Gratia271
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Posts posted by Gratia271
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Also your kids who don't seem to be as bothered, may be but may show it in some different ways. Or may have needs as well for breaks, but just fortunately have an easier time than your daughter.
I do think it is probably stressful for all your kids, though, and I think having breaks is good.
Also any help you can get I hope you can pursue. I don't know what is best.
Also, I think anything can be a break. Maybe a class or an activity or just going out. I think if your daughter thinks she needs to stay to help, try to get other help and make sure she feels like she can go out.
I hope this doesn't last very long, but advice I got was -- I have to be ready for the longhaul, I can't afford to burn out. This has guided some choices for me. Things have to work for the child, but you must be able to function long term for the child's sake too.
You sound really stressed out and I hope you can find respite of some kind. I think feeling better about your older daughter would be a weight off your mind, too. So if your older daughter sees things are under control -- it will benefit her, too.
My other two bio kids are different in the way the cope with vicissitudes of life- they are much like DH. They also, in all fairness, are not around nearly as much which is to your point about getting out and away. DD18 is a college intern full time and will head to uni this fall, so she doesn't deal with much pertaining to DD4. Like DH, she just deals with the people who are in the trenches all day long.
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I just signed names by typing on the line and then saving it as pdf.
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My poor ds took them 1.5 years after he took one course and 3 years after the other. He only had 1 month to study, so there was a LOT to relearn. Just one of many side effects of changing course mid-stream in high school. sigh.
Ruth in NZ
It is so difficult to stay on top and manage everything that life requires. There is so much to relearn. DD18 jokes with students she tutors that you really have to stay in the middle of all of it, or so much of the details eek out of your brain.. :)
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When we were going through the recruiting process, one of the schools that my son was considering had recently revised its SATII policy from "required" to "recommended." The coach told him that the school only did this because students in the underserved areas of the country did not always know that the SAT IIs existed, and therefore didn't have the necessary tests to even apply. The coach said that the school still expected to see scores from applicants that did not fit this demographic and not having them would place those students at a big disadvantage.
Because we cast such a wide net and schools vary widely, I just have my DC take them. It is relatively easy for them to take the tests and is simply not worth the potential disadvantage to them if they didn't take the tests.
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Come to Ohio if you're not finding what you want. We rock in Ohio. :)
Funny! DD18 will be at Ohio State this fall, and I drive my son to Columbus regularly for fencing. It seems like I'm there all the time. Maybe I should move there. :tongue_smilie:
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Where are you located? I'm in no way saying send her away to this residential school, but I would CALL Chaddock School and ask one of their staff members to just give you some advice. They specialize in kids with attachment and emotional regulation issues. They're really phenomenal and might have some great suggestions. I can't seem to link here, but google Chaddock School. They're based out of Quincy, Illinois, and have some family based programs that they use with little kids.
We are in Indiana currently, so that is not too far way I am guessing. I will check it out.
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On the trampoline gig, that's really energizing. You need to get a copy of Zones of Regulation PRONTO. Like go order the book, bite the bullet, pay full price, order it. It will change your lives. There's no way the trampoline is THE answer all the time. So right now you're not seeing when she's red zone, when she's blue, when she needs more input, when she needs something calming, when she's in transition and needs a totally different answer.
Then you can make lists of things you do for each place/zone she's at. Then you DO those things PRE-EMPTIVELY. So you practice the tools BEFORE she is red zone or even yellow zone. It keeps her from getting to red zone or yellow zone. And it's FUN! And the fun improves compliance.
You can google compliance drills btw. You'll find videos showing how to do them.
But yeah, you need more tools than just the trampoline, mercy. It's no wonder you're having trouble. She needs options that work for her for CALMING, etc. First thing the behaviorist did with ds, who was VERY ROUGH was bring in activities that were GENTLE! Totally counter-intuitive, ey? But it forced him to self-regulate in a small way in an activity he already liked doing. So instead of throwing a ball for toss, they were throwing cotton balls using flyswatters. Still calming, still connected, but self-regulating, down-tempoing.
