Reminders to Myself

The Back Story

For three years we struggled to get a handle on Ty’s behavior. Instead of growing out of his behavior, it seemed to get worse as he got older. While I had read Dr. Karyn Purvis’ The Connected Child: Bring hope and healing to your adoptive family before Ty came home, I falsely found her methods to be too permissive. At the end of our rope, I decided to further investigate Dr. Purvis’ Trust-based Parenting model after hearing multiple workshops that peaked my interest. Long story short, we decided to go to Texas to become trainers because it had so radically changed (and continues to change) our household.

In a Nutshell

So what is Trust-based Parenting?  There’s a lot of science to show that children who have experienced stressful pregnancies/deliveries, early hospitalizations, changes in primary caregivers, and abuse or trauma have altered brain chemistry.  These children from “hard places” process life (specifically stress) in a dramatically different way than healthily attached children.  Stress (even good stress like excitement) is perceived by the brain as a threat to survival causing many unacceptable behaviors and emotional deregulation.  Their heightened state of stress also limits their ability to change behaviors based on cause/effect consequences.  Trust-based Parenting takes the entire child and family into account to heal and connect and change behaviors from the inside out.

While many of the necessary responses to kids from hard places ,may seem too gentle or permissive, let me assure you that taking on Trust-based Parenting is not for the faint of heart.  Other parenting models tend to fall either on the highly structured end or the highly permissive end, but Trust-based Parenting requires extremely high structure paired with equally high (or even higher) compassion and nurture.  It’s like burning a candle at both ends, and it’s exhausting.

The Rubber Meets the Road

While I fully subscribe to Trust-based Parenting and adamantly believe it can work miracles in families, I’ll be the first to tell you, “Do as I say and not as I do.”  Part of Trust-based Parenting is knowing how your “buttons” effect how you parent (specifically how you respond to misbehaviors).  My button is disrespect.  I’m also a pragmatic, pick-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps person who expects others around her to be the same.  I can find it hard keep my Total Voice Control and remember to do the connecting part.

Enter my four children from hard places.  Lately, as the older kids have settled in, I am finding I need to not lose sight of what I am convinced is the best way to parent them.  It’s so easy to fall into my more natural, less-effective parenting habits.

Reminders to Myself

1. Attachement starts with me.  Attachment disorders are often attached to the child, but parents all bring an attachment style to the table.  We are the big people.  We need to make sure we are available for attachment even if our child is not.  We need to understand how our child’s behavior affects our ability to attach.
2. Each misbehavior deserves a Level 1 response…first.  The thing with kids from hard places is that they go to flight-fright-freeze at any sign of stress.  I am an intense person.  Mouthiness pushes my buttons.  The goal? Meet mouthiness with a playful request for a re-do (i.e., Level 1 response).  My upbeat, low stress response would prevent my child from shutting down and retreating into a world of fear masked by anger.  In reality, I often overreact, and in the end, my child has learned nothing and our relationship takes 2 steps backwards.
3. Relationship (not consequences) is everything.  To do the job well, remain connected even while correcting.
4. Compassion cannot have an expiration.  One of my heroes in Trust-based Parenting reminded me of that here.
5. Shed your expectations.  My children are who they are.  Meet them where they are.