Quote #4: 
" You're never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read to a child."
- Dr. Seuss
June 7, 2016                                                         Eleventh Edition
  Greetings!
Fun bonding activities and play are such a huge part of living with a child with RAD, that I decided it was time for a whole edition on playtime.

Part of this is from my website, some is new, and some is borrowed.

Enjoy it all!

Love, Karen
Children with Attachment Disorder need lots of positive excitement in their lives. They crave excitement in large doses; if it’s not provided in a positve, fun, parent-led way, they will create their own negative excitement – chaos and out of control behaviour.

Children with RAD also need fun activities and playtime with their parents to help them to want to bond and spend time with their parents. Parents they see as being “boring’ or ‘no fun’ will not be parents that they will put a lot of effort into being with.

As Roald Dahl says:

“A stodgy parent is no fun at all! What a child wants – and DESERVES – is a parent who is sparky!“

Parents that create positive excitement and are fun to be around will be the ones the child will want to be with!

Play is used to:
  • Build attachment
  • Eliminate negative excitement (chaos)
  • Build brain power
  • Get exercise
  • Learn motor skills and balance
  • Teach children how to have fun and be fun!

Remember:
  • Parents should be in charge if the activity – NOT the child
  • Keep activities short to hold your child’s interest throughout playtime
  • End when the parent decides – NOT the child
  • Laugh and be goofy!!

— get LOUD — be CrAzY — make SILLY faces —
get EXCITED —  be CREATIVE LAUGH!! 


Here a few activities that help with sensory and cognitive regulation that can be turned into fun parent-child interactions:
  • Wheelbarrow walking
  • Bouncing on an exercise ball
  • Sucking applesauce through a stra
  • Rubbing lotion firmly onto arms and legs
  • Blowing through a 3-foot long tube (from local hardware store, choose one that has the diameter of a drinking straw) into a big bowl that has 3 inches of water and 2 drops of dish soap in the bottom
  • Swimming
The following article was written by Ce Eshelman, founder of The Attach Place for Strengthening Relationships. 
Visit her website to sign up for Daily Wisdom for Adoptive Parents 
MORE AND MORE I BELIEVE PLAY TRUMPS EVERYTHING

Dear Parent,

Go ahead, call me a broken record.  At nearly 60-years-old, play is not my first or second language.  I have to work at it, and I am still prone to seriousness.  Boo-hoo.  I know for a fact I myself am happier when playful, but it wasn’t done with me as a child, so I had to learn it as a parent.  This might be true of you, too.  Or, if play does come like rain used to in Spring, then you may be suffering under the misconception that attachment challenged and traumatized children are so naughty that you have to be serious in order for them to know you mean business.  Otherwise, you might think, your children could grow-up into mass murderers or anti-social, ne’er do-wells.  There is true terror in that thinking.

A mean task master, fear often scares the play right out of most parents of adopted children.  While adoptive parents are known to post lively, deliriously happy and grateful comments on Facebook, let this not distract from the underlying realities inside most attachment and trauma challenged relationships–chaos regularly oozes from under backyard fences, around window sills, and through carefully locked exterior doors.  The wounds of childhood abuses last a childhood and adoptive parents are on the front lines doing triage and in the background doing the healing.  Who has time for play?

That is my point really.  You  must make the time to play every day of your child’s life, without exception, because that is the healing language of children.  Play is not just a little thing you do when you can squeeze it in.  It is the whole shebang–the one true natural therapy.

Play is a biological imperative hardwired into children that sustains them while their bodies grow and their brains learn to handle the conflicting feelings produced by the slings and arrows of budding adulthood4.

Parents, if all you do differently is amp up your smiling face, throw on more laughter, and find the silly deep within your core,  you will be applying some of the best naturally occurring salve available for what ails the wounded heart of your child.

The Attach Place
Center for Strengthening Relationships
Love matters,
Ce



Father's Day Poem

A Dad is someone who
wants to catch you before you fall
but instead picks you up,
brushes you off,
and lets you try again.

A Dad is someone who
wants to keep you from making
mistakes
but instead lets you find your own
way,
even though his heart breaks in
silence
when you get hurt.

A Dad is someone who
holds you when you cry,
scolds you when you break the rules,
shines with pride when you succeed,
and has faith in you, even when you fail.

--Unknown
I don't know how many Dads actually read this newsletter, but for those of you who do, I want to thank you for all you do for your familie! 
I know a lot of the time (ok, almost all the time) I talk about and to Moms, and what they do for their kids, but Dads are like the cheerleaders and the rescuers from disaster at the end of the day.

So, thanks Dads, and Happy Father's Day!

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you HOPE and a FUTURE.”

Jeremiah 29:11  

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