Edited repost
On December 12th, 2002 2000, we had three children, ages 2, and roughly 8 and 9. On December 13th we got two more girls, and the new kids were nearly 4 and nearly 6. Yes, our lives changed radically! I would say it was two years before I started to see the light at the end of the tunnel, and it was four years before the new kids were fully integrated and bonded, and things felt ‘normal’- or as normal as they get for me.;-0
Our new daughters barely knew us at all, had never been to our house before, and they had a *huge* culture shock adjustment to make. We were, at that time, nearly vegetarian, and my new girls didn’t know what most vegetables were, having never seen broccoli or tomatoes, and hating the veggies they did know. They only drank carbonated, sweetened beverages or Kool-ade. I *never* served kool-ade, and we drank water, milk, and sometimes homemade lemon-ade.
Everything was new to them, and changes are a shock to the system. Things smelled different, tasted different, looked different, and the whole basis of how their world operated changed overnight. That takes some getting used to.
Some of the things that I think helped us the most during the transition, in addition to prayer and more prayer, were:
Limited outside contact (and I wish we’d limited it even more- they were overwhelmed by the ‘new’)
Quiet time, every day, absolutely insisted upon. They didn’t have to have naps. But one girl went to my bed, one girl went to the couch, and our birth children (who were used to this and could be quiet in the same room with each other) went to their separate beds. They could read, play with paper dolls, color, work with stickers, do origami, string beads, do puzzles, play with baby dolls- whatever could be done quietly while sitting on the couch or bed they could do. But no noise above a whisper. This retreat was marvelously helpful for *everybody*. It made them calmer the rest of the day. The downtime was just vitally important. We moved to a smaller house with less space, and sometime quiet time had to be in the same room. In this case, I put one in an easy chair, turned towards the wall, and one in the couch where she couldn’t see anybody. This isn’t punishment, it’s a *gift.* It’s vitally important *space* in the day- downtime, a retreat from all the stimuli that can get little children’s nerves on edge without them even realizing it.
My older children got to a place where they would ask for quiet time if we got out of the habit. They learned to look forward to it. Of course, now they ask for quiet time for their younger siblings.=)
When they are up, keep them with you. They will learn to play quietly sooner than you think if you are right there alongside them, able to nip bad habits in the bud and replace them with good habits (very CM, too, btw).
In our family, our new 4 y.o. and our home-grown 2 y.o. bonded instantly, and instantly became a dynamic duo devoted to dastardly deeds, spurring one another on toward love, but anything other than GOOD deeds. For their own safety I developed this plan- they had to play near mom, no matter what. They could never leave the room I was in together. They pottied separately, got drinks of water separately, left the room to get toys to play with separately.
I did not alter my schedule much to accommodate this. If I had to leave the living room to prepare lunch in the kitchen, they had to pick up their toys and come with me. They could help me or play together at the counter or table nearby. They could not stay in the room without me. If they wanted new toys, they decided together what they wanted, and then ONE child went to go get that toy.
I cannot stress how much this helped them stop some very bad habits they had developed, because, since I was right there all the time, I could catch things almost before they started and redirect their thinking and actions. I continued to do school with the older girls, and the littles just learned to listen in quietly, play
nearby without too much ruckus, or even participate!
Have fun together. Make sure you make time during this busy and often overwhelming period, to have fun. Play a game together, read aloud together, sing together. one of our new children did not let me touch her unless I was singing to her. As long as I sang, she would sit cozily in my lap, but as soon as I was done- off she’d go. I sang myself hoarse quite often in those days, and it was well worth it.
Do lots of reading aloud together. They are probably going to be behind in the vital skill of visualizing what they hear. Reading aloud and more reading aloud will help them catch up. Get books on tape to listen to together so that you can give your voice a rest.
Eliminate sugar from the diet- in spite of studies to the contrary, in my observation, it made my kids hyper. We have too much sugar in our diets again, but during those first two years, I really did need to keep my children away from the stuff.
Watch them for cues as to how they are adjusting, what’s special to them, what’s painful. Never, ever underestimate how hard this is for them. I do not care if they’ve been rescued from the pits of hell, YOU are not what they are used to, and children are great traditionalists. It’s hard for you, too, but frankly, you’re a grown up and you had a choice. They aren’t, and they didn’t. You also have coping mechanisms and life experiences that help you process what’s happening and put it in perspective. They don’t. Imagine being plucked out from all that is familiar to you and taken to a new home among strangers- possibly people who don’t even speak your language, and who certainly don’t do or say things the way you’re used to. You’re told this is your new family, and perhaps you’re given a new name to answer to. You don’t get the food you’re used to. It would be hard, and that’s an understatement.
Other people told us about ‘the honeymoon period.’ A lot of people who adopt older children experience the first six months as fairly easy (the kids are learning the rules and getting used to the new place). After about six months they relax, let their guard down, have the emotional energy to focus on something else besides survival, and sometimes the change can be pretty hairy.
