Download - at Bethany Christian Services
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My name is Kate wondering I am actually in the adoption supervisor
at Bethany Christian Services.
And I'm obviously going to be presenting on caring from for
children from hard places who has ever heard of dr.
Karen corbis before Oh great.
Awesome.
Well, then you guys are really going to enjoy this because
I actually went out and learned under dr.
Karen Perez for her trust-based relational intervention out
in Texas and did that Tenley?
Study last year, she's amazing.
Obviously a lot of you guys know that she recently passed
but her Legacy lives on and I'm super excited to be able
to share what she taught me through that program a little
bit about how to really practically work with children.
So just a little bit about me before I dive into this material.
I am originally from South Jersey.
I've been married and my husband's in the back with our three
Month old daughter so that's definitely exciting season at
our life.
But like I said, I've been working for Bethany for about
seven years now start out in the Philadelphia area moved
down here and now working Winter Garden but start out working
with kids older child adoption.
So this is this is real, you know, I have stories and know
these kids that have been in the system for a long time and
heartbreakingly had to work with many children and telling
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them that they had to move.
Home to home.
So this is not easy stuff.
This is in the trenches that you guys are in and being foster
parents and adoptive parents if you are, but with that I
worked in older child adoption and I worked at International
domestic infant I come from an adoptive family just a little
bit about myself and my story my parents started the adoption
process about 15 years ago.
So I have three siblings who are adopted internationally
all came home.
Older around four five and six with special needs and with
medical conditions a lot of trauma that they went through
at that.
So I get it.
This is not easy stuff at also a lot of things that I'll
be talking about today.
I want to share practical experience of what I've seen and
learned from from a personal basis and also from a professional
basis of what I've seen working in the field, so Alright
today, we are going to start off learning just these are
the topics that we're going to cover today and just briefly
touch upon a lot of them and hopefully at the end we'll have
some time for some QA, but I really want to start off with
the foundation of compassion understanding where these children
come from and when we have a heart of compassion and understanding
it can really change our perspective.
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So we'll definitely dive into that in more detail on spoken
messages behind a child's Behavior or signs of neglect.
This will really touch upon not seeing a child for their
behavior. What for what's really going on behind the scenes
and what's really going on their background to cause that
behavior disarming the fear response with felt safety and
what that means a lot of children who have gone through trauma.
Their behavior is really centered upon fear and again that
perspective of understanding when fear isn't a toy How they
respond to that.
Strategies that reduce fear how to be the boss how to handle
at-risk children dealing with Defiance and proactive strategies.
So I know we have a limited amount of time today.
So if I go by through these things quickly, it's because
we have a lot of material like I said, but again, I'm here
at the end.
If you guys have more questions to expound upon one of these
topics we talk about I have a lot of information on these
slides so not going to read through all them you guys can
kind of pick and choose I'll highlight certain things that
that You know stand out with this but a big thing here is
understanding emotional age vs.
Bear physical age.
This is just foundational a child may come home to you at
maybe my gosh 10 years old.
Okay, so they come home to you and maybe you have parented
biological children.
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So you have an understanding or work with kids to say.
Okay ten year old should be able to do a b c and d.
Okay, however with children that come from hard places or
I have experiencing type of abuse neglect trauma.
Their physical age is going to be very different from their
emotional age.
So when a ten-year-old gets upset or whatnot who has had
consistent bonding who has, you know learned how to have
coping skills.
Learn how to communicate how they're feeling a child who
has not been taught that or have they have some of these
delays May revert to an age that the abuse started.
For example, I worked at with a little boy named Zion and
he was 10 years old and when he would get upset, he would
throw himself on the ground and throw a tantrum now some
of you may be thinking okay.
I know what ten-year-old that didn't had the experience and
it would be sort of like that would maybe do that too.
But again, like I said, hopefully a child who is 10 years
old can communicate with her upset about you know, they can
use their words have other types of coping skills will for
Zion. He never learned that he had a tremendous amount of
abuse. It started around two or three years old and did it
stop for him.
So he's emotional age was about two or three years old.
That's the only way that he knew physiologically emotionally
how to communicate and how to cope with that situation.
