Attachment Therapist round 2

Yesterday we took Moyz to his appt. at the U with the attachment therapist. Overall it went well and we were not surprised by her concerns and what she said.

When Moyz first got home, he was one of the silent kids that you hear about. He could only sit up on his own so if he tipped over he could not get himself back up into sitting, but he also wouldn't make a sound to let us know he had fallen. The type who you didn't know was awake in the morning or from naps because he didn't make a peep. We were dealing so much with Kembia because she was much more vocal and I was gong to go insane if we somehow couldn't help her with her issues. Moyz would sit in the living room and play by himself essentially for what could have been forever. And he never fussed.

He is NOT this way now. He very vocally lets us know when he is awake, when he wants to be held and when he wants something. He runs all over the house and looks for us when he needs extra time and love. But he still does go to almost any other woman which I have mentioned before, and that was why we decided to take him in to the therapist just to make sure we were doing everything we could for him.

Basically she said that she probably would have classified him when he first came home with an attachment disorder. She does NOT think that he has this now. She placed him on the relationship line where he is learning that I am mom and how to have a relationship with a parent. Incidentally, Kembia is also on this line, just much further along.

Our goal with Moyz is to help draw him out when he closes in and starts to do his lip sucking, and stomach rubbing. He does this when he is stressed, feels like he isn't getting enough attention and other reasons. We are going to focus on interacting with him to draw him out. It is as easy with him as taking a car and driving it up him and tickling him. He laughs and jumps up into our arms and starts talking and interacting a ton.

We also are going to keep going from the therapists suggestion, on not letting anyone hold him or feed him besides Chris and I and the kids in a pinch if we need it. Nobody else should hug him or kiss him as well. Another big thing is to protect him when we are out in public. Now I realize that I am his mom, and perhaps partial, but the therapist said it too so it hopefully won't look so vain! But Moyz is quite a good looking child, and thus people are always coming up to him (Kembia too) in public and talking to him and touching his hand and all that stuff. We are going to try and keep this from happening as much as possible. He may not understand that it's because he is so darned cute, but he does understand that if he flashes a smile or reaches out to strangers they will in turn give him the attention that he sought in the orphanage. Mostly we will do this by my wearing him in the Ergo on the front. I figure people will be less likely to put their face down by him and engage him when he is hanging on my chest. At least I hope so!

The therapist is very happy with his progress, he clearly prefers me to anyone and has shown much improvement. She thinks that he will progress very quickly like Kembia has. But that we should expect some behavior similair to Kembia's as he begins to understand that yes, he does love us and doesn't like to be away from us. we were definitely happy to talk to a professional and basically what she told us is what we had gathered from our own research, but it's things like protecting him more in public that I may not have thought about on my own.

I would definitely recommend a visit with an attachment therapist even if you think that everything is okay. It's much better to go before there are problems, then after.

I can honestly say that both of our kids have shown tons of improvement in the 4 months that they have been home. That really isn't all that long of time and they are already doing so much better.