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We have 3 sons and they have a horse.
Ds9 (FAS) was sent out to shovel poop when he would rather have played with his toys. He was ticked off. A few minutes later I hear him crying. It's real crying--the kind moms recognize as something really wrong. So I run out to the barn and find him in a little heap on the ground, blood smeared all over his face from a wound that starts at one corner of his mouth and goes all the way across to his other cheek. He tells me the horse bit him for no reason. He pet him on the nose and the horse bit him, just like that. It was clearly a horse bite.
So we go to the ER and he tells the story again. Details stay the same. While we were in the ER over the next hour, I asked him again...and again...and again what happened. His story stayed the same right down to the last detail, and I was TRYING to confuse him, to trip him up. This son is an established liar. It's one of the hallmarks of FAS. But he's never been a very GOOD liar.
So, since this was a rescue horse and we don't know a lot of his history and we've only had him for a few months, we decided to call the rescue and have them come pick up the horse. It's our house rule that no animal that inflicts bites to the face can stay. We didn't want the kids to witness the removal of the animal, so we made the decision to act right away, and they came to pick up the horse and returned him to the herd at the rescue. My other 2 sons were seriously upset but this one didn't seem to care.
3 days later the truth comes out. My husband (on a gut instinct) asked ds to tell the story again, and this time he admits that he provoked the horse--swung a rake at him in a threatening way. My dh calls me at work to inform me that ds lied and the horse actually did what any animal would do when they felt threatened--he bit. So now we've dumped a horse that didn't do anything wrong. What am I supposed to do with this information?
We called the rescue and explained the situation and could we please have our horse back? They're kind of non-commital. Probably think we're crazy. Said they'd think about it over the weekend. Thanks for that. :mad:
But I'm really struggling with myself. I can only confess this because no one on this board knows who I am. I am so livid with this kid and his lying, I'm truly having a hard time even being civil to him. I basically don't even want to look at him. And I'm also mad at myself for BELIEVING him! How could I have bought his line of crap? How did I fall for it? I know he's a liar, but like I said, he's never been very good at it and I've always seen through him. Now the other 2 boys and the horse are all paying the price, and I'm on a huge guilt trip for it.
Somebody help me move past these feelings (or lack thereof) for this child. I'm so angry and embarrassed by this whole thing. Everybody felt sorry for him and he was enjoying himself, getting all the attention. Now I have to face these people and tell them why we're trying to get the horse back. Because ds lied...again. Ugh.
Now, when someone asks him what happened to his face, I make him say, "A horse bit me, and I deserved it."
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I think it may be best that you don't get the horse back. It doesn't sound like a good situation for the horse to be around your son. It's a good lesson to all your children that if they can't treat your animals right then they have to go to another home (was your child adopted through fostercare? Maybe you can explain that the same is true with people. It is our job as parents to care for and protect our children. If we get upset and hurt or abuse our children then the court steps in to protect the child. The same can be true with animals. We have a responsibility to care for animals and protect them and if we choose to hurt, scare or abuse our animals than we don't deserve to be around them.) Your son must have hurt or really frightened the horse in order for it to bite him like that. This may be a consequence that he should live with. Seeing how not only he hurt the horse, himself, but also his siblings who love the horse and as well as the trust that you guys have for him.
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It sounds like either A) your son is not mature enough to do his chores unsupervised or B) it's not the right time to have animals as part of the family.If this were me in this situation, I would not take the horse back into your home, as clearly, your son has shown he is violent towards animals, and I would give this specific son a MAJOR chore equal to shoveling poop, and I would supervise him doing it every day.
i'm with the others on the horse coming home. the animal was a rescue. he may well have suffered abuse and neglect. he won't forget the incident with your son and there may be safety issues there. that would mean he would need continual supervision when around the animal or he wouldn't be able to be there at all. he would never be able to take his part of the responsibility for the care and feeding which wouldn't be fair to the other kids.there may come a time where you can have another horse. another horse, not this one. it's a hard lesson, but i think it's necessary. until that time, no.how to get back? fake it. seriously. he doesn't know how to get back to your heart all by himself. you have to open the road. touch him more often. sit close. tell him how angry and disappointed you are but also tell him you love him. give him opportunities to earn back your trust doing things that don't matter as much as the care of a living thing. find ways to praise him truthfully.for yourself, you might want to write. write your anger and upset. write your lack of feeling. write whatever ugly thing you need to write. then lock it up or, better, destroy it. it's symbolic, but it works. letting it out of your self is like draining a wound. it may fester up again, but it won't be able to continue to poison you. writing for you is good for your soul.finally, stop being so hard on yourself. our kids are driven by their biology, their past, and their need for survival. they lie because they lie. you cannot control that. no one can--not even them at this point. we parent tough kids. and we won't get it right 100% of the time. you are doing the best you can with what you've been given.
