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We have a 10 year old daughter who has been stealing money and lying. She may have even started shoplifting. She, along with her 3 siblings, has been in our home for nearly 4 years - finalization was exactly one year ago. We didn't have a problem with this until recently, maybe the last 4 months.
My partner and I have punished her for stealing/lying as we see appropriate, we have a large support group and often run our punishments by other parents to make sure we are being fair. The problem is that our daughters therapist believes that she should be treated differently because she is adopted. We understand that foster/adopted children do have issues that may be more severe than your average child. The problem is, if we do nothing (this is what he is recommending) she will not understand that there are natural consequences for stealing. Our problem with that is if she doesn't learn what consequences are now, what are her teen years going to be like? If she's shoplifting now and knows she can get away with it where will it end? When she is older and steals a car, will the police let her off the hook because she's "adopted?"
I just want to know how long adoptive parents are supposed to ignore behaviors that the "normal" child would be punished for? We are not talking about spanking her, we feel that she should return the merchandise and let the store know that she took the items w/o paying for them.
___________________________
K & D
Parents of 4 Siblings
(4yrs, 7 yrs, 9 yrs & 10 yrs)
Finalized 2/2006
Fostered 2003-2006
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wow... that is some kind of therapist you have there. Actually, where are you? Sounds like maybe he works with the therapist I just fired that thought the solution to dd's ODD was to just ignore her behavior.
Stealing can never be ignored. Nancy Thomas has some real good advice on stealing.
Thank you guys for your replies. We are sticking to our guns and following through with what we've told our daughter her punishment was - she has to tell the store owner that she took the items (I will call the shop today and let them know what we will be doing) and wants to return them AND pay for them in full. Because she doesn't have enough money to pay for them she will have to do chores to pay us back and also pay for the gas as this place is a mission over an hour away - she was on a field trip when the items were taken.
Unfortunately this is not the first time that we have been told to ignore behaviors that our kids have. Our son is 7 and will sometimes touch his sister inappropriately. The therapist told us to ignore it which we did for a while but then he did it more (duh! no consequences, why would he stop?). Finally his sister slapped him and guess what? He didn't do it again! I'm all for natural consequences!
Thanks again for assuring us that we're not crazy!
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K & D
Moms to M-10, S-9, J-7 & C-4
I agree with the above posts too - FIRE that therapist.
There definitely are therapists out there who claim to understand adoption/foster issues who truly don't. I've had to fire 2 therapists for this sort of issue.
The first therapist claimed to have worked with foster/adopt kids for over 20 years. The very first meeting with him, in which he insisted that we meet with my child in the room, he spent 20 minutes doing the "hero worship" thing because my DH and I adopted 4 kid. This was NOT in my kid's best interests, as to her, she lost her parents, she didn't know us all that well, and being adopted by anyone instead of going back to bio mom was the last thing she wanted! Obviously, he ruined any potential trust in him in that first meeting.
Other therapists seem to have issues with understanding attachment disorder. We had one who was working with one of our kids, who has been severely abused and has trouble attaching to us, and the therapist began treating our daughter as if she were HER daughter - e.g, its ok to hug & kiss the therapist but not do that with your a-parents...!
So, if you instincts send you a message, please trust yourself, you are most likely right. And, the longer you let this go on, the more of a bond will form between your child & the therapist, so firing them later will be more damaging, and you'll have a much more difficult time with her because of the perception that you are removing a support system that she feels is on her side.
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