Stealing Feels Good

Dear Parent,

Our attachment challenged and special needs children do things we often have a hard time understanding.  Parents have a tendency to label these things nonsensical, stupid, ridiculous, criminal, and crazy. I have been guilty of the same thing sometimes, even though I do understand.

Because there are so many articles, TV shows and Internet pieces on how prisons are full of attachment challenged adults, it makes sense that you would be worrying fiercely about your child who steals.  The obvious conclusion is that your child will end up in prison.  That is jumping to a fear conclusion.  

Your fear may cause you to distance yourself, over control, or shame your child when you experience behavior that you don't understand.  Resist an emotional response.  Use your thinking skills to quell your own fear, so you can be therapeutic in your response, rather than hurtful.

Our children often do not understand why they stole something; therefore, asking them why will not likely beget a meaningful answer. The following are some of the reasons why:

• Stealing often holds the promise of filling up a pervasive hole of emptiness and deprivation in one's core. There may be variances and nuances, but the result is usually a vague hope of getting something that will make them feel better, less empty, more special, less deprived.
• Stealing feels good.  The act of taking something that one knows is forbidden produces an immediate neuro-chemical boost--adrenaline and dopamine.  It's a jolt that children often experience as powerfully pleasing.  There is a down side to stealing, but they have poor cause and effect thinking so the threat of the down side will not break the urge to feel good.  The high reinforces stealing the next time.  That is often why children repeatedly steal.
• The good feelings resulting from stealing outweigh the pain of punishment; therefore, punishment will not work to extinguish stealing. Give it up.  Go for a calm relational intervention.  It sounds like this: Oh, you brought home something that isn't yours.  You must really have wanted to feel better, so you took it. We don't steal in our family--it's wrong and it's against the law--so you are going to return it with an apology. That's it.  Over and over again.  
  

  Stealing will stop with consistent messaging and low shaming.

   

Love matters,

Ce

P.S. Are you pulling your hair out trying to figure out the best way to parent your child from difficult beginnings? Get some real support here: The Love Matters Parenting Society. Honestly, you probably need this.

P.S.S. You can also grab a copy of Drowning With My Hair On Fire: Insanity Relief for Adoptive Parents by yours truly. Parents really appreciate this bite-sized, inspiration.