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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Wishing our lives away

Nearly five weeks into the academic year and I’m exhausted! Kids are exhausted too and I’ve heard many teachers and parents counting down the weeks if not days to half term. Surely this way of always looking forward to what’s to

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

The thing no-one wants to talk about

It’s been 8 years since we adopted and 18 years since we got married. To say that we have always been a volatile couple is an understatement. I thought after those 10 years together there couldn’t be anything else that could

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

The impact of shame – Part 3 Run and Hide

Children who’ve experienced a difficult start in life have so many different ways of hiding from their pain. They may be the clown of the class, the angry child, the quiet and well-behaved girl in the back, the life and soul

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

The impact of shame – Part 2 Lying

Probably one of the hardest behaviours to face in vulnerable children is lying. Of course that depends on your own values and feelings around this subject, but I’ve not met a person and particularly an adoptive parent yet who doesn’t get

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

The impact of shame – Part 1 Blame

I’ve decided to do a short series for my blogs over the next few weeks on shame. This is something that seems to permeate everything that children with Attachment difficulties do. It’s also a very misunderstood emotion I find. It’s not

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Life Long Recovery

This weeks’ blog is a bit of a follow on from last week. I don’t usually do this, but I feel this topic is so important in helping us all change the way we view children who’ve experienced early trauma to

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Attitudes
Nicola Marshall

Why is it important to raise awareness?

It’s Mental Health awareness week at the moment with the theme of relationships. It’s remarkable to me when I hear professionals say that Insecure Attachment in itself is not a mental health issue but behavourial. The Child and Adolescent Mental Health

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Surely they can control it….

I’m constantly reminded that we need to change our whole way of thinking when living or working with vulnerable children. Those with insecure attachment difficulties can not help the behaviours they do. Often they are acting from the reptilian part of

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Be brave in Education

I had a worrying and all too familiar email from an adoptive parent this week about her child’s experience at school. In this case a Secondary School but I know many children who have these experiences at Primary School too. I

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Education System
Nicola Marshall

The Aim in Education

I often wonder about those in government making the decisions about our educational system. It seems that more and more we are pushing our children to breaking point in some cases. You hear of young people committing suicide because of the

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Too old at 4?

This week has been National Adoption Week – seems only last month that we had last years the time is flying so fast. Our children are now 12, 13 and 14 and every stage has its own joys and challenges but

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Competition – curse or cure?

Reward schemes in schools are probably one of the most thwart with perils area that we deal with as adoptive parents and also in my workshops with schools. The level of competition and judgment that comes from the sticker charts, the

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

I am, I can, I ought, I will

I am, I can, I ought, I will – a philosophy on education by Charlotte Mason that raises some interesting thoughts to consider in our British educational environment. School is supposed to be a place for learning, creativity, achievement and growth.

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Life goes on….

I’m in a particularly honest mood which is probably not the best place to write a blog from so apologies straight away! My blog buddy and I are writing to the theme ‘Life goes on’ this week and I love the

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

Joining the dots

It always makes me smile when I hear people doing positive reinforcement techniques with children in groups like in a classroom. When you hear an adult say “wow Jenny’s sitting really nicely – thank you Jenny” – when what they’re really

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Attachment Theory
Nicola Marshall

The internal spreadsheet

For some vulnerable children who’ve experienced a difficult start in life things being all fair and equal is so very important. In fact it’s like they have an internal spreadsheet that tots up everything; “Billy spent three minutes on the computer

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Self-care
Nicola Marshall

Secondary trauma in schools

As a parent of three adopted children secondary trauma is something I think about often – the impact of living with children who’ve experienced early trauma. However I’m also beginning to see more of this in education. I’m sure it’s always

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