Seeing her feelings

One thing we've always done with em is "show" her her feelings (suggested by her AT). Since she doesn't feel her feelings or always connect them to what's on her face, we show her in a mirror and help her connect them. (I should explain that better, but it's late and I'm lazy).
In the car, she was really annoyed with me (because I touched her at the same time she thought she was "in trouble" so she was all tense and weird - and then I pointed that out). But she was making this very annoyed/frustrated face and I said wow are you annoyed with me for pointing out your feelings, look! And I took a picture of her. When I showed it to her, I expected her to just continue being annoyed, but she grabbed it and said WOW, do I seriously look like that?!
It cracked me up. Definitely not her best look. :)

First Mothers' Day

Pretty big issues around here lately, so we’ve been doing lots of therapy and working on things. I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel yet, but I do think there’s a light, so that’s a great improvement of late. It’s been tough.
We did a First Mother’s Day here as some therapy for the kids. No matter the issues, our kids’ first moms DID choose to have them, so they’ll always have my heart for that. I figured they’d be pretty detached and emotionless, so mr really surprised me, but in a good way. BIG feelings but he’s not trying to hide them or holding them in, so good stuff. He asked if he could “write a cuss” and I said these are your feelings so you can write absolutely anything you want. He did!
Cj is pretty typical for him and em is typical for her (trying to guess what I’d want her to write.) Maybe she’ll let go of those feelings one day. FYI, a LOT of therapy surrounded all this (with much positive and negative), so please don’t post advice or complain since you don't have the full story.  I'll frown and delete.
I do hope my cards tomorrow are different!
Language warning! Sharing unedited, except for misspelled words that were auto-corrected and erased names to protect the guilty.  The boys decided to burn theirs, so no pics.

mr:
Happy Mother’s Day. Thank you for not aborting me but I still hate you and even if you tried you couldn’t have me back. 
Fuck you, you bitch. 
I’m sorry for my bad language but that’s the way I feel. 

*cough* I know!

cj:
Hi Mom. My new name is __. I live in the USA. I am 12 years old. I am a Christian. And I have no hard feelings against you. :)

 

em:
Happy Mother’s Day! How are you? Are you well? Have you had any other kids? I have a big family now. And live in my RV and travel the country. I have a new name and still live with my brother __ who is now __. I would like to hear more. 
I don’t resent you for what you’ve done. You made a mistake and like God I forgive you. God loves you. 

This was our first and it was interesting.  They ended up needing much more than honoring their first moms and it was hard good. I won't even try to explain.  Afterwards, em went outside and just sat, quietly reflecting, while the boys went into their room to wrestle.  Now that didn't surprise me.