Adoption and problem kids?

Question

Please let me apologize in advance in case I sounds crass or insensitive. It is not my intention, but sometimes I don't express myself in a tactful manner and i don't mean to offend anyone.

Lately I have been hearing horror stories of adopted kids that are developing severe emotional problems/bad behaviors due to actions of the birth mother (fetal drug use, etc) and early trauma or due to their experiences in their youth.

Can others share stories of this nature with me? Is there an "age cutoff" that will help with avoiding development problems?

Answer 1

good question

Answer 2

All I can say, is do your research.  This is a huge issue in foster adoption, as the entire history of the child not always disclosed to the adoptive family.  This leaves a family struggling to cope with severe and violent emotional reactions from a child; something that they were unprepared for and have no support.  

It can happen in overseas adoption as well, which is why I suggest to do your research.  If a country has a huge alcoholism rate among adults, it's a fair estimation that there is a high incidence of fetal alcohol syndrome as well.  Also look at how orphanages are handled.  If there is little contact encouraged, that's asking for a child to develop extreme reactive attachment disorder.

Even with all of your research, there is still a chance.  But with good research, you can minimize the risk of being unaware (and therefore unprepared) for these challeges.  

ETA: There's a huge difference between adopting a fetal alcohol syndrome child with reactive attachment disorder and adopting a child with "some issues."  Huge.  If you aren't prepared to take care of a child that can never function independently, there's nothing wrong with that!  My heart goes out to people who choose to adopt these children that were crippled by their first parents' alcohol abuse and neglect, but it's not for everyone.  Don't let anyone try to guilt you into taking on more challenges than you can realistically handle.

Good luck.

Answer 3

If you are not prepared to raise a child with emotional problems, you should NOT adopt.  Many adoptees have issues, even if they are adopted at birth.  Please read The Primal Wound, and Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew before going any further in this process.  You owe it to your future child(ren) to be prepared for their anger/fear/sadness/abandonment issues before bringing him/her into your home.

Answer 4

Truth should not be offensive if spoken out of desire to know the truth, and not out of a desire to hurt.  YES, there are LOTS of problems that are more and more prevalent in adoptees now than in the years past.  YES, it is because of the increased use of alcohol and drug use during pregnancy.  It's not the adoptee's fault.  But it certainly does mean that couples wanting to adopt need to be aware of the realities.  There is simply no way to be sure you can avoid problems of this nature unless you have the absolute truth about the child's history and background.  Social workers don't always tell everything they know because they don't want to scare adotive parents off.  Some don't even bother finding out as much as they can find out, because it makes their job easier to just not know.

SOME of the factors that cause adopted children to have moderate to severe behavior and/or learning problems:

Exposure to alcohol and drugs during pregnancy

Neglect and/or abuse in infancy to age 3

Exposure to violence in early years

Instability due to moving around from house to house

Moving from foster home to foster home

Post Trauma Stress Disorder is common in adopted childern

Bi-polar disorder and other mood disorders

Sexual abuse

Reactive Attachment Disorder--this one is a real stinker that is extremely hard to treat and heal.  

If you hear of a nightmare story where the adoptive family had to distrupt an adoption, it was most likely a case of RAD--Reactive Attachment Disorder.  In very serious cases, the child can be a serious danger to siblings and parents or to himself, even at a very young age.  It's very unfair to criticize the adoptive parents.  No one knows what it's like if you haven't dealt with it.

I have a RADish.  We are finally working with a therapist who really knows what she's doing.  He just turned 11, and she still believes there is hope for him.  It's HARD work at home and in the therapist's office.  But if we can help our RADish have a successful life, it will all be worth it.  We love him with all our hearts.  He just doesn't love himself, and therefore can't accept our love yet.  

I also have a teenager who suffers from Post Trauma Stress Disorder because of exposure to violence in her early  years.

Answer 5

First in most cases everyone does very well...and most families do not have Horrible Stories.... Please keep in mind that those of us who have faced sever issues are More Likely to Reach out--especially on the Internet where we can "Talk without being overheard".  This reach-out may appear to be huge and it may seem that there are Many Many families dealing with Huge horrors.... The reality is however that generally children are very adaptable and with the proper care, love and understanding the Majority of children don't have horror stories.....

Now---your questions.....

There is No way to tell..... None at all. There are No rules....A child may do well in Foster Care and may develop an attachment disorder on the Last Move to a new caregiver.... It could just be the final straw for a child....so often, the Foster home will Not see attacment as a problem--but, the new home may.

Sometimes the it is known when a family has a child placed that the child was exposed. We knew our son was--he was born addicted so we went in knowing he had been. We also knew enough about his older sister life to assume she would likely have some emotional issues to overcome..... So we were ready--and we willingly accepted this as part of our decision. We took training---classes and support groups understanding that we decided to parent children who would most likely have developmental--social--emotional and even possible mental-health issues.....

The times I believe that are the most difficult for parents are when they do not Expect this possiblity. Our Special Needs instructor had been one of these parents.... She had adopted a newborn--but, as time passed it became clear her child had been profoundly Alcohol Exposed.... Which was part of the history that brought her to become a SN Adoption Trainer....and she had a long story to tell with a 31 year old son who would never live indepentantly.

The other area that parents are often poorly prepared is with International Adoptions.... as these children are also generally not newborns....and in many cases the families adopting internationally have not been trained to imagine some of the special needs... These families also find an inequality in the types of services and supports they can find for these children as those adopted from foster care have Medicaid or State medical plans--but, the children adopted internationally do not have access to the System as the children who were adopted from the system do....

