Navigating the Holidays With a Trauma-Sensitive Approach

Why do our kids melt down, act out, or regress during the holiday season? Listen to our conversation with Dr. David Adams to learn what is going on and what you can do about it to make this holiday season more enjoyable for you all. He is an adoptive and foster dad, a licensed psychologist, and a licensed professional counselor. He is the Founding Director and President of New Life Psychology Group in Laguna Hills, California, and an expert trainer of Foster and Kinship Care Education (FKCE) at Saddleback College. He has also recently written and released the book, Trauma-Informed Foster and Adoptive Parenting: Methods for Managing Meltdowns, Mishaps, and Maladaptive Behaviors.

In this episode, we discuss:

• What are some of the reasons that holidays are hard for children who are adopted or are in foster care?
• What kind of behaviors do parents and caregivers commonly see that are likely related to those challenges around holidays?
  • Sleep challenges
  • Feeding challenges
  • Increased anxiety, fear, insecurity
  • Impulsivity
  • Dysregulation (louder than usual, bigger emotional response than normal for this child)
• How do these behaviors relate to the reasons holidays are hard for our kids? What’s the connection between that outward behavior and the internal need or hurt?
• Can you provide us with a few practical strategies for addressing these behaviors? Let’s break them down by age:
  • Toddler and preschoolers
  • School-aged children
  • Tweens and Teens (into young adults)
• What trauma-sensitive preparations or preventative actions can we take to minimize the challenging behaviors and help our kids feel safe, supported, and able to find healing?
• What is compassion fatigue? What signs should we look for to help us identify our risk during this holiday season?
• Strategies to help parents and caregivers plan now for a less-stressful holiday season.

Additional Resources:

• Set Your Family Up for Success This Holiday Season
• Tips for Managing Your Picky Eater
• Strategies to Manage Holiday Stress

Chapters

• 1:17 What are some of the reasons that holidays are hard for children who are adopted or are in foster care?
• 7:48 What kind of behaviors do parents and caregivers commonly see that are likely related to those challenges around holidays?
• 16:30 How do these behaviors relate to the reasons holidays are hard for our kids? What’s the connection between that outward behavior and the internal need or hurt?
• 23:19 Can you provide us with a few practical strategies for addressing these behaviors? Let’s break them down by age:
• 23:57 Toddler and preschoolers
• 31:18 School-aged children
• 36:44 Tweens and Teens (into young adults)
• 40:41 What trauma-sensitive preparations or preventative actions can we take to minimize the challenging behaviors and help our kids feel safe, supported, and able to find healing?
• 45:47 What is compassion fatigue? What signs should we look for to help us identify our risk during this holiday season?
• 52:17 Let’s discuss a few strategies to help parents and caregivers plan now for a less-stressful holiday season, one that focuses more on connectedness and less on busyness.

Transcript

Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.

Dr David Adams is a proud adoptive parent, foster parent, and a licensed psychologist, licensed
professional counselor as well. He is the founding director and president of New Life
Psychology Group in Laguna, Hills, California, and an expert trainer of foster and
kinship care education at Saddleback College. He has also recently published a new
book called Trauma -informed Foster and Adoptive parenting, methods for managing
meltdowns, mishaps, and maladaptive behaviors. We're thrilled to have you here with us
today, Dr. Adams. We're excited to talk about how to handle the meltdowns,
mishaps, and maladaptive behaviors that happen around the holiday season, why they
happen, and what we can do about them. Yes, excellent. Thank you for having me here
with this important topic. Thank you so much for joining us. So let's get right
into it. Let's talk about some of the reasons that the holiday season, and when we
say holiday season, we mean basically everything from the week of anticipation before
Halloween, all the way through the new year. And there's lots of different holidays
in there, depending on what your family observes or celebrates. But this chunk of
the year from mid -October until early January,
what we can do about the hard stuff. Yes, excellent. So one of the things that
that is brought to my mind is just the change of the holidays,
the change of the routines and the new and the different experiences that we
encounter. And what we know from our kids with trauma histories is that a lot of
times these holiday seasons are kind of like an over -stimulation highway. A lot of
times our kids have painful memories of the differences between what they are
experiencing now and or what they have or have not experienced in the past.
So these changes can be a reminders of grief and loss for our kids.
A lot of times when Countering holidays, there's going to be strange new people and
traditions around that they aren't used to. And anytime we experience a change,
that can be very difficult for our kids. So I think, first of all, the changes,
the new and different experiences and some of the reminders of those loss, those
holidays are a reminder of the hurt and the pain of the past. In a season, seasons
such as Halloween or Thanksgiving or Christmas or Hanukkah or whatever holidays that
you do celebrate can be a season oftentimes focused on family and traditions and and
the the reminders of these traditions of what they aren't experiencing or what they
are experiencing and or the reminders of family can remind our kids with trauma
histories of loss and and rejection or or feelings of inadequacy and sometimes these
holidays are a reminder of the family that they once had, but maybe they do not
have or maybe they're not around or they don't get to see the family as much,
their birth families as much as they wish. So a child may really miss their birth
or first parent in their life. And maybe they're still involved, but they aren't
involved as much or maybe they're not involved at all. And this likely, these kind
of big emotions can resurface as they have these kind of memories of their birth
first parent. So I think the reminder of the loss, the change of the routine and
the reminder of some of those past experiences, one of the things that we know
about the brain is it's programmed in a sense to reenact current events based upon
their past experiences. Okay. So your child may be safe with you,
but their brains may not realize that yet. And it may take their brains a little
while to realize, hey, I'm safe with you. And so their brain is constantly scanning
for what can go wrong. And unfortunately, sometimes they don't always, the brains
don't always get it right. And we may see threat in places that there's not threat.
