Unsolicited Adoption Advice

Nobody asked me, but I'd like to pass on a couple tips on adopting. I'm not a professional, and the only experience I have is personal (our own adoptions and those of friends) and the ponderings of my head. It's just my own personal unsolicited advice, plain and simple.

I believe the research on the bonding that occurs in the womb is pretty well established now, and most adoptive parents are informed and educated on this point- but just in case- even if you adopt a newborn from the hospital, adoption is traumatic. You, the adult, have been longing for this day, but the baby knows nothing about it. The baby only knows that the familiar smells, tastes, sounds, and people he experienced in the womb are suddenly, abruptly, no longer part of his world. Adoptive parents need to be sympathetic, understanding, mindful, and compassionate of the trauma and loss even a newborn infant experiences at the sudden shock of a new home and new family.

It is also appropriate to be sympathetic to and ache for the pain experienced by a woman who has chosen to place her children for adoption, and even for the tragic case of a parent so abusive that choice has been made for (something horrible has happened to her to make her able to hurt her own children that way), and your frustration with her behavior or choices is not going to help the child. There is also a limit to what you can do with that compassion, we did not create her circumstances, they are generally beyond our remedy, and we are not responsible for them. In an ideal world, everybody would live happily ever after, but we don't live in an ideal world.

Because of the trauma experienced even by newborns, I believe it's important to limit outside contact as much as possible while the child regains some equilibrium and familiarity with his new world, and while bonding process develops and the relationship cements. This is so important. Biological children have several months of space to get used to the smells, tastes, and even sounds of their family (they hear and taste in the womb, and are born recognizing their mother's voices, and often those of siblings and the father). Adopted children, even if they are newborns, even if they are 'homegrown' and presumably from the same culture as the new family, are plunged into an overwhelmingly unfamiliar environment. You eat different things, you smell different, you sound different, your daily routines are different. Even healthy, emotionally mature and stable adults experience culture shock in similar circumstances. It's much harder on small children who haven't the language to process what's happening to them, who don't know enough to even know what to ask, and who haven't the emotional maturity to take everything in without a qualm. Furthermore, the circumstances that caused these children to be placed for adoption in the first place will complicate their adjustment as well. What they are experiencing is overwhelming, even if they are newborns, and they need the trauma of sensory overload cushioned as much as you can.

Often in an older adoption (not always, but often) they will hold their new parents at arm's length for all kinds of reasons, depending on their circumstances- they can't attach well, they don't trust people calling themselves Mom and Dad, they resent being adopted out and so they resent their adoptive parents, their ability to develop close, loving ties has been crippled by previous experiences, all sorts of reasons. But children still need physical contact and love, and they will get it where they can, and this makes them vulnerable to predators. What often happens is that adopted children will be extremely affectionate with strangers and acquaintances so that they can avoid physical contact at home, this strengthens their sense of insecurity when they need to be developing a sense of security, and is just not healthy or safe for them

Tell your friends and family to give you time with your new children. Ask your friends and family NOT to come over and shower the children with physical affection. You need to help these children learn to bond, and I believe it is healthiest for these new blessings to learn to come to you, their parents, to fill up their love buckets first, because you are the only constant in their lives now. Then they can add others to their circle, but they need this relationship with their new parents to be firm first, as it is foundational for their mental and emotional health, as well as for their personal safety. Child predators have a honed radar for seeking and finding vulnerable, insecure children. And if your friends and family will cooperate with you, this will be much easier. Instead of letting the new children climb up in their laps and give them hugs and cuddles, they need to be strong and self sacrificing enough to gently redirect the child to the new parent, saying something like, "I'm sorry, but I am just getting up to get a drink, why don't you go cuddle with your Mommy?" And then they need to get up and make themselves unavailable for snuggles. If they won't, don't have them around your kids until you are sure your kids are well bonded. It's that important.

Naturally, if you are not adopting but have friends who are, respect their space, don't enable their new children to fill up their love buckets with you instead of with their parents, and take your cue from the new parents. Ask them what's okay and what isn't, and do not dismiss their concerns or ignore their requests.

Here's another thought, based on our own experience. I don't think it's a good idea to tell children that their birth parents 'loved them enough to give them up.' Some of them are going to wonder what's going to happen when you love them that much. We learned this when one afternoon two of our children asked to go outside to play. It was their naptime, so I said no. One child turned to the other and said, "I can't wait until we're grown-ups, what about you? We can just go outside whenever we want to then." And her sister, who had been adopted less than a year prior, sighed and said, "No, that's not what happens. When you get bigger, they just give you a new mother."

We had a long talk that afternoon as I explained that no, she wasn't ever getting a new mother, I was the end of the road, and she was stuck with me forever. Because of the circumstances around her adoption and the explanations others (including the birth mother) had given her, I realized she needed stability and reassurance that I wasn't leaving the picture. She needed to know the safety net of permanence was there for her.

Children are funny and it's difficult to know how they will process what we tell them, but I think we might have seen that one coming if we'd thought about it very hard.

Part Two is here




I am regretfully closing comments to this post. Readers interested in reading further on the topic should read the book mentioned in the comments and might consider this site.

Post edited and revised, Feb. '09