Helping a Little One With a Move

September 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We are moving. Luckily it’s just a couple of miles away and even closer to my sister’s family and also to our best friends. Nevertheless, a move is a big deal for our little girl who, only nine months ago, moved to our home from her long-time foster home. In fact, our little girl has never experienced change up to this point in her life that was not traumatic. In our case, moving two miles away might as well be two thousand.

So, how can parents help kids with a move? I had a very stable childhood, yet, I distinctly remember moving when I was seven, and I was not happy about it! Home is, well, home. Leaving it behind is bewildering. The hope, of course, is that children will be attached to us—the parents—and not primarily to things (like houses). Nevertheless, it’s usually a mixed bag of attachments: mommy, teddy, daddy, blankie, my bedroom, the dog, our tattered copy of The Poky Little Puppy…

Speaking of familiar objects, this can be one place to start as you help your child with a move. We’re going to set aside one big bag that our little girl can put her most special things in. That bag will be sacred; she can keep it with her on move-day. Those items will not go into boxes, will not get packed away or taped up, and will not go on the moving truck. She can keep her bag of special objects in her sights all day.

We’ve decided to let her stick around for the first hour or so of the move; she can watch as guys haul our furniture out the front door. She can see the beginnings of what our house will look like without our stuff. And then, after seeing how it all works, she’s going to go over to my sister’s house with our dog to play and get some mostly undivided attention on a day when I won’t be able to give her mine.

I’m also planning a little “good-bye” ceremony for our house. Either the night before or the day of the move, after everything has been moved, I want us to spend a little time in each room, share a few good memories that happened in that room, and then say good-bye.


As for the new place, the first time she goes there, we’re going to have a gift waiting for her. We’ve been planning for months to get her a kid-sized kitchen. This seemed like the right time. It will be a special gift for a special girl and will help our move have an element of fun built in. We’ll also be careful to set up a “kid corner” for her in the new place just like we’ve had in our current place: her kid-sized table, chairs, bookshelf, and alphabet banner will still be featured prominently.

Final thought on the subject: we want to help our little girl understand that “home” is what we all build together—that home is where we all are together. We may build a home out of cardboard and all climb in, or maybe we can just draw one together with markers—somehow we will figure out a way to help her visualize that the new place is still home just because we’ll all be in it together.
Filed Under: Home & Family, Special Needs Parenting, Support for Children, Support for Parents Tagged With: , ,
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Special Needs Parenting: Little Signs of Major Strides

August 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Last week my husband and I had a special session with our family play therapist to review our daughter’s progress since she first came to live with us in January. Our therapist records each session, and last week she had some clips for us to see. First we watched a clip from February. Our daughter had been with us for a month at that time. Throughout the clip we watched our daughter try every trick in the book to distract all of us from the task at hand. She tried charming us into letting her be in control; she wriggled and squirmed. She simply couldn’t sit still. She refused every activity that worked in nurture or affection.

Our daughter’s primary areas of difficulty are a compulsion to be in control and resistance to nurture–or really any form of affirmation. In the video clip, it was obvious how problematic those two areas are for her.

Then our therapist showed us a clip from last month. Our little girl was calm and engaged. She smiled often and easily followed directions. She allowed us to rub lotion on her arms without wiggling or trying to do it herself. At one point she leaned over and kissed my husband of her own free will! What a change a few months can make!

Things change so gradually that we had forgotten where we had been and how far she has come. We take it for granted now that we can cuddle her or, occasionally, get her to follow directions. We have seen a decrease in severe temper tantrums and violent outbursts.

Her emotional and behavioral needs were not severe to begin with, but nevertheless, our therapist was delightfully surprised by our daughter’s progress. She said in the beginning she had been very concerned; our little girl could have gotten worse instead of better. We are so thankful for how well she is doing.

We have tried our best to give her a stable, peaceful environment and lots of love. We are beginner parents, though, whose own parents, while very loving, did not parent us very “therapeutically”! We have all had to make major adjustments and work to change ingrained patterns of thought and behavior. We wish we could “get it right” every time; we wish our patience was endless and that we didn’t get discouraged as often as we do. Nevertheless, despite our own shortcomings and despite how much we still have to learn, our little girl is flourishing. What a wonderful feeling!

It’s amazing how significant a little kiss or a successful game of follow-the-leader really is for us. We are relishing these little signs of major strides.
Filed Under: Family Health, Home & Family, Special Needs, Special Needs Parenting, Stories of Inspiration, Support for Children, Support for Parents, Uncategorized, You're Not Alone Tagged With: , ,
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Finalizing Your Adoption: Preparing for and Celebrating the Big Day!

August 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment

On July 29th of this year, my husband and I took our 3 year old little girl to the court house and finalized her adoption! It was a wonderful, memorable time. We will cherish that day forever. Our day went smoothly, our celebration that night was fabulous and our little one was able to take it all in without being too thrown off.

The success of our day had several sources. First, we had lots of coaching from our play therapist ahead of time. We were reminded that finalization can trigger a child’s most broken place of all — their shame. Children who are adopted, especially from foster care, have trouble overcoming the sense of shame that comes from having been abused, abandoned or neglected. Finding out that her adoptive parents want to keep her forever can cause a head-on collision with the child’s worldview — a worldview of worthlessness.

For this reason, it is wise to celebrate the child and the day in ways you know the child will enjoy, but that are not too far out of the child’s normal routine. It’s great to tell your child how much you love her, how special she is, etc., but it’s also good not to over-do it! The child can only handle so much extra attention or moments of intimacy.

