A major public awareness campaign would be a wonderful thing.

I actually wrote to Lou Dobbs and Sanjay Gupta of CNN asking them to do a feature or a series on attachment disorder - Sanjay Gupta because it fits within his medical field, and Lou Dobbs because of his comments and coverage of the recent VA incident. (Particularly comments like, how could this young man be free to walk the streets after his diagnoses - how many adoptive parents have had their kids handed back to them because insurance won't cover the necessary treatment, or because the kid hasn't done something dangerous enough yet for legal involvement.

When it came to mental health professionals, we basiscly encountered three sorts: those who didn't give any credibility to attachment disorder (and seemed to have no interest in exploring the possibility), those who were neutral (did absolutely nothing), and those who at least seemed to "get it", and actively pursued courses of therapy. Unfortunately, the first two catagories are what we ran into the vast majority of the time. That left our family "flapping in the wind" trying to find face-to-face resources for therapy. That meant that we had to do the research, find information, support and encouragement on our own.

However, as frustrating as that was at the time, I think that my husband and I are the better for it in many different ways.

Nancy, If only the social workers and CPS could be educated...that in and of itself would be HUGE. I recently found a journal called the "journal of child abuse" and in perusing the articles, there is a lot of stuff on educating mandated reporters, but nothing on attachment disorder. NADA. Except for being carful about believing persons who report ritual abuse, I couldn't find anything. I realize I may be treading on shaky ground, but I have come to believe that a lot people in social work have a lot hurts in their background and they believe what THEY WANT TO BELIEVE and when these kids are SO DANG cute and SO WELL BEHAVED (in their presence), well, its easier to believe the harried parents and mother especially are to blame. People believe what they see, not what is true.

We tried to educate the staff at the local public school and the school pyschologist had never heard of "therapuetic parenting". I gave her all sorts of resource to look at from Nancy Thomas's classroom room DVD to Deborah Hage's printouts on "Going to Your Room Practice" to Foster Cline's "Uncontrollable Kids" to a wonderful little publication by a social worker in Connecticut called "The Unattached Child in School", which really described so many of my son's behaviours and why he did them and what the staff could do to address them. His teacher got it and was helpful; however, the rest of the staff couldn't [wouldn't??] provide the boundaries necessary for my son to feel safe. And then there was the special ed teacher who told me that she could solve all my son's problems by rewarding him with school lunch. Well, he quickly showed her...and she kicked him out after three weeks. (I didn't say "I told you so"; I was too tired of trying to educate the educators)

We've tried "play therapy". I really dislike having to "educate the therapist". She was willing to listen, but still "believed" my son and was shocked when I would say "Uh, he just lied to you almost the whole session". In the end it was worse than a waste; it caused quite a lot of behaviours because my son doesn't feel safe when he gets away with things. We've gone to several therapists that I thought were quite good and understood attachment and RAD. Honestly, having that support really helped a lot, even if my son didn't make the progress I would have hoped for. I didn't think I was the crazy one.

We chose our pediatrician because he had adopted. And, forgive me for saying this, but I can't tell you how glad I was when our son was rude to him and told him that he didn't trust him. The pediatrician looked at my husband and confessed that we knew more about what was going on with our son than he did. He recommended a consultation with International Medicine at Oakland Children's Hospital. I groaned. Another professional I have to educate!!! The pediatrician called ahead to get us a consultation and called us to tell us that the head of International Medicine said "They don't need to start over again. I have seen some of the toughest kids from the country they adopted from. They need someone to prescribe.". Well, that was some validation. But it is so rare. The last of three therapists we went to that understood attachment was the best and our son actually did some work, but then he stopped and so we are trying some medication as RAD is only one of about seven or eight other diagnoses. I digress, and want to ask you, Nancy, if you have written about or read any of Steven Gray's books or heard him talk? He is a pediatric neuropsychologist in Colorado Springs. He's written "The Maltreated Child: What Lurks Beneath" and "Motivating Marvin". I laughed so much reading the former book. He is a professional that understands our population of children. Even here in CA with Stanford and all their research, there is really not anyone that truly understands. We had our son evaluated by Dr. Gray. Our psychiatrist here in CA is better than most, but during this last visit, our son pulled two things that I finally had to tell the psychiatrist were "games" on my son's part. At this point the psychiatrist said that I really needed to go back to getting our son in therapy. I responded that we had spent bucketloads on therapy and we were taking a break at this point. Besides the evaluation from Dr. Gray, which our psychiatrist had, indicated unless my son's extreme anxiety and world class control needs were addressed by neurotherapy and / or medication, all the therapeutic parenting and therapy would continue to move to move microscopically if neuro and/or pharmacologically avenues were not tried. I want to clarify that we don't believe for a minute that there is any medication to address RAD, but some of my son's other dxs have been helped by the medication. And he is continuing to dabble in school work --at his request--and this is really something for him.

