The Perfect Child Quotes

“Children of trauma are experts at triangulation.” “Triangulation?” I asked. “The child will act a certain way with one parent and a different way with the other parent. They try all kinds of things to drive a wedge in the parents’ relationship.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“She crawled up on my lap and whispered in her sweet voice, “I like hurting people. Do you?”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I wished I were as optimistic as I pretended. I used to be. Not anymore.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“No matter how many times I was questioned by the police, it never got easier. My nerves jumped into high gear automatically. They always made me feel like I was lying, even when I was telling the truth.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“You can’t just give your kids away when it’s rough.” “You can if your kid is a monster.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“It gave us an opportunity to miss each other, and sometimes you needed that in a relationship even when you loved each other as much as we did.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Parenting a traumatized child is horribly difficult. Most of them suffer from severe attachment issues, and mothers are usually the targets of their rage. It can get pretty awful.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“It never crossed anyone’s mind that someone else might be in trouble. I wished it would’ve. Maybe then things would’ve ended differently.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I wished I lived in a world where I didn’t know violence intimately, but I’d seen more than my fair share, given the work I did.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Why did the universe allow people who hurt kids to have them? Why couldn’t it give them to people like me, who wanted them?”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Christopher scoured Amazon, overnighting books to the house so we could take a crash course in working with traumatized children.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“No man understood what it was like for a woman not to have a baby to hold.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“The house was dark when I got home. Stillness enveloped it. I opened the door quietly and stepped over the spot on the wooden floor where it creaked. I tiptoed through the living room and into the hallway. Janie was already sleeping. It was too early for her to be asleep. Hopefully she wasn’t sick. Our bedroom door was shut. I put my ear up to the wood, straining to hear anything. I wasn’t going to wake them if they were asleep. I’d sleep on the couch. It was worth a terrible night of sleep if Hannah got a chance to rest. My heart sank when I heard whimpering.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“They’d officially diagnosed Janie with child abuse syndrome. People always assume sexual abuse is the worst kind of abuse that a child can endure, but it’s not. It doesn’t have the kind of lasting effects that you see in kids who’ve been severely neglected.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I didn’t like labeling children with psychological disorders. They were too young to be slapped with mental health diagnoses.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“There was nothing better than the feel of the sun on your skin after a long winter.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“See, that’s what I was saying last night—we need a girls’ weekend. It’s been way too long,”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Fine,” she huffed. But nothing was fine. We both knew that.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“What are you talking about? We can’t just give her back—we’re her parents. Her parents, Hannah. Whether you like it or not, that’s what we signed on for.” His body shook as he tried to control his anger. “You can’t just give your kids away when it’s rough.” “You can if your kid is a monster.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Lillian had only been gone for three days, and Hannah was already stretched to her limit again. Cole was a voracious eater and fed every two hours, sometimes sooner, and she wasn’t sleeping more than a few hours at a time. Even when she slept, she wasn’t completely relaxed. She jolted awake at the slightest sound. Cole was in a bassinet next to our bed, and she obsessively woke up to check and see if he was breathing, terrified of SIDS.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I fell in love with my baby boy instantly, marveling at his perfection and that he’d lived inside me for so long. My feelings stemmed from the deepest parts of me.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Someone’s got to be an optimist.” I wished I were as optimistic as I pretended. I used to be. Not anymore.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“Why did the universe allow people who hurt kids to have them?”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I like hurting people. Do you?”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I tried to pretend I was happy and excited about the baby, but all I could think about was Janie and how it would affect her. She was the child in front of me. It was hard to feel close to a baby that was only real in discussion.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I had always thought it was odd how you could go from not knowing someone at all to wondering how you’d ever lived without them,”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I slapped my hand on the counter. “Are you kidding me? She pinched her hard enough to leave bruises. More than one time. She absolutely knew she was hurting her.” “We don’t know that.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I never used to cry. Now? It's all I do. It washes over me like an unwanted wave, flattening me.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“I ordered a carpet cleaner on Amazon today.” I raised my eyebrows. “We don’t even have any carpets.” “We have rugs,” she said like that explained everything.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child

“The questions went on and on. They spoke around me like I wasn’t there. I couldn’t keep up with the plot or process the information correctly. The sound of Cole’s skull as it cracked against the side of the porcelain tub interrupted everything they said, everything that was going on around me. It forced its way in unbidden. He was never supposed to get hurt.”
― Lucinda Berry, The Perfect Child