Another factor in celebrating the big day is to keep the child’s physical needs in mind. Help her keep her eating and sleeping schedule intact. If she still naps, make sure she gets one. Have one special dessert at the party (if you plan one), but don’t make it a whole day of unhealthy treats, which can throw off both the child’s digestion and her mood. Also remember to celebrate your child in ways that will connect with her:  who are her favorite people to be around? What are her favorite foods? What is her favorite thing to do? Focus on your child’s favorites and have fun with her.


As we approached finalization day, we did our best to help our daughter grasp what was going on at her own level. She is three—too young to understand the concept of “forever.” So, we gave her some concrete ideas to hold on to: “This is the day when your name will change! We will all have the same last name now.” And also: “We won’t ever have to have any social workers come to our house ever again!” Both of those things meant something to our little girl, and helped her get excited about this day we were so excited about. For a week straight she told everyone she saw about her new name and gave them a big smile.

Finally, commemorate the big day with a gift your child will love. Our little one had been asking for a small guitar of her very own for several months. This was the perfect time to treat her. We gave her the guitar at her small adoption party, and she has been a little rock star ever since! As a result of the guitar, we experienced one of our most precious moments yet; she said to my husband the next day, “Daddy, this is my very special guitar because I am a very special girl.” His eyes lit up and he nodded, “Yes. That’s exactly right.” And that, of course, is what finalization is all about.
Filed Under: Home & Family, Special Needs Parenting, Stories of Inspiration, Support for Children, Support for Parents Tagged With: , ,
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The Importance of Eye Contact

August 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment

At first glance, my daughter would appear to be an exceptionally healthy, happy three year-old. In a lot of ways that is true. Underneath the surface, though, there is a little girl who has survived a lot in the three short years before her adoption. She’s a little girl who wants nothing more than to be loved, yet who has so much trouble accepting love when it is offered. One of the ways that this comes out to me is in the way she avoids eye contact.

A healthy infant will stare into a parent’s eyes for minutes on end. They will eagerly, hungrily accept that intense gaze. They learn so early to read a smile in a parent’s eyes or a frown. I’m not sure what messages my little girl got as an infant, but whatever they were, they have left a scar. She finds it difficult and sometimes impossible to meet my loving gaze when I cuddle with her or rock her. She looks away as I sing lullabies or stroke her hair.

One way to get through to children who have a hard time accepting nurture is to make things a little more light-hearted—to play. They can feel very uncomfortable sharing intensely loving moments, but sometimes there are other ways to get at a connection. When a parent finds something that works, it’s a glorious moment. Both parent and child long to feel connected and feel enormous joy when they are.

Last week I tried making up an eye contact game. The plan was to see who could hold the other’s gaze the longest. First I would make eye contact and count until one of us looked away. Then she would take a turn. It was great counting practice for her on top of being at least slightly therapeutic! She liked the game, and we have played it again. It will be interesting to see if she can hold my gaze longer as time goes on.

Special-needs parenting—like all parenting—takes a lot of creativity and perseverance. The important thing is to hold on to hope and to wait patiently for that hope to bear fruit.
Filed Under: Home & Family, Special Needs Parenting, Stories of Inspiration, Support for Parents Tagged With: , , ,
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A Twist on “Time-Outs”

July 26, 2011 By Leave a Comment

My pre-school aged daughter is an adorable, intelligent, and strong-willed child. She is also emotionally fragile, defiant, and has difficulty bonding as a result of two disruptions in her first three years—first from her biological mother and then from her foster family when we adopted her.

At times her behavior can lead to a vicious cycle: she is defiant, then we give her consequences, then she is more defiant, then we give her consequences, etc. Recently we found ourselves sending her to her room multiple times a day in order to de-escalate tense situations or as a consequence for her defiant behavior.

Our play therapist made a few suggestions which I have found most helpful:

1) She helped us see that by allowing ourselves to participate in this cycle, we were permitting our daughter to be in control of the situation. Children with attachment disorders often have a compulsion to reinforce their negative self-image; they do this through behaving in unacceptable ways. Typical consequences for negative behavior (e.g. “time-outs”, spanking, or being sent to their room) can sometimes reinforce to a child that they are bad or that the parent is rejecting them (which they expect).

2) She recommended that consequences should be directly related to the child’s behavior. For example, if our daughter throws food at the table, then we could move her plate out of her reach for a set amount of time. Because she threw food she will temporarily lose access to the food. This is a type of “time-out” but it directly links consequences to the problematic behavior. Also, it only lasts for a few minutes, and we will remain with her the whole time.


3) For temper tantrums, not only our therapist, but several books we have consulted have encouraged us to use “time-ins” instead of “time-outs.” For the child with an attachment disorder, this is a really important difference. The child is not sent away (i.e. rejected) for bad behavior, rather the parent remains with them. It still works like a time-out. A timer can be set for 3-5 minutes, but the child is not left alone. You don’t have to talk to the child, but you can re-assure them with your physical presence by sitting them on your lap, or just by keeping a hand on their back, that you are not rejecting them. The purpose of a time-in is not punitive; rather it is an effort to de-escalate the child’s emotional trajectory and empower them to calm down with the parent’s help.

These suggestions have been so helpful to my husband and to me as we have continued to navigate life with our precious little girl. No one tactic will work for every child, but I hope these insights will inspire some creativity in your own unique situations.
Filed Under: Special Needs, Special Needs Parenting, Stories of Inspiration, Support for Children, Support for Parents, Toddler Health, You're Not Alone Tagged With: , , , , ,
This post may contain affiliate links or sponsored content. In most cases, products are provided to Moms Living Thrifty for review. All product reviews are written according to the writer's honest opinion, experience or beliefs. Your opinion may vary. To see more on our disclosure policy, please visit our Disclosure page