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So again, a lot of these kids do not have coping skills.
They have not been taught them.
They haven't learned them.
They have a lot of challenges that they need to work through
to be able to catch up to their physical legs.
Just keep that in mind even if you are working with child.
This is if you catch yourself saying, you know, but they're
15 years old.
They should know better.
They should know how to respond in this situation.
Honestly, they may not know they may revert back to the age
when the abuse started around two or three years old or whatever
that may be and some kids are stunted at that emotional age.
So just keep that in mind when you're working with these
kids. And is there in Homer or even if you have biological
kids in the home, you're just going to have to pair it a
little bit differently with these kids.
Again, these are just they bring with them abandonment loss
grief issues again, we could talk so much about all of these
topics, especially sensory deficits.
All these are just these are not the root cause these are
things that are offshoots of what the bottom line is that
these kids have gone through.
I have a couple of these charts up.
I'm just going to touch on a couple of them.
When a child.
Does this he or she may be trying to express this so Example
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if a child pulls away from your Embrace.
Okay, they may not know how to handle that physical touch
or a child May Flinch, you know, if you move too quickly
towards a child, especially if they're in your home first
Romantic Period, you don't have that trust and relationship
with them if they see an adult coming at them, even though
your intentions may be good and you want to show them physical
touch or affection or give them a hug or a kiss.
They may Flint just back away because as an adult coming
towards them they may only know maybe a fist or a slab is
coming. So that's just an example of why these kids do what
they do.
So they've never learned how to process touch so being held
is terrifying to them.
A lot of kids is infants who were not held or maybe left
in the crib or for a short and long period of time they have
not come to understand what physical touch nurturing affection
and a healthy way.
It looks like so an actual hug maybe Physically, it hurts
them because they're not used to what that feels like again.
They may been abusive adults and learning to trust you.
This is a really important one.
I've never experienced a proprietary nurturing affection
from adult.
So this is all very new and scary to me and that has a lot
to do with sexual abuse that children may have gone through
another one that kind of goes hand-in-hand is approaching
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strangers it discriminately.
You may find that your child may just walk up to random strangers.
Strangers and just or walk away from you.
They don't have that instinct to stay near you.
So for example, when we brought my little sister home from
China, she did not have a consistent caregiver.
She was in an orphanage for about five years of her life.
So she didn't know that one-on-one Bond and connection.
She had multiple caregivers.
So we wanted to Wal Mart one time and I was with her in the
card section.
I'll never forget.
I think I was 17 years old or something and she just walk
I turn my For a second she walked away and she was like four
aisles down and I was panicking think I lost my sister.
My mom's going to kill me, you know at the time but for her,
she didn't have that that sent that awareness to stay close.
She just knew I needed to take care of myself and I'm on
my own, you know, so she could walk up to anybody and just
talk to them.
So if you see that in children who have had multiple caregivers
throughout their life, that's what they know.
So they just or they may or not under their caregivers may
not have been reliable or abandon them.
So those are all really really important things to consider
and not to immediately get frustrated or to yell at the child
but toxin explain to them that you're going to be stable
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in their life, and they don't need to worry about you peeping
for a period of time.
So Anger is a huge one.
Anger.
We know is again not seeing them for their behavior.
But an anger that behavior is a result of many different
underlying things anger can really be expressed through fear
as we talked about before.
So again, I'm so frustrated.
I don't know how to express my needs and feelings.
My blood sugar level is uncomfortably low.
I don't know how to deal with this my Hunger appropriately
have any of you guys experienced pain.
Ariba for through that means hunger verse angry.
Okay, I think we've all experienced at some level.
We're hungry Karen purpose really talks about this in depth
that children and food and worked for going to talk about
hoarding that kind of stuff later on but that is super important
if your child or your foster child starts to act super irritable
start to think have they eaten in the past three hours.
That's huge if their blood sugar is low.
They're not going to be at the top of their game.
You know, they're not going to their blood sugar is if they're
their love their frustration their irritable that's going
to start to come out.
She is a huge proponent about talking about having healthy
alternatives with always having snacks on you having a water
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bottle for your child is huge to keep them hydrated.
Again.
