Nearly all of my adopted children have come to me as older kids. Most were teenagers when they arrived, from disruptions, hurt and angry and incredibly resistant to trust. Nearly all had a RAD diagnosis on top of everything else.

With teenagers, there’s not much time with us before they are “grown ups”. For bonding and attachment, we have to work fast – but also have it appear slow, so as not to frighten the kids off too quickly, but allow THEM to choose when and how they will attach. I once told our therapist that our family seems to function with "intensive subtlety".

Here are 11 activities we use at our home that seem to make helpful strides toward building bonds for parent and older child. (Most of our older adoptees have been girls, so a couple of these would likely not apply if you are working with a male child.)

1. Hair brushing – Before bed, I take a few minutes to brush the hair out for a child with long hair. I usually do this in front of the television. This allows the intensity of the activity to be muted by the distraction of the program, which makes the child more willing/makes it less painful (literally or figuratively). It also usually allows me to continue the activity for far longer than we would without it.

2. Life books – Work on life books together. We have one daughter now who is EXTREMELY resistant to me knowing anything about her past. She feels it’s hers and not mine. So, we work with that. We do side by side work on lifebooks – sometimes I work on mine and sometimes on another child’s; she works on hers. Opposite sides of the table. I gave her a box to put her things in when we’re finished working. I put it up for her in my lifebook/scrapbook room. However, I have assured her that the room stays locked and I’ve promised her that I will not look in her box. (And she trusts me with that! That is huge, I think. I could not harm that trust now by “sneaking a peek”.) When I work on other books with her present, I make sure to verbalize a LOT of what I’m doing – to show that I can be trusted, to show I accept their histories, etc.

I'll cover the other 9 activities on the next blog....