[momtosami]

Hi, has anyone adopted a child 2 yrs old, how did it go with the transition and such?

[SuzBerg]

Our daughter was 2.5 when she came to us, she is 6 now. I would recommend the book "Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft' by Mary Hopkins Best".

Our transition was fairly easy. We visited her 2x (she lived about 6 hours from us), after the second visit she came home about 4 days later. She adjusted very well (she's a pretty resilient kid).

Some things I wish I had known about for attachement pruposes and done differenty. I wish I had put her back on the bottle, I wish I had carried her in a sling (she was tiny and this would have been easy to do) and I wish I wouldn't have felt so much pressure to put her in Early Intervention pre-school when she was younger - now that she is in kindergarten I wish I would have kept her home more with me.

Some things I did do that helped were rocking her (we still rock everynight before bed), reading lots of stories with her including ones about adoption "How I was adopted", "Happy Adoption Day", "I chose You", "Little Miss Spider" and lots more.

If you have any specific questions, please post or pm me.

Best Wishes - Suz

[tanmansmom]

Suz, how did you go about your adoption? Did you use an agency, was she foster to adopt? We so much want another child, but I am so drawn to an older child. We were thinking when TJ is about 4 we would try to adopt a 2 year old since I guess birth order is important. I would love to have a 2 year old now so they are close in age, but just at a loss of where to go.

[ocracoke]

My daughter was 21 months when I picked her up in Ethiopia. She was seriously greiving for her bmom who had died 3 months prior to our meeting but it did not affect our bonding at all. Our bond was rapid and intense. I met her for an hour on a Tuesday. On Wednesday I went to the orphanage to pick her up for the day. The nanny put her down and pointed her in my direction. She took one look at me and turned and ran in the other direction. I had to chase her. I wore her in a hip sling all day. I fed her. She slept on me. And she cried and screamed a lot. If I passed her to my mom you would have thought someone was trying to kill her she screamed so much. On Thursday I picked her up at the orphanage and she seemed fine with coming to me. And we played for the first time together. She smiled for the first time. And she would nestle into my body while in the hip sling. I returned her to the orphanage that night while she was asleep. On Friday I picked her up at the orphanage and she was very hesitant to be with me. She was very stiff. After about 5 minutes I went to change her diaper and she threw a 45 minute fit. She screamed. She hit. She kicked. If I tried to hold her she would wrench her body away from me and scream louder. If I put her down she would try to crawl up my legs and scream louder. Eventually I let her stand next to me with one hand on my leg and just scream. After about 45 minutes she crawled up on my lap and fell sleep. I seriously believe she was mad at me for turning her into the orphanage that night. She let me know I was mom and that I needed to act like it from then on. Within a week of being home she turned into basically the most happy and smiley child ever. Within 5 weeks of being home I returned to work and she entered the day care center. It took her a little less then a week to completely accept the day care.

Samantha