Attachment Treatment, Page 2

A Word About Therapists

by Nancy Geoghegan

It is important to find a therapist that can be effective in bringing the whole family together to work toward healing. We all suffer - the child with attachment disorder, the parents and the siblings. A good therapist knows this and helps us work through all of the issues we may have and teaches us how to effectively parent our sick children as well as how to take care of ourselves and the others in the family. Here are some guidelines that I would use when choosing a good therapist:

There is a national organization of individuals called ATTACh - Association for Treatment and Training in the Attachment of Children. Membership in this group would be a good sign. This group is open to parents as well and they offer excellent yearly conferences that I think every parent of a child who suffers from RAD should attend at least once.

The therapist should see the parent(s) as their partner in the healing process. The parents should be included during the sessions.

The therapist should work very hard to teach the parent(s) therapeutic parenting techniques, validate their feelings and support them. The child should never be allowed to triangulate among the adults in his life and the therapist should be aware that they will try. They should also be aware of the child's strong need for control and know how to stay in control of the sessions.

A good therapist will also realize that there may be other disorders such as Sensory Integration Disorder or Bipolar that may co-exist with the attachment disorder. They should know how to direct the parent to the proper interventions and/or medications to help in the healing process.

The therapist should be hopeful that positive change can be achieved in the life of a child with attachment disorder. They also need to help the parents adjust their expectations - not lower, but adjust. This is often very hard for those of us that thought we were adopting a child who only needed love and time to adjust.

A good therapist will challenge the child to work hard on their life while maintaining respect for them as a person.

I would never stay in a therapy if I was not seeing positive results in a years time. That may be too long but that is what we did.