Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Therapists

We have been through a lot of therapists in the last few years. Well, at least 10 of them.  Some were good and some not so good.  Of course our latest "not so good" was the girls therapist who said we should have them moved.  The therapist we found after that is pretty good.  I really like her.  Why?  Because she gets it.  She actually understands attachment issues and why my child has them.  I can talk to her about issues and she gets it.  She doesn't even talk much to my child, she has me do it through the Parent Child Interaction Therapy.  I am in the room with the child and she is helping to direct me through an ear piece.  My child is not able to lie to her.  She can't manipulate her.  The person who needs to interact with her is me.  The person who she needs to attach to is me.  The person who needs to know how to work with these issues on a daily basis is me.  The most this therapist interacts with my child is after our session and she only talks to her while I am in the room.

In researching attachment therapists I did read one site which stated that in attachment therapy the child shouldn't go off with the therapist with the parent being left out.  Why?  Well, the child probably lies and manipulates.  If they get away with it then how is that helping.  Thinking about my own experiences with therapists I think that to be successful the therapist needs to trust what the parent is telling them.  If that trust doesn't exist then how can the child be helped.  I think that was our problem with the first therapist.  She saw our child acting like an angel for 30 minutes and thought we were crazy.  In her mind it was obviously us who had the issue.  I was told that she had experience with attachment issues, I don't think so.

I am glad that we decided to seek out a different therapist.  I read all the time that people have problems with their therapists.  I really believe that if a therapist does not trust you as the parent then it might be time to seek out someone who does.  The hard part is actually finding someone who does know what they are dealing with.  It just so happens that my current therapist works with a lot of foster children.  She has seen a lot of attachment problems and has educated herself on the issues.  I wish that we had found someone like her when we were trying to find one for Joselin.  We were never able to find anyone to work with Joselin in any positive way.

Anyone out there have success with their therapist?  Anyone have a great attachment therapist? 

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