Book Review: A Safe Place for Caleb

Title:  A Safe Place For Caleb
Author:  Kathleen A. Chara and Paul  J. Chara, Jr.

Description from Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1843107996/?tag=mh0b-20&hvadid=3525330470&ref=pd_sl_5sv099im3v_b
"A Safe Place for Caleb is a comprehensive and richly illustrated resource for individuals of all ages who are dealing with attachment problems. Parents, professionals, and lay people will find this book helpful in understanding and addressing attachment disorders in children, adolescents, and adults. The first half of the book is an interactive story that follows the experiences of Caleb, a young boy who relates his difficulties and frustrations in forming and sustaining healthy relationships. He learns strategies for coping with attachment issues during his journey to the Safe Tree House, where he is introduced to the four "attachment healing keys". These act as therapeutic tools to unlock difficulties with attachment, and are presented using text and illustrations that are easily accessible for readers of all ages, even for young children. The second half of the book presents a summary of current scientific thought on attachment styles and disorders, and provides a wide array of assessment tools, photocopiable material and healing techniques to address attachment difficulties. Lists of helpful organizations and relevant reading materials are also presented. Based on established psychological principles, the book is a unique and imaginative guide for professionals, parents, caregivers, and people of all ages who are dealing with attachment issues."

Review:
My son and I went through this book together when he was 7/8 years old, I wouldn't recommend it for kids much younger than this.  There are some really great concepts and parenting ideas in here that could be utilized for younger kids, so you may want to read through the book and introduce the concepts that would be appropriate for your child.  For older kids they could work through the book independently if they wanted to.
The book is broken into three parts.  Part I tells Caleb's story from the perspective of Caleb.  He starts by discussing his hurt parts, what he believed and how he behaved.  He then talks about starting to heal, how he changed his beliefs and behaviors  The next section in Part I talks about Caleb's Safe Tree House, a safe place that can be created in your mind to go to when things are tough.  He then goes over four steps to healing and where he ended up 15 years later.  Part II contains helpful charts, assessment tools, and handouts. There are several tips/tricks for dealing with difficult behaviors like lying, stealing, anger, negative thoughts, etc.  Finally, Part III has resources that might be helpful.
I would highly recommend this book if you are ready to delve into helping your child heal.  My son was fascinated reading Caleb's story, that bad things had happened to other kids too, not just him.  Those of you parenting kids from hard places know that dealing with all of these feelings can trigger some more behaviors in our kiddos, so you need to be prepared for that as well.  The book offers some GREAT suggestions on dealing with behaviors, we have used several of them!  The other thing I really liked about this book was the language introduced, "hurting beliefs" "healing behaviors", etc.
The language put some complicated ideas into simple language that can be used with your child to explain things they went through or feelings they are having.

Feel like being offended today.........Read this Article

 

GO READ THIS ARTICLE from The Christian Post,  http://www.christianpost.com/news/adoption-the-best-option-109268/, right now, DO IT!

Ok did you read it, on a scale of 1-10 how offended are you?  I'm not sure if I am more offended because I am single, adoptive parent, or a Christian!!

If he would have stopped about halfway through the article,  I would have agreed with him.  I strongly believe that abortion should NEVER be an option.  Where he totally lost me was this:

"Keeping the baby is almost never preferable to allowing a baby to be adopted into a solid, faithful Christian home. A single mother who keeps her baby is quite often denying that baby the father that God wants for that baby, and every baby, to have. Furthermore, in most circumstances, keeping the baby circumscribes and forecloses both the mother's and the baby's economic futures in tragic and unfortunate ways.
If the mother is doing what is best for her baby (one of the defining marks of maternal love), she will part with her baby so that it will have the future God intended for him or her to have. The Old Testament story of the two harlots who both had babies and one died in the night comes to mind (1Kings 3). Both women claimed the surviving baby was their child and wanted the king to give the baby to them. King Solomon decided to have the baby divided in two and each be given half. Immediately, the real mother told the king to give the baby to the other woman in order to save the child's life. In other words, she was thinking of the child's best interest, not her own."

Where do I even begin with that?? Let's break it down:

 "Keeping the baby is almost never preferable to allowing a baby to be adopted into a solid, faithful Christian home." WHAT?!  Keeping a baby is almost ALWAYS preferable to adoption, unless the child would be unsafe, abused, or neglected.  The removal of a child from their birth mother is a TRAUMATIC event for both the mother and the child, some are able to recover, some live with lifelong issues because of that trauma.  Furthermore, why is it assumed that the Single Mother's household is not a solid, faithful Christian home? And just because a child is placed in a Christian home doesn't mean that the child will in turn be a Christian or even embrace the parents moral values.  Just as there are many people who grew up in non-Christian homes who have found the Lord.  And where exactly does one find all these solid, faithful Christian two parent homes?  They aren't exactly stepping up to the plate around where I live, unless of course we are talking about a perfectly healthy Caucasian baby from a healthy drug/alcohol free college educated birth mother. 

