Kids are suppose to feel pain!

(warning--graphic photo of her incisions farther down this post)

TingTing had 7 or so vials of blood drawn, then she had to do her pulmonary function test.  Part of that included an arterial blood gas baseline.  This involved the technician drawing blood from the artery in her wrist.  She spent about 3 minutes trying to get hit the artery on Ting's left wrist.  When that didn't work, she moved to the right wrist.  After a couple minutes, she hit it.  

TingTing did not cry, did not squirm, and did not need me to hold her AT ALL.  She sat there with her arm out.  Just sat there.

She didn't cry or fuss in the hospital. 

Today is day 4 post op and she only took 5 cc of Lortab at bedtime tonight. And she didn't really ask for it, just a simple statement that her back hurt just a little so I gave her a low dose to make sure she could sleep.

Think for a moment if your child had these things done.  Do you think he/she would cry? Need you to hold them down to get bloodwork? Lay there and let them cath her with no sound or movement and no one holding her down?

If so, why is it so brave of TingTing to not need someone?

The number of times we heard how brave she was, how tough she was, what a big girl she was...

She's not, well she may be, but more than likely this is due to 2 things:

1.  A learned response--It's not unusual for orphans to learn early on that it doesn't matter.  Crying doesn't elicit the response God created it to get.  Hey, I need someone.  No one comes.  They learn it's a waste of effort to cry.  It won't matter.

2.  It is also related to Sensory Integration Disorder (SID).  Some individuals don't register sensory input in a neurotypical fashion.  Some are hypersensitive to sensory input (loud noises, bright lights, touch, pain... send them into a tizzy).  Others are hyposensitive--they need more intense input to register what a neurotypical person registers with normal input.  This would include pain.   We did a neuro-reorganization evaluation the week before surgery and the therapist noted that she seems to have rather low response to pain.  This also shows up in being able to empathize with others.  Example when a cat has gone missing or we find a chicken dead, she smiles and laughs, and wants to keep talking about it all day.  If she can't feel pain, she can't empathize and respond appropriately.  If it doesn't hurt her, it doesn't hurt anyone.

So... all that to say.  Kids are suppose to feel pain.  It's not "normal" for them not to.   I feel God gave us pain to protect us from more serious damage.  We need to feel pain.

We've got occupational therapy, speech/language therapy, and our newest addition neuro-reorganization therapy going on to help TingTing become better regulated and function at her best.

There's so much more I want to share about TingTing, but I need to figure out how much to tell and what.... (I'd love advice on how you know how much to share about your child's issues and needs.)

Oh yeah, here's the photos I warned about:

This spine X-ray was done in December.  It had gotten SIGNIFICANTLY worse since then.  It was about 40 or so degrees here.  The most recent one was about 65 degrees curvature. (The main curve, there was a secondary above it, but it was smaller.)

Spine x-ray the day after surgery.  They believe they got it down to about 30 degrees and the upper curve is starting to straighten itself.

Here's her incision sites on Friday morning before they discharged us.

Here's a video of TingTing walking today.  Her right shoulder is so much lower... and we're noticing the leg length difference more.  When she takes a step with her left leg, she lifts her body up to where her right foot almost doesn't touch the ground.  You can't see it as much in this video... I'll try to get better tomorrow.

Attachment issues...

I knew being gone this week would stir up attachment issues and it didn't fail to deliver.  Grace was rotten yesterday.  Just wild, disobedient, and downright annoying.  

At dinner I passed a comment to her that it seemed like she was trying to be disobedient in order to get me to go away to prove to something to herself.   After dinner we went have a pow-wow.  She started by telling me that what I said at dinner was right.  She said her heart felt like it was half and half.  She said (with adorable hand gestures), "This half loves you and this half wants to make you go away."  She said Satan was trying to get her to feel that I didn't love her.  She knew I loved her, but he was telling her I didn't.  I was so proud of her for putting her feelings into words and being able to talk about how to handle these feelings in the future, as it will happen again.  That she is in control of her feelings, that we have to go on what we know, not what we feel.  

Btw, this is a common adoption scenario (and NOT just international either!)...  Attachment is not an "is" or "isn't" issue--it is a sliding scale that is always adjusting and changing, which is why I try to have my radar up to watch for these issues and try to parent in view of attachment.  Often times these behaviors can fly just under the radar unless you know to look for it.  It would have been so easy to just chalk it up to hunger, being tired, any number of excuses.  

What does attachment disorder look like? Part 2

I realized that I jumped ahead of myself in the last post.  I want to step back and give you some signs and symptoms to look for.  Remember, not every child will have all the symptoms and not all will show them to the same degree. 

Attachment Disorder Symptoms:

• Superficially engaging & charming 

• Indiscriminately affectionate with strangers 

• Lack of eye contact on parents terms 

• Not affectionate on Parents’ terms (not cuddly)

• Destructive to self, others and material things (accident prone) 

• Cruelty to animals 

• Lying about the obvious (crazy lying) 

• Stealing 

• No impulse controls (frequently acts hyperactive) 

• Learning Lags

 • Lack of cause and effect thinking 

• Lack of conscience 

• Abnormal eating patterns 

• Poor peer relationships 

• Preoccupation with fire 

• Preoccupation with blood & gore 

• Persistent nonsense questions & chatter 

• Inappropriately demanding & clingy 

• Abnormal speech patterns 

• Triangulation of adults 

• False allegations of abuse 

• Presumptive entitlement issues 

• Parents appear hostile and angry

  My info comes from Nancy Thomas.

