I was reading this article about why toddlers reject their parents and I thought it brought up some really excellent points. Rejection is one of those things that no prospective adoptive parent wants to think about but its something you need to prepare yourself for .The one point that I liked about this article is that often the more you work on attachment the more your child may begin to reject you. It’s almost as if once the superficial niceness wears off and true reciprocation is required a new level of rejection occurs. This was not something I was prepared for.


I think we all can understand the rejection that will occur in those first weeks together when everything is new. But when months and months have passed and you feel that you should have earned some trust by now only to be snubbed… that my friends is very hard. I think its how our children attempt to protect themselves from future hurt. It’s a defense mechanism. If your child is rejecting you then more work needs to be done with trust & attachment. It’s a process that takes time. In the beginning I went about it wrong. We often did not demand or require much from her in the early days. If she stiffened and screamed when I held her I put her down. I later learned to hold on to her and work through the attempts to push me away.


Our daughter was rejecting my husband after her attachment grew very secure to me. She would stiffen & scream when he held her and instead of allowing them to work through it I often stepped in and interfered. Then I read all I could about attachment. I learned some valuable tools that really strengthened our attachment and lessened the rejection. I understood it better. Rejection can be as subtle as your child not looking you in the eye or as full blown as physical attacks against a parent.


A Few Tips

Demand eye contact-it needs to happen for true attachment to occur- make it fun,play games, buy cheap sunglasses & pop out the lenses. Play Grandma's glasses fingerplays. Do what ever you need to to encourage eye contact

Holding time
worked for us... I know this is a much debated practice

Get some support- rejection can feel horrible.. know your not alone.