And that threat oftentimes can be in new situations as well. So change and reminders
and lack of previous experience with this family that has been repeated enough to be
able to build trust. It also strikes me that the smells and the sounds and the
lights and the food. All of those things are, so many families have all of those
things on just a season.
pretty serious sensory overload, especially for a child that already has a hard time
managing sensory challenges or sensory input. You got that right.
And I mentioned earlier about the sensory overload for our kids. And that is a
huge, huge issue that happens for our kids with the newness of these sounds.
And sometimes I kind of call it the Disneyland experience. I'm out in California,
but you get, you kind of get this overstimulation and all this excitement and you
think, oh, things are great, but children are getting everything they need. Yet that
can be very different from their expectations and what they experience normally with
the senses and those sensory issues, the sights, the sounds, the touches, the
feelings, all these kinds of things are so novel and so overstimulating that they
just a lot of times the behaviors will kind of bubble back over because of that
overload. It strikes me that even school isn't exempt from those changes.
There's holiday parties and holiday games and different holiday food and treats and
stuff in the classroom. And so even if all of that change and new stimuli is
happening at home, they can't even always count on school to be kind of like that
regular structured routine around the holiday season.
during the season and even the beginning, they'll have, you know, especially in
elementary school, you know, they'll bring pictures to, you know, school to talk
about themselves or whatever. And they're going to be seen that they're different.
You know, I don't maybe have the same experiences and what the expectations we have
as well. Right. So speaking of those behaviors and how the pressure impacts our
kids, what are some of the kind of common behaviors that parents or caregivers might
see related to all of these challenges around.
This may not be the case for you, but in my situation, I've learned that when I
set up two high standards for my kids on what to expect, it puts a lot of
pressure on them. They surely will allow fear to take over when they cannot possibly
meet that expectation of how to act or what things are going to be. And sometimes
my own expectations that it's going to be peace and harmony and everyone here is
going to get along. We're going to put some extra pressure on our kiddos, and that
extra pressure to be nice to each other to get along, in a sense, can create that
extra fear for our kids that they're not going to live up the expectations. And
I'll share a story about that in a moment. But some of the types of things that
we may see, a lot of times we may see a regression to more childish behaviors.
For younger kids, we may see, you know, your child has been potty trained, but now
they may have some accidents because of anxiety. We may see an increase in meltdowns
and tantrums and an increase in aggression. And part of this has to do with what I
talked about fear and the role of fear and what that does to us is that when
we're put into a new situation, The part of our brain that actually processes fear
is called the limbic system. And one of the parts of our brain is the amygdala is
what really processes what we call the flight or fight or freeze response. And so
when fear and new transitions come down, they're going to be more likely to have
these kind of meltdowns or tantrums or aggressions because of fear. and because the
brain is constantly Thank you.
But we may even see an increase in that isolation. And this can be a self
-protective measure. If you think about kind of the idea of, I don't know what to
expect, I'm about to get hurt. I'm going to pull away so that I'm not going to
get hurt. And if you think about it, that makes sense, right? So we've got to
figure out a way to help allow our childs to have permission to have their own
safe place and place to isolate, but not do so within, you know, within reason,
obviously. Sleeping issues, we talked about the bed wedding. Maybe they're sleeping in
a bed or maybe no bed at all or a couch. Perhaps that's a reminder of,
you know, situations that have happened in the past where they didn't, they were
sleeping in a new place, a new situation. They wake up in the middle of the night
and all of a sudden they're in a new place and their brain isn't really thinking
and they're not thinking. And that can cause increase in nightmares. One of the
things that I've seen with my own kids is what I would say, oh man, they're being
rebellious, right? But they're not really being rebellious. They simply are trying to
maintain a sense of control in their lives. They're not trying to manipulate things.
So remember that control brings safety. And so a lot of times our kids may be
trying to control things more. Your child maybe hasn't fully learned to trust the
adults in their life. And so when they are in control, they feel more safe. And
then that may become out in the terms of more rebellious type behaviors as well.
So I think those kinds of things can happen. I'll share a story with my own son.
He's 18, but one of the very first holidays that we went to with extended family,
we went from Oklahoma to Texas, and this was the first time they actually got in a
plane, which was a nightmare in itself with two kids. But we got there and we went
to a home that was a very nice home, okay? And it had a lot of clocks and
ornaments and all these things. And my son is one who has ADHD.
