The parents decided to teach themselves about parenting a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder. It wasn’t until Tina discovered that Julia was suffering from a condition called “ Reactive Attachment Disorder” that the parents understood it wasn’t all them. All this, when Julia was still a baby! During preschool meets, Julia would fight to get off her mother’s lap, resulting in immense frustration and self-doubt for the parents. Julia would never make eye-contact, never demand a favorite toy, never demand to be tucked into bed, never even try to stay in the same room. While Tina and Rick were thrilled to bring home Julia, they quickly saw that Julia didn’t feel the same way.

While pursuing a glorious career as a newspaper reporter and an independent writer, Tina and her husband, Rick decided to bring home Julia, a baby from a Siberian orphanage. Parenting comes with its own challenges parenting a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder becomes that much harder.Īnd then you begin to wonder: Is it me? Was I ever meant to be a parent? What am I doing for them to not even want to look me in the eye? Some children so desperately want everyone gone that they turn criminal. That’s because the child has reactive attachment disorder. And then you notice that everything you do just slips away on the child – like you have poured water on an oily surface. You look forward to showering the child with love, care, nurture- everything you have got. Imagine this: You wait eagerly to hear from the adoption centre. In this post she talks about her journey. ‘Rescuing Julia twice’ is a heartfelt account of how an adoptive mother overcame her child’s reactive attachment disorder.

Rad disorder adoption