Parent & Child Attachment Podcast Episodes

The root of the unattached child’s issues is not their will. It’s not a problem of their will nor is it a problem of the caretaker’s parenting skills, but it is their brain which has been hurt, their brain has been wounded. Welcome everyone to Breaking Bread, the podcast brought to you by Apostolic Christian Counseling and Family Services. Craig Sticking is in the studio today. Welcome, Craig. Hi, Matt. Glad to be here. Great to have you here.  

When Craig’s in the studio, you know that we’re going to be talking about content that has to do with children. And today’s topic is going to be reactive attachment disorder, and that’s a mouthful. That it is. And there are probably some in the audience that are tracking already with us. But most are probably not.  

So yeah, let’s unpack that term a little bit. What is this about? Sure, looking at reactive attachment disorder and some other descriptors is now called developmental trauma disorder. So, we’re looking at this particular package of experiences that has created a lack of a child to be able to attach and then the trauma that’s occurred that is also then impacting that attachment. 

Okay, so attachment is an important word here. Absolutely. So what does attachment mean? Let’s set our foundation on what is a good attachment? What does that look like? Starting off, attachment is that deep and lasting connection between a child and a caregiver established in the first 36 months of life. 

It profoundly impacts every part of us. Our mind, body, and soul. It’s a two-way connection. Both sides care about each other. It’s a relationship construct. In other words, this idea of attachment is something that’s being built and formed. Even over time, we’re continually doing that. Sometimes it’s easy to think of it as a trait. 

But really, it’s a construct that is built over time. Children attaching to the parent, but also the parent attaching to the child. Yeah. And this attachment is significant. Being able to have that healthy love and care and respect for each other. It’s amazing as we look at this topic, just how significant this ability to have attachment which builds relationships is. Some of the positive things that come out of that is that we’re able to have appropriate and healthy self-worth and self-value. We’re able to manage our impulses, our feelings, and we’re able to build powerful relationships with others around us. 

Now, you mentioned those three things there, that in my mind seem very separate from attachment, but what you’re saying is there’s a causal relationship between attachment and being present. Yeah. And self-worth is being impacted by that. Yeah. Is that true? It’s all connected together. It’s all interwoven. 

You know, we are fearfully and wonderfully made, and we are pretty complex human beings with all the different pieces, but they all are woven together in that. And would you say this is a natural process? That’s why it goes without our notice in most cases? Yeah, and it occurs even in utero that mom and her mindset toward the life within her and her care and protection of that and then as it moves into the first two to three years in their life how significant that happens and how beautifully it occurs. You know a baby as she’s close to her mom whether feeding or being taken care of creates this proximity for them and that first year that the child has a need to be fed, changed, is cold, is warm, is scared, has a need, and it gives a reaction, right? 

She’ll cry. I have a need, and I’m now giving out a reaction. And then, they get relief. Oh, mom comes, she picks me up, she feeds me, she takes care of me. These very natural things of caring are building this attachment. I’ve often thought human beings are so pathetic in our youth. We cannot fend for ourselves. You would think that being at the top of the food chain, we’d be off and running a bit quicker than we are. Yeah. Watch wildlife. We’re not there, are we? Yeah. I mean, a calf is soon on its feet, you know? But it’s interesting. 

The human being is rendered helpless for really a long time. Yeah. And I’ve never really thought about it before, except for now in the context of attachment. And is that perhaps what God is trying to work? Yeah. And as that grows. Matt, so you think of that little baby in year one, right? All these needs are their needs, and they get relief from those needs and concerns. What happens when they cry and struggle? They start to learn that wow, when I cry or am upset, an adult comes, a mom comes, dad comes. Oh, they’re okay. I get to start this process of an adult who comes, they take care, and they’re okay. 

Right? And then year number two comes, and we move along but they still have wants and parents react to their wants, and sometimes it’s like, oh, okay, yeah, here’s a toy, I’ll give you to play with. But usually by year two, the child starts to understand that parents are going to be giving boundaries. And that means the word no. And then the child reacts to that. And there’s this exchange and care that’s being built to the child that these adults around me are protecting. They care for me. Right. And that builds that sense of trust.  

