Did Adam Lanza love his mother?

What kind of stuff did Adam Lanza write or say about his mother, do you think he killed her to spare her from having to know what he did. Do you think he loved her?

I highly doubt it.

Nancy asked him if he would be sad if she died as she was really poorly and he said no.

She thought it was just the aspergers.

I don't think he did. You gotta be fucked up to be a mass killer, but Adam Lanza was fucked up for a mass killer man.

I sometimes wonder if Nancy ever showed hostility towards Adam, even just on a rare occasion. We're all well aware of how much she did for him. Several loads of washing to accommodate his OCD, never having visitors over, even going as far as to reject a marriage proposal.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a therapist describe Nancy as being a prisoner in her own home? I wouldn't be surprised if Nancy held some sort of resentment towards him, even if she thought he was the way he was due to his Aspergers, which she seemed to emphasise a lot. After all, she was only human. We all have our breaking points.

I don't think so, and it's not about Asperger here, I think Nancy overcare about him.

Flanders Darrel wrote:

Do you think he loved her?

He shot her. That's a pretty big "no" to me.

A part of me thinks the "selfish" document that is reportedly recovered from Adam's computer is somewhat aimed towards Nancy, hard to tell really considering that it hasn't been released to the public yet or ever.

I think he was incapable of love and didn't seem to possess normal human emotions. He was fairly robotic in all areas of his life and decisions were made on cold facts rather than emotion. He probably shot his mother as a means to an end, she knows too much about me - she has to die now. He attacked his own computer hard drive - something he spent hours and hours on but the hard drive knew too much information about him - it had to go.

I think Adam used people like he used things, as a tool and a means of getting to an end process.

As far as I remember, I have read that in the "Big book of Granny" (Adam did the script, his friend the drawings) there is a scene of matricide.
If that's the case, Adam might have had the desire to kill his mother for a very long time.

MalonsMilk wrote:

I think he was incapable of love and didn't seem to possess normal human emotions. He was fairly robotic in all areas of his life and decisions were made on cold facts rather than emotion. He probably shot his mother as a means to an end, she knows too much about me - she has to die now. He attacked his own computer hard drive - something he spent hours and hours on but the hard drive knew too much information about him - it had to go.

I think Adam used people like he used things, as a tool and a means of getting to an end process.

Jeez, he was autistic and schizophrenic, not psychopathic.

Jeez, he was autistic and schizophrenic, not psychopathic.[/quote]

LOL, yeah on a base level it seems that Im saying he's psychopathic but he was certainly NOT psychopathic. Psychopaths, as we can agree, are glib and manipulate the world around them in order to bend people to their will. They understand other peoples emotions but they don't always possess them themselves.

What Im saying is that autism is a spectrum and Adam WAS autistic in the classic sense that he couldn't seem to connect with the people around him. This isn't uncommon amongst some people with autism, in fact I work alongside someone who is just like that. He has as much feeling for his computer then he does his own family. It doesn't make him a psycho though, its just a condition of the way his brain works. Sorry didn't mean to offend.

It seems unlikely considering the fact that he shot her and that he probably had matricidal desires during his childhood.

CALU wrote:

As far as I remember, I have read that in the "Big book of Granny" (Adam did the script, his friend the drawings) there is a scene of matricide.
If that's the case, Adam might have had the desire to kill his mother for a very long time.

You might want to keep in mind that everyone gets murdered in that story. Granny's son does kill her a couple of times but Granny and her son also go back in time and kill the Beatles, for which they get sentenced to 75 years in jail. A lot of the killing is actually done by Granny herself, using her rifle-cane. I do think that the stories are evidence that Adam was preoccupied with violence from an early age, probably because he was having emotional issues that he didn't know how to handle on his own, but I'm not sure that it says much about Adam's feelings about anyone in particular, including his mother.

I also disagree with the poster above who said that Adam didn't have any human emotions and was incapable of connecting to others. I do believe that Adam was capable of empathizing and connecting with others, even if he was not completely typical in that regard.
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I agree that his social and emotional issues were, most likely, mainly due to being autistic but autism doesn't automatically make a person into a robot with no emotions and no empathy. One problem is that autistic people are often less (or atypically) emotionally demonstrative even when they are experiencing emotion but aside from that, autism is a spectrum to begin with and the relationship between empathy and autism is still being sorted out.
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I don't know if Adam loved his mother but this is some of the available evidence regarding their relationship.
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I don't think Adam respected Nancy tbh. There was an email of a back and forth between Adam and Nancy that was posted somewhere here and to me there was an overwhelming sense of..disgust? on Adam's part towards his mother. I think he saw her as weak and clearly inferior. As far as loving her, I'm 50/50 on that.

I have a bit different take on this question. I think Adam Lanza probably did see his mom in a positive light as a child but that view soured and then became feelings of loathing and hatred after he began to develop as a person and all but inevitably had conflicts with his mother and the rest of his family. In the end he killed his mom not too spare her the embarrassment or pain of her finding out what he did but rather out of extreme anger and hatred. He shot her multiple times, more than enough to kill her.