He likes to touch things and pick it up and explore his environment. And at the
house, we allow him to do that. It's a safe environment. But I don't think I did
a really good job of one preparing my son for what to expect and preparing my
relatives of what to expect. And so all of a sudden he comes and was wanting to
touch these ornaments. And he got into an ornament and broke a very valuable one.
And then there was some clocks. And I was having to follow him around. And I gave
him all these new rules and says, no, you can't touch this. Don't touch this. And
what ended up happening was he just this new expectation,
the constant following him around the house to make sure that he was going to be
safe and not touch things. I realized thinking back, I didn't do a really good job
of preparing him, number one, or preparing my
And I mean, I would never have had to do this in the home, right? And so I think
it was just for my experience, I didn't help prepare my son, number one, what to
expect, looking back. And I don't think I really did a good job of preparing my
relatives of what to expect. You know, maybe they could have tried to safe -proof
their home a little bit and not, you know, have to be worried about that. And I
didn't do that, you know. And so I had to learn the really hard way about how for
him it was a combination of all these new experiences, the new people, and it was
a nice home, and there was kind of pressure to make sure that things aren't broken.
And then so the entire week, I had to follow him around. And, you know, I think
if I would look at him doing differently, I would have created some breaks and
gotten him out of the house to kind of explore and get his energy out. But all
these things just led to kind of a nightmare experience. And unfortunately, I totally
resonate with that. You know, I remember in the early years of parenting before we
adopted, looking back now, I feel like I had a different set of expectations for
how we lived at home versus how we visited other places, including relatives.
And I didn't bridge that gap very well. And learning like this,
you know, along the years has been so helpful to the point where I learned how to
advocate for my kids in the presence of other people or in their home, in other
people's homes. But I also learned how to prepare my kid for like when you walk
through the front door, this is what you're going to see. And it's different than
we have at our house. And, you know, different isn't bad. Different is just
different. And so we're going to, you know, just like we do at home, We treat our,
you know, furniture with respect and we don't break, you know, we don't drop our
shoes in the middle of the carpet so that somebody fall and break a leg. We're
going to behave in the same way at grandmas or at aunt so -and -so's, but I didn't
bridge those gaps well in the early years. And I feel like I'm able now with this
information to kind of connect the dots with my kids and for my kids more clearly.
Well, I think sometimes our expectations can create a sense of greater fear for our
kids. And I think in this situation, what I did was my expectations were up here.
I was having to follow him around and make sure. And that was just too much.
I mean, all of a sudden, fear takes place. And then we get the meltdowns.
And so that was just an unfortunate situation that I had to learn and still
learning. I get it. Yeah, it's a process. So you brought up something, kind of a
little nugget that I want to pull out there. How do these outward behaviors relate
to the reasons that the holidays are hard for our kids? What is that connection
between that outward behavior and that outward, you know, those outward expectations
that press on our kids and their internal need or their internal experiences.
Great question. Well, if you think about it with my son, you know, and this,
all the behavior really makes sense that our kids do. I mean, his little meltdown
really makes sense. It serves a purpose. Unfortunately, our kids with trauma histories
do not, and have not always learned more adaptive ways to get their needs met. They
haven't learned how to express their feelings in a way that you and I are able to.
So these behaviors, in a sense, serve as a type of loudspeaker to us that things
are not okay, that they are feeling dysregulated inside and their bodies are not
okay. And their emotions are all out of whack due to the holidays and due to their
previous experiences. And so for our kids, it's not that they're being manipulative
or rebellious. It's just they haven't learned more adaptive ways to get their needs
met and how to express their feelings. And so what we realized during the holidays
is that fear often drives behaviors of our kiddos, these new experiences, the new
transitions, the overstimulation that we've talked, all of these types of things
change the state of the brain of our kids, the brain state of our kids. It causes
our child to be more likely to be in that flight, fight, or freeze response, right?
So to answer that question, I think it's really important to understand that when
fear actually drives our kids' behaviors, oftentimes they do not think.
They just react. In fact, their brains are not always made to actually think when
they are in a state of fear. Their brains and bodies aren't designed to are
designed to actually respond quickly. So now, if you think about it, when we think
about that flight, fight, or freeze response, let's say we encounter a big bear that
approaches them. The adrenaline and cortisol in their bodies are released in their
bodies to get their hearts pumping, to get glucose to their muscles so they can
fight.
quickly. And there's a term that a psychologist by the name of Daniel Goldman talks
about called the amygdala hijack. And I love that. It's one of the greatest hijacks
that's been around for years. And what that is is an immediate overwhelming response
out of the ordinary of an expected response. And the amygdala,
the part of the brain that's designed to respond to threat, whether the threat is
real, whether there's a big bear or not. The problem is the big bear, the migdala,
the response of the fight, flight, or freeze is great when there's a big bear, but
when there's not a big bear and we think there's a big bear, it becomes a problem,
right? But what happens with the amygdala hijack is the amygdala is designed to
actually respond very quickly, very quickly. But the problem is it doesn't always get
it right. And what happens is there's a hijack that actually occurs where the
frontal lobe, that thinking part of the brain, it's much slower than the amygdala,
the limbic system. It provides logical reasons. The migdala isn't logical. It's quick.
