Ray and I first learned about The Attitude in the midst of our first major crisis with one of our adoptive kiddos, who at the time were still a part of the foster care system. We had just discovered they’d been using their bedroom as a bathroom (ruined furniture, walls and carpet) and a good part of the reason was that they were just mad. Just Mad. Which I guess balanced things out because we were just mad too after we discovered this very gross truth! After all the behaviors and chaos leading up to this, we’d been thrust over the edge of what we could handle.
I had been searching extensively for a new therapist for the kids. The state provided one was about to retire and honestly she didn’t appear equipped to help them or us. I finally found one who took their state insurance and had tons of experience with trauma and kids in the system. We’d only been seeing her a few weeks when Pee-mageddon happened, but she immediately knew what was going on. After another session or two, our child was diagnosed with Reactive Attachment Disorder. We didn’t know what in the world that was, but it was at least an answer after 6 months of chaos and behaviors we weren’t trained to handle. The next few months were spent learning how to parent these very special children with The Attitude.
Their therapist, who is a rock star btw, recommended a book to us called Building the Bonds of Attachment by David Hughes. We both read it in a matter of days and it was eye opening. It introduced the concept of The Attitude. The Attitude has 5 main qualities:
- being accepting
- being curious
- being empathetic
- being loving
- and finally being playful.
These qualities all build on each other, but they are more like steps. The biggest piece missing in our home when we started this journey was Being Accepting. Which sounds pretty simple right? Sure, when things are logical they are easy to accept. I can be accepting with the toddler for having a meltdown because he is 2. I can be accepting that our teenagers experiment with pushing boundaries involving curfew because they are teenagers. Where we struggled was Being Accepting of an 8 year old making decisions like a 2 year old. It is very hard to accept a tantrum from a “big kid”. It requires an incredible deep understanding of the trauma affected brain and body, and in our home we were being asked to do it times 2. Another of our children, also out of the foster care system, was diagnosed just a few months later.
People, we struggled with step #1 for a solid year before I can comfortably say we ever moved on to curiosity or empathy, let alone love and playfulness. We love our children, but being Loving is hard when a child is actively trying to make you hate them because it is what they know. Likewise, it is hard to want to be playful with a child who throws chairs when you tell them no, but when we settle back to acceptance, it can be a little easier. This Attitude is good for our children for a lot of reasons, but it is also very healthy for us the parents. It keeps our expectations in check so we don’t set ourselves up for disappointment which leads quickly to frustration. Their behavior is not about us and it isn’t personal. It just is. It is where they are and it is a product of a past we had no control over. Reality Check: Neither did they. When we remember that, it can help keep us from getting emotionally triggered by their behaviors.
Scientifically, it is a cycle that can be beneficial or detrimental. If we maintain the ability to be accepting and can move through the steps, they heal and we are able to see forward progress. If they are able to get us emotionally engaged in frustration, anger, and any of the things that come from that like yelling, then they are able to keep themselves stuck in a shame cycle. “I am a bad kid” is a real thing for them. If they’re a “bad kid” they don’t deserve goodness, or love or kindness so why would they do anything different? They lived in that cycle for so long it is actually uncomfortable and, especially for one of our kids, painful to experience success or moments of unconditional love. We have learned enough now to expect backslides after the big moments so we can prepare ourselves and not allow them to achieve the shame they seek. I have never seen a child so out of sync as when I can look at them after they have intentionally pooped their pants, and without yelling, give them instructions on what to do next. Being able to do that, to show them that kind of acceptance even in the face of gross behavior, it changes them. Done enough times, with a lot of prayer and help from a much stronger power than I, it can help heal them.
I can tell you I do yell – in my room with the door shut into my pillow. Sometimes I don’t make it to my room and sometimes I just plain lose it. Because this gig is hard. Because I have a child that rejects me and engaged in gross behavior when he’s mad at me over something simple. Because it breaks my heart.
This summer after all those awesome wins with Martin #6’s education, Ray and I both expected some backsliding. The combination of being out of routine mixed with all that uncommon success was bound to slingshot a bit and oh man did it ever. We backslid into behaviors we’d long thought gone. Stealing, lying, tantrums, the works! For weeks, and guys, I did exactly what I had been trained not to do – I got so disappointed. It was like watching the last year get burned in a flash fire before my very eyes. I have been taking it so personally too, as though it is some slight against me as a parent and as a person. How dare she burn all that progress to the ground after we worked so hard!!
But while on a work trip I pulled my book out and re-read some key chapters. I was reminded that raising my expectations of her is unfair to the both of us. A good year of school does not undo a lifetime of trauma. A good year of bonding and attachment does not undo years of repeated pain and heartache, and somehow expecting her to just be beyond all that now is a recipe for disaster. I yell and get angry. She gets handed proof that she’s unlovable. And we get setup to backslide even more.
So here I sit, reminded of the very basic principle of The Attitude. Acceptance. If I love her, then I need to get myself back together and accept her where she is. Today. Right now in this moment. Not where I wish her to be or the dreams I pray each night she achieves. I have to accept her today with all of her struggles, all of her efforts to push us away or prove she’s not capable of being loved or having success in this life. When I can do that, when I can remember that, true healing can begin. Healing for the both of us.
Being in the trenches of this messy mission God asked of us is hard. It can feel unfair and it is incredibly isolating. There are few who get it and even fewer who are willing to jump here into the trenches with us. Sometimes I struggle to be accepting of that too, but I would have to be blind not to see the fruits of this hard work. To see the healing God has brought into these children’s hearts and minds simply because we said yes.
So today, we accept and we ask for strength to keep accepting these kids the way God accepts us. In all our flaws and mistakes, our desires to push Him away. We strive to honor that unconditional love by extending it to our kids who ask for that love in the most unloving ways.