Charles whitman killed his wife and mother, and he loved them, it was a mercy kill in his eyes

Probably not, I agree with Peter Lanza that Adam would of killed his whole family.

Personally, I doubt he did. Otherwise, he wouldn't have killed her. It's difficult to say.

I wonder if they ever argued. Adam once commented that he found it difficult to talk to Nancy because "her behavior was not rational and she was unwilling to talk about certain topics that he felt were important", whatever that means. Maybe he took issue with an unwillingness to his talks about the nature of society or humanity. I doubt he ever talked to her about the topic of mass murder or pedophilia, so perhaps he resented her over a perceived close mindedness.

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This is also somewhat informative. Here he is as a child (age I do not know) describing some of the things that bothered him in one morning. You can see he mentions that his mother (presumably) spoke "angrily", "loudly", and "threatened" him. We don't know exactly what the circumstances are here but if this was Lanza's perception of his mother throughout his life it's really no wonder there was hostility.

For anyone who may not already have seen this, it's an interesting interaction between Nancy and Adam via e-mail discussing some sort of argument or misunderstanding that happened before the initial message from Adam was sent. Although it doesn't exactly give us great insight into how Adam truly viewed or "loved" Nancy, it does show an odd relationship between them, at least in this particular instance and I have found this particular interaction very interesting and insightful, hopefully someone else does too.

August 2008

E-mail from Adam Lanza (sixteen years old, eleventh grade) to his mother, 11:25 PM:
You do not seem to understand that I was attempting to comfort you with what I consider to be a maxim with which to live. You unfortunately probably still do not understand what I mean. As a disclaimer: I type nothing in this that is in a tone that is condescending, vindictive, malicious, snide, malignant, or any synonym that you can think of. I mean well. If you believe that you wasted your life, as you seem to have insinuated, you will gain nothing from regretting it and will only depress yourself; you cannot change anything from the past. There is something that I can assure you of that will always be true: it does not matter if you live for the next one year, five years, ten years, fifteen years, twenty years, thirty years, fifty years or even 100 years; the day before you die you will regret ever worrying about your life instead of thinking of what you want to do. Every new year that you do live, you will regret not having started anything that you wanted to do the year prior, only regretting the past more. What I mean is that you should think of what you want to do today; not starting next year or next month, but today. Thinking that you are not going to be able to do anything in the future will only ensure that fate. Also thinking that you are too “old” is going to ensure the same fate. It is not as though I do not mean that you are homeless and begging; I would spend my life savings to prevent that out of obligation for what you have done for me. My personality is merely inherently unmoving; I will not be upset over something that you cannot change. And you should not be upset either. What you should do is think about what you want to do. I also want to mention that I purchased something two weeks ago on Newegg to double your computer’s memory without even saying anything until now. I do not try to avoid doing anything for you as you seem to think. I am glad that I was born, and I appreciate your having taken care of me. (It is not my fault if you have not detected as much of an increase in speed as I would have liked, however; I blame its outdated processor. I would change that if I could, but it’s not possible to do so for your model.) Please read the first paragraph again. 100


