Unbreakable mother-child bond

Finally it was Friday afternoon after a super busy week. I was praying for no more urgent phone calls for next two hours. So I could start to relax and enjoy my weekend. Unfortunately, a moment right after this thought, a phone call came through. It was Jack’s foster mother.

“YOU come to pick Jack up. I cannot care for him anymore. You cannot believe what he just did. He put my cat in the microwave. I saw it and stopped him in time. Then he picked up microwave and threw it at me. I… I… I am old. I can’t”. As the foster mother told me what happened, I could tell from her voice that her feelings became to fear from anger.

I cannot believe what I heard. Jack, a tiny 7-year-old boy, could pick up a “microwave”! Was he secretly trained to throw shot? Or did he have a magic to become the Hulk? I rushed to the house and had a few talks with Jack. Jack felt sorry for what happened and apologized. Then suddenly he asked me: “If Tracy wants me to go, can I go home to my mom? I worry about her?”

What a shocking question! Jack has been placed in the government foster home right after birth. He visited his mother on and off because of his mother’s unstable condition. So why did Jack have such strong connection with his biological mother? I started to search answers to my question.

Then I realized how right a Chinese old say is -- Mu-zi lian xin （母子連心）, which means mother-child connect in heart. According to T. M. Levy and M. Orlans, “bonding is the physical and psychological connections between mother and infant what begins at conception, grows during pregnancy and intensifies at birth and exists forever” (p. 224). Attachment can be learned as it is emotional connection between caregiver (adoptive parents, foster parents and so on) and child.

I did not know how to resolve Jack's desire, but what I do know was not to disregard his feelings towards his birth mother and do believe there is hope because attachment,emotional connection, can be learned.