"A single mother who keeps her baby is quite often denying that baby the father that God wants for that baby, and every baby, to have." So what happens when a woman from this solid, faithful Christian home is widowed, is she to give up her children then? Are we to assume that there are no divorces in the Christian church?  No cheating or abusive husbands that a woman may leave?  Isn't God our real true father anyway?  I adopted my children as a single mother, there weren't any married Christian couples lining up to adopt three special needs boys. Would it have been preferable to let them sit in foster care till they turned 18?  Furthermore, even if a "father" would have stepped up to take in the boys, it would not have been a preferable placement.  The abuse that my children suffered at the hand of a male figure would have made that bond extremely difficult to form at that time in their lives, trust would have been far fetched to come by further harming their emotional development.

"Furthermore, in most circumstances, keeping the baby circumscribes and forecloses both the mother's and the baby's economic futures in tragic and unfortunate ways." WOW, what a stereotype we have here, the poor single mother.  First every single mother I know is financially comfortable, I cant say the same for many married couples I am in contact with.  I would also assume that for most single mothers who are "poor" whether or not they keep the baby they will still be "poor".  Just because someone is poor does not mean they cant be a good parent and provide for their child.  Splitting up a mother and child merely because the finances aren't ideal is astronomically wrong and un-Christian in my view. Can you imagine Jesus saying to a hungry mother and child, here let me help you by taking your child and giving it to this couple over here?  NO, he would feed and clothe them, shower them with unconditional love, invite them into his family.  There are MANY solid, faithful Christian homes whose finances are in dire straights, going into debt to have the nicest car on the block or traveling to Disney world when they can't afford it.  There are also those who have managed their finances well but been hit with an unexpected job loss or medical issues putting their financial future in jeopardy.   Economic futures should not be anywhere near this conversation!

"If the mother is doing what is best for her baby (one of the defining marks of maternal love), she will part with her baby so that it will have the future God intended for him or her to have." Who are you to tell God what future he has planned??  Doesn't God use people from all walks of life, all socio-economic classes for his good?  I for one can tell you that the marks of God working in my boys lives leading them to be with me, a single mother, are ALL over our story.  I have no doubt this is the future God intended for them to have.  If God wanted a husband/father in these single mothers lives, or wants the child raised in a solid faithful Christian home, couldn't he easily make that happen right where the child is at?  Couldn't the struggles a single mother family have be exactly what that child needed in order to learn/develop/experience what God needed them to so he could use them in the way he needed them??  Someone should let  Jackie Robinson, Whoopi Goldberg, President Barack Obama, Angelina Jolie, and Tom Cruise know this wasn't the future God had planned for them, being raised by single moms and all.

"The Old Testament story of the two harlots who both had babies and one died in the night comes to mind (1Kings 3). Both women claimed the surviving baby was their child and wanted the king to give the baby to them. King Solomon decided to have the baby divided in two and each be given half. Immediately, the real mother told the king to give the baby to the other woman in order to save the child's life. In other words, she was thinking of the child's best interest, not her own." Ah yes, lets talk about the King Solomon story,  I seem to recall that in the end of that story King Solomon gave the child to the "real" mom, a prostitute nevertheless! Furthermore, King Solomon gave the women a choice and that is what Adoption is all about.  A loving mother making a choice for her baby.  As Christians I believe it is our calling to support a birth mother in that choice, whatever it may be, to show her love and compassion in a difficult time.  Let's all get behind that Dr. Land.  If we as Christians all did that, love and support without judgment, wouldn't that be a testament to each of those people of God's love?

Another poster on facebook had a brilliant idea:

"SINGLE MOMS- Do everyone a huge favor and bless Dr. Richard Land this Christmas with a photo card of your family. Because we can't peel the podium away from this misguided soul, tell him to stick a stocking in it, or take away his megaphone, we'll just have to counter his foolish and uninformed talk with proof. READ the article, PICK UP your jaw off the floor, put a STAMP on your Christmas card, and MAIL it here:

Dr. Richard Land
3000 Tilley Morris Road
Matthews, NC 28105

Feel free to include a sweet note or yummy cookies. Or not. But at least send the photo card of your SINGLE MOM FAMILY! Now! Get on it!"

