Welcoming a New Brother or Sister Through Adoption. Arleta James
five-year-old Lori as a result of strong religious convictions to give to someone less fortunate. The family received little information regarding Lori’s pre-adoptive history. However, they felt little concern. They believed their experience as parents would ensure that Lori would do fine in their home. Lori’s arrival was met with several welcoming parties attended by supportive extended family members as well as friends from their church and community. At one point in therapy, Julie stated, “She received 16 Barbie dolls, two Ken dolls and a Barbie Dream House. We were trying to teach our older children that sex outside of marriage was not acceptable. Yet, in Lori’s play, Ken was always in the hot tub with five naked Barbies. Everything became sexual with Lori.”
Shelia and Wendell have one child by birth. Staci is 14. She is attractive and smart. Their second child, Yvonne, joined the family via adoption at age two. She is now 12 years old. Recently, condoms have been turning up in her back pack, purse, jeans’ pockets, and her bedroom. The family’s home is located within walking distance of the school. When Yvonne was late in arriving home from school one day, Shelia began canvassing the neighborhood looking for her. When she could not spot Yvonne, Shelia began knocking on neighbors’ doors asking if anyone had seen Yvonne. Indeed, one mother reported that Yvonne had come home with her 13-year-old son. The two were “upstairs listening to music.” This parent went upstairs to let Yvonne know that Shelia was waiting for her. There was quite a rustle on the other side of the boy’s bedroom door as the two attempted to put their clothes on.
Subsequently, Wendell and Shelia presented this situation to their family physician. After much discussion, Yvonne was placed on birth control. The family has increased their supervision of Yvonne. Shelia and Wendell have also engaged in extra conversations about sex with Staci. They became fearful that Staci would be influenced by Yvonne’s behavior.
John is 14 years old. He was adopted by Marcy and Dan when he was age ten. The couple also has two birth children, presently ages 11 and eight. Marcy and Dan have made great efforts to monitor their children’s use of the Internet as well as the music they listen to and the movies they watch. However, John always seems to find ways around their parental controls. Each time he obtains access to the Internet, he downloads pornography. Pornography turns up in the bedroom he shares with his younger brother, in the bathroom, in his backpack, and once it was left, in plain sight, on the dining-room table!
Eventually, the couple sought professional assistance. Over time, John described sexual abuse by several men and his birth grandfather. It became clear that the pornography was his way of attempting to let Dan and Marcy know that he had been sexually abused. He was also verifying that seeing men having sex with women made him feel heterosexual. As long as he was “excited” by what he considered “normal” sex, he did not feel as if his sexual experiences with men had “caused him to be gay.”
The vignettes above show that adopting a child—young or older—may mean dealing with pornography, masturbation, homosexuality, sexual identity confusion, pre-marital sex, birth control, the sexual abuse of one child by another, and so on. Being proactive about sex and sexuality may not come easily to some adoptive parents, but, as the above stories indicate, proactivity is an invaluable tool for families adopting children coming from traumatic backgrounds. I’ll revisit this topic in Chapter 12 to provide tips that will ensure the safety of each child in the family.
Complex trauma: Special focus on domestic violence/physical abuse
Physical abuse and domestic violence are also traumas affecting both domestic and intercountry adoptees. Here are some examples:
Dustin and Kristen entered their pre-adoptive family at ages five and four. Shortly upon their arrival into this family, Dustin became angry with a neighbor child and immediately located a plastic bag. He then attempted to place the bag over the child’s head. Fortunately, an adult intervened. When asked why he had done it, Dustin was quite clear that his birth father often “beat me with a belt” and “tied bags over my head” when he was angry. It was certainly a long time before Dustin was able to play without adult supervision.
Mark, a four-year-old, arrived into his adoptive family after a four-year stay in a Ukrainian orphanage. Attempts to discipline Mark were often met with his running to cower in a corner or a closet. Frequently, he would cover his face and shout, “No, please don’t hurt me!” Bewildered by this behavior, the family sought mental health services. Over time, Mark described that some “orphanage ladies” would hit the children with sticks for behavioral infractions. He assumed the adoptive family would do the same.
As our examples make clear, children who were physically abused or who witnessed domestic violence in their birth or foster home or a foreign institution may move into the adoptive home and hit, shove, push, kick, and so on. The intensity and frequency of this behavior is well beyond “normal sibling rivalry.” Traumatized adoptees will repeat the patterns of behavior they learned in a dysfunctional birth home or orphanage until they learn a new way to act. Aggression can be a behavior resistant to change.
Infants and toddlers who have experienced deprivation may become aggressive as they mature. This latter group wasn’t shown love in infancy. So their moral development will lag behind. They may not be able to show affection, empathy, and remorse until parents have the right tools and therapy to help teach these skills. These kids have distorted thoughts in addition to their immature development. They may think that aggression is a means to solve problems. The strongest person gets his way or gets more of his wants and needs met.
A child who has been a victim of unpredictable physical abuse learns that if this abuse is going to happen, it is far preferable to control when it happens. As a result, children who have been physically assaulted will frequently engage in provocative, aggressive behavior. They believe that the adoptive home operates as did their orphanage or birth home. This means that the child is soliciting anger—from parents and siblings. He believes it is easier to provoke a “beating” than to wait for one to occur. Indeed, in my clinical work with adoptive parents they report, “I never thought I could be so angry!” Brothers and sisters also report, “I get so angry with him that I hit him back.” “She makes me so mad that I get in her face and scream at her. I just can’t help myself!” “Once he made so mad, I pushed him onto the couch!”
Complex trauma: Conclusions
Interwoven into the content of this chapter are examples of some of the behavioral difficulties presented by children adopted through intercountry programs and from the child welfare system. The behaviors presented thus far are in no way exhaustive.
“When they first came, we played like regular brothers and sisters. Later, that period ended. I expected to have some fun brothers and sisters to play with. It’s not fun at all. Sometimes my brother plays with me, but my sister and I don’t even talk most of the time. I expected a happier family. I ended up with a family that isn’t so happy. I am mad about that. I am mad at my brother and sister, but mostly I am mad at my parents because they made a decision that changed my life.”
These behaviors stem from an inability to form a healthy, loving attachment, or due to the adopted son or daughter feeling the need to avoid attaching to his or her adoptive parents, brothers and sisters. The heartache of abandonment is a pain the child fears re-experiencing. Subsequent losses of foster families, a favorite orphanage caregiver, an orphanage mate, classmates, foster siblings, pets, neighbors, church members, and so on only serve to reinforce that relationships lead to hurt. Provoking the family with negative behaviors leads to anger. Anger creates distance in the relationships. The adopted son or daughter thinks, “Distance is safe. My heart won’t break again.” Fear of intimacy and grief for past losses and traumatic insults cause the child to act out to self-protect.
The behavior stems from fractured development. The child is one age chronologically and a younger age socially and emotionally. The new son joining the family at the chronological age of four may actually function as a one- or two-year-old. He is a much “littler” child than expected. Or the newly arrived daughter may not meet age-appropriate developmental milestones as she matures. The developmental interruptions are most prominent in the areas of cause-and-effect thinking, problem-solving skills, abstract thinking, moral development, delayed gratification, the ability to identify, express, and regulate