Monday, July 11, 2011

Attachment/ RAD... hopefully finding a way to heal

Well... I have completely lacked any enthusiasm lately to blog. Between my business life and my nosedive with M*'s attachment issues lately I haven't had it in me to say much of anything. Frankly, (and to be honest) I think I was scared. Parenting an attachment challenged child is tough (and I mean REALLY TOUGH!!!). So much of the pain and suffering gets turned into rage and in my case it is rage directed almost solely on me just because I am "MOM".

And, than because no one else sees the behaviors that you (the mom) sees it is hard to get any "real" support. The fact that in adoption we chose this path we are on also has some stigma bc you feel like you can't complain bc people will say something like "you got yourself into this" or "I warned you". So, sometimes it is easier to suck it up and just try to "get through" each day.

I have spent many sleepless nights recently up reading about attachment. About the horrible diagnosis all of us adoptive parents don't even want to mention in fear it might make it come true for our child- RAD. But, thankfully this huge support/ network of Ethiopian adoptive families has restored me. You have given me hope. My son can heal. It can be done.

We have our first appointment with an attachment therapist this week. I am excited. It feels good to finally be able to admit to myself, my husband and my family and friends that my son is still struggling greatly after being home over a year. And, that his issues are pretty intense and I am not capable of addressing them alone. That I need help!

It feels good because I think that just getting those words out of my mouth was the hardest part. I am hoping that we will move forward now with a better understanding of how to handle our son's behavior's and how to help him with his BIG sad and mad feelings. I know there are others like us out there that need help, encouragement and ideas. I am going to post about our failures and our successes in hopes that we can help others as so many have been helping us.

2 comments:

Ashley said...

Thank you. I'm not sure if one of my sons truly has an attachment disorder or not, but I do know that I am having (and he is having) a much harder time attaching (and getting along in general) than I am with the other one. I am looking forward to your posts.

MRK said...

I am glad you posted this. It is so important for us all to know that we are not alone. 8 months in and ours is a still a struggle as well x2. "A" was making a lot of progress to the point where *I* was starting to feel attached, but then she nosedived bigtime in the last 2 weeks. It is so hard for her and so hard for the rest of us to experience all the negatives and the behaviors and to wonder about the progress we had made. And she was the one who was doing BETTER. I think summer has been hard on everyone and perhaps that is affecting you, too? We are also seeing an attachment therapist now and rereading many attachment books late at night and talking about things endlessly when the kids are in bed and we wish we could be kicking back with fewer challenges to worry over but find ourselves sleepless and coming back to our concerns over and over again. I am going to Orlando next March to have a retreat with other moms struggling with similar issues. I am trying (when I can get up the energy and will, like you) to share some of what we're trying and doing on our blog and hope you will, too, since we can all help each other. Rereading "The Connected Child" has been helpful. I met up with two other WACAP parents a few weeks ago, and one was saying the same thing about not feeling able to vent because others think we brought this on ourselves. And we did, but that doesn't mean we don't need a ton of support. You have mine. I'm going to email you my number...call anytime!

Megan