So there's a great hijack that takes place that the amygdala actually hijacks the
frontal lobe of the brain. The migdala actually perceives the flight, fight, or freak
response more quickly than
situation, our child doesn't know that the Christmas concert that they're performing
in is not a bear. They just know that they feel threatened.
They feel shocked. They feel scared, confused. And to them, the Christmas concert is
a bear. Yes. And we don't see the Christmas concert as a bear. Their little brains
don't know that it's not a bear, but their whole body feels like it's a bear
because that's what their amygdala has told them in that fear state of how am I
going to perform. Yes. So the migdala short circuits the frontal lobe, but it can't
think it. Later asked the child, why did you do that? And what response do you
get? Right. I have no idea. But it makes sense. I mean, think about a time in
which maybe you responded and yelled at your child because you were frustrated and
you think, why in the world did I just do that? Well, it's the great amygdala
hijack. So what happens is when a child is fearful, they can't think. They respond
quickly. So the best thing that you can do when a child is dysregulated is to
lower your voice volume, to show empathy, to not show reactions, right?
If you say, that's not okay, you can't talk to me that way or whatever, we've just
maintained that fear for our kids. So you've got to get to their emotions, body,
and mind relaxed in order for them to get them to think, in order to get them to
reason, right? So the best thing that we can do is to actually show that sense of
calm reaction.
Let me interrupt here for just a moment and let you know about a free resource
that we're thrilled to be able to bring you thanks to the generosity of the Jockey
Being Family Foundation. We offer a library of 15 free courses that you can take to
strengthen and support your family and they go very nicely with the topic of today's
conversation and helping our kids navigate the holidays. There's courses on there
about how to talk to your kids. There's courses on there about helping our kids
handle big emotions and many, many more that will be helpful and supportive to your
family. Check us out at Bitley slash JBF support.
That's BIT .L .L .Y slash JBF support.
And now back to our show. So Dr. Adams, when your kid is feeling the impacts of
an amygdala hijack, as you called it, what are a couple practical strategies that we
parents can step into the moment with? Let's primarily focus on how to step into
those moments with them. And let's break them down by kind of like age categories.
We'll pick maybe one or two common behaviors of each age category. And then we'll
talk about the behavior. and then we'll talk about
kind of feeling that toddlers and preschoolers get. So give us some practical
strategies to handle a toddler's whining and clinging during the holiday season. Oh,
wonderful. So I think as foster adoptive parents, it's important to first kind of
determine the function or why that behavior occurs. And once we're able to determine
why the need that that behavior is serving, then I think Thank you.
the behavior to to increase the behavior. But let's talk about, you mentioned the
toddler and preschool, the whining and some of the cleaning behaviors. I mean,
I'm going to assume that that cleany behavior is serving a need for that child.
And perhaps they're very anxious or they need, you know, some extra attention. And
so when they become clingy, they know that you're not going to leave them, right?
They know that they need that comfort and attention. So I would say if that's the
case where they're looking for attention, they're needing you, one of the things that
I would say during the holiday season is to be proactively trying to find special
attention one -on -one time with them to reduce the need that they have to become
clingy to get your attention, right? So if you can even take, I mean, Maybe I do
this a lot, even, you know, it seems like when you're on the telephone, they
become, they need you right then, right? So if I know I'm going to be on the
telephone, I may go spend, you know, five or ten minutes just with my child and
say, okay, I'm going to be on the phone and then I'll come back and talk to you
in five minutes, you know, that sort of thing. But trying to find some extra time
to take to reduce that need to become cleany. Another thing that may be good,
especially if you're having to drop them off at a daycare or drop them out
somewhere. Maybe you're going to be wanting to talk to the relatives and you need
them, is to give them a special toy or a teddy bear. It's kind of like a reminder
of that attention, right? And tell them that it represents your love and give that
teddy bear or a hug when she needs or he needs some extra love. And so sometimes
kids can have that. I know a lot of times maybe they'll have a Blinky or something
like that that can be a reminder. And you can give that Blanky or Teddy Bear some
extra love and say if anytime you need my attention, you know, you can have this,
you know, as an idea. And I would say also, Tracy, to be able to provide that
reassurance that they're loved and noticed, right? I mean, and I think we are going
to have to go above and beyond for our kids because they're going to need that
reassurance. And I kind of call it the snapshot moment. Sometimes our kids can be
kind of uncomfortable with that kind of attention. And so that may not be, hey,
great job. It could be, hey, I notice you. I see you over there coloring. I notice
that you are over there doing this. So you kind of take a snapshot of what you
see and just comment upon it. And that can be really good for maybe some of the
kids who may have a hard time dealing with praise. I don't know if any of your
kids are that way, but sometimes praise can be uncomfortable for them. And so that's
a snapshot moment that you can do. So those are some strategies that I would say
are proactive that you can try to avoid. And then a teaching strategy, you know,
how you can teach that child, how to get your attention when they're clinging. You
know, you can say, would you like to ask for a hug, you know, or you can teach
them to try to figure out a way to get your attention in a positive way. So
they're not constantly hanging on you in that sense. You teach them a new behavior
of what you'd like them to do. So that would be kind of a teaching and then a
response strategy when they're cleaning. You know, sometimes you may just need to
give them a hug and give them a little bit of attention and then gradually redirect
them to a new activity and do that activity with them. So say, hey, why don't we
go play with the toys together? And then you can start playing with the toys and
kind of shift their attention to another activity and focus on it because they're
really just wanting you. And you're wanting to try to figure out a way to help
them so they're not so attached to you and they can do their own thing. And
gradually you can say, okay, that's great job. I'm going to go over here and talk
to my friends and then maybe come back in five minutes and say, hey, I see you.
