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This sounds so much like my son (who's finalization is this Friday, May 1!). He had TPR at 5, in and out of foster homes, had a long term pre-adoptive home that disrupted. He was then sent to an RTC which helped and messed him up at the same time. He has ADHD and ODD and Attachment issues, but not RAD. He was one angry boy when we got him at age 8. We did not have any honeymoon period at all! Tons of raging, anger, hurling offensive words at us, wishing we would send him back to the RTC, urination issues, etc. He is the only child and that truly helped the whole situation. We were able to focus on just him. What really helped was being strong with him, not letting him use triangulation on us and tons of follow-through for consequences and a great therapist who is a realist. We also used a lot of love and affection with him. Letting him know that we loved him no matter what and would never give up on him.
After being with us for 4 months, he was put into a mainstream elementary school, with no special needs classes. Our son is a very smart boy and always gets good grades and loves to read. We also kept him busy with team sports so that he could learn to play with normal kids and some individualized sports to boost his self-esteem which was very low.
It has been almost 2 years and he is doing sooo much better. What you need to realize is she is never going to be a normal child. It's hard, but true. She will probably have a hard time making and/or keeping friends. Emotionally, she is probably 5 or 6 and social skills will definitely need work on. I know my son still has a hard time with being social. He tries too much for kids to be his friends. Just this past year he has a group of friends from his classrom that also live in the neighborhood and he is ok to play with them.
It will be a long road for all of you, so be prepared for lots of crying and yelling from either of you! Our son really loves dogs and the transition into our home was much easier because we had 2 dogs. They love him unconditionally and have never hurt them, so he identifies with them.
We still have some hard days, but he is in more control of his anger and emotions. What really helped us was one weekend he was raging and raging, just wouldn't stop. I even had to hold him down. Finally, I yelled in his face what he was angry with? He didn't know, so I handed him a piece of paper and pen and told him to write down immediately what he was angry with. It wasn't us, it was his birth parents and how they messed him up. I had him tear up that paper and throw it away. Next I made him write down what he was happy with and it was all the positives in his life, us, the dogs, his friends, his toys, etc. We still have that piece of paper hanging on our fridge.
It's hard and it drains you, but we love that boy so much and he finally loves us and his life. He is so much happier these days and can't wait for his adoption and tucking some bad memories away in his mind.
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