E-mail response from Mrs. Lanza, 1:05 AM:
I appreciate your effort to be a comfort to me. I apologize if I seemed angry or antagonistic. I was simply over emotional and as it is often the case worrying about the future. I admit that I have been feeling a bit overwhelmed by my circumstances lately, but in no way do I regret having raised two wonderful children. I have high hopes for you both and will consider my life a success if you and Ryan live happy and productive lives. There are a few things that I do regret . . . one of the biggest is that I dropped out of college, believing it to be more important to help your father get through college. Financially, it was impossible for us to afford a college education for both of us, and it seemed more important that he receive a diploma. In some ways I regret leaving the workforce as it has severely limited my prospects for the future, but again, it was a decision that I made to take more responsibility for the house and the children, and to allow your father to concentrate on his career. I do feel that I was able to be a better mother and have been able to put great effort into raising you and your brother, so that regret is mitigated in that respect. On the occasion that Ryan or you show some appreciation for my efforts, I feel completely justified in that choice and dually rewarded. I know that it is harder for you to show appreciation, and that it does not come as a natural response. I really do not want you to feel obligated in that way. I do not expect any help, financial or otherwise, from you or your brother, and would not accept it if it were offered. I am certain that I will not be homeless or begging on a street corner, as your father is obligated by law and morality to see that my 30 years of service and sacrifice are compensated for. He has assured me that I will live a comfortable life and that my health expenses are covered. He is an honorable man. I am grateful that I was married to someone who honors his responsibilities. He has also taking [sic] responsibility to provide a college education for both you and your brother, so that neither of you will have to struggle and sacrifice as we did. If you choose to, you will emerge from college with a master’s degree of your choice, debt free, to pursue any career in life that you wish. When I think of what I would like to do for the future, I think I would like to get my college degree first. I just thought of that tonight, as a direct result of my conversation with you. I think it would be possible as I dropped out only a year shy of my degree, and it seems as I might be spending quite a bit of time on campus waiting for you to take classes, so why not take advantage of that?! I suppose I could take classes at the same time you are taking classes. I agree with you when you say that I should try to think positively of the future and what I want to do today. There is nothing that I can do about my diagnosis, and I do try to be as healthy as I can, despite the prognosis. I am sure that you noticed that I exercise regularly and do my best to stay in good shape. It’s not like I have the attitude that since I will be crippled anyway I may as well give up and get fat and sedentary now. I am working hard to stay as healthy as I can, for as long as I can. At some point, I might like to start a business. I sometimes toy with the idea of an internet business like my friend, [L], owns. (Did I punctuate that last sentence correctly?) Her website is. You should have a look at it sometime and let me know what you think of it. Anyway, I would like you to know that no matter what, I am very proud of the person you are. I have no preconceived notion of how you should react or respond. I know that you tend to be more reserved and less emotional and I do not perceive that as condescending malignant, or callous. You are pragmatic and stoical. These are fine attributes. I am glad to know that you are glad to be born and appreciate being taken care of. I love you very much and am more than happy to take care of you in any way I can. I suppose I have felt that you didn’t even notice how hard I try to make things as tolerable as possible for you and that has made me feel sad in a way. I am much happier now, knowing that you do not despise me for bringing you into this world. Above all, I want you to be happy, no matter what you choose to do. You may not think I notice, but my computer is working faster and I have been able to download bank statements faster and search the websites quicker. I was able to get baseball scores for all the games in a split second, and watch a video clip that a friend sent without any freezing. I didn’t know that you had worked on it, so I thank you for your efforts. You should let me know when you do thoughtful things so that you can get credit! As an aside, I am having a problem that has been ongoing for months. The cursor abruptly moves to a different place in text now and again when I am in the middle of typing a sentence. It is very strange and annoying. Maybe you can have a look at it sometime? Thank you for taking the time to send me this e-mail. I now understand your motive and meaning, and I truly appreciate it! 101

100 Office of the Child Advocate Report, pages 75–76
101 Office of the Child Advocate Report, pages 76–77

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I think Adam, in some strange form, loved his mother, but he also resented her. He probably killed her to spare her the thought of her son murdering little children. However, given that he'd had a fascination with violence and murder since he was ten, I believe that Nancy's mistakes with raising him (mainly the overprotectiveness and threats) combined with that made Adam fantasize about murdering her and his family.

He showed his love by giving her four bullets to the dome.

oh, the girl he shot to death? I'm sure he's a big fan

I dunno. If I shot up a school, I'd probably kill my parents first. Save them from being rather unceremoniously thrust into the limelight of media attention, and of course spare them the pain of knowing I killed a whole shitton of muthafuckas. And that's all because I love them!
Of course, I love my virtual machine that runs Windows 95 *slightly* more than I love my mother. But that's just the silly autism speaking.
I don't like Nancy, personally. She seemed way too overprotective and willing to accept her son's rather obvious warning signs of being weird. Plus she's dead and that's lame. I haven't died in all the time I've been alive, it isn't very hard not to.

FrauSmiggles wrote:

I dunno. If I shot up a school, I'd probably kill my parents first. Save them from being rather unceremoniously thrust into the limelight of media attention, and of course spare them the pain of knowing I killed a whole shitton of muthafuckas. And that's all because I love them!
Of course, I love my virtual machine that runs Windows 95 *slightly* more than I love my mother. But that's just the silly autism speaking.
I don't like Nancy, personally. She seemed way too overprotective and willing to accept her son's rather obvious warning signs of being weird. Plus she's dead and that's lame. I haven't died in all the time I've been alive, it isn't very hard not to.

I'm gonna ask you to sorta refrain from the "If I shot up a school" talk, for your own sake. The FBI's been watching this thread for a while (justified given the two murderers that used it), so just as a precaution against the feds knocking on your door.

Oh believe me I'm already on plenty of lists.

FrauSmiggles wrote:

Oh believe me I'm already on plenty of lists.

We all are, we're on the Columbine forums for crying out loud 

No, he didn't trust his mother, he thought that she didn't like him. He also said he won't care if she dies.

vril wrote:

He showed his love by giving her four bullets to the dome.

I tend to believe he did that because she was a repository of information on his life. He treated her the same way he did the hard drive.

I don't think Adam felt love or any strong emotional attachments at all. Alot of people seem to think Adam killed his mom to spare her the mental hell of not being able to grieve her own sons death because he did something so horrible (like Kip Kinel killing his parents or Mutsuo Toi killing his grandmother) but even if that was the case I doubt it was out of love, more just a thank you for taking care of him (see that email where he doesn't state he loves her he says something to the effect of "for everything you've done for me") I don't think he loved her, he only saw her as an obstacle on the day of the shooting and thought about matters very simply and detached from any morals or concept of love.