This is a huge topic that we could spend some time on just
going to touch on it briefly, but even the car If you have
you know, a granola bar or something, it's not going to melt
in the sport of heat, but something in the car that if they're
saying I'm hungry, I'm hungry that you can reach back and
just give them a healthy alternative for a snack food is
a huge deal.
I know that for working with these kids and with families,
especially when your lifestyle of food choices may be different
from where they came from.
So we'll touch upon that will bit later.
I'm thinking of kids who are used to fast food kids who are
used to eating.
McDonald's three meals a day and that's not what you're used
to but they come to you and that's that's their comfort and
then they're being asked to eat vegetables and fruit and
things that they've never even tried before even the texture
May bother them.
So again, that's a huge other topic but keep that in mind
that food is a big deal and make sure your child's always
hydrated and always has a healthy alternative for a snack
for never feeling hungry.
All right some more.
Here disobeys instructions is what's really interesting to
me. I don't understand all the sounds and words coming at
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me because I'm deprived of sounds and language exposure when
I was young and I can process effectively yet.
I'm sure many of you guys have kind of shot it out through
the house or said across the room.
Hey, can you go do this?
And it seems like they are just completely ignoring you and
they're like, hey, so I'm talking to you, you know, please
go do that Circle you remember whatever it is.
And it just seems like their behavior is outright disrespecting
you however keep in mind is the TV on is there background
noise if its a child playing, you know, another alternative
and doing that is that getting frustrated the third outright
disobeying you or are you in a crowded environment where
there's a lot going on and they're sensories.
They're like at their peak of you know, I need to focus on
where I am and be on guard.
Disney the parks are a huge deal.
You know that kids get overwhelmed even children who don't
experience trauma and neglect get overwhelmed at you know
theme parks and stuff like that.
But say you're at home and it just seems like they're just
completely ignoring you.
I recommend going to their level getting their eyes and having
them see you face to face making sure there's no other distractions
and explaining what it is that you need or you want them
to do because kids are going to be distracted.
They're overwhelmed, especially if they're in your home and
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the beginning stages.
They're getting used to a whole new environment.
They're getting used to the house.
The layout with the the rules are the unspoken rules.
That's a big deal.
I used to work in safe families.
I don't know if you guys have heard of that program, but
it's like a preventive to foster care and one thing that
was really important when we would go into a new home is
that we would tour the house and start to give some of what
the underlying unspoken.
Rules are in your home.
So that's I could go into that a lot.
Like I keep saying but it's really important just to understand
what your expectations are and where this child is coming
from. So again, just making sure we're not seeing them as
just disrespectful but that you understand what's really
going on behind the scenes.
Another important one is is restless and constant fidgety.
I must stay alert and prepared to defend myself at all times
because in the past there is no adults to protect me.
My little brother he came home and he was about seven years
old. We're not sure of his exact age.
He was left in China and he's comfortable with me sharing
the stories up and something private for him that I he's
given me permission to talk about but when he would get overwhelmed,
he would suck his two fingers and he would rock back and
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forth. And for him, that was his comfort.
That was something that he knew I'm overwhelmed.
I don't know how to handle this situation and he would just,
you know start to do that or other times he would get Overly
excited that we would have to be like Eli calm down just
breathe and calm down because for him he was always on high
alert. Always he always scan the room he knew who was in
the room.
He wanted to know what the next step is going to be for him.
And when he didn't know he had fear and that that turned
into being Restless overact hyperactive always moving, you
know, it is exhausting.
You know, why can't they just calm down?
Just to sit down and watch a movie.
He would just be overly anxious.
So that was just something he had to learn, you know to have
trust and with that he would act as body and actually physically
calm down.
Alright again.
This is a lot of information that I have up here.
But when a child experiences early deprivation and poverty
moment, you might see some of these symptoms food hoarding
sensory processing disorders bonding and attachment self-comforting.
So please if any of these stick out to you, hopefully you
can all read them all.
I'm sure we're going to have this we have this tape to can
get this later but having a high threshold of pain that's
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a few down towards the bottom.
That's The important you may under see that your children
have a high threshold of pain.
They may not respond and typical way because they've learned
to adapt to pain and fear in their life at a high level.
