Parents of adopted and foster kids often feel like they must be doing something wrong since they are not able to make their children behave during the holidays.
In this episode we hope that parents will understand that “it’s not you, it’s them.” Although we will be learning interventions to help, our kids are going to have issues during this time of the year.
Here are the 5 reasons kids struggle
- Trauma triggers
- Grief and loss
- Sensory Issues
- Self Regulation Problems
- AnxietyIf future episodes we will unpack those? more and give some interventions to help minimize the effects.
About Potty Break:
Potty Break is a series of daily training and encouragement videos for foster and adoptive parents…designed to be watched during those precious few minutes that you can find some alone time….your potty break. (Parents of kids with other special needs are free to listen in 🙂 – most techniques we suggest are effective for kids that have other types of trauma and neurological developmental issues.
Segment Overview
The first segment of Potty Break consists of 13 episodes dedicated to helping family with adopted and foster children with special needs thrive during the holidays. Jennie and Lynn laid out 5 reasons that kids struggle more during the holidays that at any other time of the year.
- Sensory Processing Issues: All the extra sights, sounds and smells overstimulate children with Sensory Issues. Sensory issues are common among children with in utero exposure and other early traumas (Episodes 3, 4 & 5).
- Anxiety: All kids get anxious around the holidays. As anxiety goes up, functioning goes down. Many of the children that were adopted from hard places already had very little capacity for anxiety so the holiday put them over the edge (Episodes 6 & 7).
- Self Regulation Issues: For a variety of genetic, mental health, and trauma related reasons, some children lack the capacity to regulate their own emotional state. Parents of these kids will need to help them stay regulated and set realistic expectations (Episodes 8, 9, 10 & 11).
- Trauma triggers: Often the worst times of our kids lives happened during the holidays. Sensations and situations can trigger a traumatic response which can cause a physiological response, bring up an old memory that they may try to suppress or both. Parents can help their kids discover what is going on to reduce the child?s regression. (Episode 12)
- Grief and Loss: Special moments are a reminder of what our kids lost or wish they had. Processing this loss periodically is a necessary part of acceptance. (Episode 13)
