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Adoption
toddler adoption
hi all. this is a repeat post from fb (sorry for those who are seeing it twice) - but i thought some other mamas on here might have some insight.
while we are pursuing newborn adoption, we have had two situations come to us that were toddlers (one was through friends and the first mom did not end up making an adoption plan and the other was from our consultants).
i have done some reading on attachment issues and the difficulty of the transition, but was wondering if any of you have first-hand experience you would be willing to share?
if you've adopted a toddler, what was your transition like? what were/are your experiences with attachment/bonding like?
would love to hear your stories! tia!
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Re: toddler adoption
PP--- can you talk about what it was like when he was first placed with you? How did the transition go? I know nothing about the process but I am intrigued. Is it "cold turkey" or do you spend time w/the toddler prior to taking him full time?
We brought DD home at 26 months. She was adopted from people that we knew and first meet her at 18 months.
DD and her grandmother came and stayed 2 weeks with us in our home. It took us two years to go through the IA process to bring DD home to stay. DD's grandmother was her foster mom so she helped by talking daily about our family and showing her pictures of us.
We visited Canada in March for a weekend before DD was finally home with us in Sept. DD's grandmother came with DD and stayed for 2 months in our home but upstairs away from DD. We took care of DD when we were home and went with her by ourselves on all outing. DD's grandmother took care of her during the day while we worked. After DD's grandmother left it took about 2 weeks for DD to stop looking for her.
It took about 2 months for DD to go to sleep in our arms. She would look to us for comfort like someone elses child would do to you and it took about 4 months for her to look to us like a child does a parent. It was heart breaking for me at times that she did not want me to comfort her but we worked through it. She bonded with DH and DS first and was agressive to DD1 and I. She is now bonded well to all of us.
14 months after bringing DD home we took her to CA for the wedding of her birth aunt and everything went well. She wanted her birth family but she came back to us when she was tired or hurt. We talk about her birth family like extended family and so far all is well.
Thanks for sharing Glynn... it sounds difficult but rewarding
DS was placed with us at 23 months. I will say that the attachment piece was one of my biggest concerns, but that has actually been the *easiest* of everything. DS is very attached to us as his parents, and has been from the beginning for the most part, I think due to all the hard work we put in right away. He does, however, sometimes display indiscriminant affection- being overly friendly and sometimes affectionate with people he has only met once or twice. These behaviors are getting better over time. We are his 5th set/group of caregivers, and prior to us he lived in multiple group settings, so I was prepared for these types of behaviors.
We immediately worked on some attachment techniques when DS first came home. A lot of skin to skin contact too- bottle feeding with eye contact (even though he had been off a bottle for 6ish months), taking baths/showers together, feeding each other sweet foods like pudding, rocking in a chair, staring contests, wearing matching shirts, massages, etc. We did not allow anyone besides DH and myself to care for DS, this included feeding, changing diapers, bathing, etc. We did not allow anyone, including grandparents, friends, other family, babysitters, etc to do anything for DS for at least 6 months. Either DH or myself slept in DS' room with him for the first 8ish weeks too and slowly transitioned out.
Some of our biggest challenges have been surrounding eating, health, and discipline/compliance. These are all still challenges for us, but are very slowly getting better as time goes by. I can elaborate if necessary, but I will just say that toddler adoption is not for the faint of heart. It is/was a huge leap of faith and also a huge test of our marriage. DS has now been with us for almost 14 months. He is a wonderful kid who loves his family greatly, including his baby sister who he adores and we adore him back. I would highly recommend reading Attaching in Adoption.
eta: Im also curious what age toddler you are thinking about adopting... We know a lot of kiddos who joined their families through adoption. I strongly believe adopting a two or three year old is significanly different (read: more challenging) than adopting a one year old ....
I've got a different scenario adopting from foster care, but my oldest was placed with us when he was 3.5yo. There were many behavioral difficulties - anger issues, issues with first introducing structure at an advanced age, ect - but, there was never once an issue with attachment. We even went to see an attachment therapist when he was first placed with us and despite all the continued behavioral issues, she discharged us after 6 weeks since the attachment was clear and healthy.
I know not all stories are like mine, but from the very beginning I was blown away by how quickly that love and attachment filled us all.
Blogs: Our Growing Family - CT Working Moms
DS1 was placed with us when he was 19 months old in foster care. We started doing respite for him when he was 16 months old. He was said to have reactive attachment disorder (RAD) as he was not bonding or developing attachment to his foster parents. A speech therapist also made an off the record comment about possible autism, brain damage, etc.Transition into our home was quite easy. He also developed a bond/attachment with us very quickly. He called me mama within a month of doing respite on the weekends for him.
to a PP (i think it was silliestbunny) - I know in foster care you can't "shop" the kids before sending in your homestudy to be considered for adoption. We didn't really "shop" Jaxon, his foster parents needed a break and we were asked to do respite because we had already expressed interest in adopting him.
Our situation was an emergency placement through fostercare. It was 100% cold turkey - we received a phone call, social worker brought him while he was asleep. I'm sure more of a scheduled transition would be very valuable, unfortunately, that isn't always an option in dealing with foster situations.
We had no idea that we would be adopting this little boy - so honestly, I didn't concentrate on bonding "techniques" per say when he was first placed. We thought it was an emergency placement that would last a week at the most before he moved on to a family memeber. By the end of the first month he had stolen our hearts completely and had bonded with us as well as we could have asked for.
The next youngest child we have fostered was 3 years 8 months - now that situation is a different ball of wax altogether!
I feel that so much has to do with the childs history, age, etc. There's no easy answers!
We adopted our DD through foster care, she came to us at 3.5 years old. We were matched with her and went through a two month transition period, day visits out, day visits at our home, overnight visits, weekend visits, and week long visits before she moved in.
I felt like we all bonded right off the bat but after she moved in things changed between her and I and we've struggled (it's gotten better) over the last 10 months. Her behavior with me is opposite her behavior with my wife, I'm not sure why it's that way but it drives me nuts some days. We are slowly figuring out what works for us and in doing so have been healing our relationship. Honestly, I love her but don't feel close to her like I do our other kids, we are working our way there but it's taking awhile.
I wasn't prepared to feel this way, I thought everything would be sunshine and roses and that I could be the one to make life easy for her but it just isn't that way for her and I...........yet. It's hard to admit that things aren't always so peachy in an adoption but this is my experience with this particular adoption.
Two Mommies Healing Hearts