So that is due to lack of attachment sensory deprivation
elevated stress again, my little brother it almost seemed
like he could, you know stub his toe or trip and fall, you
know, especially tripping and falling he didn't he just you
know, you get over Early excited and just kind of get out
of control and you follow the ground and normally are responsibly.
Oh my gosh you okay and he would have scraped his elbows
on his knees or something.
He's like, I'm fine.
I'm fine.
I'm all right.
It's because his body had developed such high levels of cortisol
that he was feeling the pain but but emotionally and cognitively
he wasn't feeling it.
So that makes sense.
You know that these kids can just keep on going and going
and because their cortisol levels are so high.
This is really interesting.
Especially with kids not necessarily something in foster
care, but hearing loss due to chronic untreated ear infections.
This can be confirmed kids who just been untreated and the
young age a lot of kids under the age of three of ear infections
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a lot.
And obviously, you know, being a parent you'd go get that
treated get the right medications very easily treated however
with kids who've experienced neglect, especially International
adoptions a lot of kids.
I may have hearing loss because they were untreated for certain
on appearing to time.
So it's really important to look into those things and to
see what their medical backgrounds were if you have that
information and not just assume again that there may be ignoring
you or what not.
They may have significant hearing loss.
All right children with sensory processing dysfunctions.
The world is never safe or predictable again sensory processing
is a huge topic and if some of these stick out to you, I
really encourage you to research or even talk to your pediatrician
about some of these some of these thinks.
This is a symptom of some children that have gone through
trauma and neglect reacted to certain smells perfumes visual
images. Certain textures of food, May really bother them
clumsy lacking balance and coordination afraid of new things
saying I can I can you know, again a lot of children under
the age of one with sensory like rattles or different textures
that they can touch hair smells are exposed to a lot of different
things for to be able to develop as they're growing because
kids are changing constantly in the first few months of life.
However, if a child Slept in a crib or car seat and not interacted
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with their not having these basic things that we kind of
take for granted.
So a child May physically hurt and not know how to communicate
that this is bothering them.
So again taking it slow introducing new things again food
is a very big deal unwilling to wear certain clothes some
kids like they're close very tight or you know, very loose
it all depends, you know.
And what's going on physically in that have any of you guys
heard of a weighted blanket before?
Yeah.
Okay.
Those are great tools to have with kids awaited like is literally
it's a blanket that has like weights in it and the pressure
on top of the body can actually calm and child down neurologically,
especially or even say a child is kind of we'll talk about
this at the end but getting super overwhelmed excited.
Maybe on the verge of a meltdown certain things to think
about how they eat in our they hydrated if they just need
to calm down and step away for a little bit.
They may actually need that type of pressure on top of their
body because once they have that pressure on their body,
it literally calms them down when I was working in the Middle
School in Maitland.
I was doing counseling program.
There were certain types of tricks.
I would tell kids to calm themselves down when they were
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starting to get revved up and kind of add a controlled spiraling.
A lot of that is tightening and loosening their muscles.
So even if you're sitting on a chair if you want to practice
you can real quick but in your hand underneath the chair
and kind of pulling up so your whole body tightens and then
relaxing. So what a child can do that anywhere they can do
it at school.
They can do it at home.
They can do it with a weighted blanket and literally putting
it on top of them so that pressure on them and not too much
or over their face they can breathe and still, you know,
be be safe, but that that pressure will actually help their
bodies calm.
Down another trick that I tell kids is to literally use this
finger. It's kind of like their mustache.
So people may not know what they're doing at the time especially
if they're in school and to put it right here and there are
gosh I'm blanking on the word right now, but actual processes
in the body that when you a pressure point on your body when
you touch this and breathe deeply your body will actually
start to calm down.
So those are just little tricks that if you see your child
escalating that you can say, alright, let's do this.
And breathe and hold there for like 10 seconds.
No one really needs to know.
They may even go like this, you know, they're a team and
they're embarrassed you that or whatever or being a hold
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their chair and let go that is a physical way for them to
be able to calm down so they don't keep on escalating.
All right.
Again, this is just again talking about sensory sensory challenges.
