Being Open and Honest
Parenting in general requires that we communicate effectively with our children. Parenting children affected by adoption requires even more. Not just for the children who were adopted but also for the children in your family who were born into your family.
Through a chain of circumstances, Lucas lost members of his family, leading his mother to place him in the orphanage so that he could be adopted. My children did not give that much thought until Lucas arrived. His arrival and grief brought their own fears to the surface. What if they lost their family?
I could have simply told them nothing will happen and not to worry, but I cannot promise that. I don’t know what the future holds. What could do, though, was tell them that I have reason to believe I’ll see them through to adulthood, and if I’m not, we have extended family who love them and will help them through it. I validated their feelings even as I as was attempting to alleviate their fears.
The result has been that they still fear it to some degree, but it is not consuming their lives as it once did. We still talk about it from time to time as I continue to assure them that their dad and I are still here.
Lucas has a sister who was placed with another family. Even in Haiti, this is unusual and we have not been able to find out exactly why that decision was made. What we do know is that it had an impact on Lucas and his ability to attach to and trust us. One day it dawned on me that perhaps Lucas was harboring some resentment toward us for not adopting his sister.
He had never expressed it so I could have been wrong. I could have left it alone until he said something, but I didn’t. I asked one day if he was thinking of her and if he was feeling angry at us for not adopting her. He confirmed my suspicions. I explained what happened and how it was beyond our control. I assured him that had we been allowed, we would have adopted her as well.
The result is that he, thankfully, believes I am telling him the truth–which I am. Lucas has expressed to me that because I bring up some of the subject manner, he believes that I do not hide information from him.
Keep in mind, though, that open and honest communication is not a free-for-all. There are some pieces of information that are not appropriate for Lucas to know at the age of eight. Some day he’ll be old enough and/or mature enough but at the present it will only harm him to know. And he knows that I do not tell him absolutely everything. At eight, he is accepting that. I know it won’t last forever, but he will hopefully be more mature and closer to ready when he finally insists that I tell him anyway.
Between now and then, I try to be as open and honest as humanly and compassionately possible. He deserves to know whatever I know–at long as it is appropriate–and the more open I am in my communication, the more he is able to trust me and feel secure in my care.
Copyright © 2008 Becky Wilson. All rights reserved.
communication, parent-child relationship, adoption, adoptive parenting, parenting after adoption, attachment in adoption, attaching in adoption, grief & loss in adoption
June 16th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
[...] Lucas has told me that a lot of the time he isn’t thinking about his past or the trauma he experienced, but he does think of it often. He has also told me that a part of his ability to press forward and enjoy the life he is living now …. [...]