And then come back to kind of reduce that possibility that they're going to start
whining when you're not right there with them. Right. So those are some of the
thoughts that I would have for the toddler and preschool age. One thing I think is
really important with toddlers is giving them our eyes. Oh, yes. Sometimes that means
getting down on their level. Sometimes that means pulling them up to your lap. I
had one that needed that touch point of sitting up in my lap for a minute or two.
And then he'd squirm back down and go off and do his own thing. But he just
needed that face to face with me for a second. And it doesn't have to interrupt
the adult conversation. It doesn't have to distract the adult conversation. If you
just kind of do it matter of fact, pull them up, look at them, say, oh, I see
what a great job you're doing, playing with your cousins, and then let them get
back down when they're ready and move on. It can kind of just meet the need
without making a big deal of it. I love that. You know, we don't always realize
how the size differential can be for us. For staying up versus getting down on
their level and looking at them and smiling and, you know, having little rituals
with them and fun traditions as well. So thank you for that. That's, that's
wonderful advice. I mean, it's not a huge height difference for me and any of my
kids because I'm a short girl, but it's, it still was a touch point. I had another
one that had to just kind of put his hand up the back of my neck and kind of
bury his fingers in my hair for just a little bit. And then he'd go off and do
his thing. That's wonderful. And I found that when I was, you know, less resistant
to those interruptions and saw them more as bids for my attention, it was much
easier to change the way I responded. And so much of parenting, that's true of so
much of parenting. If we can change the way we view the situation as something they
need rather than there's something they're doing to us, it makes it so much easier
to respond with grace. You're seeing the need behind the behavior. Act absolutely.
Yes. Exactly. So let's talk about those schooling.
help our school age kids handle those kinds of big holiday events. Right.
Meltdowns and transitions and all of those things. Once again,
I would kind of come back to ask what is the function of that behavior. So let's
just talk. Maybe we could talk about transitions or meltdowns. One of the things I
like to do to help those meltdowns is to to really help with those transition
points, right? So a lot of times, you know, some of those transitions when,
you know, maybe before we go to bed and ask them to brush their teeth or when
before we're going to ask them to come and wash their hands before they go eat,
you know, those kinds of things is to provide a lot of priming and advance notice,
advance warning of what's to come and actually them ownership of what it's is to
come and provide extra choices and get their involvement because a lot of times over
the holidays, there's a lot of things that they can't control. So I think being
able to find some ways to give them a sense of control, give them a sense of
choice can really help reduce the challenges in some of those transitions and some
of those meltdowns. Obviously, if a child has a meltdown, we've got to figure out,
you know, why is that child, you know, what's going on? Is it just that they've
got this release that they're trying to get a release out of? Sometimes I have to
say in the moment, you've just got to, when that meltdown goes, you just got to
wait it out. And there's not a lot you can do. And you have to remember that
child isn't thinking, right? They're responding and reacting. They're in the migdala
hijack. So they have a big reaction. And so, you know, the response on our report,
again, is to get them to allow them to be calm and have a calm body to, you
know, get down on their level, to not use a lot of words. You don't want to over
stimulate him and talk softly and say, you know, what's going on? How can I'm here
to help you and get them to where they can at least explain to you in their
words, what's frustrating, you know, like maybe simple, I'm hungry. Oh, okay. yeah,
every two to three hours, they need, you know, food and water and making sure that
you're providing that. It could be that they're upset because someone took their toy,
you know, and trying to figure out what it is and working with them. But I think
the best thing that we can do is to show empathy and calm in the moment. And then
do the processing time later. I used to think, you know, I had to really do that
teachable moment, you know, right in the point of regulation, and the dysregulation,
but that's not the way the neurobiology works of the child. They're not going to
hear you. They're just, it's going to be, yeah, my mom, my mom, right? So being
able to get them calm, redirect them back to task. And then later when they're
calm, come back and say, hey, earlier, you said some really mean things or you said
this. Maybe what could we done? Let's do a redo together and kind of figure out
what we could do differently, right? Yeah. And help our kids with that kind of
thing. And I think for this age, you mentioned, giving them some choices, kind of
preventatively saying, okay, so let's talk about what happened last time we went to
grandma's for a big family dinner. What was fun for you? What did you love?
