CENTERS' PIECE: Things to think about before you adopt
It is National Adoption Month, and I am reminded of all the things parents should know before they adopt. Most people adopting from the foster care system know that their soon-to-be adopted child comes with a long history, both good and bad. People who adopt a child at birth think that they are bypassing a lot of grief by getting a child “from the beginning,” which is not always true.
The nine months of gestation is critical for the healthy formation of all of a child’s organs, but especially the brain. The baby learns his parents’ voices, the mother’s stress hormones course through the baby’s system, as well as any alcohol or drugs. The baby begins to learn that the world is either a safe or a dangerous place. If the birth mom is continuously stressed, whether good stress or bad, then the baby’s stress level will equal her mom’s and become the norm. These babies can exhibit extreme signs of distress over innocuous things in their environment. It is hard to say where the environmental factors cease and genetics take over. Dr. Karyn Purvis, a researcher at Texas Christian University, puts it this way, “It is not nature versus nurture, it is nature NEEDS nurture.” Few parents would ever say they regret adopting their children, but they may wish they had been better prepared.
Many adoptive parents are surprised by their child’s behaviors and the intensity of their feelings. It is not unusual for a child to be very compliant and polite for one to six months after coming to their new home. These months are known as the “honeymoon” period. Soon after this time, reality sets in and children often exhibit anger, sadness, and/or terror. Parents might not recognize the terror, because it typically comes out as rage.
Children have “triggers” that new parents are often unaware of, and even the children themselves may not recognize. If a child is abused or neglected before the age of two, he is not going to be able to verbalize why he is afraid or angry. However, the motor memories are still there. It could be a smell, a sound, a scene, or a touch that sends him into a meltdown.
Recognizing that the behavior is about the abuse or neglect is difficult for the parent who finds themselves on the receiving end of the meltdowns. The child appears to be attacking the mother, because the child sees the birth mom and the foster/adoptive mom as one and the same. This is one area for counseling, to help the child differentiate between the mothers. Often the new mother is the recipient of the rage or grief that’s really about the birth mother. While the displaced anger can often be turned around, this knowledge doesn’t make it any easier for the parent who is dealing with the child’s challenging behaviors day after day. As a result, many adoptive parents are fatigued and burned out. They need the assistance and support that Centers for Children and Families Post Adoption Program can offer.