That is interesting. We were told to keep her on the trampoline as much as possible. I have been thinking I need to find ways to calm her, but dr. said all the exercise would be helpful to accomplish that.
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You are so right. I am going off of what developmental ped said while issuing disclaimers about not knowing for sure. I honestly am in the dark about all of this and am largely ignorant. From the one meeting we had with a social worker who evaluated all three for attachment (attachment specialist), she said they all had integrated quite well and were in a good place attachment wise. My little girl loves everyone here, but I seem to be the one who grounds her, at least as grounded as she can be at this point. My absence last week was really ugly for everyone still at home. Yet, when I returned, she was more agreeable in the house for everyone, not just me. So I think maybe it is that I am her security? Honestly, I look for patterns and there aren't any. I'm pretty stupid about all of this and have never dealt with anything like it before.
I really thought our adoption agency would try to help with support systems. DH is p*ssed at this point about their poor support system.
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It is so difficult to keep her calm. We are always wracking our brain trying to find ways to keep her in a good place once she is there. I told DH it is beyond draining, and I am not sure what we even get done beside managing the eating ritual, drink ritual, bathroom ritual,dressing ritual. Somedays, it just seems insane trying to help her get in or stay in a good place.
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Oh Elizabeth,
I am going to meet with an OT early next week if dr. can work it out. I will try to do some reading and research to find out what I should be asking them. When the meds calm her down, she seems to do better with puzzles and books with me. We also have her jump on the trampoline as much as possible to help with her need for movement.
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Which meds have they put her on? Have you noticed any difference since starting? Some meds (stimulants or antidepressants or antipsychotics) can actually make behavioral issues worse if she doesn't have the issues those meds are meant to treat.
They put her on Tenex. She no longer gets "way" out of control, so it seems to be helping her. When she gets upset now, it often looks more like a typical 3 year old response. When I am away, though, nothing consoles her. So when I took my trip, I think she became fearful or something because she wouldn't comply with anything. The meds keep her from being belligerent, but when she is in a bad place she is still not compliant.
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Does the orgnization that arranged the adoption provide supports?
Have you explored the possibility of RAD?
Do your 15yo twins have SLDs? I"m confused by that.
Our private adoption agency provides zero support. DD4 doesn't have RAD. She has attached to all of us and, on good days or good moments, she is delightful. She has zero frustration threshold, doesn't sleep or eat well, and presents with a lot of sensory issues. She is also a very willful child. The difficult part is that it's like she cannot help herself because she loves us, hugs us, and seems to want to do the right thing but she simply cannot do it in the moment. She has severe behavior dysregulation and cannot control her emotions in the moment. She never directs the rage at others though; it's simply hitting things, throwing things. She is also highly intuitive. It's very hard to figure out.
My biological kids have no issues whatsoever. The problem emerging with DD15 is the stress and anxiety she feels as a result of my little girl's troubles.
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Oh, Elizabeth,
I will reach out to the school and see what I can find out. The friends and one famly member we have in the PS system here are not too promising, but I will talk to them again to see what and how they may help. Thanks so much for sharing your experience.
Arcadia,
My family has a long history too of highly gifted and high empaths, and the combination can be very difficult. All three of my biological kids are like me this way, but DD18 and DS15 cope more like DH (also highly gifted). I'm not sure how that works out, but they definitely cope better.
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Was the little girl molested? It would be an explanation.
My dd is highly emotionally sensitive, like yours is, and you need to get them physically apart enough hours a day that your dd15 can recover and do what she needs to do. So either send the 15 yo away during the day or the 4 yo. We sent my dd away this past semester, and that was part of the reason why. She needed the emotional break. It was a great opportunity for her, but also it was time away from the challenge of ds.
