Reply to We are about to adopt a girl - looking for books to help my four year old understand

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I know this is an old thread, but I have a related question:

When do you tell the child and how?  We're at the beginning of the process and haven't been chosen yet, but with even the slim chance of an adoption falling through, I'm not sure what I should tell my child and when.  I like to think these things through early so that when the time comes, I'm mentally prepared for the conversation.  My biggest fear is that we will bring the baby home and the birth mother will change her mind.  I don't want my child getting attached to a "sibling" and then being heartbroken.

Those of you who've BTDT, how did you handle?  [/quote]

My plan had been to tell my older kids at some point between the time of our referral and the time of our travel (we did International for number three).  However, with my kids having been through foster care and being older (4 and 7 at the time I started the process for a third), they could smell a social worker a mile away.  So, when the home study started, they knew right away that something was up and the best explanation seemed to be the truth.  So, they knew for a year before the baby came.

There were lots of things that went wrong and lots of political changes during the process so we were never sure if or when it would happen.  I never discussed these things with the kids because it would have been unnecessary for them to stress about what might or might not happen.  I guess, if it hadn't worked out, I guess I would have figured out what to say.  But, thing is, even when you have a baby, things can go wrong.  And, there was no particular baby/kid that we were going to get so it wasn't a real person that they were attached to.  The other thing is that while things go wrong during adoptions, I don't think it happens as often as people believe.  You might not get the kid that you thought you were getting, but almost always it works out that you eventually can adopt.  [/quote]

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