I will be sending my card out this month, that is if I can afford cards since my economic future is tragic and unfortunate :)

I Spy Jars and a GIVEAWAY

Today's Art Therapy Thursday (or Friday since I'm a day late due to Thanksgiving) are these adorable I Spy jars!

 

About a week ago while at the grocery store I was conned into buying these cute little Apple juices by one persuasive three year old.  We were about to head up to New York for a lunch get together with some other "trauma moms" from Orlando.  This would be a four hour trip up and a four hour trip back for lunch, crazy right?!  BUT oh so worth it ;). Anyway, we had to pick up some snacks and these made their way into my cart.

 

(This picture is of the plastic bottles, our grocery store only had glass....I'm keeping my eye out for these!)

I decided these little bottles couldn't go to waste and found the perfect craft to put them to use.

I had picked up several different beads at a craft store awhile back on clearance.  You will need letter beads and an assortment of others.  I had soccer balls, footballs, baseballs, and animals.  I also had some sequins that I thought would look great.  

We filled the jars up with rice.  You can dye the rice using food coloring but we didn't do that this time.  You will need to leave some space in the jars so they can be "shaken" around.

I had the kids each pick a color of sequins and dump them in the jar and then let them pick an assortment of beads to put in.

In Matthews jar we put the letters "RELAX" and in the younger two kiddos we put their names.

Once everything was in, we superglued the caps on, hopefully avoiding any curious hands from dumping rice everywhere.  The glass jars themselves may be a little iffy for a child prone to throwing things when upset, but were gonna hope for the best!  You could always use a little plastic water bottle instead if you're worried about it breaking or maybe you will be lucky enough to find the plastic version of these jars in your local store.
 

For now we put our jars over in the calm down corner.  The boys have gone over several times to play I Spy and find their letters or other beads.

GIVEAWAY:

In addition to using Art to help the boys and I connect, one other great way to communicate with children is BOOKS!  I love using books that are relevant to whatever a particular child is going through.  I've got a great give away for all my readers of a new book written by Ricky Martin.  The book is called "Santiago the Dreamer in Land Among the Stars":

 

"Santiago’s biggest dream is to perform on stage.  But when he doesn’t get the lead role in the school play, he can’t help but doubt himself. Encouraged by his father’s inspiring words, Santiago rebuilds his confidence and finds that with passion and dedication, you can achieve amazing things beyond your wildest imagination." - Amazon

What a great message for our kiddos, despite everything they have been through they can still reach their biggest dreams.  I hope you win and can enjoy it with your kids!
 

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BE SURE TO JOIN US FOR NEXT WEEK'S ART THERAPY THURSDAY!!!

Communicating with your children and a giveaway!

 

I don't know about you but sometimes it is really difficult to have a meaningful conversation with your kids.  I've got a nine year old boy...communication is not his strong point!  I'm lucky if I get more than a one word answer, LOL.  There are a couple of things I have done to try and encourage communication between the two of us.  I learned quickly to not ask questions like, "How was school?" or "What's wrong?".  It is too easy for him to say "Nothing" and move on to playing video games :).  Instead I try to say things like, "Tell me all about your day" or "Tell me one thing you learned today".  Make it a command sentence instead of a question sentence, if I can remember to do it I get much more communication from him. Today I'm going to show you a communication journal that we have been using in our house.  The basic premise is we take turns writing in the journal, anything we want.  The journal stays on his bed and he can write in it at night before falling asleep and I write him back during the day. Not only is it a great tool for communicating but what a great keepsake to look back on later!

 

I've made two different covers which can be placed on the front of the journal, you can download them from google docs here.

 

GIVEAWAY:

One other great way to communicate with children is BOOKS!  I love using books that are relevant to whatever a particular child is going through.  I've got a great give away for all my readers of a new book written by Ricky Martin.  The book is called "Santiago the Dreamer in Land Among the Stars":

 

"Santiago’s biggest dream is to perform on stage.  But when he doesn’t get the lead role in the school play, he can’t help but doubt himself. Encouraged by his father’s inspiring words, Santiago rebuilds his confidence and finds that with passion and dedication, you can achieve amazing things beyond your wildest imagination." - Amazon

What a great message for our kiddos, despite everything they have been through they can still reach their biggest dreams.  I hope you win and can enjoy it with your kids!

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Instant Mom by Nia Vardalos

ADOPTION BOOK ALERT:

If you all are anything like me you love reading other people's adoption stories!  You may remember Nia Varalos from the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, well she has recently came out with a book documenting her adoption story.  Nia and her husband first met their daughter when she was almost three years old.  The book tells her families story, "Some families are created in different ways but are still, in every way, a family."

I cant wait to read it!