at Bethany Christian Services

file:///centervideo.forest.usf.edu/...FAPAConf/caring/VEED-subtitles_Caring%20for%20Children%20from%20Hard%20Places_default.txt[11/30/2020 11:39:42 AM]

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


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.


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.


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.


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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


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.


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.


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


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


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


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


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


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.


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,


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


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


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


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


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


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


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,


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.

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