(I boldfaced the ones that I was seeing in Grace.)

What did this look like in real life?  One frazzled mama!  One of the first things we noticed was that  when someone would come over (especially a man), she would be all over him--sitting on his lap, touching his face, getting all worked into a feeding frenzy of attention.  When we would go to remove her, she would act as though we were in the wrong, that we were the stranger.  I lost count of how often she did this one.  Of course the person she was playing would think it all cute and precious and be flattered that she wanted him/her so much.  She would get so worked up that she was hyperactive and had no self control.    Grace is a very physical little girl. Everything she does is full force and full of gusto. She has broken more toys and books than all the other 3, even more than Connor on asthma meds!  And she wouldn't care.  Tornado Grace would strike again and again with no remorse.  She can be quite rough with pets.  On this one, I'm not positive she was trying to be cruel as much as she just doesn't think and acts so physically in everything she does.  She would often just babble and chatter and not care if you understood her and she loves babytalk.  She asks the most obvious and nonsense questions.  Nonstop.  And could she ever play one parent/adult against another!  (That's triangulation.)    She would get mad at one of us and go climb on the other parent and look back at the first parent and smile this victorious smile (out of sight of the parent she was on).  Very manipulative.  Ahhh, and entitlement?  She thought she deserved everything even if it wasn't hers--things, time, activity.... She couldn't stand to think someone was getting something she wasn't.  

And after all this, don't you think the parent would feel a bit hostile?  Add to this that most parents (of a normally attached child) a RAD parent talks to will tell them, "my child did x too, she'll out grow it" or "she looks so happy and well adjusted, you're exaggerating," or "she's just outgoing."   It's not just one or two of the above signs.  It's the multiple signs, the repetitive signs, and it's what the child allows the other person to see which is probably not at all what she shows her parents.  One thing I cannot stress enough is that God has given us wisdom and intuition.  Trust your parent's intuition, if you feel something's not right, it probably isn't.  You are around the child the most and you see the child in his/her most natural state.

Tune in to Part 3 to see what we have been doing to help Grace to heal.

Mama, you really love ME? (Part 1)

Mama, you really love ME?  

Yes, those were the words that came out of our precious Grace's mouth yesterday.  It was both a statement and a question all in one.  Grace has had such a harder time of adjusting and attaching and understanding our love for her than Shaoey did.  I haven't posted much about her attachment lately, well, probably not much at all.  Why? I guess because it's still such a work in progress.  It's so hard to explain to those around us that she's wounded, fighting our love, unattached when all they see is the silly, loving, attention getting little girl that she lets them see.  

We are making some really good strides forward, but then there seems to be an innate fear that senses we're getting too close and she goes into fight or flight and misbehaves all she can to try to keep us at arms length, to keep us from getting in.  (Doesn't that sound just like how we relate to God and others?)  I've been incorporating a lot more of Nancy Thomas' stategies and philosophy into our parenting.   We are having good results with Strong Sitting and using some of her tactics on Dealing with Defiance.   

STRONG SITTING

Strong Sitting is a gift to the child.  It is a gift of time.  Grace sits cross legged on the floor with her neck and head in line and arms relaxed in her lap.  She is facing a blank wall, preferably in a quiet area near you, without too many distractions.  This works well for us when I'm cooking.  The research shows that the yummy smell of food cooking is a positive sensory input.  Grace has built up to 4 minutes at a time and we aim for 2-3 times a day.  A big thing to note is that this is NOT punishment, I repeat, it is NOT punishment.  I make sure NOT to do it when I am annoyed and cannot place her there in a peaceful loving tone and be there to cheer her on.  Yes, I get to give her positive input such as "I like how you are sitting so straight."  I try not to interrupt too much, but a little encouragement goes a long way.  I can see her smile from the back of her head when I do!  Why do we do it?  Nancy says it well.  Here's an excerpt from her website:

Strong Sitting gives the brain an opportunity to shift in the most successful position. Children who have been traumatized have the wiring in their brain more developed in the inner core (R Complex). This is defense or survival mode. (Fight: arguing, defiance, negative behavior, Flight: running away, Freeze: shutting down) This inner core is where children with RAD are most comfortable because it is the most highly developed section. They seek negative attention and criticism because it puts them in their comfort zone The parts of the mind with RAD that are less developed are the Limbic system (Love and Attachment) and the Neo-Cortex (Logic, reasoning, school work) In order to do it correctly (sitting still, straight and quiet) they must shift gears in their brain to the Neo-cortex by going through the Limbic system. It stimulates both of these parts of the brain! Each minute they spend doing it correctly exercises the logic and/or love parts of the mind. Brain power!

I love it--exercising the love and logic parts of the brain--   

helping our girl to get stronger and healthier!

In Part 2 I'll share how we are dealing with Grace's defiance.  Nancy has some off the wall ideas that really seem to be making a difference in our relationship with Grace.