Wow - I need advice

We had a similar story on one of ours. When it came time for finalization we were at a pretty bad place in the relationship. Our son had RAD. These problems can come from all kinds of varieties of attachment issues. and probably many other places as well. An attachment therapist would obviously be a good choice, as even if it is not the primary cause, attachment issues MUST be present to some extent in every adoption. I think it is common for the finalization to happen at a time when the relationship is very sour. It's quite a leap of faith.

Attachment therapist. Also it's clear from your post that your daughter has food issues. My dd (also adopted at 7) had MAJOR food issues. She kept a baggie of food- granola bars and such that she could get anytime in her backpack- yes she ate them all at once the first two times, but slowly she has learned that there will be food. She is not being "sneaky"- she is using her survivial skills. My dd also kept a running list of things she thought we needed from the store. I NEVER say no to food to her- I say "Yes. You can have the _______ with your dinner (or other appropriate time), do you want me to keep it safe or do you want to put it on your placemat on the table so you know where it is?" Your daughter CAN overcome these issues, but you will need an attachment therapist. Also I suggest reading "The connected child" and "Adopting the hurt child". Be sure to post when you are having trouble- the special needs main forum is where a lot of traffic is about kids with emotional issues. I will tell you at 16 months- things are SO much better than they were when my dd came home, but the first year was HARD. Also, thats not to say we don't still have issues, but they are better, and I feel very good about my daughters future.

An attachment therapist would be ideal. You should be in there with her during therapy all of the time, especially at first. She is probably telling the therapist exactly what he or she wants to hear, and not actually doing any work at all. Why would she? She doesn't trust you, and she doesn't trust the therapist. She is going to do what she feels she has to do to protect herself- that includes feeding herself and manipulating adults to keep herself safe. The Connected Child is a great book, and I also really like Beyond Consequences. It does a lot to explain where these behaviors come from and, talks about treating the root of the problem (fear) instead of just the symptom (the behavior).

Re lying, watch the video on the home page on the Brian Post site. It's pretty amazing:Re food, I keep 2-3 types fruit out on the table, and a low drawer or cupboard with healthy food for children. Crackers, almonds, peanuts, healthy chips (no food dye or chemicals). I tell all children that if I've really misunderstood, and they really need to eat but I'm telling them "no", this food is there for them to get. IF they're getting into those drawers, it's a signal for me to back off (hasn't happened, having the green light to do so seems to help a lot). I'm aware I could've gotten a child who had major food issues, who might've eaten everything at once, hasn't happened yet. I've read that if a child has major food-stealing issues, you should either set out a basket of acceptable to you food in their room,or even let them wear a fanny pack with snacks. I wonder if a version of that could be implemented at school -- that is, you providing some sort of food that she could eat when she feels she must. Her "thinking brain" isn't involved in her feeling that she needs food, it's her "reptilian brain" or amygdala (sp??) which feels it will die if it doesn't eat. That is, she's not *thinking* "I'll steal some food," she's responding to a *feeling* of desperate survival fear.Counselor: Same as humanchild said. Attachment counselor, you should be in the room, the role of the counselor is to support you in bonding wtih her, helping her heal, and overcoming trauma. Ck out these folks and their philosophy, it's amazing: [url=http://www.ddpi.org]Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy Institute[/url] If a counselor isn't helping, move on. Try to get a good referral from the DDP people if you can....

Hi alys: I have had a basket/bowl out on the table, the problem is she eats ALL of it in one sitting. I replenish it and she eats ALL of it again. SHe has NO self control!!

If she can't regulate herself in a healthy way then she'll need you to do it for her until she is ready. She can still learn to trust you if she can't have food whenever she wants. It's pretty much the same--trust that you will refill the fruit bowl, or trust that you will put food on her plate at meal time. One isn't necessarily better than the other in terms of trust but one may be better in terms of health. Consistency is the key. The bowl of fruit would be a disaster in our house, mostly because we have too many kids. They would compete to get it and that would add a new source of stress into their lives. We regulate food using a lock on the pantry and an alarm on the fridge. We dish them out a generous portion at meal time and do not allow them to go for seconds. That stops them from making themselves sick from over-eating and prevents them from racing with each other to get the most. They are dependent on us for their food and have learned to trust that we will feed them.

