[sunshine2003]

we are looking at adopting a five year old. My husband is very hesitant and is wnating to hear/read about older children of this age adoption experiences. Can you please share pros/ cons and what to look for as well as resources we may read to educate ourselves?

[Dr. Art]

Dear Sunshine,

Have you selected an agency and begun your homestudy? The agency SW should be ansewering this and other questions as part of the home study /certification process. Most agencies have a series of educational workshops as part of the adoption/foster care certification process.

[Ramani]

If I wanted unbiased opinions, I would not go to a board specializing in behavioral issues in the older adopted child. You might try asking your question on the adoption boards at Parent Soup at ivillage. You are more likely to have a normal range of opinions. Nevertheless, my two cents worth are that the advantages of a late adoption are that the child's strengths, weaknesses, and problems are apparent right away. The disadvantages are that this early knowledge may interfere with your ability to bond to the kid. And of course, the kid has his/her own personality, and may have trouble bonding to YOU. Adopting early means that you can't see most of the problems right away, but if you know what you are doing, you can cut a lot of them off at the pass. Usually bonding comes easier, though this is by no means a given...

My eldest child was adopted at age almost three. She came home with frank kwashiorkor: height well under the third percentile, such severe, generalized eczema that she looked like she had congenital ichthyosis, sparse, coarse, orange hair on scalp, no eyelashes or other body hair, potbelly, generalized weakness (unable to climb steps or push a Big Wheel), and chronic untreated ear infections. (With the exception of the height, none of the above could have been figured out from the medical history given to us, or the crummy Polaroid that I had carried around in my wallet for nearly two years.) She also came home with a million dollar smile, strong leadership qualities, and incredible resilience. She had me eating out of her hand within minutes; the entire family wrapped around her little finger within days; had mastered the tricycle by the end of the first week, and by the end of her first month home, she was the leader of the little pack of preschoolers in our neighborhood. Her skin cleared up, her eyelashes grew three quarters of an inch long, and her hair was thick, black, and lustrous by the time she'd been home three months. Okay, the chronic ear infections, and the CAPD, sleep apnea, mandibular hypoplasia and reading/writing/sequencing difficulties they caused, took longer (and quite a bit of intervention) to clear up. Nevertheless, by the time she was ten I had stopped worrying about whether or not she would be able to finish high school, and had gone on to worrying about the more traditional concerns of parents of preteens in 21st century U.S.A., including the all important one of whether or not she is going to be able to make it into medical school. How might this act have played if she had been the quiet type? Given what she looked like, given the problems she had, given the MR label that her school tried to pin on her in first grade, - her scores now suggest giftedness - would I have been able to bond with her? And I needed that bond, that vision, to be able to "see the angel in the stone", and do what was needed to "set it free".

My second child is far less intense than my eldest. When I first saw my eldest, my brain had hardly finished noting that she was a short, eczematous, orangehaired FLK before something in my very bones told me that this was a LOVELY, PERFECT CHILD, and shot me full of endorphins. By contrast, when I first saw my younger child, my first thought was to cut and run while I still could do so. She was a pale, floppy baby who at seven months old had only head control and a social smile. No babbling, no sitting up, no rolling over, no creeping, no batting at objects, no stranger anxiety. I looked at her and at those odd light-colored spots on her pale face and my heart sank. On reflection, however, I knew that I could handle whatever problems this new little kiddo posed. So I took a deep breath, and picked her up. There was no moment of euphoria, as with her big sister, but we bonded to each other slowly, over the course of several months. I was a lot more aware of potential problems this time, so she got her tubes in earlier (age 9 months) and started babbling within two months of being able to hear sounds (11 months.) She said her first word at 15 months, and with a whole lot of language and occupational therapy had 10 words at two years and was meeting gross motor developmental norms. After that things got better in a hurry. We did a lot of the things we did with my eldest to head off the CAPD and the small motor difficulties, and now, at age almost six and entering Kindergarten, she talks incessantly, reads for pleasure at the end first grade level, writes at the beginning first grade level, can count to one hundred, can add and subtract numbers under twenty, and is the best swimmer and best artist in her age group. Okay, she's shy, timid, and lacks her sister's resilience. (Teaching her to ride her bike reminds me of teaching her sister how to read.) But I'm mostly not worried about either autism or MR anymore. She still has those hypopigmented spots on her face, but now that her skin tans in the summer it is clear that there aren't enough of them to give her a firm diagnosis of tuberous sclerosis, as I had initially feared. She's almost out of the range at which most kids with TS have their first seizure. (Of course, she could still have the gene. We'll consult with a geneticist when she is a bit older, and I make sure she gets yearly opthalmological examinations. ) In the meantime, we just call those birthmarks St. Peter's handprint; three bold, oval, pale spots on her right forehead and left cheek, right where his left thumb, index and middle fingers would have rested when he reached out to bless my child as she went out Heaven's gate. She's a sweetie-pie.

Adoption isn't a game for cowards or quitters. There are more likely to be problems in adoption than with a regular birth because, after all, each adoption begins with tragedy. With older kids, the problems will declare themselves early; with younger kids, usually not. But I still think it is worthwhile to hold your arms out in the dark.

[Just Julie]

Beautiful and inspiring stories! Thank you. God bless you and yours!

[Kammy]

We are in the process of adopting a 14 year old girl. We have 10 year old twin daughters and we know this girl pretty well. We've known her for about 4 months and I have talked to two of her foster homes and two of her caseworkers.

Like someone else said you will hear a lot of negative responses like I did but I had to keep in mind that every child is different and only you know what you can and cannot handle. The child we are going to adopt is exceptionally well behaved with no bad habits like drinking, smoking, stealing, etc. She is also very Christian and enjoys her school work and does pretty well in school.

By no means do I think that everything is going to be wonderful and stress free. I am going into this with open eyes and I am very nervous and scared. I do remind myself that this child needs a home and a family and when I hear about what other girls her age are doing (birth and foster children) I feel that she is definately a well adjusted, smart young lady that needs a family.

I just hope it all works out for her and my family.