As authorities continue in their search to come up with a motive for the senseless Sandy Hook Elementary school killings at the hands of troubled 20 year old Newtown, CT resident Adam Lanza attention is now focusing on that of his relationship with his mother, Nancy Lanza.

By all accounts Nancy Lanza was well regarded in her community, she took part in social gatherings from time to time and was able to afford a genteel existence in the well to do town of Newtown, CT courtesy of a generous alimony package which saw her collect over $250 000 a year courtesy of her divorce to her husband (more on him below) Peter Lanza in 2009.

Nevertheless the proud mother had a few peccadilloes that many are wondering unwittingly led to her undoing.

From the UK’s telegraph:

“She prepared for the worst,” her sister-in-law Marsha Lanza told reporters. “Last time we visited her in person, we talked about prepping – are you ready for what could happen down the line, when the economy collapses?”

It also emerged that Mrs Lanza had spoken of her fears less than a week before the attack that she was “losing” her son. “She said it was getting worse. She was having trouble reaching him,” said a friend of Mrs Lanza who did not want to be named.

How ironic that Nancy Lanza was preparing for Armageddon when in reality the real disaster lay in her own household, her stockpiling of weapons (recklessly many now say as she did not keep her weapons locked away, especially knowing that she had a troubled mentally disturbed son, then again what mother ever thinks her son is capable of such atrocity?).

In concentrating on the possible dangers of the outside Nancy Lanza had unwittingly failed to come to a deeper appreciation of the troubles of her youngest son Adam. Instead of addressing his issues with councilors, mental health experts she instead chose to shield him from what she perceived to be an abrasive world, sequestrating her son from the world that she must have thought lacked the capacity to understand her son the way she did.

And that too may be part of the problem, by limiting her son’s social contacts she may have unwittingly fed into the young man’s mind that he was a pariah to be avoided. It is already understood that Adam Lanza had trouble mixing with other children, with sudden outbursts and social awkwardness. Add to that a mother who then over compensated to her son’s deficiencies by keeping him ‘locked’ away it wouldn’t be too hard to imagine Adam Lanza over time feeling shame, a worsening self esteem and a greater reluctance to accept himself and to attempt to overcome his limitations. In many ways his sequestration only fed into the young man’s inertia and self loathing and the sense the world had wronged him.

Also worthy of consideration is how Adam Lanza’s family dealt with him. His father Peter who has gone into hiding since the massacre was primarily absent from the boy’s rearing, especially since the divorce. Who was also absent was 24 year old Ryan Lanza, Adam’s older brother who by now had been able to attain a university degree, and his own life outside of home. It has been reported that Ryan Lanza hadn’t had contact with his brother since 2010. Certainly something that could have been augmented by the feeling of family shame as Adam Lanza was consistently reminded that he was a failure, a freak who had to be put in a special room away from the rest of the world.

Also revealing is how little outsiders knew of Adam Lanza, it’s as if his mother was embarrassed by her son or best just wished to protect him from what she saw an abrasive world. And yet one can only imagine how the boy must have felt over the years as the ‘damned’s son who one could never really bring out into the world.

In the end Nancy Lanza became a victim at the hands of her son, shot multiple times in the head as she lay presumably asleep Friday morning before her son charged off with her stolen weapons to nearby Sandy Hook Elementary school to inflict his special retribution.

Nancy Lanza in so many ways is like so many mothers, she probably meant well but in the end struggled to come to terms with her son’s special needs, especially in the gilded community of Newtown, CT where it is must have occurred to her everyone else lived a ‘perfect’ existence. But does anyone really? In the end her inability to come to terms with her son’s needs and effectively deal with him may have unwittingly led to him finally capitulating after years and years of being marginalized at the hands of his protector, Nancy Lanza.

Nevertheless, intrigued by what other commentators had to say on the matter, I collated a variety of comments from the web which illustrate the current perception and understanding of dynamics of Nancy Lanza’s relationship to her son, Adam Lanza. See what you think…

the key question in my mind is why a person with a child who was experiencing issues with social interaction would introduce weapons into the home. I understand she was a survivalist who feared an economic collapse and chaos. Was her paranoia a contributing factor to her sons condition and eventual rampage?

Sounds like the mom partied a lot and the son did not have a strong man in the home to learn from. A son with a single mom is not healthy. There is no father figure around much.

Case closed. The responsibility rests squarely on the shooter and the mother. Had mother kept the weapons secured they would be there right now. There would not have been no shooting.

My weapons and ammo are in locked cabinets. The key for one is locked in the other. It’s key is locked in my handgun safe. Access to my handgun safe is by fingerprint recognition.

Now, can we direct the discussions about “gun control” to gun safety practices, beginning in the schools?

One thing I know for sure is that violence breeds violence and if this kid was living with a mother engaging in target practice, it goes to reason that that was his life.

Adam obviously had mental problems. He was withdrawn. When people at school would approach him he would turn and walk the other way. Did his mom ever seek professional help for him? He might’ve have been Autistic. His mother may have appeared to be nice to the outside world, but what was she like toward Adam?.. We don’t know. What we do know is Adam was in great need of help, and obviously didn’t get any. I’m so sorry for those children…and yes I’m sorry for Adam, who, at 20, was still a child himself and because I have a feeling that his parents didn’t really want to bother with him either…

P.S. Our Congress needs to get some balls and outlaw all assault weapons.

