Reply to Adoptive parents that treat their biological child and adopted child differently

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This is a 15 year old thread and hopefully there have been some improvements in understanding the complex needs of adoptive children since then.

We have both and we have tried so hard to treat them equally but it may not always look that way on the surface.

They are very different people and what worked with bio DC has not worked with adopted DC.

Adopted DC has required much more help and has had many more struggles. We try to support those needs but not always successfully.

Plus All adopted children have some kind of trauma. There are not many therapists who are trained in helping youth with complex adoption traumas. But there is now special training for therapists to help adoptive children and parents.

Also there are big differences between domestic (mostly open) and international adoptions (mostly closed and often interracial).  International adoptions have dramatically
Reduced. I imagine since overturning Roe v Wade that there will be many more children available for adoption domestically.

Also Many adoptees have learning differences or special needs of some kind which can require extra supports.

So I agree that parents should not treat bio and adoptive DC differently where possible - and definitely all children need to feel that they are unconditionally loved. [/quote]

All adopted kids do not have trauma.  Maybe your parenting is to play.  My child joined our family through adoption and is not my adopted child.  Your post makes me so sad for this child.  [/quote]

Well maybe but my experience is that our bio and adopted children have very different needs . Our adopted child explicitly asked us not to treat them in the same way as they have different needs and life experiences. We tried to treat them the same and it did not work for us.  Of course we try wherever possible .

The idea that most adopted children have some level of trauma is what adoption trained therapists have told us / that all adopted children have some kind of deep pain related  to feelings of abandonment, belonging snd self worth .. from what I have seen among children adopted internationally into multiracial and closed adoptions, this is very true. It is probably very different for open domestic adoptions where adoptees don’t struggle with looking different to everyone else in the family.

I think adoption therapists use trauma in a different way to what most of us think of as trauma - The root cause is that Whether a child is adopted at birth or they are older at the time of adoption, their separation from the birth mother is a profound experience. The body processes this disruption as a trauma, which creates what may be called an “attachment wound.

If your adopted child does not struggle with identity and belonging issues then I am happy for you. But I know many adopted children who do struggle. It is a complicated journey for them.

We love and support our adopted child the best we can but it is not up to us to dictate their emotions and how they respond to their situation. We also don’t expect them to pretend everything is honky dory when it does not feel that way to them. However, we continue to provide the most stable and loving home that we can. 
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If your child feels you are treating them differently you need to look at what you are doing.  Just by calling the pm the adopted child speaks volumes. You are projecting on them and trusting them differently. Of course they have issues with this. [/quote]

Thanks but we will stick to advice from our trained adoption therapists - personal and family -

What speaks volumes is your decibel blowing condescension. [/quote]

You need a new therapist.  You are paying them so of course they will humor you and blame the birth parents. Kid lives with you.  You need to change.[/quote]

You really are sanctimonious and wrong-headed.  You believe that Your DH and DC had perfect adoptions so that gives you the right to diminish others who work hard with professionals to meet the needs of their adoptive children? You are not an expert, and you don’t seem to understand the current therapeutic  use of the term adoption trauma/ adoption loss  -/ yet you rail against it like a hurricane wind in a teacup as if this serves the adoptive community some greater good. (Note: It does not) - Denying wide spread experiences with adoption traumas/ losses just adds to feelings of shame for adoptees who do struggle with deep conflicted feelings around their adoptions .

There is a growing body of research related to traumas around separation from biological
Mothers/ families and how that manifests in different ways in different developmental stages.

Try reading more on the topic before shaming other adoptive parents.

CASE (Center for Adoption Support and Education) now offers training for therapists to better understand and help adoptees and their families to work through adoption losses and traumas . All adoption trained therapists are trained to recognize and help adoptees and their families to recognize and process adoption traumas/ losses in ways that help them to deal with adoption issues in honest and healthy ways. Thank Heavens they exist now.
https://adoptionsupport.org/

“In 2019, a book titled [b]Seven Core Issues in Adoption any Permanency[/b] was published. The authors, Sharon Kaplan Roszia and Allison Davis Maxon, wrote about [u]the deep impact of adoption that we see here in our International Adoption Center where we assist internationally and domestically adopted children along with their parents, pediatricians, and the community doctors who care for them[/u].”

The 7 Core Issues of Adoption Loss. For adoptees, loss of birth/first parents results in a loss of connection to one's roots and sense of safety and protection. 
Rejection. ...
Shame and Guilt. ...
Grief. ...
Identity. ...
Intimacy. ...
Mastery and Control.

https://blog.cincinnatichildrens.org/learning-and-growing/exploring-the-7-core-issues-of-adoption/

Apart from many people who work with adoptees seeing adopted children and youth struggling with adoption losses, I personally know many adoptive children (via closed international multiracial adoptions) who have struggled.

You really need to stop giving unsolicited advice to adoptive parents when you don’t know what you’re talking about. Reality and fact deniers do more than good. Again, it is great if your  DH and DC are perfectly adapted adoptees but that is not the case for everyone - Many become healthy eventually but may need help from adoption trained therapists who understand the impacts of adoption losses - to get there. 
[/quote]

Even adoptees who become part of loving stable homes can struggle … [/quote]

But OP’s example was truly terrible - you’d think all the safe guards for adopting (home studies/ social workers/ criminal back ground checks/ references) would prevent such people from adopting, [/quote]

Not sure what real safeguards there are when the adoption is done privately. The family I know "found" a young woman ready to give birth (within a week) and took the baby home 3 days after it was born. It was all done with a private attorney paid for by adoptive parents. I don't think much was done on a background check on adoptive parents and their families. Several of the family members have criminal backgrounds including domestic violence, drug addiction and abuse of children. One of those family members babysits. [/quote]

That is terrible and sad. I hope it does become More common with all the forced births in the US.

For international adoptions, the US only has adoption agreements with countries that are fully compliant with the Den Hague treaty on international adoptions. So you can’t adopt without privately without criminal back ground checks, licensed social worker home studies that include interviews with any bio children, criminal background checks, and substance abuse checks. We often thought that bio parents should have such checks as well. Even with all of those safeguards, and being adopted into loving stable homes, adoptee children still often struggle with adoption losses.

It is truly terrible that families such as the one you describe are allowed to adopt privately in the US. The lawyers who facilitate this without checking fitness of the parents should be disbarred. 
[/quote]

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