The impact of loss on adopted children
Generally, the younger the child is, the fewer adjustments they will need to make in dealing with loss. Adoptive parents need to understand the loss that their child may be experiencing, and the behaviours associated with their loss, to help them move forward.
Distressed infants may cry for days or weeks and require a great deal of attention. Toddlers may relapse to an earlier stage of development, physically reject affection and even kick and scream. While this behaviour will be difficult for you to deal with, it is much harder for the child who may be feeling very confused and anxious.
Older children may feel homesick for their country of origin and the people they knew, and may demonstrate this through crying or become quiet, unresponsive or even suspicious. Deliberate, difficult and troublesome behaviour may be an indication of their anger at being displaced from their familiar surroundings. Other symptoms may include bed-wetting and a refusal to eat or sleep.
It is important that adoptive parents understand that the child may be confused by what is happening to them and may not be as happy to be with you as you are to have a child. Try to imagine what it must be like to be young and vulnerable and moved around with no control over what is happening to you. It may take a long time for the child to replace fear with trust in people.
Activity 2 - Erika's story
Schoolyard teasing was very much a part of daily life and always prompted me to think about how and why I was different to other kids my age. I was saddened that I was always seen as Chinese and adopted, almost as if there wasn't anything else to me. It made it difficult to ignore my adoptive status and meant that it was always out there in the open.
I couldn't control who knew I was adopted because it was apparent at first glance that I was not my adoptive parents' natural child. Somehow this gave complete strangers the right to ask the most personal and intrusive questions about my adoption and my background. It accentuated not only my difference to my family, but also my family's difference in the community.
My difference within the family was also accentuated by growing up with a sister who is my adoptive parents' biological child. My sister was, and still is, the spitting image of her Latvian aunts - those same strong Latvian traits still coming through in her own daughter who is only part Latvian. I couldn't count the times I was told 'you don't look a bit like your sister' from some inquisitive stranger.
In your learning journal, comment on the following questions:
- How would you embrace an adopted child's differences within your family?
- Last updated
- 19 October 2007