I have digressed a bit in my blogging about adoption to post on some things that have been on my mind and heart lately.
Today I'd like to return for a moment to parenting a child who happens to be adopted and also suffers from an attachment disorder.
Now, when my husband and I were in the process of adopting older children, we were aware of the behavior issues that we might have to deal with because of the pain of possible abuse and abandonment. We were ready! (Or so we thought.) After all, we already had 4 children, 3 of which were already teens. If you can parent a teen, you can parent any child, right?!
What we soon discovered after bringing our daughters home was that traditional methods of positive reinforcement and discipline that we used to raise our biological children did not work to change the heart and behavior of a hurt child. I was the queen of sticker charts. They didn't work. More love! Nope! Time out. She could sit there all day seething at me. Put her in her room. Terror! Destruction! More of this, less of that...more of that, less of this...
Perhaps you've heard of this, perhaps you've experienced it. It was like living in chaos and constantly banging my head against a wall.
After trying lots and lots of different avenues, we stumbled upon the book, "Parenting the Hurt Child". Actually, we were given this book by a wonderful couple who had also experienced the pain and frustration of raising a hurt child. How nice to have other people in our lives who can relate and offer help and hope!!
What I love about this book is that it gives very practical ideas on how to deal with the behavioral issues that we were dealing with every day.
(What? A whole book that describes my child's behavior? This means I'm not crazy and I'm not alone! There are actually many many books out there that address this issue. It's a real need. WE are not alone!!)
As stated in the book, each child is different. Not every method will work for every child. We are encouraged to take what works for us and leave the rest. We've found some very helpful methods for managing undesirable behaviors.
It's a whole new way of parenting for me. There are things that I allow my hurt child to say and do that I would not have allowed my other children to say and do. It's trying and I still get frustrated (taking lots of deep breaths), but there's a lot more sanity in my household. I've noticed a change for the good in my daughter. If success is measured in making progress, then we are succeeding!
"Maybe the most any of us can expect from ourselves isn't perfection but progress." ~Michelle Burford