My asthma doctor thinks that his kids should play with my kids because "Your kids are so well-bahaved!" I gave him a Mona Lisa smile. And said nothing.

The dentist is sympathetic but continues to tell me my son really needs braces and it will be difficult for him to floss. The dentist informed our son of what the results of not taking care of his teeth will be. It seems to make an impact as I informed the dentist of our situation.

Honestly, Nancy, I have a mantra that for the most part I have found true: "If they don't get it in five minutes, they wouldn't get it in five hours of talking or any number of books". So I am learning to take every advantage of keeping my mouth shut--unless I perceive there is real interest.

Unless Brad and Angelina or some other "luminary" has a kid with RAD, I don't think much light will come to the issue. Look at what Christopher Reeve's accident and resulting paralysis did for that particular malady. Even Ronald Reagan's public admission of hearing loss and wearing a hearing aid was the only thing that convinced my grandma that getting a hearing aid was okay.

patricia

Patricia wrote tings so eloquently. I haveread all over here today...and having worked in esidential Care for twenty years and adopted tow children with RAD myself, this has been a great read all together....The Angelina Jolei thisng..while i wish them all the best in the worl..what are the odds that the last child, upsetting the birth order stimulates some reaction from the older child...who may or may not already be feeling dethroned by the new babies....then what are the odds that a three year old as shy as their newest appeared does not have some sort of attachment disorder? I actuakky heard she was thinking of another? If that were true I would anticipate at this point she is meeting her own needs not theirs but that could be gossip...My kids by Gods Grace adopted at 4 and nine but 3 years apart although birth siblings...had a therapist in CA 13 years ago who not only knew about attachment and what RAD was making immediate diagnosises but was our therapist for a decade until we had to move. We have been through IT ALL but they are teenagers I am proud of and I know without all that work and support, I might not feel that so strongly~ Kim Ahrenholz

Thank you Patricia & everyone else that posted here. Patricia - your post particularly - you summed up our experiences - except that our son's school teacher turned us in to CPS for medical neglect (they said he had ADHD & just needed ritalin) & the CPS investigator had only heard of RAD & refused to read any of the medical reports or documentation & took our son away at 9PM at night - with 3 policemen & with our other 3 children watching in horror! What a nightmare! Our oldest daughter equated it to what she's read about Nazi Germany when they'd come to your house, do a search & when they left one of your family members was missing. We had to not only educate the doctors, but the personnel from child protective services, the lawyers, & the judge!?! Wouldn't you think that the people most responsible for the illness would know something about it? After our son was in a foster home with 2 other violent children for 17 days, he was returned to us, our case was closed & our name was cleared (after 6 months of legal work & CPS review of our file) only to be told that we are doing a great job & that we can adopt again if we'd like to. I don't think so. Anyway, I want to thank you for sharing. I hate that you have the same experiences - particularly in Norther CA. We lived there when we adopted our son, but moved to TX within a year after the adoption was final. I always wondered if we would have better support & resources if only we would have stayed in Ca. You have helped my guilt tremendously because you have had the same experiences that we have had in TX. As sad as it all sounds, you have helped me tremendously knowing that we are not alone. Thank you.

I got on here looking for more answers, but now I can count my blessings. Our daughter is RAD, but we do have the compassion from the caseworkers even though we adopted her and we go to church with the director of a children's home which is where I am coming to terms with sending our little girl at least knowng my friend will see her everyday. Rad is very hard to deal with especially when they are perfect angels everywhere but home. I showed video tape to family members after they were shocked we don't have "aren't you being a little hard on her" anymore.