Today I just want to touch on something that I was recently encouraged to do by my son\u2019s therapist\u2026and that is to \u201cparent the child that\u2019s in front of me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now this could mean many different things, but the context I am talking about is that kids coming from trauma are often emotionally delayed, and on average are, the maturity of half their chronological age so if a child is chronologically 10 they are probably emotionally close to five; one thing she reminded me about is that it\u2019s a case by case basis and to say half just makes it nice and clean. Some kids are not that delayed and other kids are more delayed.<\/p>\n
Regardless of the delay, I feel like this context might also apply to many of you as well.<\/p>\n
So we were talking about it because my son has some other needs in addition to his trauma, things that he was born with and because of that, his developmental age is below half. He\u2019s chronically close to 10 but he\u2019s definitely not emotionally 10.<\/p>\n
Honestly, not even close. Sometimes it\u2019s like he\u2019s six and other times it\u2019s like he\u2019s three. This isn\u2019t his fault and it\u2019s in no way intending to demean him. It is what it is and we are doing our best to help him \u201ccatch up\u201d in any way we can.<\/p>\n
So her point to me, and thereby my point to you, is to encourage you to parent the child in front of you. In order to do this, don\u2019t necessarily think about a child\u2019s chronological age or what they \u00a0\u201cshould be\u201d. Think about where they are. What is their behavior telling you?<\/p>\n
Do they need you to swaddle them and rock them even though they\u2019re eight? Does they need you to feed them with a spoon like you would an infant, even though they are perfectly capable of doing it themselves? Now some of you already know this, but for those who do not: a big part of the issue is that sometimes kids have experienced a lot of unmet needs\u2026swaddling, rocking and feeding to name a few.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve talked about it before and I will talk about it again I\u2019m sure\u2026when working with kiddos from hard places, you\u00a0 have to set aside some of your preconceived notions about what a \u201ctypical\u201d child is. A neurotypical\u2019s child. Because even if a child is scored at a level one, which means they have no extenuating needs beyond their basic care, I personally think that\u2019s kind of bogus (there\u2026I said what I said)\u2026because when kiddos are removed from their home and everything they\u2019ve ever known, that is trauma. And so they\u2019re going to need something additional from you, no matter what the initial intake assessment deems.<\/p>\n
And to figure out what it is they need, you have to look at the behavior. They might not flat out say to you \u201cI need you to spoon-feed me\u201d.<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need you to wash my hair.\u201d<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need you to tuck me in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need you to pick out my clothes\u201d<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need help picking out my clothes\u201d<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need a snuggle\u201d<\/p>\n
Or \u201cI need you to rock me\u201d<\/p>\n
Or any of the various things that might indicate a stage has been missed somewhere in their lifetime.<\/p>\n
Point being: if you are attuned to a child\u2019s behavior and can take a step back from whatever it is they\u2019re doing or saying (even if it\u2019s the most unloving and unloveable behavior\u2026and chances are that\u2019s exactly what it will be), you can get clues to what they might be missing\u2026and can parent the child that\u2019s in front of you. They might be chronologically 15 but emotionally they\u2019re 6, so you parent the 6 year old.<\/p>\n
And one other quick reminder: Maybe you\u2019ve had other children in your home who were the same age so you go into the placement with preconceived ideas\u2026but this child may be more delayed, or advanced, than the previous child. Point being: parent the child in front of you, not what you think they should be.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a hard transition to shift your mind to this; you necessarily don\u2019t want to think about what they might have missed or what their life was like\u2026but ignoring it and\/or parenting as though a child is developmentally their chronological age won\u2019t bring them up to it. All it will do is serve to frustrate both you AND the child.<\/p>\n
Sincerely,<\/p>\n
Kris<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today I just want to touch on something that I was recently encouraged to do by my son\u2019s therapist\u2026and that is to \u201cparent the child that\u2019s in front of me.\u201d Now this could mean many different things, but the context I am talking about is that kids coming from trauma are often emotionally delayed, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kriss-corner"],"yoast_head":"\n