One thing I've really seen is prone to hang limply in your
arms like a sack of potatoes when they're carried.
That's huge a kid, you know, have you ever had a kid who's
just maybe not even defiant but you try to hold them up and
naturally a child would if they're young maybe hold on to
the side of you grip their legs against your side and Hold
Onto You Will child who has sensory delays or defective deficits.
I may not know how to do that.
So you're kind of like come on hold on to me or come on,
you know and a child may not know so they just seem to be
taught and not just kind of falling limply that they have
that just response.
Alright, we've kind of touched upon these these things and
again fear and pain are the two most powerful drivers of
emotional behavior.
These are their triggers a need to control.
So again a child externally may be acting irritable, but
they're feeling disassociated on the inside or anger.
They may Express that crying rage sadness aggression.
These are just certain things that you guys can see these
kids. Through a lens of what's really going on inside them
in them in that topic here.
They talked about the the upstairs brain downstairs brain.
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Do you guys remember when they talk about that in the video
that to me is just fascinating how the brain develops and
all works together.
But one thing that you can do with your child is an example
of Flippin your lid out of anybody's heard of this before
practice it with your kids.
But if you imagine your fist as the brain, okay the downstairs
Rains down here the upstairs brains right here.
Okay that a child in kind of X and when they're escalating
they need to practice certain tools to calm down.
Okay, so that may be in school at home.
Wherever you guys are that literally if they're starting
to escalate their cortisol levels are getting so high and
they're about to have a meltdown, you know, they're flipping
their lid and who's in charge is the upstairs brain?
Okay, so when they are in Meltdown, that means that they
you can't rationally talk to a child who is in meltdown mode.
They're not going to fit like developmentally.
They're not going to be able to understand what you're saying.
So your initial instincts should be to remove them from the
situation again, are they hydrated are they fed?
Calm them down.
You can't rationally talk to a child who is completely freaking
out. So this is just an example of even if a child's.
Ratings they are you Flippin your lid.
Let's calm down, you know like and this is just an example
of things that you can explain to them.
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So they can understand it's not just them feeling out of
control. It's literally a physiological response that they're
having and in order for them to calm down once they're calm
that they can would rationally have a conversation with you
and we're actually understand what they did and how to learn
from it and that kind of stuff but once that lid is flipped.
You just got to calm down the situation and kind of Triage
as you go so just keep that in mind as you're working with
these kids.
All right.
This is just an example of the cerebral cortex and the prefrontal
cortex and what that looks like even to have your kids practice
it so they can start to communicate what is really going
on inside of them.
Okay.
These are strategies to reduce fear.
I know touched upon a couple of them alerting a child upcoming
activities one thing with my brother before he would go to
bed every night.
He would ask me or my mom or my dad.
Whoever what's the plan for tomorrow?
So kids who have gone through Trauma, you know don't know
what to predict so they're always on high alert.
So my mom would literally go through.
Okay tomorrow we're going to wake up and you're going to
have you're going to you can go into much detail as you feel
like you need to go to the bathroom brush your teeth get
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dressed. You're going to come downstairs.
We'll have breakfast ready for you.
This is what's going to be for breakfast, you know that you
can start to play out.
So they know what to expect and that can give them a sense
of safety that they know what the next steps are going to
be. Oobi once that's in the early stages, you know bringing
a child home.
They're developing trust with you.
Now, of course life does not always go as planned, you know,
and that's why when you're talking about these things it's
important to say, well we have to have flexibility.
There may be some changes.
I will let you know this really important again things that
we may take for granted that you have to walk these children
step by step so they can start to understand develop trust
with you to know.
What to expect because if it's just a blank slate and nothing
was communicated with them you're going to start to see behaviors
because there's they feel out of control.
They don't know what to expect so they're always on high
alert or you know, what's going to happen next.
Am I going to be fed?
Breakfast am I going to get lunch?
They may not know that because they haven't been they haven't
received that in the past.
So again making their day predictable giving appropriate
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choices to share control.
It's really important that with kids who have just come from
hard places that you give them choices.
Okay, so instead of engaging in certain like tug-of-war or
battles with you, it's really important as their parent or
caregiver or foster parent to really understand is this a
battle worth fighting with them and picking the ones that
are important and it said of going to a child saying go do
this or go do that.
