Reactive Attachment

Life  is challenging these days.  Raising a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder is a constant roller coaster of love, guilt, inadequacy, and frustration.  There are so many moments that I have questioned my abilities as a mother.  So many moments when I have questioned whether or not I have the Hutzpah to give my daughter everything she needs while maintaining my sanity and the rest of my family relationships, and the rest of my life.

 RAD is a disorder that makes it very difficult for my daughter to feel emotions the way the rest of the world does.  She struggles every day with so many things.  Relationships, friendships, even family relationships are hard for her.  She does not have the little voice in the back of her head that the rest of us have, the voice that helps us make decisions.  She struggles a lot with her identity and with her self esteem.

 When I first made the decision to become an adoptive parent, I wanted to be a mom so badly that even though I knew that I may be raising a child that has been abused and has issues associated with that abuse, I didn’t really understand what that meant.  Even when I met her, she was this beautiful 3 year old that seemed happy and vibrant.  Within moments of being introduced to her she crawled into JD’s lap and politely asked him to read her a story.  We were both totally smitten from that very moment.  I had been told that she had been diagnosed with RAD but I didn’t have any idea what it was or what it meant.  I saw this little angel and thought there is no way she can be anything other than “normal” and I couldn’t wait to be her mother!  As she has grown she has both struggled at times and at times seemed to have no issues and we all have become much more knowledgeable about her disorder.  We have seen many symptoms manifest and then fade away only for something else to show up later.  Through it all my love for her has multiplied thousands and thousands of times.

 Sometimes we really battle.  My child has a vibrant personality.  She is very charismatic and people are drawn to her initially and that is part of what makes RAD so difficult is that others only get to see the charming, beautiful girl that she wants them to see and they can’t understand the issues that she has.  I always felt like I was determined to “fix” her.   Well, it’s not that simple and when I realized that I could not “fix” her I started feeling helpless.  I felt like a bad mother, after all mothers are supposed to be able to do everything for their children.  The stress at times is overwhelming for our entire family and when she is on a rampage it affects us all in a very big way.

 My beautiful girl has really been struggling lately and we have had to work on getting her through it.  I know that as she grows she will experience difficulties that she does not understand and cannot control, difficulties beyond the normal growing pains.  She has been my primary focus this last week and we are spending some girl time to recharge and rejuvenate…

 I have not really followed anything this week as my focus has been on my family.  I have been to gym 3 days this week so far, I am looking forward to going tomorrow (my heaviest workout day of the week) and releasing some tension and some stress.  I am also gaining control of my food plan again and tomorrow I am back on track.  I am committing to staying on plan this week no matter how hectic it gets and I am committing to getting to the gym every day.