STOP

One night after eating some McChicken that did not set to well on my stomach, I was lying in bed wide awake. I normally sleep like a baby so this is unusual for me. We had been working on some things in attachment therapy with our son and the above acronym came to me. Say something nice to someone right now. A VERY hard thing for my child with RAD. He will stand there for 5 minutes humming and hawing and come up with nothing. Try using a positive replacement behavior. He has many negative behaviors, so we came up with a list of positive behaviors he is supposed to give a try this week. He has tried a few times doing them alone rather than with me, which was the goal, but at this point we take baby steps. Only you can change your attitudes and behaviors. Children with RAD blame everyone else for anything bad that happens. They do not see themselves as causing the bad thing, but that it happens to them. They see themselves as powerless and yet spend most of their time trying to be "in power". Plan on success. Sigh. Another hard one. Right now he is planning on failure. I keep telling him that we believe he can do this. He is not alone and we are here to help. So far, he sees himself as a failure. We keep going!