You know, it's really important that they need to know that
they have a voice.
Because they have not had a voice for a very long time and
they may not have been respected or given choices.
So whatever that may be, you know, say a child says I want
candy for dinner.
Well clearly, they're not going to have candy for dinner,
you know, so well, we're not going to have candy for dinner.
This is what we're going to have.
You know, however, if you do this this or this here will
be your reward at the end.
So it's really a balance that the child can feel heard and
that it's not a constant.
It battle between the two of you and in you know arguing
it out and just dying on this hill choices are a huge deal
realistic choices again speaking, simply and repeating yourself.
These are super important.
Like I was talking about before with kids who are distracted
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may not be able to hear you making it very simple.
All right.
These are dismayed just quick topics being an effective leader.
Feel safest with a kind but firm leader a lot of kids know
how to manipulate.
Okay.
I know you guys already know this, you know that that is
true. You're like that is my kid, you know, they know how
to manipulate so when I share all these things I'm not saying
be a pushover.
I'm not saying just to give in that's not what it's about.
It's being firm.
It's instilling trust and safety to them because again, they
may feel like they have to be in control.
Role of everything and if you don't look like you're going
to be in control.
I'm going to be in control that makes sense is again.
A lot of these kids have had to be in control of their situation
because they've lived in chaos.
That's another really important thing to think about is kids
may feel more safe in chaos, then in a stable situation.
Okay again kids their normal could be chaos in a normal.
relation where you may feel like I'm overwhelmed this is
scary to me that maybe feel more safe to them in the beginning
stages of trying to develop trust bonding attachment because
all the known is chaos I worked with so many kids or even
clients you know the field of birth moms placing for adoption
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on the other end you know and that we come in and the first
thing they tell social workers you know in education this
field is you cannot rescue or save these people they need
to make choices themselves you know so these girls that we
worked with they've been raised in chaos for years years
and years and here we come in try to stabilize their situation
and they don't want it and because that seems uncomfortable
to them get them housing get them food have them in a healthy
positive environment they're used to moving from place to
place to place they're used to domestic violence or yelling
or the TV on all Tied at a blaring level, you know, so these
are just things to see our kids in and understand where they're
coming from that chaos could be a norm for them.
So stability and comfort in nurturing and consistency may
feel uncomfortable at first.
Don't Corner them that's really important.
Never put a traumatized child the position where they feel
cornered or physically threatened permission to touch and
one hand that's really important.
Like I talked about with the hugging and the touching really
make sure that if you're going towards a child who has a
history of abuse or even sexual abuse whatever it may be
physical abuse to that you asked for permission and it may
seem so simple but just saying hey, you know, what?
Can I give you a hug right now and just going in you know,
it's one And then slowly a lot of kids if they feel like
you're getting cornered by an adult their response is going
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to be to fight or flight or in a totally free from the situation.
So it's super important that you are asking permission from
these kids.
And again that is developing a bonding connecting attaching
relationship with them that they may not know or have a foundational
understanding of Helping kids identify safe people, especially
if you're babysitting or using respite before you are dropping
the kids off making sure you explain to them the lay of the
land the house, you know, this is where you can go.
This is where you can't go, you know, especially these are
safe people that may seem like a silly because you trust
them but these kids don't know who they are.
So it's super important is you're dropping a kid off saying
this is Miss so-and-so.
I've known her for a very long time.
She is very kind.
She will you know, this is He will not either do these things
and to instill trust with them that get they don't know and
so babysitters and respite that kind of suffer huge that
you are having conversations prior to leaving because they
may not know you're coming back either.
They may not realize that again food issues are huge just
going to touch upon this again.
These are not a pills to die upon especially in the first
few months of the kid is home.
I know that for some people this is a very big deal.
This is may not agree.
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I worked with a ton of families adoptive families and Foster
families again at the kid is used to eating fast food or
not knowing when they're getting food to come into your home
and say you have well-balanced meals or meat or vegetables.
They may not be used to that.
There are so many especially in the first weeks and first
few months that they are just overwhelmed with so many new
people and new environment new smells new roles food is just
one thing to slowly gradually get into introducing that to
the to the child.
