NHA GAVE US THE TOOLS WE NEEDED TO START BECOMING successful with our children

How started using her new training right away. “At first, Chloe really couldn’t understand it when I said she was doing something right. She’d cover her ears and scream. She couldn’t absorb the fact that she had value. So we started a greatness notebook. I wrote down the good things I saw in her so she had time to digest them. It was like I was talking to a blind person. She couldn’t see herself. I had to see her and speak words of affirmation so she could see it, too.”

“It’s hard on your heart when you do foster care and adoption,” How acknowledges. “Other people kept saying I only needed to love Chloe, but she wasn’t used to love. One night, Chloe had a major tantrum and wrote ‘I hate you’ in her greatness notebook. I had to stop and consider, ‘Does her behavior define her value?’ And I told her, ‘I love you. I will always love you. It’s okay that you hate me right now. But I’m not going to stop loving you and taking really good care of you.’ Then Chloe took the notebook and wrote, ‘I do not hate you. I love you.’ That was the first time I knew Chloe was starting to hear me,” How said. “NHA was not magic. In many ways it was very difficult. You have to stick to it like your life depends on it,” How said. “And we did. I had to look at my kids and say, You are worthy and Your worth is not defined by your actions.”

How continued to implement and learn about NHA. In September of 2009, the school district sent her to be trained as an NHA trainer. “I thought my failings would disqualify me, but these are the very things that have connected me most with parents. I know their pain. I have real empathy and that is an asset to connect me with foster, adoptive and biological families. Isn’t that like God? He uses our weaknesses and makes them our strength!” As things slowly improved at home, the How’s recommitted to the adoption process. “Even though it wasn’t perfect, we had the tools,” How said. “NHA takes work and time. We lost friendships and relationships. It’s hard to be around challenging, intense kids. After months of intensive work, using local services and the NHA in day-to-day parenting, the fog began to lift.”