We never really had that. The things that were easy the first six months continued to be easy (The Cherub actually never had any trouble adjusting, she was happy as a lark from the get-go). The things that were hard continued to be hard. Nothing anybody had to say about the honeymoon period proved true for us, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be for most people. Ours was a unique situation because they never had been in foster care, never had lived anywhere but with their birth parents, and it was a domestic adoption.
That said, it was still very foreign for the girls. Although we ostensibly spoke the same language, their language skills were so delayed that communication was often difficult. I had to learn to translate “Show me where you are hurt” to “where’s the boo-boo?” and I had to lose ‘tell me’ from sentences like, “Tell me what just happened.” “Tell me” was understood by one of our new daughters to mean, “Repeat back what I am about to say,” so she answered ‘tell me what just happened’ with “what just happened.”
There was hostility, and there came a point where I thought to myself, “We have made the biggest mistake of our lives, and things will never be the same again. I have taken in a child who hates me and will always hate me.”
I reminded myself that I had been able to choose every step of the way on this path, and this child who wanted nothing to do with me had had no say in the situation at all, and I settled it within myself that I would simply parent a child who would hate me forever and leave as soon as possible, and it would be hard and discouraging, but I still had to parent her.
It was hard enough as it was, but I also had no friends who really understood what we were going through. I never really spoke about it in detail, because I quickly learned they didn’t want to hear it- it didn’t match their fairy tale. Whatever concerns I expressed were quickly dismissed with a wave of the hand and an unrealistically optimistic explanation or excuse.
In our case, things got better- so much better. I would say it took at least four years before things began to be really better. I know that there are families where that never happens, for whatever reason. Often, the damage done to the children before you get them is just too deep. We were blessed that things got so much better that those four years are a very distant memory.
I’m thrilled we adopted, but I don’t believe adoptions is for everybody, and older adoptions are for even fewer people. It’s not something to go into lightly, and absolutely not every something that should be taken up with a ‘savior’ mentality. That never works.
P.S. We have other posts on adopting older children and some of the difficulties involved- look for the adoption label at the bottom of the post and click through to find them.
10 Comments
I very much enjoyed reading your post this morning. It could have been the reminiscing of my mother. My family adopted a sibling group from Vietnam when I was 16. They were 8 and 10; my natural brothers were 14 and 18. It does take years to return to a new “normal.” This adoption was a success. Unfortunately our family had an adoption that disrupted with another little boy years later when I was 27 (34 when it ended). That is the one no one wanted to hear about because it didn’t fit their picture.
Anyway, pardon my rambling, thank you for sharing!
I never really spoke about it in detail, because I quickly learned they didn’t want to hear it- it didn’t match their fairy tale. Whatever concerns I expressed were quickly dismissed with a wave of the hand and an unrealistically optimistic explanation or excuse.
I so understand this–not in relation to adoption but just in what we dealt with. People do NOT want to hear it if it doesn’t match the fairy tale. I wonder sometimes if people think that hard times are contagious so they don’t want to really know or help others…..
Do you mind if I quote you?
Feel free!
” I never really spoke about it in detail, because I quickly learned they didn’t want to hear it- it didn’t match their fairy tale. ”
Just yesterday, I read a piece that said something very similar, by the mother of a child adopted from Eastern Europe. She said that nobody believed how much damage her daughter brought with her, and how hard it was to repair that damage; they believed that “all you need is love” and everything would be fine.
This seems like a good opportunity to ask you what you think about how adoption seems to have been thought of say a century or two ago, and whether it had different outcomes than it does now. I’m thinking of the Anne of Green Gables books, in which adoptive children are often viewed with some suspicion–”You never know how they’ll turn out” or “Blood will tell.” Or of Ida Brown in the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, who says things like, “Since I’m adopted, of course I have to work and can’t expect extras.” In other words, there doesn’t seem to be the contemporary attitude that an adopted child is as much the parents’ “real” or “own” child as a biological child would be. On the other hand, there’s no depiction of the rage, withdrawal, or other attachment-related behaviors, either. Do you think such behaviors were less prevalent, or simply not depicted? Could the lower status of adoption have meant that everyone’s emotional expectations were lower and there was in fact less post-adoption trauma?
I think it’s just too complicated. Parenting styles in general were different. Expectations that everybody would tamp down their emotions and just endure and tough things out were different. Fewer children were born to drug addicted parents with all the disabilities that causes. There was no CPS. Children born to unwed parents were assumed to have inherited tainted blood and often ended up in the dark underbelly of society- in child prostitution, living in squalor and dying young. I am not sure that we see fewer depictions of attachment issues because there were fewer of them, or because the way society dealt with them was different- sweeping them under the rug.
I think if you are going to adopt, there *should* be the expectation that you are just as much the parent as you are to your biological kids.
However, I also think there should be a better middle ground- guardianships, for instance, would be a better fit for many cases . It’s been required for quite a few years now that all foster children call their foster parents mommy and daddy, no matter how temporary everybody knows the situation is, and I think that’s nuts and bound to create confusion in the heads and hearts of small people tossed around by the system.
