For the second year in a row, Nancy Ashe was one of the biggest hit speakers at the ATN conference. I highly encourage you to order the DVD of her talk and the question and answer sessions she did.

If you are not familiar with Nancy, let me tell you a little bit about her. First of all, she was the editor of this blog up until a couple of months ago. She is the person who got me to blog.

She is an adult who readily admits that she is attachment affected. Her talk was a very honest look at her life and the mindset of attachment affected children. When she speaks, the room is silent since everyone in the audience it soaking up everything she has to say.

I first met Nancy a little over a year ago at the first ATN conference. As is my personality, I went up and gave her a big hug. I had corresponded with her on line several times and was excited about meeting her. After I hugged her, she told me that she is now able to hug people without cringing. Does this remind you of our kids at all?

I can not fully summarize her talk, but here are some of the highlights. If you are not in her sight, she does not think about you. She keeps reminders on her computer to ask you how you are doing before she asks you for something, touch is so hard for her that she vomited during a massage. Her entire talk focusing on the “disabilities” of having attachment issues. I find her to be incredibly brave. How many of us could get up in front of a room of over 100 people and spill the gory details of our lives?

I’ve also had the opportunity to spend time with Nancy on a personal level. She is an incredibly amazing woman. She is making a conscious effort to deal with some of the things that she knows society would expect of her. She watches other people in relationships to see how people “should” interact, and works toward that. She holds several degrees, and speaks several languages, all of which she find insignificant.

While her life may not be one that we would want to live, I find hope in the fact that she is able to live a life that works for her. I could spend hours just listening to her.

One of the things that we talked about was my blogging. As I mentioned, Nancy is the one who hired me for this blog. We talked less about the content of the blogs than how blogging has impacted me as a person. She asked me if I found my writing cathartic. The answer is yes with a caveat. Writing blogs like the one I wrote yesterday are extremely freeing for me. At the same time, the opportunity to be able to help another person have realistic expectations for when they adopt, and the opportunity to find resources for their child when they are in crisis is equally cathartic.

I owe many thanks to Nancy and I encourage you to watch the DVDs. It may give you some insight into the way your children, or future children, think and feel.

To order Nancy’s DVDs go to the ATN website.

Photo credit – 4 Nancy’s at the ATN conference. From left to right -Nancy Crawford, Nancy Spoolstra, Nancy Cozadd, and Nancy Ashe