So, now you’re really showing how this attachment is built at different levels and stages. Right. So as the child gets older that attachment is made through different lessons. Yeah. So, you mentioned in year two, it’s the boundaries where in year one it was the provisions. Is that right? Oh, absolutely. And you know what? It’s hard to really even comprehend all the elements that go into that with a child who isn’t getting that who cries and cries and maybe has been abandoned or doesn’t get those needs met. 

And so, what’s going on inside their little brain, even at that time, is impacting this concept of attachment, right? So, that really builds the empathy here for, as you said, reactive attachment disorder. So, there are cases when this simply has not been done and it’s going to have ramifications. 

And that’s really what warrants today’s topic. Yeah, absolutely, a clarifying. Because usually when this phrase comes up, and I remember having been in the school district a long time and this was a pretty hot topic 20 years ago as it came up and they were starting to try to understand, especially kids that have come through foster care or the adoption process. 

And it’s a great clarifier to say that foster care and adoption, they do not cause reactive attachment disorder. Sometimes it’s easy to lump all of those in there, but kids who have come through some of that, their susceptibility to the trauma and the issues sometimes put them at higher risk here. So that’s really what you’re saying here too. And a lot of our audience is very much involved in foster care, very much involved in adoption. And we’ve seen tremendous growth and awareness in this area in the last 20 years. And it’s such a beautiful visual of the gospel when we see kids and young children who have been orphaned brought into families, but not without challenges. And you and I don’t need to state that. 

So, provide that articulation of what this is and how we can process some of the difficulties that parents and children experience. And then ultimately, we’d love to hear on therapy or how do we move forward, right? 

Yeah. What do we get to do? Well, let’s kind of take the textbook here and take a page out of the definition and just looking at this reactive attachment element and it’s a complex psychiatric condition that affects young children characterized by serious problems in the emotional attachment to others. 

It’s usually present by age five. But people close to these kids start to notice these symptoms by their first birthday, and some of those symptoms are that detached and unresponsive behavior, difficulty being comforted, preoccupied or defiant behavior, and an inhibition or a lack of restraint for inappropriate closeness with strangers. Just some interesting pieces there. There’s a longer list of symptoms. Maybe we’ll talk about that later, but how does that impact the kids? Attachment disorder is a result of a break in the connection for that child with that caretaker, the mom or dad or the person that’s there for them. 

So, boom, we look at difficulties forming lasting and loving relationships. They fail to develop a conscience or learn to trust. And, oh, this is the huge one. They do not allow people to be in control of them due to trust issues. And so, you connect that dot back to I’m a little baby and I’m crying because I’m hungry. I cry and I cry. The more I cry, the more my brain is releasing that stress hormone, and it just creates this sense of I’m never going to be taken care of. Yeah. And I think you dropped the term trauma early on, and we’ve talked about trauma in the past on podcasts and it really does sound like this is fallout of some early trauma in a young person’s life, which makes a lot of sense, right? 

When adoptions happen at two or three or four years old, some of those early years are a bit unknown. Yeah. Some things Matt, that we can share that maybe give us a framework of what are some things that maybe are impacting this issue of trauma that is impacting a child’s ability to attach? 

This isn’t a causal list, and it doesn’t automatically mean every kid suffers. There are stories and situations of kids that have had these experiences, and haven’t suffered from attachment trauma, and there are stories of kids that have maybe had a lot less, but they’ve still struggled. So, there’s a unique kind of range here, but just some general elements to consider. Think of a case where the mom did not want the baby at all and what is going on in her brain and the stress in her and that even connecting with a child in utero, some of the trauma that can occur in utero, either through physical abuse or even some other environmental situations.  

Now for the little baby, emotional or physical trauma, abuse and neglect are huge things. A maternal separation. Maybe mom died early or maybe mom had a sickness or an illness or the baby had a prolonged medical condition that kept them in the hospital over and over. Poor daycare, poor parenting, repeated moves. Those all can factor into this picture of that attachment being formed.  

And I think you’ve painted with some colors that we can recognize. You’ve talked about some symptoms. What put you onto this trail? Where did you learn about this and share some of that story. 