So there are ways that if you have biological child in the
home and certain now, you're not going to run out and get
this child McDonald's as your other kids in the home.
They're not going to be able to eat them, you know.
Not what you're used to so this is a huge topic.
I really encourage you to seek out information at this is
a big deal in your home or if there's battles and fighting
over this kind of stuff because in the first few weeks, that's
it's not going to be in trusting trust attachment bonding
if you're fighting over food or what they can eat what they
feel comfortable with so there are other huge challenges
to overcome that that is something you can get to but not
in the beginning phases.
These are just really Pull tips helping the child meeting
challenges and approachable and introducing a child to a
new environment basically don't catastrophize by painting
the worst case scenario help them know the consequences,
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but not produce fear in matter.
Alright, this is really important honoring their emotions
often carry deep sadness letting them know it's okay to cry
without certain phrases that make some people may use this
Boys Don't Cry.
Why would you cry about that again understanding their emotional
age versus or physical age and allowing them the time to
catch up to that so and that may take years honestly for
a child what they're emotionally acting like and what they've
gone through to catch up to what their physical their in
their To Be A Champion, so respecting their own life story.
This is really important.
Like I said, I had permission for my little brother.
He is now 13, but certain things that I know people are always
going to have questions, especially when you have a new child
in the home.
It is super important to just understand that bears story
is their story that we need to have privacy and respect that
because say the child is two or three years old and whatever
their biological situation maybe we're coming from and you
share with the neighbor people friends or whoever that child
is going to grow up one day and people are going to know
their story and how invasive that may feel to them and embarrassing.
So please just be careful with who you tell information to
and to ask them to respect and honor it because you guys
are going to need support you're going to be able to talk
about things a process it through but it's not something
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that publicly Proclaim.
Sometimes I see things.
Like Facebook or social media and the new kid coming home
and next year and all the details but certain things that
I think of the child's going to grow up one day and they
may see this or may hear about it from a random person, you
know that is not honoring to them.
So that's another way to sit still respect to them that this
is their story for them to share and ask for their permission
to share certain things.
Gosh.
I love Karen Purvis.
I mean she is just awesome and what she does Is like I said,
there's tons of resources out there with more of her videos
very short videos just like this.
So, please keep her in mind when you learn more about this.
But Karen Purvis kar-wai n pu r v is her website again is
called empowered to connect.
Yep, all her videos and they're great.
There's many many on there.
I'm going to kind of move Quickly through the rest of our
material. I really want to get through it as we are leaning
slow and time again a new way of thinking that disciplined.
Most Regional are not going to work try responding quickly.
She talked about a lot of these things that she present Choice
has consequences again.
Don't take it personal recognize that Tantrums are driven
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by Deep rooted survival Instinct and fear.
Okay.
So especially if a child, you know just flies off the handle.
Delight you if you are starting to develop trust and bonding
with this child it's going to be scary to them.
There's going to be there's a honeymoon period there's a
fighting period one of you bring a child home, but if you
are starting to connect with them and they are starting to
feel safe with you do not be surprised if they trigger your
anger at you if that makes sense to you guys because you
are showing them stability consistency and love and their
development. Trust with you and that's scary because they
don't want that trust to end.
But if that's their way of having control, so it's keep that
in your mind as well that as you are building these Bridges
and connectors with them that they may resist you until you
get through those hurdles and you don't turn away or leave
them. You know that you realize that this is the Long Haul
with that with them again.
She talked about the ideal response.
This is really awesome for you guys to look that up.
Again, and go review these things immediate direct affectionate
and efficient action based and leveled one thing she mentioned
in there that I thought was really important is not to expect
them to also have an immediate response to you.
Remember how she counted one two, three because a child who
had may have certain delays in their brain or did not have
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those those needs met.
They will take a little bit longer to respond to you.
So don't view that as disrespect.
Literally count to like three or four to allow them to respond
to you guys.
Be mindful of your voice just high-pitched tentative.
Whiny is perceived as weak and fearful overly loud and intense
comes extremely threatening again, Karen.
Does this in such an awesome way to be firm with the child
but not to scare them.
