[Ktates]

We went through the same thing - though we did it from the beginning - Aisling was 14 months when we brought her home and I can say that one of her attachment issues was her lack of fear with strangers (ran up to a stranger several times wanting to be picked up).
After a couple of months we lifted one of our rules - I think it was holding - because we thought things were going well but then what I just described above happened a few times so we put the brakes on it. DH's family is 5 minutes away and the rest of his family is close by. My family understood though they didn't like it - DH's family we had a much tougher time with. DH's grandmother was very angry with me, yelled at DH and told him all that Aisling needed was love and we didn't know anything...grrr - I've never seen DH so mad...

However I still allowed her to be held by them - I was afraid that changing that would be too confusing for her (she couldn't, then she could, then she couldn't you know??). And Aisling did sometimes initiate hugs or kisses with them - I told them not to encourage or initiate but it's ok if she did...We also tried to limit our visits (tough when there is so much family close by).

I did print off some information that talks about the bonding cycle - easy read type of stuff - for them - but we still had issues with the family. I told DH that either they respected our rules or they wouldn't see her for a while and he needed to be on board (which he was). I also stressed to everyone that it wasn't forever - and that I didn't know how long it would be but an ounce of prevention for a pound of cure kind of thing....

Good luck - I think it's tougher when your family lives nearby as far as attachment goes - but we tried to include them as much as possible and really limit some of our other activities to make up for it...You have to do what's best for your family - whatever that turns out to be!!
Karen