Dear Family and Friends: July 22, 2006

Alexia is doing very well, all things considered. She amazes us everyday. At her 18 month checkup Alexia weighed 24 lbs and was 32 ¼ inches. This put her at 47% for weight and 70% for height. The important thing about growth charts is not what percentage the child falls in, but the consistency of the child’s growth rate. Alexia’s pediatrician is much happier with her weight to height ratio than when we first brought her home (15% weight and 82% height). Alexia is crawling up and down stairs, walking, and running all over the place. She is the best personal trainer we could ever ask for. Her hand/eye coordination and finger dexterity has really improved. She is very happy and very independent. She does not like to sit still, meal time is becoming a challenge. Although she does not have many words Alexia is very vocal, and her sign language has really come along. Alexia loves music and dancing. She is currently attending Gymboree both play and music classes a couple of times a week. She is also attending “Music Together” at the local community center once a week. These classes with small group interactions have really helped to bring her out of her shell. Alexia has been showing signs of being a bit of a ham lately, we are very happy to see this. But we do need to make sure she knows that she does not need to “perform” in order to get attention. Alexia is also doing really well with people recognition. She definitely recognizes our neighbors and friends from church and gets very excited when she sees Alyssa and Kiana, her two friends that are her age. Alexia is also starting to ask for positive reinforcement. Whenever she does something she is proud of she will seek us out and ask for praise. Usually by looking/yelling at us and clapping until we also clap and tell her she did a good job. Alexia has also started to give physical affection, hugs and kisses. This is so much better than how she would slap at us for physical connection. Right now she only actually hugs and kisses Mommy and Daddy, she will air hug and blow kisses to everyone else.

Some of the things we are concerned about are; 1. If exclusive attachment is happening. Does she see us as the caretaker of the moment and then when we let another grownup into the circle is she expecting that “caretaker” to take over? 2. Her pediatrician is concerned about the lack of vocabulary she has or has not developed. 3. She has very few temper tantrums. I can hear many of you parents out there saying we should thank our lucky stars, but truth is, temper tantrums are a very normal part of childhood. We are concerned she is trying to be too pleasing, “if she is good she won’t be ‘moved’ again”. We need to gain her trust that our love for her and her life with us is unconditional. That is going to take time and work. Consistency in her environment and her routine is also very important in building that trust.

Alexia is in the process of being evaluated for developmental delays due to institutional life. What we will find out from these evaluations basically is her developmental age (vs. her chronological age) in the main areas; cognitive, gross motor, fine motor, social, and language (receptive language and expressive language). So far we think Alexia is pretty caught up with the exception of social (this includes attachment) and expressive language (her receptive language growth has been huge). If she is found to be 30% or greater delayed in any area she will be referred services in those areas. If 30% or greater delayed these services are covered by California Early Start, which is a federally mandated and funded program, all states are required to provide early intervention services for every child under age 36 months with significant delay. If she is not 30% delayed but an opinion is given that she can benefit from assistance we will then seek out assistance independently in the private sector.

Research shows that disruption in attachment during the first three years of life can cause neurological damage. It is said that all children that come from institutional life are special needs from their circumstance alone. Children who spend more than a couple of months in institutional care suffer from some degree of neurological stunting. If recognized and treated early enough (usually before age 3) this neurological damage can be repaired or reversed. This is the most important thing we can do for Alexia right now, and over the next year, is to give her every chance to heal.

We strongly urge everyone to go back and review the various links regarding attachment, exclusive attachment, and the effects attachment parenting have in healing the hurt child. These links can be found on the links page http://www.pietrasiks.com/KenandErin/Adoption/links.htm .

In what ways are we utilizing attachment parenting? Well because Alexia is not an infant we have needed to make some modifications to the practice. Alexia does not like being crowded in bed with us (and quite frankly we are not thrilled with the family bed concept anyway). So instead we have a big comfy recliner/rocking chair in her room. Whenever she needs any comforting at night or any other time we snuggle in the big chair, sometimes one of us will spend all night in the big chair with her. Alexia is also too big and active/mobile to “wear” her, but she is held a lot and gets a lot of lap time. We also permit Alexia some degree of possessiveness. We are teaching her to share but we do allow her a few things that she does not have to share. She comes from an environment where everything was temporary. She needs to be shown that being here with us, her room, her food source, our love and affection are all permanent. We are doing exclusive care, which means only Mommy and Daddy provide any and all care for Alexia, ie; diaper change, clothing, feeding, bathing, holding, picking up, hugging, kissing, comforting, fixing boo boos, etc. No babysitters for any length of time. She is with either Mommy or Daddy or both at all times. This is not easy to do. Alexia gets very heavy after a while. We would love to be able to let someone else hold her on occasion but that is not what is best for her at this time.

When will we know that she has attached/bonded and we can go to a more laid back style of parenting? We may have to parent Alexia like this for a couple of years, possibly up to age 3, maybe even longer. We are hoping that the first year home will be sufficient. The behavior we are looking for may seem counter intuitive to you. Basically, when she freaks out, cries or screams, when anybody other than Mommy or Daddy tries to hold her, pick her up, gets too close, then we will know she has formed the very important exclusive secure attachment. Right now, she isn’t doing that. She isn’t thrilled when someone else tries to hold her but she doesn’t get upset, she just calmly hangs on to us or will move toward us quickly. So even though you may think how great it is that she has been so carefree with you, has maybe come to you easily or let you touch her without a fuss, in reality that is not a good sign. This is an indication that the exclusive secure attachment has not occurred, yet.

We have every confidence that once you have a better understanding of the importance of secure attachment you will be supportive of what we need to do for Alexia. We have every confidence in Alexia and how she has progressed so far that she will heal and bond and feel secure in her new life and will be a happy confident person. And we have every confidence in ourselves to do only what is best for Alexia.

Thank You

Ken and Erin Pietrasik