If you put your dd in a ps now and get her an IEP, it may work. Later, you're looking at ED classrooms, etc. For now though, at this age, the placement might not be so objectionable to you.
Also, what is your adoption board saying?
The twins are non-identical, so you could have ASD in one dc and not in the other. A lot of the techniques are going to overlap. You might call around and see about getting evals sooner. That wait is intolerable. Around here, the hospital system has a 6 month wait but privately you can get in sooner.
I mentioned that to DD15, and the whole idea is upsetting to her. I feel like I am holding a losing hand. When I try to help either one of them, very difficult emotions emerge. Since DD4 falls apart away from me, I dread sending her to people who will label her and put her in a corner. DH and I brought her home as our daughter so she could be spared a life of stereotypes and judgment. She is so very difficult, but underneath the ugliness I see this glimmer of beauty and strength that I want to bring out. I just don't know how, and I understand why others simply wouldn't bother trying to.
Our adoption specialists have been worthless. Our ped. is trying to get us in different places. It's just ridiculously difficult with wait lists.
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I don't know whether counseling would help. She gets her intuitive/high empath personality from me, and we are both struggling far more than others around here. Unfortunately, most of the care devolves on us as well. Very.bad.combo. DH is concerned for us but has no idea how to help. I am going to take her to the dr. to see if they can give her something to take as needed for stress and/or sleep. I worry so much about her.
Like you, I have had to build emotional walls over my lifetime with people sometimes to protect myself.
I think my four year old twin son was highly favored by his foster mom in the other country, and his twin sister was poorly treated in comparison. I think this is why she is so developmentally delayed by comparison because her little body was always in stress/fight mode so she just couldn't develop. In fairness, she does have a very feisty temperament compared to her "calm by nature" twin brother.
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I don't remember the thread, but if I recall correctly, the reviews for PaH comp sci are mixed. Some students liked it and did well. Others were not too keen.
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:grouphug: :grouphug: :grouphug:
I am not in your situation, but I know people who have BTDT. One acquaintance has posted about trauma competent caregiving training on her FB page, and I asked her where she received training since so many people on here ask about adoptive kids with trauma or stressed backgrounds. This is an organization she recommended: http://back2back.org/tcc/
Specifically she said trauma competent caregiving and spiritual and emotional wellness for the caregiver were very helpful to her.
I apologize if Christian resources are not appropriate in your situation.
This organization is location specific, and I think it's probably secular. I think they would tell you what to look for, questions to ask about finding services near you if you gave them a call. If you are in the area, by all means, please do check them out: http://connectionsforlife.org/
thank you so much for the recommendations! I will check them out.
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I am going to try to locate help for around the house. DD15 is very emotionally attached to DD4 and keyed into her emotions. She is a high empath and highly intuitive, so she keenly feels the pain and emotions of those she loves. I think that is the core problem for her in coping. They don't share a room. Over the years, DH and I have been through a lot so his primary concern is for my coping at this point. He encouraged me to fly with DS15 for competition so I could get a break. But things fell apart quickly with my little girl, who just lost it. Usually when I travel with my son to competitions, I take her with me to minimize disruptions. It just gets so draining, and I go downhill as a result of no break. But when I take a break, it falls apart at home. I keep telling DD4's pediatrician that I don't have one child; I have six.
We adopted three children together because they are a sibling group. It's hard for these children to find families, and we wanted to give them a family instead of seeing them on a waiting child list, where they would likely have never been placed. We carefully evaluated forms filled out to determine what we could contend with, and long story short Eastern European countries are known for lying and misrepresenting situations (both our intl. adoption docs told us this after the fact). So we have been blindsided by many of the problems we're faced with. And, yes, we now have two sets of twins. My little girl's twin brother has no significant issues. That's what puzzles the doctors because they said alcoholism and drug abuse is rampant in Eastern European countries and problems are seen in adopted kiddos as a result. But it is not really plausible here according to them because she has a twin brother with no issues.
