on this public site. Please email P---- EMAIL REDACTED ----

I second that you get in touch with the potato group. Email them on ---- EMAIL REDACTED ---- Even if he isn't a teen yet.

I second that you get in touch with the potato group. Email them on ---- EMAIL REDACTED ---- Even if he isn't a teen yet.

Hello and I’m sorry to read that you are in such a whirl with things. I do understand that you can feel like this about a child. Especially with children who have full blown RAD. They aren’t generally very likeable children and the lack of anything genuine in response is like living with a dementor. I agree with the thoughts above, it’s almost certainly projection and counter projection going on. But I’m going to say something else too. You might try something else. Maybe safely distance yourself emotionally & in your mind regard yourself as his carer. In the meantime, you work at developing a space to be You and leave ‘work’ one evening a wk. Joining an evening class might be an idea. Or going to the pub on quiz night. Whatever but keeping you, you might get you through. Perhaps think that you love your children in different ways. Hate and love are split by a knife edge in many ways. You love The cyber friend from Facebook, send love in a Christmas card to a cousin you haven’t seen in years. Love looks different in various circumstances. Find one thing on Peter that is nice. Appreciate he has freckles in summer. That’s enough for now. You might find there’s more than one thing. But if not go with one for now. Therapy I’d think is pretty essential You’d be welcome on POTATO I’m sure :)

I’m afraid that I don’t have any words of wisdom, but just wanted to send you my support. Things sound really difficult - probably asking the obvious, but have you been to see `your GP? You mention CBT but wonder if you may possibly be depressed and maybe you could get something for that or to ease your panic attacks? Once you feel in a better place, maybe then it will be more feasible to work at things with your son. Sounds like you have adopted 3 plus children at once, which is an enormous thing to do and incredibly difficult. You must be exhausted. Maybe stopping work is no bad thing, so you have time to recharge and do some things you enjoy and some self care. I think you need to help yourself before you can start working at your relationship with peter. And 11 isn’t an easy age with transition to secondary school which can be so tough, and maybe you’re getting the brunt of his anxieties, which will,make it harder to bond maybe. But anyway, sending you hugs xx

Think what pear tree has said is really true. Parents do and can have differing feelings towards their children. My mother had a very special connection with me ,for example, which she didn’t have so much with my sister. She loved her but there wasn’t such a strong bond and they argued an awful lot! But my father and sister were closer, and in fact in later years, when my sister had her own family her and mum became closer. Family dynamics can be so complicated and relationships can and do change and evolve..xx

Hi SerafinaP, You are not alone. My observations would be don’t beat yourself up you have demonstrated you are perfectly able to love his siblings. I too have a child who’s survival strategy is to evoke very strong negative feelings in others-people that show care or attention towards them (thankfully for my sake it’s not just me). It’s a defence, a way of keeping you at bay. As others have said you may find the Potato Group helpful :---- EMAIL REDACTED ----

thanks again everyone, your reference to the potato group is really useful, i'd not heard of them. i have been diagnosed with depression and anxiety since the children moved in, and in the last two years have been having regular panic attacks- mostly triggered by peters behaviour. effectively, i think i have been internalising all the negativity and unlike a pressure cooker haven't been releasing it slowly. then i get overwhelmed and have a panic attack. it takes me days to get over it, as i feel like a chemical imbalance has taken place in my brain. currently i'm self-referring to anger management support, so i can look at it in different ways. i wonder if there is anger mixed up with the frustration i feel. i don't consider myself to be angry and no-one has ever said that, but going for an assessment might be helpful in uncovering stuff i don't know about. i'm doing some personal classes and courses to take my mind off things and focus on me, so trying my best to do lots of things to help me.

Sorry I haven't had time to read all the replies. I will never forget hearing an adoptive Mum (who was giving a talk) saying that at one point when her daughter came into a room she had to leave. Not the same as you as I think that was a stage they went through in teen years but certainly extreme emotion. Just a few thoughts One is would it help if you could stop feeling guilty and just accept that's how you feel about him. Maybe thats been addressed in counselling already? The other thing is could it be he is the 'scapegoat' for all the pressure you have been under with a sibling group. He is the one that possibly had a parenting role in the group and the one least likely to want a Mum so the least attractive one as it were. How does your DH feel about him? I am assuming he doesn't have a problem with him since you don't mention it. So you may have the guilt of being the only one who has a problem with 'Peter'. That's quite a burden to carry. Another thing is fear. What's the worst thing that can happen if one day it is all too much and you tell him you hate him. Will the sky fall in? All you could do would be to say how very sorry you are. I am not saying its ok, but it wouldn't be the end of the world so cut yourself some slack and stop worrying that you might say how you feel. Obviously you want to be the best Mum you can be but on the other hand as my friend Corkwing once said on these boards (he hasn't posted for ages) we beat ourselves up about not getting it right but our parenting is infinitely better than anything these children have had. So we might think we are failing them but we are NOT. It was something like that. Maybe your son doesn't want to be loved but I would say that by caring enough about him to want to hide how much more you love his siblings you are expressing love. Seeking help (for yourself of course but also because you want better for him) is also an expression of love. An adopter on here once admitted to hoping their son had got run over and killed (I think he had a narrow escape if memory serves) It only goes to show how much emotional pain and intolerable pressure that parent was under. (((((((((SerafinaP)))))))))

He possibly does not respond to you the way you'd expect and that makes you uncomfortable. With AS (adopted at 7 yo) I felt we never agreed on our roles, and that created friction in all our interactions. We would do a puzzle together, and I was trying to be a parent, encouraging, helping, comforting, teaching, etcetera. He was trying to put me in a role of someone to impress with his puzzle skills, he was there to teach me and he felt I was just trying to show off that I was better than him and trying to humiliate him. I was trying to be a mother, he was trying to put me into the role of girlfriend. And he probably felt the opposite. He has never been able to settle in the role of a child, but it is getting easier now that he is closer to being an adult.

Larsti You ask if the sky would fall in if SerafinaP told “Peter” that she hated him...... ??