And what was maybe challenging for you? And how can we kind of mitigate some of
those challenges together? We had a situation with one of ours, where the very loud,
noisy gathering of the family was sometimes just too much for her to handle. And so
we talked it through with her and we gave her a little, they're called disc mans,
you know, like the old walkmans. And she just took that into a quiet corner and
put her headphones on and listened to some quiet, calming music that she got to
choose and just gave her 10 or 15 minutes in the middle of the big family
gathering, she just kind of had freedom and permission to go off by herself to get
the break she needed. But that's because we had kind of done that debriefing the
last time when things didn't go as well. What a great way to also connect with
your child and to get them involved and allow them to have choice. And,
you know, in order for our child to self -regulate themselves, they have to be able
to be co -regulated, right? And so you're now being a safe person to talk about
those feelings and you're able to help co -regulate that child into being calm. We
can't expect them to go out and just calm down by themselves until they learn that
co -regulation. So finding ways to co -regulate our school -age kids and see a safety
and talk about those feelings in a safe environment. So that's wonderful. And I'm
not taking any credit for that one. We were working with a trauma and trauma
sensitive occupational therapist at the time to help us work through some of the big
emotions and how she would express them and how she would feel them in her body
and recognizing what they felt like so that she could talk about them. So yeah, I
take no credit for that one. That was all our dear friend and OT who was helping
us in that season of life. Oh, yes. So the last age group that we kind of want
to talk about is a pretty broad topic of tweens all the way up into young adults
quite often during these family get -togethers and during the holiday season. The
primary behavior that we see, and you mentioned it earlier in the conversation, was
this sense of isolation, whether it's actually getting up and leaving the room or if
it's putting earbuds in and
change. So I mean, in a sense, I think being able to go off and do your own
thing is a good thing. I mean, it's something that we want to support and allow to
an extent when they do it to the point of isolating themselves so they are now no
longer around other people. I think one of the things that you want to do,
obviously, is to provide ownership and make a deal. So you can give them permission
to go out and play video games for a little while, but maybe have a few small
expectations. You know, they come down for meals. Maybe we're going to negotiate
playing a family game together for 30 minutes, maybe doing this activity and this
activity. Give them a sense of control, but do a little bit of stretching and the
expectation of spending some time with us and say, hey, we want to realize this is
your holiday too, right? You're going to be, this isn't just our time to celebrate
Thanksgiving or Halloween. This is your time. And I know you want to have some time
to yourself. Is that right? You kind of get them, but also understand how there may
be some other people and that we want to see you and spend time with you and kind
of get some ownership and see if you can kind of get some ownership in their
ability to agree that they will spend a certain amount of time and come out of
their bedroom, you know,
when he comes back, we want to be careful and not bombard them with too many
questions and attack because you're not going to see them again and, you know, kind
of help prepare your team to, you know, be aware that there may be some silly,
funny questions and maybe afterwards we can come together and say, I bet you that
you're going to get three silly questions from. And you come back and let me know
how many silly questions did you have to answer, you know, and kind of make it a
kind of a fun little thing. So to kind of help prepare them and say, I appreciate
you spending the time and effort to work through this and give them a sense of
control in that, I think. It's fantastic. I love that. We had a family gathering
actually just this weekend. And my niece just graduated from college. And she said,
I feel like I should just put a sticker on my forehead that said, yes, I'm glad I
graduated. No, I don't have a job and no, I don't know what I'm doing yet. And I
totally resonated with that because all the aunts and uncles want to know, we all
love her so much. We're all so excited for this stage of her life. But, yes,
recognizing that because there are so many of us on my side of the family that
we'll be asking that question, a pre -printed card might have been a good idea.
That's great. I have to take some notes here. Yeah, we're a big noisy crowd,
and we do, we're also nosy. We're noisy and noisy. So, yeah,
most of the kids accept it as part of the territory, but I understood what she was
trying to say. So let's turn to the adult side of the conversation.
What are some things that we parents and caregivers can start to put into place for
ourselves that will kind of be trauma -sensitive, preventative actions to minimize our
stress when our kids have the inevitable challenging behaviors,
because we're not going to ever totally mitigate challenging behaviors. But we can
take care of ourselves in ways that will help us prepare for those things. Oh,
wonderful. So I think there are several things that we can do to kind of help
prepare ourselves for the war that we're about to face, right?
I think the first is to are kind of some proactive strategies that we can do for
self -care. And this isn't just necessarily in the moment, but ongoing proactive
strategies to deal with this. Obviously, self -care of sleep, exercise,
nutrition. We think of during holidays, you know, oh, you know, these things are
going to be sacrificed, right? You maybe aren't going to get as much sleep or maybe
you're going to get out of your exercise routine. But is that the case? Is there a
way that you can maintain that exercise? Is there a way that you can maintain that
sleep? You can't be expected to take care of the needs of your child with trauma.