OK, I'm over my head on the food issue and your child! Thank goodness jeff replied. And I see I forgot to put in the Brian Post link, duh:[url=http://www.postinstitute.com/]Reactive Attachment Disorder & Defiance in Adopted & Foster Kids[/url]

Jeff: Thanks! Your replies (everyone's actually) is so helpful!! I feel so bad for my fd. Our relationship is not great right now. I am trying to be there for her, tell her she is safe, will have enough food, etc. and then the next day she gets caught lying, stealing AGAIN! I am going to try a snack box that someone told me about. Thanks for ANY tips! K from Illinois

One thing that worked for us was that we took E to the store with us and let her pick out her own snacks (the school has limits of fruit or nuts for snack) so we got creative in the bulk aisle. There are several types of bulk dried fruits and nuts so she gets to pick out 5-6 items. In the morning she tells me what she would like for me to pack for snack that day, this helps give her a sense of control of what she eats too. E would take others snacks after eating her own so our therapist came up with a snack return ceremony. We purchased all the snacks that her took from her classmates and one by one she had to apologize to the person and give them the makeup snack. E had no sense of empathy just survival skills when she was stressed. We worked with the school counselor and she attends an empathy group too at school. I am proud to say that E hasn't taken a snack in WEEKS and she is feeling safe now.

I don't know if this will help, but you said, "any tips". I had a little RAD foster guy for 18 months. The sws kept changing things about his routines (no dad visits; oops, dad visits; leave this daycare, go to that; start kindergarten before you're ready; threaten to move you, change counselors, etc.) He would meltdown and regress in response to changes. Once after a big change, we were out at an event with a family he was really bonded with, and I got a snack out of my fanny pack. With no words, he swiped his hand in the air to grab it out of my hand. Now -- for *months* he'd been using decent manners, and I'd been meeting his needs, there was no rational reason for him to fear getting the snack.So I explained the 3-part brain to him. I told him we all have 3 parts to our brains. One part is like a lizard that sits in the sun all day until it's cold, then it crawls under a rock. It sticks its tongue out to capture food. When it wants food it says, "GIMMEE!" -- said with a hand-swipe motion to grab the food. Then we have a mammal part to our brain. That part is like a kitty cat that says, (super sweet voice and cute squiggly body language) "I'm so cute, you should give me some food!" And we have a *human* part to our brain. When that part wants food, it says, "May I have some apple, please?" I don't remember a lecture on my part, I think I left it up to him to notice that he was in a human body, that I expected human behavior from him. Over days, we went repeated it, so he could answer what the lizard says, what the kitty says, what the human says. He *loved it*. We would do it like a performance for friends. If he reverted, I could say, 'How do humans ask for food?" and he'd change.The thing is, when we're afraid, the "lizard brain" activates, and all we have are our primal instincts. The lizard brain shuts off the thinking brain, so it can fight, flight or freeze, so it can survive. That's all it cares about, surviving. Traumatized children live in fear, far too much of the time. Before they came to our homes, they were afraid, maybe most of their waking hours. Sadly, they wired up that part of the brain more than a child in a peaceful home would, *and*, they're lacking in "wires" or pathways to get them into the thinking parts of their brains. In our homes, they truly have to re-wire and build new habits, of living and reacting from the human, thinking part of the brain. I figured, what the heck, we tell kids the difference between green, blue and orange, why not give him the info to understand some of what's going on in his brain?

Try to see your daughter as being in survival mode -- everything she does (all the behaviors that are obviously not based in the emotion of love, anyway) are rooted in the emotion of fear. She lies because her life depends on it (her reality is twisted by past trauma). She steals food because she believes the time will come that there won't be any food for her. Basically all of her sneakiness is to provide herself with resources when the time comes that you aren't taking care of her (which she believes is inevitable).Alys1 posted a link to the Post Institute. That's an excellent resource. Also visit [URL="http://beyondconsequences.com"]BeyondConsequences.com[/URL], Heather Forbes was trained by Bryan Post. They co-authored the BCLC book. When you look for a therapist, look for one bases their therapy on The Stress Model. Many still use the old models of attachment therapy that view the child as an enemy of family peace who must be controlled at all cost.Take a look at the Beyond Consequences web site... get the book...

