The following link is the telecourse by Dawn Choate created live
for ThinkingofAdopting.com. You may listen to the course as
well as view slides for the presentation and download the podcast.
Link to Healing Hannah Telecourse
Healing Hannah
Taking attachment disorder out of the closet....one mother shares her
story
May 01,2006 / Dawn Choate
The moment was exactly as I had imagined it. They called our names
as a blur of a person walked into the room holding her. I don't even
know who held her, because all I could see was that beautiful face from
the picture, now come to life. She looked exactly the same, and I could
have spotted her on the streets of Beijing after the hours I had studied
her sweet face from the referral picture. Our Hannah Li was finally in
my arms! There was a brief moment of concern when we noticed the
large bruise on her head, an indentation created from the hours she
must have spent banging her head against her crib. But this was
quickly brushed aside while we played with her (she wasn't even
crying!) and even got our first smile! Now I feel rather naïve as I think
back on that precious day. How many clues did I miss? How many
subtle, yet clear, signs was she trying to send us that this road we were
about to travel was going to be a little more bumpy than we had
expected or prepared for?
The first month with Hannah Li continued as the first day…a breezy,
honeymoon-like entrance into parenting our new daughter. After
having raised 2 boys through the baby years, Hannah seemed like a
piece of cake. We even frequently remarked to others this was almost
“too easy”. She would play quietly on the floor for sometimes a couple of
hours without demanding anything. She ate well and wanted to go to
sleep without us fussing over her at all (which was really a blessing
when you have 3 kids to put to sleep!). Then, one day after a traumatic
visit to a doctor, the shock wore off and the reality of a year of life in an
institution came exploding out of Hannah like a volcano.
What I can only describe as “emotional meltdowns” began to emerge
once, then twice, then up to 5 or 6 times a day. The reason I don't really
think “tantrum” is the appropriate word is because it was clear that her
emotional explosions were much more complex, much more deeply
rooted, and much more agonizingly traumatic than your normal run-of-
the-mill toddler fit. Believe me, I have seen my boys throw themselves
in the floor and scream because I took a toy away. I had never, however,
seen a child (much less a baby) kick, scream, and rage until her whole
body shook just because I wanted to rock her to sleep. I had never seen
a child cry in absolute panic if I stopped feeding her for one minute to
get something in another room. I had never had a child who desperately
pulled her hand away every time I tried to hold it, pulled her face away
every time my cheek touched hers, and pushed at me with both arms
every time I tried to pull her to my chest.
Crawling into my closet in the dark one night after I laid her in her
crib, I sobbed over my daughter's losses and grief and inability to trust
me as her mother, my own grief over the loss of “natural” attachment
that I had shared with my biological children, and my ignorance at the
great sacrifice and cost it is to take a broken, wounded child and
somehow help them find healing. I cried on that floor and asked God to
help me find a way to wake up that next morning and refuse to let the
kicks, the rejection and the cries cause me to fail Hannah's test…her
test to see just how much I am willing to love her; just how determined I
am to not abandon her; just how sure I am that I was meant to be her
mother.
We spent the next year trying, and failing, then trying again to help
Hannah heal. Each time we would think we were through the healing,
another wound would seem to appear in Hannah. Layer after layer
melted, slowly but surely. We did a great deal of holding therapy with
Hannah, though we did not know there was a clinical term for it at the
time. But our instincts just told us that if she pushed us away and
screamed when we tried to hold her that the worst thing we could do
was to not hold her. So we would cradle her in our arms and hold her
even if she screamed her way through it! I also spent a great deal of
time on the internet and phone trying to track down anyone I could
who could help us. I talked to several social workers, adoptive parents,
agencies and therapists trying to glean as much information as I could.
Sometimes we received undue criticism or judgments from those who
didn't understand. But it was worth it to keep seeking help whenever
we would stumble across even a small bit of information that we could
use. We also tried very hard to keep Hannah in routines that were
predictable and peaceful. Large amounts of time spent at the mall, the
school or church or other places in public were often detrimental to her
well-being. We limited her time spent in over-stimulating
environments and being cared for by others, making sure we did the
vast majority of her care. At the same time, we tried to also balance our
own emotional well-being by taking time for ourselves and as a couple
to decompress and replenish.
Hannah is a child now, over a year later that, in many ways, barely
resembles the child that was first placed in our arms. I often am in awe
when she is laying across my lap, completely relaxed and snuggled up
next to me of how much she has healed and how far we have come. She
has truly become bonded in a way with us that I wasn't sure at times
was even going to be possible. I still don't know why God called a naïve,
inexperienced, impatient mom like me to help Him heal Hannah. I can
only surmise that He enjoys the beauty of teaching a broken, imperfect,
helpless mother how to lay down her life to help love a broken,
imperfect, helpless child. At least I know I'm not alone. And now,
neither is little Hannah Li.
(This article is archived at Rainbowkids.com at the following link)
"Healing Hannah" on Rainbowkids.com