From a complete outsider looking in, (insert - with no experience with a FAS child), I can hear the frustration in your post. First off, don't beat yourself up. It sounds like both you and DH are parents are in control of your household and are good parents. I can undersetand how humbling it may have been to call and ask again for the horse but maybe the other posters are right. Maybe it isn't the right time for a pet of that magnitude and it is a valuable lesson to your kids that if you can't treat animals right there are dire consequences. Don't let what the rescue people think fuel your frustration. You have enough on your plate with what is in front of you with your DS. His well being, health and your relationship with him are the most important right now - not the animal or what the animals guardians think. I am a huge proponent of writing in a journal. I did it for my IF and inability to have a child - while it is not on the same situation - the underlying frustration, festering of emotions and inability to move on existed. It helped and it allowed me (as greenrobin says) to open the road back to me so others could reach and touch me again. I hope that writing your post helped a little and your find words of encouragement here.
I have a smaller scale but similar issue....Our stbas got bitten by our male dog (small 9 pound dog) in the face about a month ago. I considered getting rid of the dog but knew in my heart that our stbas had to have done something to provoke the dog and we have had the dog for 6 years (our daughters dog).. He says he wasn't doing anything to the dog but I know that is just not true. Just last night I caught him holding our female dog down (small 8 pound dog) and piling a blanket and pillows on top of her. It looked like he was trying to suffocate her. She will not bite him no matter what but our male dog will and she isn't big enough to get away from him. I was so mad at him for trying to hurt our defenseless 9 yr old dog. This isn't the first time I have caught him trying to harm our dogs...I sent him to his room until dinner. This morning I talked to all 3 boys about our animals and that they are not allowed to hold them down and that Wild Child isn't allowed in the room with them unless an adult is with them. If you do get the horse back, I would just never let him be alone with the the horse and if you have other animals I would caution you to keep an eye on him with them as well! My theory is that these kiddos abuse animals because they were abused and feel like someone or something deserves to suffer like they did. Your son probably doesn't care that the horse got taken away...so did he. It comes from their past and their own pain. Pretty serious stuff, I will be bringing it up to the therapist today. Now is the time to address these issues so they don't grow up and abuse their own children. Just my thoughts/theory on this...
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Thank you all for your thoughts and comments on this. Dh and I talked about this a lot and agree with what everyone said here. This whole incident has got our family in a turmoil. It seems everybody is mad at everybody.
We spoke with the horse rescue place today and they said (and we agreed) that it was probably not best for this horse to be returned to us, for several reasons that I won't go into here. However they did offer us another horse, even trade. The horse they're offering is perfectly acceptable to us but we're not going to rush into a decision. We're gonna chill for a while. We still have one foster horse (not rideable) and two donkeys to play with and love on. Everybody here needs to breathe and move past all this drama.
As for my youngest son, I believe that the horse taught him a lesson that was faster, more severe and more effective than anything I could dish out. I'm sorry it happened and I wouldn't wish that on anyone, but the horse definitely got his point across. He communicated with ds the way he would with another horse.
Our plan is to arrange riding lessons for ds that will include horsemanship, like how to care for the horse, how to treat him, how to understand his behaviors, as well as how to ride. Maybe he'll do better around the horses if he's armed with some knowledge and training from a professional.
I'm still struggling with my negative attitude toward ds but I'm trying to fake it. I've noticed that since all this happened, he's regressed in some other areas and I know that it's up to me and dh to build him back up. He does better when he feels good about himself (don't we all?) So today I commented on a couple of things he did right and it seemed to please him. Coming here to vent helps a lot. It helps to organize my thoughts and verbalize my feelings. My dh is my rock. We lean on each other quite a bit and can speak openly about our feelings to each other without fear of judgement. A journal wouldn't work for me because there's no way I could guarantee that no one would find it and read it. It would never be private, unless, as greenrobin suggested, I just write and then destroy it when I'm finished. Maybe I could do that.
Thank you all for your encouragement and words of wisdom.