Attachment, Grief, and Loss is a new three-part attachment workshop designed for waiting adoptive and permanency parents and caregivers who want to better understand how early relationships, loss, and trauma shape a child’s development. It centers on helping caregivers recognize how children communicate needs through behaviour and how responsive caregiving builds secure attachment.
Participants will learn to reframe challenging behaviours as meaningful communication and develop practical strategies for attunement, co-regulation, and repair. By the end of the series, caregivers will feel more confident responding to children in ways that strengthen connection, trust, and long-term well-being.
Format: Two educational sessions, each 1.5 hours long, followed by an optional two-hour support group session (this component is encouraged but not mandatory).
Workshop dates and times: Wednesdays, May 20 and 27, 2026, from 7 to 8:30 p.m.
Optional support group session: Wednesday, June 3, 2026, from 7 to 9 p.m.
Cost: $25 for the full series
About the facilitator
Ashleigh Martinflatt (BA CYC, MSW) has been working in the permanency field for almost 20 years. Along with teaching at Vancouver Island University, she has her own private counselling practice in Nanaimo. Ashleigh has built her family through adoption and continues to learn from her children every day.