This “I am adam lanza’s mother” stuff is BS. Can you imagine if an ethnic kid pulled a knife on his family or anyone once (let alone repeatedly) there would be no let’s talk this out at a cushy hospital you can voluntarily discharge yourself from… There would be a sentence of 10-12 with a pronouncement of “you are a common criminal”.

These mass murders all look the same yet there are no prevention programs for them. We do however have gang prevention programs and all types of other profiling. Gangs will most likely not effect my life because I don’t engage in high risk behavior. These people make everyday life a high risk behavior yet they get the pass until they kill random people. Makes me angry.

The world is always finding reasons to exonerate these young Caucasian Americans from their crimes. I sympathize with mental illness like the next person but this propensity a certain group of people have of trying to be “heard” this way is plain CRIMINAL. There is nothing to absolve here, I don’t care what went wrong early in your life, if you don’t kill yourself before the police gets to you, I want you thrown in Jail and the key tossed away forever. Everyone knows the insanity plea is a whisper away when you do something crazy and this is causing these young kids to feel JUSTIFIED for their actions. Some budding young murderer is wiping his eyes right now watching the coverage of Adam Lanza and feeling inspired to follow in the steps of this new “hero” “Omg he was misunderstood like me, his parents didn’t understand him either wah wah wah” . I actually saw a comment like that left on a social media, the commenter said, “I am proud of Ryan for expressing how he felt, this world sucks”. I feel like it is time for Americans to treat these cases as terrorism and not as a platform for the “why’s and wherefore’s of mental illness”, we need swift action and not paragraphs on the culprits.

1 COMMENT

Mettilda December 22, 2012 at 3:59 pm

Dear reporter,

I also agree with your findings. See below is a reply sent by me to some of the reporters. I am not editing much of its contents, but would like to give an introduction.

I am an Indian mother working in Oman, having two children of Adam’s and Ryan’s
age. This incident shook me. Throughout the past one week, I was so much worried and was thinking as to why he did so. Adam was a genius. True, he had some problems moving in the society. But the the society at large is to be blamed for this
incident.

In US, people divorce for small Issues (?, I don’t know exactly),
which affect the children too much. Also, enough support will not be there from
anybody for upbringing the children after divorce. And for small mental
problems, you start giving medicines to children, which we do not do. Those
medicines, finally cause severe mental problems.

And nobody cares the persons, who are mentally upset. The lack of
love, recognition, care, etc. to a person who are socially introvert worsens
the situation.

Even though Peter left the family as early as 2001, Adam would
have had a hope that he will come back one day. His withdrawal to himself after
2009 reveals that the divorce shook him too much.

You can get another husband after divorce, but you will not get a
father.

And when Peter remarried, the remote hope of his father’s coming
back might have been completely lost. May be that’s why he did’t speak to his
father afterwards.

He showed his interest to join army, but Nancy did not allow. (I
don’t know whether I would also have allowed him if I were in her
position).

Her plans to send him for mental treatment would have made him
upset. He would have felt the deteriorating after effects of the medicine he
was using. See how smart and good looking he was when he was around ten. See
the difference when he grew up. The physical change in his appearance also
might have been attributed by the medicines he took. Being a genius, interested
in computers, history etc, he would have understood the after effects of the
medicine which he was taking and would have understood that the next treatment
proposed to him would worsen his situation. He could not have been able to
accommodate this.

Nancy had gone for vacation for 2-3 days leaving Adam alone, when
she herself felt that his condition was poor. She used to go like that earlier also.

I think, the divorce, the medicines (Fanapt) taken by Adam, the
don’t care attitudes of the society and the over pampering by Nancy (she might
have done this thinking that it is good for him), remarriage of his father,
Nancy not allowing him to join the army, Nancy’s intentions to send him for
mental treatment and her short vacations leaving him alone in the house, all
these together might have led to such a crisis.

It is high time to rethink about how the family bondage can be
made stronger. The parents should be mentally healthy enough to look after the
children rather than giving medicines to mentally affected children because of
separation of parents. Parents should be treated rather than the
children.

Rather than blaming Adam Lanza for doing this, this incident
should give a light to think of what is wrong with the present society, how it
can be corrected. He was a victim of the society’s drawbacks. Our society also is becoming like that of yours.

Let this incident be a stepping stone for a renovation.

Apply the “Glasnost” (openness) and
“Perestroika” (restructuring) applied by Mikhail Gorbachev in Russia
when Russia underwent an economic crisis.

Nothing happens without the knowledge of GOD. GOD allowed this to
happen for the good of the future generations.

I convey my condolences and prayers to all those who got affected
because of this incident. I also pray for the souls of all who died including
Nancy and Adam (of course. He was a victim of the present US society). I do not
want to blame anybody, but pray that a conscious move to eradicate such
incidents in future may be taken by all people around the world including
myself.

Mettilda