I had brought in two kids at the time, seven and nine year old. You know, I
wasn't really used to accepting help from others. And I was a part of a church
that actually had a care team that came alongside of me to help me paint the room,
to help me with organization, brought me some toys. I had a team of people bringing
me meals to kind of help. And I was just like overwhelmed. I was like, no, no, I
don't. Then I started, thank you so much, learned to accept that help from others
and even, even ask for it, you know, at times. And that's really hard to be able
to, to be able
I do try to have an attitude of gratitude to being remember what I'm thankful for.
And one of the things, one of my own mentors, when a time in which I was really
struggling about whether I was going to be able to continue and go through it, they
said, Dr. Adams, are you, are you able to handle today? And I was like, yeah, be
able to handle tomorrow? Yeah. And he goes, well, stay there. Stop projecting your
fears of what's going to happen in the future that my kids are going to end up in
prison and, and, you know, wrecking havoc in lives and all these things based upon
this one. Deal and be mindful today, right? Be present and have those being learning
to say no, boundary setting. Again, this is really tough. I know we hate to say
it, but sometimes it's hard to set boundaries and we want to please and you're
going to have to learn to set boundaries and say, no, I can't do that. I'm sorry.
And doing that with respect is another thing I would say, acknowledge your own loss.
You know, maybe over time you're a seasoned adopted parent and you had these dreams
of what it was going to be like having a family and having kids that are well
behaved and doing well in school. And you see your life is so much far away from
that. There may be a loss of that. There may be a loss that you're experiencing
and some of us need to, you know, seek therapy as well. Just the effects of these
stress endorphins, the cortisol in our body, the adrenaline, the glucose that goes to
our muscles over time has a huge effect. So one of the things that we learn is
hard exercise is so important, learning to breathe and practice mindfulness and,
you know, tensing your muscles and relaxing and practicing some of these ongoing
strategies, I think is really important to deal with, you know, the effects and the
difficulties of caring for our kiddos. Yeah. Kind of keeping that mindset that you
have all year around and just focusing more on it as you're rolling into the
holiday season. So when parents are struggling and let's face it,
it was a really quick role from the start of school to several of the big Jewish
holidays, Halloween, and then right into Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, Duwali,
all the things. So it's just fall tends to be like a lightning bolt type of
season. And sometimes that self -care and that mindfulness can get away from us.
So what is compassion fatigue and how do we know that we might be suffering from
it? Oh, wow. Okay. So I know it's been defined back even in the late 90s as kind
of this idea of a negative cost of caring for others. I've even heard some people
call it as kind of secondary trauma. And I think it's important to understand that
it's a neurobiological process, basically, of the effects.
Quails and Corkham in 2003 wrote a book and even used the term blot care. Yes.
The idea that this was a cell protective mechanisms that they said that actually is
initiated by a nervous system, right? It's activated by stress. And what happens is
that it kind of dampens that those higher brain functions related to caring for the
needs of others because your nervous system actually develops kind of like a
defensiveness toward your child. I have met, I know this is hard to imagine for
those who've never experienced it, but I've met the most well -intentioned, loving
foster and adopted parents who have literally developed disgust for their own children
because of the effects of what's going on in their nervous system. No part to them,
they are loving parents who just have a temporary feeling of this blocked care of
their challenge and actually having us loving feelings or even having negative
feelings toward the others, simply because of what's happening. So I think it's
important to understand that it's not a problem with a person. It's a problem with
the neurobiological process of stress and maybe not dealing with some of those stress
in the right way. It's so good for caregivers and parents to hear that.
It is not a moral failing. It is not a character failing. It is not even a
compassion failing. It is a neurobiological response to the weight and the burden
that you're carrying when you care for someone like an adoptive or foster child who
is struggling. Yeah. Thank you for that clarification. I mean, it's a normal result
of the ongoing stress that's going on in your brain, body,
and your emotional health. And so I think it's something that all of us perhaps
have experienced at times, some of us more, more than others. But I think as we
understand that it's that neurobiological process that gives us a little bit of
permission to experience that without blaming ourselves, without really thinking,
oh, man, I must be such a terrible foster parent that I'm having these kind of
thoughts or feelings. No, you're just dealing with a neurobiological process from the
effects of stress in your life. So some of the signs and symptoms would be maybe
some numbness. Oh, man. Fatigue, physical or mental and emotional fatigue.
Help me out. Yeah, I would say,
So those are some physical symptoms. I think obviously there's some emotional and
behavioral symptoms, feelings of hopelessness. You ever feel like things aren't going
to get better? We call it A, Hedonia, a loss of pleasure. Heedonism is pleasure.
A is not having it, right? So a difficulty in finding pleasure. Maybe even
withdrawing from others, isolating yourself, maybe a decreased motivation to do things.
And so I think these are some very, very serious, a very normal type of emotional
and behavioral symptoms that can go along with compassion fatigue. Right. And I'll
say at this point, if you feel like you might be struggling with compassion fatigue,
I would highly recommend that you seek a therapist or a counselor who is competent
to deal with some of those issues, have a safe place for yourself to talk through
and kind of just let off some steam about the feelings that you're having. You can
also consider joining our online Facebook community where we talk about a lot of
these things and we support each other. And you can find that at facebook .com slash
groups slash creating a family. And in that group, then you'll see lots of other
things that we offer as a community to support parents that may be feeling some of
these struggles. I'm sorry to interrupt our conversation with Dr.
