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Just the other day I was reading a post on my agency’s Yahoo group. The family posting had had their 8 year old from Ethiopia home for two weeks. They were so excited about how well everything was going, that they were attaching, had no behavior issues and the child was going to start school in two weeks.
My personal reaction was STOP! RETHINK ALL THAT YOU HAVE READ AND LEARNED! Our agency does a great job in preparing parents about adopting older children as that is where they put their emphasis at. I think as waiting parents we prepare but have a secret dream that our adoption will be easy. The child will be grateful, a delight and our family will go on as normal, only better.
As for my family we are a “better family” with our two Ethiopian daughters, our girls are a delight to me and Hubby. It is not easy though, they are not grateful (and nor do I think they should be) and our family is “normal” just a new normal. It is so easy to go into denial and take all of this “normalcy” for-granted.
We cannot forget that our kids have gone through a tremendous loss. Loss of parents (to death, poverty and sickness or abuse/neglect), loss of their own normal and a loss of security in knowing. Even in the worst atmospheres, we as humans take comfort in the expected. Our kids are taken from this “expected” place and put in an entirely new environment.
What we as parents must remember with older child adoption:
1) Bonding and attachment are a process. A process that has its ebbs and flows. For example the other night Mita held on to me for dear life and was so loving and the next day she hid from me all morning and didn’t want to acknowledge my existence. NORMAL but frustrating!
2) We should enjoy the honeymoon period, but know there will be hard times ahead. In fact if it stays easy for a long period of time, I would question the child’s attachment as they tend to act out when they feel secure that you are not going to “send them back”. An overly polite child who is eager to please all of the time would worry me. Albeit, this would be easier on parenting and I think that is why we choose not to address things at times.
3) Re-asses frequently. Our girls have been home for over a year and a half and just last night Hubby was voicing his concerns over Enu’s comprehension skills. She is great at faking understanding and this helps her fly under the radar at home and school.
4) Find a good therapist who specializes in adoption and attachment. In my experience, therapists will no such knowledge base really don’t get it. I once took Mita to meet a counselor I had been working with and the counselor (very nice, smart and I respect her) treated me like I was overreacting to Mita’s issues and told me she was a wonderful normal kid. I know she is a wonderful and normal kid. She also has thrown herself off her bunk bed, talked about death and suicide and is incredibly jealous! I need advice and help that she just couldn’t give me.
Older child adoption has been a challenging and wonderful experience for me and my family. I have never regretted it, but in my darkest of moments I have wondered what in the world I did to myself and my family. I firmly believe that we were never promised an easy time in life, but our life is only enriched by the challenges.
Wow, thanks for confessing your darkest moments. I was just sending an email to our social worker telling her I thought I was getting over some post-adoption depression symptoms and that I had felt at times I had ruined all of our lives as I couldn’t parent our older adoptees properly and had made life so much harder for the rest of us. I also mentioned I felt I had happily left those feelings behind as we adjust. But I also commented our 6 year old was not acting out as much–and while I was referring to this as a good thing, I did have that nagging doubt about what that actually means in regards to his attachment process. You are so right about the ebb and flow.
Thanks for the reminders.