I am taking the Beyond Consequences 10 week online course right now and it is really helping us A LOT. My kids are calming down and my 7 year daughter is eating better than ever (she was a non eater, not a horder) I think she is just feeling more heard and listened to so she is not feeling the need to control as much. I have become very calm myself these days as well!:happydance: So, yes I would definately recommend reading the book. On a side note, our MOPS group today had a speaker on Discipline. It was all about punishment and consequences. The main goal in discipline (the speaker said) is to get your child to listen to you! REALLY?? My goal is for my children to become internally motivated to do the right thing. I had a hard time sitting there not saying anything. But, I just kept thinking..."Well, I guess this stuff really does work for "typical" children." I think it is vital for foster/adoptive parents to realize that you cannot parent a traumatized child the same way you would a birth child. Trauma changes the game all together!!!!!!!!

Maybe it works with "regular" kids, but is it the best choice? Dogs can be trained using punishing corrections, but they tend to obey out of fear rather than a desire to please their leader/owner. Isn't that what we see in kids? I know for myself that was true (but then maybe my childhood wasn't so typical).Between what I'm learning as a dog trainer, and what I'm learning through the BCLC book & class, I've come to the conclusion that the goals and reward-based training methods are pretty much the same. If a "typical" dog eager learns lessons when rewarded for it, why not a "typical" kid? Granted there does come a time in every child's life when he/she has a brain that has developed enough for the more advanced concept of punishment as discipline for bad behavior, but I think younger kids who haven't developed as much of their prefrontal cortex will always do better when rewarded for good behavior than punished for bad....... Now I just need to get that bit of wisdom from my head into my heart and out through my actions. It's so much easier when the face looking back at you is smiling in eager anticipation of another opportunity to earn a reward rather than acting hateful to you just for being "Mom."

Lorie, I think you are right that the punishment/reward style of parenting is only getting compliance and not internal change . On the other hand, if a parent has a good relationship with their child and models good morals and values, the child will pick up those values from the parents' example. My mom had a good ballance of this, IMHO. She gave consequences, but was also very attuned to WHY we were misbehaving. I just know that my kids have been through a lot and really do have legit reasons for acting out. I don't think I am going to help them by punishing them for expressing themselves the only way they know how. It is my responsibility to TEACH them how to express themselves in a healthy way. Easier said than done! It was very hard to sit through the presentation and group discussion at MOPS. I felt very alone. I don't think anyone could have understood even if I tried to explain, so I just left it alone. I found urine in my 8 year old son's laundry basket today. I don't think any of the other moms could relate to THAT!!:(

You're right, Julie, the chances of the average mom being able to understand the little idiosyncrasies we deal with as "normal" are slim to none. The other day I had a conversation with someone who had asked about my daughter--so I was telling him about an episode she had in the bathtub throwing herself from one end to the other and totally incapable of stopping herself (the therapist doesn't want to label her as bipolar because of the far-reaching impact the diagnosis will have, but feels confident that she needs mood stabilizing meds rather than ADHD meds). Well... he proceeded to tell me he did the same thing when he was a kid, even going so far as to tell his mother he hated her and that she was stupid--and therefore it's perfectly normal for my daughter to behave that way and I should stop worrying about it and just let her be a kid. :grr: Last fall my church was doing a Wed night class based on the book "Raising Kids God's Way" (or something like that). I went for the first few weeks, but quickly realized that life at home was worse afterward because I felt like I needed to at least try to apply the techniques. My biggest trigger to personal dysregulation is being disrespected, which is something my daughter is very good at, so the chapters about teaching a child to be respectful of parents and other adults caused a tremendous amount of friction. I also realized that my daughter didn't do well when kept out past her bedtime, so I finally decided that relative peace in our home was more important than learning what someone with no training in psychiactric & psychological disorders has to say about raising kids and quit attending. (The author was off to a bad start anyway when he said that kids are born with a conscience.)