I’m still thinking about the consequences/restitution thing. Kinda like the merry-go-round the girl in the picture's on...it keeps going 'round & 'round in my brain. One reader recommended that I read Beyond Consequences, Logic and Control ,the book by Bryan Post and Heather Forbes. I’ve got to say that this book is quite the lightning rod, quite the buzz generator. If Bryan & Heather’s marketing folks are reading this blog, my hats are off to you. (I don’t agree with the marketing approach, but it has definitely generated buzz…so that makes it successful from a marketing professional’s standpoint.) I have never seen a book about attachment and trauma that has been the topic of so many listserves, so many blogs, and has produced such strong reactions.

I haven’t read it. In fact, Iblogged about that fact over a year ago. And since then, I’ve had numerous people both recommend and warn me about this book. In fact, just a couple weeks ago a mom I admire a great deal contacted me about the book and about how disturbed she was about a number of things in it…first that the focus seems to be squarely on the parents dealing with their own “stuff” that keeps them from being able to accept the kids’ behaviors. So much so that it appears that it’s mostly the parents “stuff” that is getting in the way of healing these kids. (Oh were that true, my daughter would have had such an easier life and we wouldn’t be in the bloody school battles we’re in!) And second that the book put down the work of other attachment and trauma therapists. This dismayed my friend, because like me, she has found help for her child by piecing together a huge number of interventions, treatments and parenting styles. We both believe that no one person has all the answers for our kids. And that if anything the attachment community should be pulling together to let the world know of these children's challenges. It's not easy for parents of traumatized children to find the often rare resource of experienced attachment therapists.

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