Yeah. Great question. I love learning from other parents, and this really was presented to me by a parent of someone who was doing a lot of foster care with kids. And the concept resonated because working in the school district, we have seen kids that come through with this attachment struggle and the difficulty to trust adults and the defiance. So, we see that little spectrum in the school. They don’t come with a label on their forehead that says, hey, I have attachment disorder, or I had early trauma. So, we don’t see that piece, but we see some of the symptoms. But I had a parent share with me about some unique challenges of her foster care and some difficult kids and I was trying to be helpful, and I was not helpful at all, and she was able to recognize that pretty quickly and she came back to me later and said, hey, I’d like you to read a book. 

It’s called, When Love is Not Enough by Nancy Thomas and that just opened my eyes to this world of early trauma and the impact that it has on kids. And so, I’ve loved that book and being able to reference the uniqueness of working with kids. And we sometimes have to throw out the parenting 101 because these kids are not coming from that same level. 

So, I was able to get that information and follow her and some of her materials and work and then recently, in the last couple of years, I was able to hear Nancy speak at a workshop at a conference and just really unpacked what it means to care for these kids who have had these early trauma and attachment struggles. She also has a summer camp for families and last summer, my wife, Jackie, and I had a chance to go and volunteer for a week at her camp. 

So, we got to be there for training. And then also she brought in five or six families that had children who met a lot of these conditions. And so, we got to work with those families for that week. So, I’ve learned a lot, and my heart has just been so expanded for the love of these caretakers who have kids who have had struggles, maybe biologically, but also even in the adoption and foster care realm. And I think this is good for us to have that information to have greater empathy towards those who are enduring this and for those in this particular situation to have their realities shared in a way that they can be understood and to process their reality. 

And I think the question stands, what do we do with it? How do we rewind what has been unwound in a person? I know there’s not going to be an easy answer here. Yeah. Well, I think it’s huge to remember, Matt, that the root of the unattached child’s issues and struggle is not their will. It’s not a problem of their will nor is it a problem of the caretaker’s parenting skills, but it is their brain which has been hurt. Their brain has been wounded, and that is impacting their operating system. How they move forward, how they treat everything in their mindset is about trust and safety. 

And so, they are like that gazelle on the Sahara Desert being pursued. They are constantly under threat. They are constantly on guard. So that base part of their brain, fight, flight, freeze is always operating. And when that is operating, then the thinking part of the brain, that good logical piece, is shutting down. So, you ask a child to think about their behavior, and that only makes them more anxious. The emotional part of their brain shuts down when they have attachment trauma. So, people are going to seem threatening to them. And so, we keep trying to react to them the way that it would normally work with most kids who have healthy attachment. And when we do, we exacerbate the problem. It’s all about driving anxiety, right?  

So, you’ve really placed your finger on some important wherewithal that before we talk about what we should do or even solutions, we need to understand what’s happening at the brain level. Yeah. And that will give you an idea about the complexity. It will help answer the questions as to why this young child is reacting the way they are. I remember it was many years ago, Matt, I was talking to a dad who had done some adopting, and they had some kids where things just went really well, but they had a particular young man, a son that they had adopted, and he just was heartbroken. 

He just felt, as godly Christian moms and dads, we can love this kid and give them a good environment and give them opportunities. And the child just struggled and never connected, and the dad was reflecting on this sense of, have we failed? We have let him down and they did so much for him, and they provided so much for him, and look at the difference. 

I look back now, and I did not have helpful advice for him in the context of what we have now learned about the significance of early trauma on the brain and the impact that has with a kid forming relationships. That dad did everything right in the sense of what he knew, but it was a huge issue below the surface that at that time research and understanding just wasn’t there. 

Yeah. So now that we know what’s at play, what do we do with it? You know what? Sometimes we’re called to go along in messy times and messy places, through those fires, through those waters, but to be able to set aside our child’s behavior, right? Because that’s the mom and dad report card, how our child sits in church or how they talk to others and all of that. And set that aside and recognize, you know what? We’re in for a longer picture here right now of connecting with our kids. So being filled with that hope that it is possible for the brain to be able to start to heal.  

