Bad Kids = Bad Parenting?
Blog manager’s note: Due to the sensitive nature of this post, ATN has decided, as an exception to our usual practice, to allow the contributing blogger to publish this post anonymously and without images. We trust that our readers will understand. Most parents hear about a school shooting and cry because they realize their kids […]
20 Years after the Fetal Alcohol Diagnosis
–Craig Peterson Manager’s note: you can read the original post, along with many others, on Craig’s own blog at https://adoptingfaithafathersunconditionallove.org/ Craig also has a forthcoming memoir, Adopting Faith: A Father’s Unconditional Love, and you can follow his son Andrew’s story by clicking “Like” on his special Facebook page, Andrew Peterson Goes for the Gold Jan was a gem, a […]
4 Reasons Parenting Trauma is Incredibly Difficult
Note from the blog manager: every once in a while, someone at ATN finds a post that is simply too good not to share. I am so glad that this week’s guest, Monica, agreed to let me re-publish it here. To learn more about this “emerging mama” and her life of faith and as an adoptive mom, […]
Smart and strong
by: Lorraine Fuller My son told me once that the reason he lies and breaks rules is because he is testing the person. He will do things that seem to make no sense, tell lies that get him into trouble, or steal inconsequential things. If a teacher tells him to write his name on the top […]
Unanswerable questions
by: Laura Dennis “So many unanswered and unanswerable questions.” That’s how my December 29 journal entry ended. One month later, not much has changed. The same old questions are still chasing each other round and round in my head, all thanks to Saroo Brierly’s A Long Way Home. Haven’t heard of it? What if I tell […]
The 10 Most Common Myths about Attachment & Trauma
There is so much that society doesn’t understand about attachment and trauma. People don’t “get it” when it comes to how a child can be traumatized, how a child reacts to trauma, and how difficult it is to help a child heal from early childhood trauma. The importance of forming healthy attachments and what can impede attachment […]
Being Investigated? Be Prepared.
Manager’s note: Altogether too many families raising traumatized kids have been investigated on false charges of abuse or neglect. This might be triggered a school retaliating against a family advocating for their challenging child, an ignorant bystander, or even the child himself. Not that it really matters who starts it. The point is, families needs […]
What Works & What Doesn’t
Let’s start with what DOESN’T WORK…and why: Traditional Psychotherapies — i.e. talk therapies, don’t work with children with an Attachment Disorder or those with early childhood, (especially pre-verbal) trauma. Two reasons. First,traumatized children are not helped by talk therapy because of their inability to access (talk about) their actual trauma memories and the specific events and triggers. […]
Protected: ATN’s Essentials Conversation Series
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
Failure is always an option
by: Lorraine Fuller I have been a special needs parent for almost 24 years. My oldest was diagnosed with Aspergers and dysgraphia. That presented a few challenges, but we were able to overcome them. Then my second son played a big part in helping my older son become super high-functioning, even as he dealt with […]