Category Archives: Attachment Hope

Free Trust Based Adoptive Parent Support Group in Sacramento CA

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Presenting a new monthly Trust-based Adoptive Parent Support Group in Sacramento. This is absolutely free with childcare provided.  Come join us.
 
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support group 2
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Come out in support of yourself.
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The No Know

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How many times have you heard, “I know!” from your attachment challenged child?  Can’t imagine the number, right?
 
Don’t be fooled by the ferocious nodding and insistent remarks, accompanied by eye rolling, that make it seem like you are insulting their intelligence by giving them information. Many feel stupid, shame and even fear when they experience the vulnerability of their inexperience in the world. Most of our kids know a lot about survival but little practical about social engagement and living life in a satisfying way.  
 
Stop and gently check what they tell you they know.  Often they have only part of what they need to succeed.  Be sure to do it kindly and with empathy for that shame spiral that comes with not knowing it all.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Shame is often just under the surface. Go easy.
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Despicable Me

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Our attachment challenged kids do some despicable things.  If any one of us did them, we would be nothing short of mortified.  Yet, our children often angrily blame others for their actions or deny culpability or insist it didn’t happen at all.  The feeling of living in crazy town gets magnified for parents during these times.  Dysregulation zone ahead.
 
I know it doesn’t always seem like it, but our kids feel like they are evil to the core.  They don’t understand themselves or their behaviors.  They just do stuff.  They feel shameful.
 
Our kids are busy as bunnies trying to fill-up the holes they often feel inside their hearts.  If they just had that one thing, got to go to that one place, got to wear that one see-through dress, got that one girl, got someone to have sex with…the list goes on.  They are constantly doing things that they feel will do the trick, ease their nagging emptiness.  When the first thing doesn’t fill it up, they try the next and the next and the next.  Rarely do they have the insight to stop and say, “Maybe I am chasing the wrong things.”  
 
It is our therapeutic parenting task to unfold with our children their fierce drives, their survival modes, their repetitive patterns. We must do that with intensely accepting empathy for their feelings, their behavior, and their true infantile needs.  Above all, we must not shame them for despicable behavior in a misguided attempt to make them change their behavior. They already feel ashamed and it hasn’t stopped them yet. Another dose of shame will not be the answer.
 
Up the empathy.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Empathy is the antidote for shame.
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I Owe Ya One

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This is a make-up note for YOU–my mea culpa for missing Thursday’s missive.
 
Well, my son, 18.1 yrs., is melting down in tears every day about the idea of having to move away from his Mommy Dearest–that’s me.  Even I am not so hard-hearted as to turn a blind eye; he is not strong enough yet to face the world–even with total funding and live-in adult support.
 
Can you hear my apron strings reeling in like a fishing line once cast into the deep end of the ocean, now pulled back fishless and bait free.
 
We try and then we try again.  That is what it is like to test the advances of development.  We will try again in a few months.  Eventually, he will be ready to make the leap.  I can wait.  
 
In the meantime, I am getting a housekeeper.  His perpetual messiness is too much for me to live with happily. I am grateful I can afford this luxury. It will make my life easier.  I really want an easier life.  So be it.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Thursday Saturday la la… la la la la
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Inability To See

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I lost a day somewhere and forgot to send a note to YOU.  Mea Culpa.
I am often struck by how difficult it is for our attachment challenged children to link our parental consequences with their own behavior. Often, they see parenting as just mean. Executive function is delayed in children from difficult beginnings.  They need a lot of empathy, gentleness, structure and very clearly explained natural consequences to slowly bring that part of their experience forward.
Yesterday, my son told me that he thought I was a mean parent.Wha?  Okay, I do remember one of my finer moments wrestling him to the ground to get back something stolen from me.  That was pretty darned mean and I clearly lost my mind in the heat of the battle. Pretty sure that is what he was going to throw out and up into my face.  Shame.  Shame.  Shame on me.  That was mean.
When I asked him what he was remembering that he thought was mean, he recalled to me not getting to spend the night with a friend a few weeks ago for no reason except to be mean.  As I recall, he had not gone to school for three days that week; had not lifted a finger toward his chores in three days; and had refused to speak to me for three days just prior to his request to spend the weekend with a friend.  
 
Honestly, I remember saying no without explaining why to him.  I thought he would make the link.  Now I hear no such link made: therefore, I am mean.  He totally missed the actual mean stuff.
 