I’m curious about the camp you participated in, what were some of the activities that you did? What were some of the objectives that you were asked to meet? Right? You know what? It’s so interesting. And there were so many parallels, Matt, to our relationship with God as far as coming to love and coming to serve him. The huge emphasis of the camp was reorientating that child’s acknowledgement of who knows best for them. Who knows best about what to eat, when to eat, who knows best about when to sleep, when to get up, who knows best about what they wear, what they have around them, what they participate in, when they speak and how they speak and, and who knows best for that.  

And so, the whole emphasis was reestablishing or in some situations it had never been established. The child was the king of the home, and the mom and dad were their puppets. But to establish that connection of mom and dad know best for them and that it starts now with learning how to acknowledge mom and dad. So, it sounds like you’re rewriting the script since you mentioned that this is in the brain. 

This trauma has done some hard wiring. Then you go in and rewrite some of the script that their brains are saying. So, you mentioned security and trust being at the center here. Yeah. And so, what I hear you say in those examples is that mom and dad are safe, and they know best how to keep you safe. 

Yeah. Right. Which is a very different script. Very different. So, three elements of that, to be safe and for them to know that they are loved unconditionally, it’s not about their behavior. And then also that sense of being cared for by a strong parent, by a strong caregiver, one who is confident, even if we have to fake it sometimes, and is able to withstand that child’s tricks and annoyances. 

So that child is always in the sense of, again, they’re being driven by anxiety, they’re being driven by a lack of trust, and the parents have never been able to attach to that child to feel that and allow themselves to feel and sense that. So, they’re always suspicious of everyone. And so that relationship with their parent, even though the parent says over and over, I love you, I care about you, they’re suspicious of that because they’re like, how do I know you’re going to be there?  

Well, that was my question. I’m sure it’s not as easy as, oh, I’ll make this clear. I love you. And by the way, mom and dad know what’s best for you. Right. And we are safe. And we’re going to look out for you. No doubt, parents have been saying those things. Oh, absolutely.  

What else do we know about helping that sink in? Is it a metric of time? Time and messaging? Messaging over time? Yeah. Or is it that message through different ways? Right. I’m curious. You know that with the timeline, there are many variables of that, but some of the literature talks about for the number of years your child is, it will take the equal number of months of this very specific, intense, structuring, restructuring, kind of a different mindset. So, if you have a five-year-old, you can plan on five to six months. If you have a 10-year-old, okay, 10 months. If you add on any other type of medical issue or struggle like fetal alcohol, maybe some drug involvement in utero, some of those other issues that just change the calendar and it’s not going to be one good week, and we’ll have this turned around. 

Yeah. And that makes sense. I think that’s a powerful thing, Matt, and we’re talking about the child, right? And we’re talking about growing and connecting their brain and helping their brain heal and relearn. But it’s also good for the parents to be able to step back for a second and to say, okay, wait a second, we want to be able to change our outlook from maybe frustration and discouragement, to hope. And that God has placed this child in the best possible place right now and to have hope in that, to change the belief that they can have an influence, that they can have an impact and that fulfills and is connected with God’s promise. 

That they can change their viewpoint from, oh, this is just a disobedient child that we have to change to understand, you know what, I’m working with a sick or a wounded child. Their brain has been hurt many years ago. Changing the direction from punishment or anger and the emotional piece but to be able to just guide and correct with love and joy. 

And so much of the training and people who work and support talk so much about the healthy self-care for moms and dads of these kids. Where they’re able to get breaks from time to time, so they’re able to be able to be recharged. Yes. Hugely important. And you need a community, don’t you, to do that proper care and to pour into people in ways they need to be poured into. And I think that’s one of the values of this message here today is that it makes the larger community aware of the great difficulty this is and the care that needs to surround it. Right. Yeah. So, with that, I think we’ll hit pause on today’s conversation. 

Hopefully now attachment disorder makes a whole lot more sense. But there’s more to be said. When we return, you’ll hear Craig field some specific questions about attachment disorder. And we’re also going to see God’s heart on the matter. I think you will be blessed. So, thanks for being with us. Goodbye. 