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Thanks for sharing this. I am so sorry! It really sucks for your conscientious son. And for a first experience, that has to be so tough. I can say from our experience, the only bad class for AP purposes at PaH we have experienced is AP Bio. IOther teachers there have been quite good. Some are not fabulous but do a good job preparing students for the AP exam.
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Why do only some universities require the subject tests? Why would you take a subject test vs an AP exam? The AP exams are harder, right?
The answer to that question depends on the subject and on the student. SAT subject tests are usually minutiae type questions, so for global, big picture people, they may be harder than AP exams. My biological kids are outstanding writers, so the AP essay exams which are difficult for many students are much easier than the m/c type questions over minutiae that comprise subject tests. That's also why students are encouraged to take subject tests as soon as the course is over.
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I don't know whether they are pointless or not. My bio kids test well and easily, and it is a simple way to validate a home school transcript and course work. If it were difficult and anxiety-producing, I would think twice. DD applied with them along with AP scores and was offered top merit scholarships everywhere she applied. In every single competitive interview she had (also during high school interviews), they never asked one question about her transcript nor did they ask for an explanation of any course work she completed. Other home school friends (w/o all of the scores) have been asked a lot of questions about their transcripts and course work during interviews, presumably to validate what they had done. It's purely correlative, so maybe there is something to it and maybe there isn't. Who knows?
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Yes, University of Kentucky was full ride + stipends and research opportunities for my NMF DD this past year. I don't know if it will change in the future but as of entering class of 2017, it was still available.
Vanderbilt also has several opportunities. DD was offered Cornelius Vanderbilt scholarship, which is their highest merit scholarship and covers full tuition + stipends. So, room and board is left to pay in that case. There are further departmental scholarships there, though, which can further defray costs. Vandy also offers a renewable scholarship each year for NMF (I think it was 2k but am not positive, but it is for each year and not just the first year), so I think we would have been left with about 10k out of pocket per year.
Boston College also offers full tuition scholarship. It's the Gabelli scholarship, and includes travel expenses for international travel which is part of the scholarship program. So, you are left with room and board. FYI, the students who interview and accept it will practically never be home, including spring break, some winter holidays, and summers. Just saying this before anyone jumps through the hoops, travels for interviews, etc.. only to discover they don't want to be away from their family more or less an entire 4 years.
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Please don't quote, as I may delete later.
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DD has a friend who is attending IUPUI on a full-ride, so I know it is available. I am not sure how many students it is available to, though. DD is attending the Ohio State University on a full COA scholarship as Eminence fellow and Stamps Scholar. Each year, Ohio State chooses 24-28 students from an entering class of about 8000 to receive the full scholarship. Out of the 24-28 students, 4-5 are ultimately selected as Stamps scholars.
ETA: IUPUI scholarship is Gerald Bepko scholarship. It turns out three of DD's friends have received this. One of them did combined BS/MS in 5 years, so she will only have to pay for 1 year of the grad school. As DD pointed out, once you have these types of scholarships, so many other types of scholarships follow because you are already known/identified. Pretty cool!
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Need support and advice
in The Learning Challenges Board
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I will look into the school option. The meds have eliminated the "zero to rage" incidents that used to be every time something upset her. I went through training with my older daughter to learn de-escalation strategies, but when DD4 used to go from zero to rage in seconds, they really didn't work. We were taught over and over about preventing escalation, but until we had her on meds, there was no way to prevent it unless we never said no to anything.
The adoption factor causes a lot of people to see it differently, and I don't know whether that is the underlying problem or that DD4 just has these issues. It's just like with the outbursts; she never directs it at us- she did with her foster mother in the other country, but she really loves everyone here and has never directed anything at us. Her brain just seems to be stuck in a rut. So, when I traveled for 5 days, she got scared and felt insecure, so her brain pathway went right back to the "fight" mode she had lived in for so long. I came back, and things calmed down (for her).