Make sure you explicitly link your actions to your child’s behavior or the learning will be lost (it might be anyway, but not for lack of linking).  After all, isn’t that what consequences are meant to be–teaching aids.  And the learning should not end in a conclusion that YOU are mean.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Lost Thursday Thursday.  Found Friday Friday la la… la la la la
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Killing and Lying Are Different

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The whole world is living at the DMV.  I went three times yesterday and the parking lots at both DMVs were full out to the street all three times.  So, no ID for the boy.
 
Anyway, that’s not what I wanted YOU to ponder today, unless of course you are on your way to the DMV right now.  I wanted you to consider that lying is not the same as killing and for some reason we parents conflate the two.
 
Most killers lie. Most people have lied. Most people have not killed.  See? Two entirely different things.  
 
When your attachment challenged child lies, treat it with a “fix-it” ticket, not a federal indictment.  Lying is a survival skill.  When the negative impulsive acts become better mediated by that part of your child’s brain that governs executive function, cover-up, reflexive, self-protective lying about those acts will subside. 
 
Lying does not lead to killing, so stop being afraid it does.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
 
 
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Wednesday Wednesday la la… la la la la
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FOMO Is A Thing?

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I am from the generation that thought up acronyms such as SWAK and TGIF.  We were cute. I stuck with the learning curve all the way through TMI and WTF, and then I just couldn’t care anymore. Perhaps my age caught up with me.  I am old.
Today FOMO came across my lap-desk.  What the heck is FOMO? Long FO, Long MO. Do you know it?
Fear Of Missing Out.  FOMO.  FOMO has spurred the best crop of dumbphone apps to help us be in the know and instantly notified of thousands of things happening simultaneously, thereby quelling further FOMO.
On another note: My son emerged from his boy cave this morning fully dressed, jacketed, shoe’d (unusual for holiday jammie fests), with a bag of trash over his shoulder, evoking his usual adeiu, “See ya later Mom.  Love ya.”
Incredulously, What are you doing?
“I put a clean bag in already, and I’m taking the trash out on my way to Jamba Juice.  I’m multi-tasking. You said multitasking is impossible, but not for me.”
WTF. TMI.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
 
 
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Monday Monday, la la…la la la la
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This One Is For YOU

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This one is for YOU.
Super Stong Heart 2
Take a victory lap.
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
 
 
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Happy Valentine’s Day, Moms and Dads.
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Stop and Notice

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Sometimes we parents are seriously Type A toward our attachment challenged children.  We are forever working our kids to be better, be focused, be kinder, be organized, be mature, be motivated, be normal.  Wha?  Our kids by definition are working as hard as they can figuring out how to feel safe in their own skins, in their own families. This thing called family life is complex and filled with emotional landmines. 
 
From where your child began, stop and notice how far s/he has come. Give yourselves a little break from bettering every moment. Slow down. 
Celebrate now. 
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
 
Lift your head up from the grindstone.  It’s nice up here.
 
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.

Do-Si-Do Around We Go

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Oh man, I am tired of the do-si-do emotions that go on inside myself when I am trying to hold a loving stance without ensnaring my son with my own emotional hooks.  I can feel myself emotionally tilt forward with hooks out, then catch myself and pull back to neutral.  Then I tilt forward again–hooks out–only to catch myself and pull back to neutral again.  Back and forth, back and forth.  I am an emotional square dancer, perpetually do-si-do-ing in order to maintain my calm, maintain my love, and maintain my neutrality in the face of shenanigans with giant meat hooks. 
 
I desperately wish for my son and myself a moment of being an introverted and relaxed wallflower.  Thanks for the invite, but I’ll sit this one out.
 
Love Matters,
Ce Eshelman, LMFT
 
Do-si-do and around we go.
 
The Attach Place Logo Next Trust-based Parent Course is planned for March 14th and March 15th, 10am to 3pm each day,  in a new back-to-back, two-day format. Save the dates.
Next Hold Me Tight Couples workshop by Robin Blair, LMFT at The Attach Place is planned for April 17th, 18th and 19th.
The Attach Place supports The Wounded Warrior Project by providing free neurofeedback to veterans.  Feel free to send a soldier our way for an assessment.
Feel free to send this link to friends or family members who you would like to sign-up for Daily YOU Time: Wisdom for Adoptive Parents.