You know, for whatever reason, there might be some struggles or challenges that happen, but so does grace. And we can take that grace and grow and understand how we’re able to parent and to care for our child. Welcome everyone to Breaking Bread. In our last episode, Craig Stickling graciously unpacked what reactive attachment disorder is. 

And how important it is that our children attach to their parents, and sometimes that attachment comes hard. In this next episode, we look forward to him saying more about this important topic. I think there’s a powerful thing, Matt, and we’re talking about the child, right? And we’re talking about growing and connecting their brain and helping their brain heal and relearn. 

But it’s also good for the parents and the moms and dads to be able to step back for a second and to say, okay, wait a second. We want to be able to change our outlook from frustration and discouragement, but that there is hope. And that God has placed this child in the best possible place right now, and to have hope in that, to change the belief that they can have an influence, that they can have an impact, and that fulfills and is connected with God’s promise. 

That they can change their viewpoint from, oh, this is just a disobedient child that we have to change, to understanding, you know what, I’m working with a sick or a wounded child. Their brain has been hurt many years ago. Changing the direction, punishment or anger and the emotional piece, but to be able to just guide and correct with love and joy. 

And so much of the training and people who work and support, they talk so much about the healthy self-care for moms and dads of these kids. Where they’re able to get breaks from time to time, so they’re able to be recharged. Yeah. Hugely, hugely important. And you need a community, don’t you, to do that proper care and to pour into people in ways they need to be poured into. 

And I think that’s one of the values of this message here today is that it makes the larger community aware of the great difficulty this is and the care that needs to surround it. Let’s go ahead and add insult to injury here, right? 

So here is mom and dad who have this child who struggles or has the challenges with that attachment and the trauma piece and we have World War III Sunday morning right before church, and it’s just been a huge disaster. And then we go to church, and this child walks into church, and all of a sudden, a switch flips. 

They put a smile on their face. They’re charming to their Sunday school teacher. They’ll hug them and be so engaging, and they’ll talk to people around the church lunch table and the perception that everyone else is saying, oh what a nice little child you have here. And you talk about how many struggles and challenges you have. 

Well, we see a pretty nice kid here. It must be your problem. And that is such a deceitful thing to be stuck on. And so, to have not just a community, but to have a community who understands that the child will act like this. Yeah. It was interesting at this camp that we went through, those of us who were there helping, we were like, here’s a gag around your mouth because your job is not to speak to the child. Your job is to guide that child if they had any questions or if they needed anything, your job was to direct that child back to their mom or to their dad. Reestablishing the fact that it’s your mom who knows, it’s your dad who knows.  

So, this is really important information, Craig. If we are going to be that supportive community and if we want to help rewrite the script in these young people’s heads that says, I can’t trust anybody or I’m in danger, trust, security but what we want to do is point them back to their folks and to rewrite that script saying mom and dad know what’s best for you. 

Yeah, their brain is stuck in fear and anxiousness and trust. And so, what’s a coping mechanism? They learn how to manipulate others. They learn how to charm others, right? Because that’s their defense mechanism of like, okay, if I can keep you, this adult out here, I don’t trust you. But if I can charm or manipulate you, then I won’t need to trust you. Yeah, I don’t need to trust you and I’m always going to be able to stay an arm’s length away. And I can stay in control. Right. Interesting. So, there’s so much about reorientating their brain to be able to say, not only can mom and dad be in control of me but when they’re in control of me, they’ve got it right. 

Okay. So, I have a few short and sweet questions, but I’m sure they have some nuances. Number one, is this attachment disorder unique only to foster and adoption or does it also occur with our biological children? Yeah, it includes biological children. Because our biological children are not exempt from trauma or maybe some type of abuse or struggle or separation. 

Our attachment difficulty is always because somebody dropped the ball. Or can there be attachment difficulties when parents are doing what they’re supposed to be doing, but attachment’s becoming difficult? Yeah. We mentioned earlier, Matt, that attachment is not a trait in a child, right? 

However, like you said, kids have certain temperaments. And some of their temperaments just naturally gravitate toward relationships and connecting with people. And others are like, you know what, I’m ready to ride the horse off in the West and do this all on my own. And so, we get those temperament pieces that just create such unique dynamics in this issue as well. 