There is No Age Cut off--in fact some would argue the Older the Child the MORE that is known.... The younger the child the Less.... With Alcohol Exposure most children Appear Normal or within normal areas in nearly every way while young.... It is as time passes that the brain damage starts to actually show more... The typical age for a child effected by prenatal Alcohol exposure to be diagnosed is about the 4th grade.

Children with Full FAS (Fetal Alcohol Syndrome) may have clear physical signs.... However, children with full FAS often have fewer Behavior problems as their brain damage is sever and they lack the ability to Think Out on a more advanced level...Therefore the behavior issues typically are annoying but the child isn't able to Step-it-Up and think of ways to get what they want with a new set of methods... Children with prenatal exposure that doesn't lead to physcial showing may not be identified for years and because of the brain damage being specific to the time of develpment when it happened their issues can be all over the place.....and they may have just enough highly developed brain to cause really huge behavior issues....

In many cases children with alcohol brain damage may have Normal MRI's and Petscans and the leasion in their brains do not fully show until about the age of 10... This happened with our daughter--her brain scans at age 6 had shadows that might be of concern...Her scan at nearly 10 showed at least 20 black holes and scars....

Ironically children exposed to the majority of the Worst Drugs have fewer issue than children Alcohol exposed. Alcohol is a very small molicues (sp) and they Pass throught the mothers body. It was explained to me that it was like "Pickeling" a baby in booze.... Whereas the majority of Narcotices are passed by the blood via the placenta and the direct damage to the unborn baby is reduced by the mothers natural body filters....

The only thing that I can tell parents with the concerns you express is that No Parent can be sure of the Nature of a child. There are Many biological children who have emotional and behavioral issues as well as many people who give birth and face horrific stories too.....Sometimes kids are just messed up or have problems for No reason....

Anyway--if you think about the fact that there are horror problems for parents in general---then it seems a little less risky. But, it is foolish to assume that any child is perfect and to be honest I haven't yet met a perfect human so..... It is really all a c**p-shot....

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Answer 6

My friend and her husband adopted two babies, a girl and a boy.  Her children are fine, as they specified that the children that they were to adopt had to come from a mother, who did not use drugs.  It took a bit longer than normal, but it was important to them.  They adopted from the US.

Answer 7

Very good question.

Adoption = trauma.  That's the first point you should remember.  Adopted children are traumatized from being apart from their birthparents.  That's HUGE.  Then there is all that stuff that comes with being in foster care, trauma witnessed, trama of abuse etc.

Exposure to alcohol tends to be the worse in terms of developmental issues.  children exposed to drugs prenattally tend to fair better in the long run.

THat being said, if you adopt from birth, or infancy even, your chances are much better.  Early intervention is key in ALL areas, not just developmental.  Early stimualtion does wonders for children. i think that if you adopt from UNDER six months of age, the better.  I think age three and up is getting more difficult as there are more issues. It can be done but, be prepared to have an emotional journey.

I would say do your research.  Being an adoptive parent requires lots of educating yourself, advocating for yourself and your child, patience,  self care, examining your own 'issues' and acceptance, and unconditional love.

Answer 8

Overall, adoptive families I know are doing quite well, and I know several. The kids occassionally have problems, but no more than other kids. However, I know one family that adopted a sibling group of older kids who had been massively abused by their birth parents. These kids have had huge problems.  But the adoptive parents knew this going in. They have had problems with the kids which it to be expected.  But they have worked through it better than any other family I know could have done.  This type of situation requires special adoptive parents.

Answer 9

It is a good question actually.  I was a foster mom for many years and now am a proud adopted mother.  You can never tell for sure what kind of problems a child will or will not have, but adopting a child with known trauma and/or know FAS/FAE/FASD requires skilled parenting, clinical at times parenting.  YOu still love your children, but need to be armed with infromation to make best decisions for your child.

AGe cutoff....very interesting actually.  For FAS/FASD there can be signs when the child is a baby through facial features, but more often children are not diagnosed until ages 4-6 and beyond.  For us, we knew how hard it would be to adopt an FAS child, (god bless those who do) and we chose older children as a result (ages 4,5,6) as we are all certain (us, social workers, psychiatrists) there was no pre-natal exposure.

That being said, here is the kicker.  Older children with trauma can have their own set of problems such as attachment disorder, ODD, they may have been sexually abused which may lead to sexualized behavioru when they are older etc. etc. etc.  MAY is the key word here, you just never know.

So if you adopt a baby there are the risks with FAS and older children risks of trauma.  While this seems "bleak", not all children from foster care are going to come with these challenges, but a great majority are.  Honest just the trauma alone of losing their parents, and the long process of new parents, and if they even fit with their new parents etc. etc. etc.

We chose older children and we know their full social history.  Its not the worst we have dealth with but we know there was much neglect and some trauma.  Knowing this information will help us parent.  We chose situations we are well versed in and can do the best job.  Byu adopting at ages 4,5,6 we have given ourselves time to make the biggest impact possible.  WE are also thrilled with teh quality of care they have been gtiven in their current foster homes.

i hope this answers your question, but in reality in adoption there are no guarantees for development problems.  ACtually in life there are no guarantees, so just get armed with information and know there will be bumps, but then all the good stuff that comjes with parenting children makes it worth it (for us anyway!)

Cheers,!