Today Younger Boy had a cognitive exam at the Attachment and Trauma Center.  They confirmed again that he is of above average intelligence.

Today I noticed two things about Younger Boy.

1. He has a huge chunk of hair missing.  I noticed as we were leaving therapy.  I asked what happened.  Apparently last night during the night he slept with silly putty and this morning it was stuck in his hair.  Instead of coming to me (or even Middle Boy) he just cut it out so he wouldn't get in trouble.  He is BALD above his left ear.  What part of that did he think I might not notice?
2. He has a new stress behavior.  He picks at the skin of the pads of all of his fingers until they are bleeding.  All 10 of his fingers have been peeled in the past week.  They are all scabbed over and then he picks off the scabs and they bleed all over again.  He was crying this evening, because they were really hurting.  I wish I knew of a way to make them not hurt and for him to stop picking at them.

Middle Boy had therapy tonight.  He came out incredibly distraught telling me Therapist L is sneaky and tricky and that she fooled him into talking about his past in ways he never had before.  Once we got past the fact she needs to do that to help him he calmed down a little.

When we got home he was still kind of lost in his own world.  Kind of in a trance.  I asked him if he wanted to talk and it was like I opened a flood gate.  He told me excerpt after excerpt of past abuse by multiple people...nine in all.  Violent, sadistic abuse.  The kind of story that literally makes you want to throw up, but you can't, because you want to be there and listen.  He just kept talking.  Words and excerpts just coming out of his mouth.  At one point he stopped and said "I don't want to tell you the really bad, really violent stuff."  It was everything I could do not to gasp.  In his mind he hadn't told me the worst yet.  I told him when he was ready I could handle it.

He was exhausted after we talked.  Falling asleep as he just kept talking.  He went to bed.  I went to bed and cried.  Many people have hurt this boy who I love with my whole heart and NO ONE protected him...NO ONE, but God.

Both of these boys have strength beyond any I can imagine.

Prayers for healing.