Okay. All right. Another question that I have for you. Is reparative motion possible? Is there hope? Yeah. You know what, and that’s the beauty. When your brain works right, so can you, and to be able for kids to start moving into that sense of being able to have trust, which then allows those seeds of attachment to start to grow. 

It starts with the brain, and that gets healed by the structure and support and, okay, we’re doing things a little differently here from the mom and dad realm. We’re making some intentional effort in that, and the research shows that we might not be able to go from zero to 100, but boy, we’re able to make points, we’re able to move positively over time, and so there’s great encouragement in that. 

The good news of a wounded brain is that the brain can also be healed. Yeah, there is a healing there. Jesus said the poor you will have with you always. And some of the curse, some of the struggle of mankind is mental illness and some of those challenges. And, boy, we can do a lot of good things and a lot of right things, but sometimes we just might not see the healing or the wow, we are at a great place now that has what we would like to see in other situations and scenarios. 

And that is grievous. And yet I know God also provides the strength to those people in those situations. I like that. Your last statement there, and I think you’re absolutely right, because it has occurred means God has allowed, and because God has allowed means that God can repair. Yeah. And I think that’s really important. 

I think we need to always remember that all the brokenness we see has been allowed by him, and it’s been allowed by him through the framework of him saying, yes, I can redeem this. So whatever place we’re in, maybe we’re an adult and realize that I had this attachment problem, and this has been a struggle for me, or maybe we’re a parent going through the thick of this to realize that this has been certainly seen by God and known by him. 

Yeah. You know, we were able to observe some of that at the camp with the five or six families that were there, and we were able to see in nearly all the kids that there was a significant reduction of children in control of everything and being disrespectful. All of those tags that are out there and by the end of the week, with great encouragement to the mom and dads, great encouragement to their training and direction, we were able to see change and turning towards their folks in just that amount of time. And I was so thrilled to be a first-hand observer of this. This is possible. Yeah, it is super hard, but it is like, okay wow, this can work.  

Yeah, okay So another question for you, can we preclude that every child who has a difficult first 36 months is going to have an attachment disorder. For some, it will impact them. In others, there might be areas or elements or whatever that are able to compensate, and they don’t have the attachment trust issues that others do. 

So, there’s some uniqueness between, so not all are equal necessarily. And I’d also like to ask you, which I think it’s important to be reminded that sometimes it’s easy to take groups and to label them as, well, this group will always have these struggles and challenges. Absolutely not, but they may be susceptible to them. Yeah.  

Speak to those who have a heart to foster and to adopt. How should they process this reality as they go into this process? Because there’s some great health in the information and there’s some potential drag in this information. Yeah.  

God equips those that he calls, doesn’t he, and to be encouraged in that. What I love about this, and the research and the information is that this generation gets to go in with a lot more tools in their belt, a lot more understanding of the full range of the battle and what that looks like. What are some of the challenges that might be out there that we might deal with? And so, I love the fact that parents coming into this now have a greater pool of knowledge to be able to understand and be prepared. 

I think of the Scripture that talks about if you’re going to build a barn, who doesn’t count the cost first. And so, you take some of that. But thinking ahead into what are we going to be getting into? How are we going to manage? What’s our plan for this? 

And being able to have some of those seeds in place ahead of time and recognizing and being able to walk in with your eyes wide open. But certainly, what a wonderful calling for God to equip, to call, and to send parents into this space of foster care or adoption and to take on these issues as they may or may not come but take them on with faith in the Lord. 

You mentioned even recognizing that, for whatever reason, even our own biological children might have some struggles or challenges with that connecting piece. But to be able to understand that happens, but so does grace, and we can take that grace and grow and understand how we’re able to parent and to care for our child. 

You know, you’ve really painted parenting in a light that I’ve not quite thought of before, in terms of our likeness to Christ. You know, God begats us. He brings us into this world, and then he asks us to trust him. Yeah. Trust me that I know what’s best. Isn’t that what each one of us struggles with to the point of repentance, right? 

