Belief in Magic and Fear of Failure

His first-grade teacher sent us a message on the classroom app while I was working at the office. School was about to let out for the day, so my son was headed for his after-care program. The teacher let me know that he was having a “very very hard time” focusing on school work and remaining quiet. She said that he seems to be fully ignoring her and going back to talking, disrupting his classmates who are trying to do their assignments. It has been going on for a couple weeks and “has not improved,” she said. “Thanks in advance for all your support.”

I know this about my kid: He’s an excessive talker, and a loud one at that. When he’s enthusiastic about something, you’re going to hear about it whether you’re ready or not. Having a give-and-take conversation is not one of the many things he’s good at. I wasn’t sure how well this was playing out at school. I drop him off at 7:45 in the morning, with a quick reminder to listen and learn stuff, and hope for the best until he comes home around 5:30. At our first parent-teacher conference in the fall, it was clear that his teacher recognized the chatterbox tendencies but she hadn’t raised any major concerns.

Magical thinking: The belief that thoughts, actions, or emotions influence unrelated situations. (source: TherapistAid.com)

Magical thinking is one of the more common cognitive distortions described in psychology. I learned about these when I was in therapy, being told that my strong emotions were in fact, on a deep level, created by my own thoughts. If I could practice recognizing my faulty thought patterns, catching them in the act and correcting them mid-course, I might be able to stave off the depressive mood to which they often led.

In my past, cognitive distortions manifested strongly in relationships, causing a lot of misery and a lot of breakups. (See my ROCD posts for more on those painful years.) Various people told me that getting into an intimate relationship was a trigger for mood disorders because it revealed vulnerabilities at every level, exposing psychological buttons for my partner to push that I wasn’t even aware I had. It didn’t need to be intentional on the other person’s part. Just the probing act of them getting to know me would push against my walls and challenge what I thought I knew, or thought I needed.

I’ve been with my husband a long time, so this sort of distorted thinking and their attendant problems have died down in the context of our relationship. We are who we are, and we know each other’s vulnerabilities. But our son is a new person who’s constantly growing, evolving, and challenging us. Parenting is a fresh breeding ground for cognitive distortions.

Magical thinking is the one my brain deploys to make me believe my kid will turn out okay, and thrive in school, no matter what. I’m not saying that he won’t be fine, but that sometimes I like to believe I can avoid the harder parts of being a mom. Like intervening to help him develop the attention span he needs to succeed at school. After receiving that message from his teacher, his dad and I had a very long talk about what we can do to curb his excessive talking and attention-seeking without killing his spirit. The conversation took a lot out of me, and left me with a hope that all the energy we’d put into it would magically suffuse the house, like the smoke of burning sage, and cleanse our son of his detrimental behaviors. Instead, I know it will take actual and sustained effort.

Magnification and minimization: Exaggerating or minimizing the importance of events. You might believe your own achievements are unimportant or that your mistakes are excessively important.

Catastrophizing: Seeing only the worst possible outcomes of a situation.

Jumping to conclusions: Interpreting the meaning of a situation with little or no evidence. (source: TherapistAid.com)

I assume that most other parents would care a great deal about getting a message of concern from their kid’s teacher, but I’m not sure many of them would break down in tears at their cubicle. Luckily I was basically alone in that section of the office, free to worry without anybody asking what was wrong. My mind raced to the most unpleasant conclusions: My son will never be able to do well in traditional school. We’ll have to put him on ADHD meds and send him to a special program. We need to start family therapy again, taking away hours of his precious school time and requiring us to take time off work. He’s never going to make lasting friendships if he can’t control his logorrhea. I’m a bad parent and it’s completely my fault that he is this way.

After I stopped crying, I immediately texted a friend who’s a child and family counselor, asking for a time to meet for advice. Part of catastrophizing is thinking that something is a problem that needs to be solved right away. She very kindly responded promptly, and we made plans, so I started to feel soothed. Later, when my adrenaline had fallen back to regular levels, I realized it was not so urgent that I had to disrupt my friend’s schedule.

The worst part of magnifying the situation was that the notion of my kid as an obnoxious, uncontrollable blabbermouth temporarily took over the image of him in my mind. The “problematic” stuff was all I could think about for the rest of the afternoon, like a stain that blotted out everything I’d been admiring and enjoying about my son recently. Briefly, this made me feel even more like a bad mom. In my mind I went down on hands and knees in penance, wiping up the inky mess I’d created, knowing there was still a broken thing set aside that I would have to address eventually. The good things started coming back into view. He’s loquacious, but intelligent with a wide vocabulary. He has an active imagination, the outputs of which he likes to share with anybody who’s around. Yes, it takes his attention away from schoolwork, but it’s a seed of creativity that I hope we can find a way to nurture in a balanced manner.

We haven’t pursued a diagnosis yet, of ADHD or anything else. We are working on strategies at home to meet him where he is.

“Should” statements: The belief that things should be a certain way.

“Should” is a loaded word, borne from all sorts of expectations. The very idea that he’s struggling in school begins with the assumption that a child his age should be able to sit still and learn lessons for hours per day. Part of me chafes against the system we live in, making the whole family get up early and wolf down incomplete breakfasts before sitting at desks and doing what other people expect of us. I have to tell my kid sometimes that I know it sucks; all of us wish we could stay in bed on a dark morning. Also much like my son, presumably, I wish I could spend more time doing creative pursuits and living inside my own thoughts.

But I can’t complain much about societal expectations when I impose my own shoulds. Naturally, I’ve brought my own baggage onto this parenting journey: pre-baked ideas of what kids ought to be interested in, or capable of, at a given age. For example, I thought all kids loved having birthday parties and looked forward to them as a highlight of the year. My son declined a party for his last two birthdays, ages six and seven, which I figured were ripe years to have a fun celebration with friends. He didn’t even want to invite one or two friends over to have cake. This confounded me a little. Shouldn’t he want a party, including the presents that some parents would inevitably bring even if we said no gifts? No, he just wanted to be with his family and have cake and some decorations in the house. He’s not antisocial; there have been no traumatic incidents with peers that we know of. He’s just a kid who can get overwhelmed by noise and crowds.

Staying in tune with his development, as well as my own thought patterns, helps me find ways to reframe my cognitive distortions.

Reframing 1: He should have a birthday party with friends —> He should celebrate in a way that makes him comfortable with the people he loves most.

Reframing 2: He will never succeed in school —> He has two parents and a teacher who want him to succeed and will try their best. Programs and resources are available.

Reframing 3: I’m failing him as a parent —> My child is happy, kind, and well cared for. The rest will follow with strong, loving guidance.

Reframing 4: The problem will go away if we just tell him every morning to listen better —> We are capable of facing this challenge as parents, using open communication and all tools at our disposal.