Some animal, no idea what kind, was busy scraping the bark off trees at the natural area.  I love walking there, 168 acres of untouched land, just a five minute drive away.

I have noticed that I no longer have time to write or read blogs on the weekend.  We seem to be busy with Jack and Katie all weekend.  Jack had his birthday party on Saturday and he had a great time.  Yesterday I took Katie out for lunch and she was good, no pain, no agitation.  Weekends have become my work days:)  A two day work week isn't bad.

The snow is almost all gone now, ice persisting in the shadows, but it's starting to look like spring outside.  The birds are all busy making nests and looking for a girlfriend to share their nest with.  The birdhouse in our yard has been taken over by a busy squirrel who spent weeks moving his food into the birdhouse, using it as a silo of sorts.  The sun now shines through the windows, it's high up in the sky, and making it's trek north as it does every year.  

There is something I'm trying to understand, it's called trauma attachment.  Every time I start reading about it I keep shifting back and forth between my children, my grandson, and myself.  I guess it wouldn't be unusual for something like this to echo through the generations and it's probably part of generational trauma, but every thing gets mixed up in my head and I can't sort it out.

For instance,

"There are several basic mechanisms for the transmission of trauma across generations. Attachment is assumed to have a mediating role in the transgenerational transmission of abusive and neglectful behaviors. Mothers’ styles of attachment are passed on to their children. Traumas of attachment in childhood, negative experiences that affect one generation, are likely to affect subsequent generations, as well (Gravener et al., 2012; Özcan et al., 2016).

Intergenerational patterns of insecure attachment have also been widely substantiated, particularly when examining the impact of parents’ unresolved trauma on their children. The presence of unresolved trauma or loss can impair the mother’s ability to respond sensitively and effectively to the infant’s needs and increase the risk of developing an insecure attachment. Unresolved trauma or loss can alter a mother’s expectations and perceptions of her child, as well as her ability to respond sensitively, thereby compromising the infant’s development of secure attachment (Iyengar et al., 2014)."

And then I think about my mum, and her mum, and grandmas, and great grandmas and it all becomes too much and I start crying which doesn't help anybody, including me.  I'm thinking this will require more research, more reading, and more self reflection.  

It also makes me wonder, how far back does this go?  Forever?  To the stone age? Five hundred years?  two hundred years? There have always been awful things that have happened in the world, that have happened to mothers, that have happened to children.  Wars, diseases, famines, abuse, addictions, none of these are new.  I guess we know better now and when we know better, we are supposed to do better. 

Right now it's a gordian knot, an endless, unsolvable problem, but hopefully we can improve things for him, for my children, and for myself.  We'll see.