Friday, April 8, 2011

Expert shares insights about attachment in children

Written by Olivia Yates
For Off 68

Traditional parenting approaches in our culture are based on the expectation that children have a secure "attachment" relationship with their parents. When children are deeply attached to their primary caregivers, the foundation for the child's healthy development has been laid.

Kinship Center professionals see children who have suffered intense and chronic abuse and neglect, and who have experienced broken attachments through many moves in foster care, says Allison Davis Maxon, LMFT, a Kinship Center regional executive director who specializes in adoption attachment and trauma and who will be the centerpiece of a major West Coast conference in San Diego next month.

"Imagine parenting a child who does not respond to typical parenting strategies, who is in so much pain that he puts a fist through the wall or cuts himself when he is asked to finish his vegetables," Maxon said. "Adoptive parents of children who carry the scars of abuse, neglect or abandonment often feel that everything they do is ineffective, and it's not unusual for them to admit defeat and return a troubled child to the public child welfare system. The national disruption [adoption failure] rate for such children is about 25 percent." FULL STORY

Or the kids might be really PISSED OFF about being kidnapped from their homes to begin with.

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