I shared your article with a dear friend who adopted 4 children (all siblings) and she wrote, ” Thank you. It comes a a time when we are struggling with extremely difficult behavior w two kids.” I wanted you to know that your words are an encouragement to many people! I’m glad you find the time to write them down and share them with us!
I’m curious more what you meant at the end about a savior mentality. We’re in the process of getting certified to adopt, and I don’t think I’m too naive about the issues, but I still of course worry about the effects. Our main goal, really, is to provide a home for children who don’t have one. Is that what you mean, though? It seems you have to have some level of altruism on this, otherwise why would you knowingly choose to disrupt your own life? I just keep doing mental checks that we are doing this for the right reasons, so it’s interesting to hear all perspectives from people who’ve reached the other side.
I am going to be brutally honest here, because every disrupted adoption I know of came from people who thought they were acting altruistically and were giving children something they didn’t have. I find this statement deeply worrisome:
“It seems you have to have some level of altruism on this, otherwise why would you knowingly choose to disrupt your own life?”
The focus there is on the adults and what they are doing and isn’t it noble? But that’s the wrong focus. You’re disrupting the children’s lives , too, even more than your own, because you know what’s happening and can plan in advance adn have the better skills to handle it- you see your home as better and a favor- but they won’t necessarily see it that way- it’s only strange, different, and foreign (even if it’s a domestic adoption). Being plopped into a new home and family isn’t thrilling to children, it’s a serious trauma. It’s culture shock and kidnapping on steroids insofar as the possible emotional impact goes (It doesn’t matter how much they *need* that change, or how much you mean it for good- I’m talking about understanding the emotional and psychological impact from the point of view of a child who has no choice).
I think that going into adoption with the motivation of providing a home for a child without one is fraught with emotional booby traps. Some people weather them well and come out on the other side, but the idea that you are rescuing a child is very seductive, and the focus is all wrong.
I don’t think thinking of one’s own motives as altruistic is a good ingredient for an adoption. We certainly didn’t feel like we were doing anything altruistic when we adopted two children. We wanted more children in our family, and recognized that they were doing as much for us as we were for them, only more so, because *they* had zero choice in the matter. The adults in their lives were all the free agents.
We all say we don’t expect gratitude, and we mean it, or think we do- but it takes an incredible person to not feel at least a touch of resentment when you have altruistically given a needy child a home (in one’s own viewpoint), only to have that child scorn the home and you as well, and far from being grateful, respond with hostility, resentment, and manipulation.
Also, Unrequited love is exhausting and if you’ve gone into it thinking about *you* are doing for somebody else, it’s unsustainable.
If you want to save a child, you can donate to an adoption agency, or a children’s home overseas, or help to pay another family’s adoption expenses, or support a local children’s home. Volunteer for respite care for parents with disabled children or see if your local hospital has any programs where people can come in to hold abandoned babies in the NICU. If funding somebody else to provide that home isn’t the way you want to do things,it would be good to think long and hard about why.
All that said, I don’t want you to take any of this personally- I don’t know you. I am responding to four or five sentences, and you are far more than those four or five sentences. I perceive them in a certain way because of my background and experiences, but my filters may be grossly miscalibrated for you. Adoption could well be the right choice for your family- and not only do I not know you, you don’t know me well enough to give my words more weight than you do to the opinions of people who have adopted and who also know you personally. So forgive me if anything I’ve said stung-that isn’t my intention at all.
I appreciate hearing lots of views on this, yours included. For more background information, we are only looking at children from the foster care system whose parental rights have been severed. So yes, their trauma by that stage will be pretty intense in terms of that cultural shock, attachment to adults, etc. you’ve mentioned. I’m not sure if I have any counterpoints really to what you’ve said, or a defense of my own motives…? I can try to explain more what I meant, though perhaps it only will cement the impression you got originally, I don’t know.
Any added child to a family disrupts the family’s equilibrium, and in this case it would likely be more than normal. We definitely do want more children in our family–it’s not like we don’t really want more kids but just feel bad for these kids or something. But if the only goal was to add more children, infant adoption would be somewhat simpler. Maybe my motives are too altruism driven, I don’t know. I just also feel that there are children who need a home, and with no one to adopt them they sit in foster homes. In our medium sized state alone there are 1000 kids a year who age out of the system. So if good people don’t step up for these kids, where does that leave them? I’m not expecting roses and sunshine every day. But if in the end a child has a place to come home to for Christmas, who otherwise could easily have ended up as part of that age-out statistic, isn’t that worthwhile? That said, I think it’s good to also remember what they are doing for us by being part of our family. Perhaps I’ll need that extra reminder. I never feel that way with my biological children–I mean, they by their presence contribute to my happiness but I never have to stop to think about it. They just are by nature a blessing But perhaps it’s different when you’re dealing with a very different set of circumstances and challenges.
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