I don’t blame you for your views. I think that adoption agencies do a poor job of informing people about what’s involved when they adopt children who’ve been traumatized. It is extremely difficult to raise children with RAD. Unless someone has gone through this, there is no way for them to understand or even conceptualize what we’re saying. When someone is being loved and cared for, the natural response is for them to be drawn to you and to love you back. Not so, with these children. They seem to reject you even harder, the more you love them. Think very very long and hard before adopting children with trauma.

Like you said it is hard to know what is really true if she is a RAD child, but unless she asks for help, it is better to give them their space to figure things out. Right not, it seems like they are happy, and every marriage (RAD or not) has issues. Poking into her business could jeopardize your relationship with them.

Marylin, I am a 15 year-RAD survivor mom of three RAD children. Too many years too late, I discovered the Instituted of Attachment and Child Development in Colorado that really “gets” RAD. The only problem is that education almost needs to come from professionals and not the parents, because family and friends do not really believe us. Worse, when the child becomes independent, they triangulate almost every person close to the mother, and one by one, those family members and friends look at the mom as the bad parent. I have been told that my children reject me because I am a “micromanager”, “overcontrolling”, “dysfunctional”, and have questionable parenting styles, (and this by a sister who has no kids). Lke all these mothers state, it is an utterly exhausting, heart-rendering journey of endless effort. Being a RAD mom has been the most grueling, challenging journey of my life, a journey I could not have handled without Faith and belief that those children are also God’s, and deserve to be loved, no matter how hard it was and continues to be. Our love has to become a mantra of unconditional love, unconditional, unconditional, without expecting any return, or warmth, or loving feelings. A Catholic psychologist and father of 10 adopted kids told me: “Love is not a cushy feeling: real love is doing what is right….and good.” And that is the bottom line, the song you pull up in your heart, day in, day out, when every attempt you make is seen by your child’s distorted lenses as something hostile. Part of the RAd diagnosis is that as they mature, RAd Children will tend to forget all the wonderful memories, and focus solely on their negative feelings. They do project their past trauma and resentments onto their adoptive parents, and as the Institute of Attachment explains, they make their adoptive moms the “nurturing enemy”. Therefore, only people who can help HAVE to be trained RAD specialists. A good RAD therapy will always, always support, support, support the parents. And if we do not give up, but continue loving them the best we can while sustaining clear boundaries, they do grow in tiny increments, a little bit every year that they mature. My oldest RAD 23 year old daughter is now bonding with me and shows me some affection, but that only happened after she lived on her own for six years (and they were VERY rough years!) I know now that their healing from RAD may be a 300 year journey—and I am now at peace with my limitations, accepting that I cannot make them whole the way I once thought my heart could do.

We put our 14yo in a rigorous military-style Teen Challenge program for 15 months. It was either that…or he was headed straight toward jail or death. It was really bad. He hasn’t been home that long, so I can’t say whether it’s going to work out in the long run, but so far, so good. Not every boy is a success story in these places, but we now have a light at the end of the tunnel. Had absolutely no hope before. Not sure you’ll see this; it’s been a while since your post. Hope things get better for you.