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Witch ... please go carefully your admission is 100% understandable but..... this is a public view & practitioners could take another view ? maybe re-phrase some comments x

Ok... I think PAS could help & maybe fund via asf ( after assessment of need) with joint or simply parent therapeutic support xxx You might need to push & be persistant...

At 6 things sadly will only ramp up from here ?

Skweek has suddenly morphed right now & is permanently Mr Angry & lashing out, shouting, raging at every turn.... so hard child on parent violence.... for us it is testosterone & some.... He is 12....

Teen years all our children seem to naturally go into overdrive xxx You have my sympathy but things I am sad to say could well get much worse before they get better due to hormones xx be ready & get yourself some prof input & parent therepy xxx

Other wise ones I am sure will be along soon.... do 'chat' me if you are a member & I can share much more...

Please be cautious on the public viewxx

Xx moo xx

PS you are doing a great job against impossible odds ... you are only human after all... your supermum outfit is always gonna slip a bit xxx

6 was a difficult age for my son- also baby placement. We assumed attachment, as did our then pasw, paed, Camhs - because, well, you know adopted can only mean attachment ?. Hmm. Except that wasn’t the case for him and may not be the case for your child.

What’s her behaviour like in school? How does she manage social interactions with others? What’s underlying her meltdowns/panic attacks? I find it easier to see behaviour as language and try to figure out what’s underlying that behaviour. Invariably there will be a trigger - it’s just not always easy to identify.

It might help to keep a diary - so you can figure out the antecedents, ie what happened pre the aggression? It is often the mother figure who bears the brunt of the behaviour - she can’t take it out on bm as she’s not there. You’re the closest so you get it.

What was pregnancy like? Drugs, alcohol, stress? Domestic violence? What are her genetics? Any history of, eg, adhd, asd - diagnosed or more likely undiagnosed. I wouldn’t assume it’s all attachment or trauma related, nor is there much point in comparing behaviour of non-birth siblings. Different genes plus behaviours can present in different ways at different times.

Has your daughter bern seen by paeds, camhs? Behaviour or learning support in school? Ed psych?

In all likelihood you’re going to need more than simple strategies to control your response - which absolutely yes you have to do. I do appreciate how hard that can be - I was the target for many years - but it’s about understanding why. Sometimes the only thing we can change in the short to medium term is our response. They can’t always change do we have to. Different strategies work for different children. Giving my son a safe space to retreat to when feeling overwhelmed helped him. Certain activities helped to regulate - building, creating, Lego, art. But it was never as straightforward as ‘just’ attachment - he was dx adhd at 6 and asd at 9.

Could there be anything else in the mix? Fasd?

Hello Witch

I am sorry to hear this is happening for you and your family. ?

I have sent you a DM to offer further support.

Best wishes

Scott

I really empathise as I am in a similar position with my 7 year old who has attachment issues (has been assessed by various types of professionals and doesn’t seem to have anything else) - who at times is extremely aggressive and says very upsetting things.

Like you, I can keep calm and deflect 9/10 times but the other times I react in a way which I know is not helpful, only escalates the situation and about which I feel regretful afterwards. It’s very hard when there are sometimes numerous aggressive incidents per day, no matter how resilient you may be.

We have been on an Incredible Years parenting course for adoptive parents, which was helpful and which focussed on positive parenting. We have also recently completed a Non Violent Resistance course which focussed entirely on preventing and reducing child to parent aggression (by the way I have heard that NVR is also used in training for prison officers!). This was useful too BUT for us nothing has been a game-changer yet. It’s all small steps. I am just taking as much help as I can get from adoption services and the Adoption Support Fund, in the hope that some of it will stick.

We have just begun a therapeutic assessment with PAC UK which I hope will open the door to more tailored therapy for my son and us as a family. Again funded by ASF. Like you, I think I need more help with keeping myself regulated even under the most trying of circumstances.

It takes a long time to get help after you refer yourself to post adoption services (ie took nearly a year to get this therapeutic assessment started) so I would start now.

All the best!

Thank you Scott, Moo, Donatella, Beebo, for your advice and experiences. I will definitely look in to an NVR course Beebo, it sounds like it might at least be of some help. Donatella, for now the child psychologist has not identified anything other than attachment issues, but we know BM comes from a familial history of utter chaos for generations. So it is not inconceivable that our little girl is burdened with issues other than just attachment.

To make matters more complicated, we have recently emigrated and now live in Europe. So getting PAS or other UK based services is not going to be possible, I think. I don't really want to raise the matter of me feeling overwhelmed sometimes with our girl to her Theraplay therapist as I don't want her to know! So I'm thinking of raising the matter with our family doctor, maybe he can refer me/us for some much needed parental support.

Hello witch how lovely to see you but sorry things are tough

good grief you are HARD on yourself. Pfff 9/10 is pretty amazing in my books. I agree re NVR.

I do think that there’s something’s I can suggest that might help.

1) sticker chart. FOR YOU. You can choose whatever you like as a prize but great parenting gets a sticker- no swearing, made dinner, went out to do something I ENJOY, in bed before 11 all get stickers. The kids can’t manage reward and sanction but I’m quite good at it!

2) get therapy. If your child is being seen by CAMHS- you have a right to support. If not CAMHS then do try and get it elsewhere. Psychotherapy- Might be a goer.

3) check out the stuff on CPV

4) make sure you have something other than home going on in your life - a night out at the cinema, book club, tap dancing, learning sign language- whatever but BOOK IT.

Take great care

Just to add to Peartree's comments. Sticker chart for me has worked wonders. Not monitoring my behaviour, but I get one for unwanted behaviour from AD. It says mummy's reward chart at the top, I've coloured it in rainbow colours, AD's favourite, listed all the unwanted behaviours and added what I get for X amount of stickers. E.g. biscuit for one, watching telly uninterrupted for 5 all the way up to a night out for 10. I can save up stickers for a bigger treat or trade in for a small one. I thought if nothing else it'll make it all more bearable. First day was horrendous, AD raging against the new regime and how unfair it was that I should be getting all these things. Then decided that I would certainly not get to watch telly uninterrupted. So reigned herself in. Ran to her bedroom to hide each time she got angry. Came back looking for cuddles and being much more aware of her triggers. It's been six weeks and it's done much more for us than NVR. I feel I'm seeing my real child for the first time. We connect. She got worried that if she behaved I would never get anything nice again until I explained that her bring kind and happier would be the biggest reward of all since it would make us all happier together. So either way from now on I would always win. It seems she needs me to take complete control and is thriving on it. Long may it last. Also please PM me/chat if you can. We too moved abroad last year.