Isn’t that kind of the core of what we wrestle with? So, what we’re talking about here is not that hard to understand. I understand it in my own self. And here we have God reaching his arms out to us and saying, trust me. And as parents, we do the same thing. We ask the same exact question. We have the same exact expectation for our children, and sometimes it comes with angst. 

Yes, it does. It’s so heartbreaking for parents and even for us in the counseling world. If we are trying to counsel a parent whose child struggles and they bring him to counseling. And if we have an attachment disorder child that’s had trauma, early trauma, and their brain does not attach. And we take them to a counselor, the counselor is going to try to build a rapport with the child and then say, okay, let’s try to work on those things. And it’s like, no, a child has no business building a relationship with someone other than their mom or dad. And that really has to be the paramount focus of building that relationship. 

And so even for us in the counseling world, it’s really important to have good diagnosis and understanding, because that leads us to a better treatment plan. That makes a lot of sense, Craig. There’s just a lot of solace in knowing that God knows exactly what it’s like to have a detached child. 

Yeah. Doesn’t he? Yeah. That’s what he endures with most of the population of the world. Yeah. And so, the parents that are going through this have in God, quite a solace, I think. Oh, absolutely. As one who completely understands their infirmities. Yeah. In closing here, Craig, point us to some resources. 

I know you mentioned a book already, maybe list some of your favorite resources. Yeah, I’d like to summarize in a sense of here’s what we can do right now. So, this is the mom and dad in this place. All right, here’s what I’m able to do right now without even reading a book or going to a website. 

But these are some things to just be reminded of that as mom and dad, as the caregivers, that you’re strong enough and smart enough to protect them even when they try to manipulate you and that you will be able to handle their misbehavior in a fair and consistent way teaching restitution because they’re going to be in opposition to that. Also, that you can be able to remain calm and respond to their stressful conditions, even when they’re causing them. 

But you’re going to be able to respond calmly and collectively, even though that’s pretty hard at times. And lastly, that you’re looking at the protection of this child and recognizing I don’t want to put them in areas where they’re going to fail or have extra temptations or struggles. So, I’m looking at protecting them as well. 

As a parent, being able to understand that there are some special parameters here that I always want to bring and that is that they can do that, and they can bring that, and they can have that in their heart and mindset is a beautiful reminder to them. What you’re saying is they can do all that they need to do in order to have that trust. 

Yeah. Right? And that’s where it starts. Exactly. Now, that trust needs to be extended from that child, which you don’t have a great deal of control over. Right. And you can at least do all that’s required. Yeah. I mentioned four general things that sound very easy to say on a podcast, right? 

But there are a lot of nuts and bolts and specifics woven into those things and how to handle those. And how do I respond to a two-year-old child versus a 12-year-old child who struggles. So, there are different ways and approaches. I’d like to give three great resources for the listener if they want more information or to be able to dig a little more deeply into this. 

The first one I already mentioned, Nancy Thomas. Her organization is called Families by Design. She wrote the book When Love is Not Enough, and she has many others. Her easy contact information is just the website attachment.org, so that’s the first one. The second one is by Matt and Fawn Bradley, and we got to work with them for the week when we were out there at the camp. They have an organization called the Beatitude House. And they do a lot of remote connecting, phone, Skype type of work for parents. Their contact is beatitudehouse.org. And the last one is Leanne Cooper. She is at the King’s Ranch. And that access is unplowedground.org. She has some great video teachings of how to set up a training day with reactive attachment disorder children. It is very well done and shares very specific next steps. This is what I can do. How do I do it? What does it look like? Yeah. So, it’s just great information and knowledge to parents who are like, all right, I think this is where my kid is at. What do I get to do differently?  

Those are awesome. Thanks for that, Craig. Thanks, Craig. Thanks for raising this issue and for educating us on it as well as equipping us. What a critical issue this is, the attachment of our children. It’s gone really without my notice until now. And now I think my ears will be open for it. My eyes will be open for it, which I think is a really good thing. Yeah. And so, I appreciate that. 

To our listeners, no doubt this resonated with you on a number of different levels. We trust and pray that there was hope and clarity brought here in this podcast on this particular issue. As always, we encourage feedback of any sort at [email protected]. Love to hear your thoughts. Thanks to each one for being here. 

Goodbye.