So again, these are all just really good things is to move
some phrases at the bottom.
Say I mean business is not playing around.
I am the boss although I value greatly and you're not the
boss. So instilling a child that they don't always need to
be in control anymore.
They can trust someone else with that control.
Alright again practical examples keeping your child close
by offering choices.
Say what you mean mean what you say if you're wishy-washy
again, they may know that they can manipulate that so really
follow through on the things that you say is going to happen.
The delicate art of communicating.
No, it's not just saying no, we're not doing that.
However saying we're not going to do that now, but this is
what we're going to do and just explain to them the reasoning
behind know instead of just throwing Not that word no all
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the time.
All right, the really dealing with defies the goal to be
is in tune with the child with the least amount of firmness
and consequences to get an overall response.
All right again, she talked about playful engagement not
everything needs to come at it with a heavy hand but giving
them choices and understanding that you are in control.
They can trust you, but you don't have to, you know build
a mountain out of Molehill.
So again, these are just really what she said in that video
feeling your convictions.
Give one chance to self-correct leaving the child to think
it over Coach the tile to redo it correctly redo is a big
one. That's if you are finding yourself engaging in battles
with your kids allowing them excited and you don't let's
try it over again, Defuse The Situation did that with my
brother all the time and my parents with him a lot that the
first time there's Second time let's try it over.
Let's do a redo that's really important to practice that
with your kids.
Again.
These are the levels of Engagement.
If to feeling dealing with Defiance one at one is the playful
engagement giving them redos.
Whoa, let's try that again have some respect then if it starts
to escalate there's four levels.
The second one is a structured engagement offering choices
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giving the child some time to process it tone a little more
authoritative. Of and slow calling and engagement so say
they're not coming down.
It is escalating.
Now you are up to child's connection is weaker with the adult.
They're losing their ability to regulate.
That's when we go back to the whole Flippin your lid and
it's escalating.
They're getting to that point.
If you get to the protective engagement, that's when total
meltdown isn't doing that means that you need to just assess
the situation remove them from that environment.
Safety during if they're just clearly just out of control
and it all depends on the age of the child.
Are we working with?
You know toddlers is this an angry teenager that can really
hurt somebody in this stage.
So it's really important to assess and know how they can
start to regulate and calm themselves down.
Again getting on their level as quickly as possible to assess
their needs.
These are proactive strategies.
These are just in prohibiting getting to the level for the
protective stage where everything is melting down.
These are just certain things that you guys can practice
with your kids separations can be tricky separation smoother,
especially with schools with the you know, dropping them
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off at a daycare that again you are laying out predictability
and stability for these kids.
No one to protect this is a really important adopted foster
kids need to be reassured and reminded that their parents
will continue to take care of them and protect them.
Even when their kids are out of you reinforcing the message
by using an attachment ritual when they hand off the child
to that's super important again with extended relatives may
be babysitting people on the home frequently knowing that
they're safe with their teachers.
Although certain things.
These are again certain ways to help a child.
And relax getting down there level kneeling sitting speaking
softly again.
A lot of these things she talked about in the video, but
it's just to reiterate that.
These are simple ways for you guys to practice these things.
It doesn't take total brain science to work with these kids
and understanding why they're acting the way they are another
one. I really think is interesting offering a piece of bubble
gum chewing is actually calming or even some suckers or like
a lollipop if it Is actually sucking on something again that
helps them calm down in a situation.
All right, again playful engagement.
These are ways that you guys can do that shared silliness
laughter. It's really important as I've kind of gone over
and over again that there is hope for these children there,
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even though they were born in a situation that say prenatally
developmentally. The first years of life their needs were
not met.
There is hope kids are very plastic and they do are able
to adapt and cope.
Ways that we as adults may not truly understand but it's
also really important to have fun.
These kids want to develop trust and relationship with you.
And if you give them a glimpse of love and nurture and build
those attachments with these kids, even if it's for a short
period of time with in foster care or whatever it may be
and we trust and know that God will use that time in these
children's lives that they will hold on to that.
So I really I think you guys for coming out tonight I really
want to end on time is 11:59.
9 so we're good.
I hope you enjoyed all this material.