Adams, but I wanted to remind you about weekend wisdom. At the beginning of the
show, I mentioned that weekend wisdom is one of our podcasts. It drops every
Saturday morning, and it's full of practical support and implementable tips that you
can try with your family right away, and they're all based on questions that you,
our listeners, send to us about adoption, foster care, or raising a relative's child.
So if you have a question, please send it to info at creatingafamily .org.
And if you're looking for a short podcast that will give you practical strategies to
support and strengthen your adoptive, foster or kinship family, check us out at
Weekend Wisdom, wherever you find your other CreatingAFamily .org podcasts. Thanks so
much, and back to the show.
Okay, well, the last section that we're going to do is we're going to wrap up with
some practical. We love it when all of these fantastic topics that we talk about
can end in very practical, implementable tips. So let's talk now about just a few
things that parents and caregivers can do to start preparing for the holiday season
and prepare for maybe a holiday season that's a little less stressful or a little
less ragey and a little more connected and a little more securely attached and
safely felt for our family members. Yes, excellent. So when I think about some
practical suggestions that I try to do to prepare. A lot of it is preparing myself,
some of the things we talked and then what can we do to actually prepare, you
know, our kiddos for this. And I mean, I think in order for us to be able to
help support our kids, we have to be able to practice some of these mindfulness
strategies to where you're getting connected with others. You're having your own quiet
times and being able to develop self -care. But then there's also the aspect of
helping our kids. And one of the things that I like to do, especially with the
holidays, is to try to figure out ways for my kiddos to get the exercise that they
need when going out, when they are locked up into a new house and they are kind
of out there as like, hey, let's get out and run them around and realize that we
don't all have to stay the entire time in the house. We can get out. We can take
a break. One of the things I always try to do when going to a new place, I say,
hey, let's find a place that you can go to if you need some space. This is going
to be your place that you can go to. If you ever need to get out, come talk to
me and we can go out. Maybe let's plan on going to the park and running around,
but actually schedule some time to actually get their energy out because if if you
don't do it, it's going to come out some other way. Right. Another thing that I
like to do is to sit down and have a conversation with my kids and say, hey, of
course, you're going to miss your birth mom or your first mom or whatever,
however you define her as. And I want you to know that I'm here for you. And this
is going to be hard. And maybe you have some big feelings that come. And I want
you to know that if you ever want to talk, I'm here to listen. And so give
permission for your kids to have these kind of feelings and say sometimes holidays
are hard for me. And so helping to prepare them to know that they may be having
some of these big feelings and given permission that that's okay and that's expected.
And I also try to give my kids some structure at the same time giving them some
choice, right? And, you know, I mean, I can kind of think of a situation that when
we were going and I was having to let them know, hey, you know, during
Thanksgiving, we have a kids table and we have an adult table, right? And the kids
sit over here and the adults sit over here and that my child may want to be with
me, but I may have to give up my standard a little and say, hey, why don't you
try going sitting over here with your friends over here? And then after that, if
you want to come sit by me, you can. And,
embrace his or her culture, you can invite discussions to talk about what are your
favorite traditions? What kinds of foods do you like to eat over the holidays? What
have you done in the past with exchanging of gifts? What does that look like? And,
you know, allow them to kind of share. Maybe some of them may embellish or create
fantasies in their mind of what was or maybe they don't have any memory at all.
But you can kind of see what elements you can incorporate. And then you can also
use that to say, hey, here's some traditions that we have and how do you feel
about that and that sort of thing. The other thing I was going to speak of is for
those that have open adoptions versus those who have closed, if you have an open
adoption where you involve birth family, first family, you know, maybe having phone
calls or visits and being able to kind of plan for that. If it's a closed adoption
or there's no ability to contact the birth family or they're not around,
you can allow your child a safe place to talk about it. And life books, you know,
are great place that you can have pictures about the birth first family and kind of
use that as an opportunity over the holidays to review or to make one as well.
But one of the big things, and I would kind of close with this, is to kind of
learn to relax your standards, be prepared for the blow up, provide support during
the meltdown and give a lot of extra attention.
much, Dr. Adams. This was very helpful. Again, the book just came out and you can
check it out. We'll link it in the show notes for you. The book is not specific
to holidays, but certainly everything that we talked about today is going to be in
the book. So thanks, Dr. Adams, for your time. Thank you for joining us. And I
wish you and your family a wonderful holiday season. Thank you so much. I want to
pause one more time and thank Hopscotch Adoptions for sponsoring today's episode.
Hopscotch Adoptions is a Hague accredited international adoption agency placing children
from Armenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Ghana, Guyana,
Morocco, Pakistan, Serbia, and Ukraine. They specialize in the placement of children
with Down syndrome and other special needs, including kinship adoptions. They place
kids throughout the U .S. and they offer home study services and post -adoption
services to residents of North Carolina and New York. You can find their website at
hotscotchadoptions .org, and I hope that you'll check them out.