older adoption moms

[alicerose]

Hello
I am 55 years old. And have become the legal guardian of my 2 year old great-niece last year. The child's birth mom had lost custody and I stepped in. We Love our little one. I am not finding the basic childcare a problem.

However, I feel "funny" about being mother of such a young child at my age. I feel compelled to explain our situation.

The other problem we continue to have is bonding with our little girl. Progress is being made, but I was wondering if other adoptive parents had suggestions for getting close to a child that does not want to be held and cuddled very much.

I'd love to hear from other moms who have adopted.

Have you any other children that she can learn from, ya know if she sees you cuddling other children, she will realise this is pretty normal.

Is she having withdrawal symptoms for birth mum?

Do you know what little princess has been going through pre-adoption?

Only you can help her, you're all she's got,but I would have thought you would have got some support from adoption agencies. Unless you didn't have to go through the barage of questioning and processing to be accepted as adoptive parents, with it being family I don't know what help you have had.

Can the health visitors help you?

I can't imagine whats going through the little princess's head, it must be very strange for her, only time can heal any hurt she is feeling, with alot of support and love from you/loved ones.

Open speaking, being truthful, letting her show her feelings, whatever it takes, I know drawing or painting, running in an open space, the feeling of being able to express herself freely might help?

Not toooooo many questions, like 'are you alright' (that continual feeling that she will think 'am I alright')

Encourage her in jobs around the house and in general, and guiding her to make her own decisions, praising and star charts, anything that will give her confidence, because I should think that will be her main hurdle at this moment.

She will cuddle when she is ready, it comes with time I should think, and lots of it. then again most girls are more independent than boys, boys are more cuddly (in our family anyway)

I don't know if she is old enough yet to be thinking why? why? is my mmummy not around? I don't know you're predicament, so she should I'd have thought only being two, adapt to her new surroundings.

Don't know if I have been any help, it must be hard for yourself aswell so don't be too hard on yourself, and don't be frightened of asking for professional help, just because you are an older parent (like myself) people automatically think you know or should know what your're doing.

Good luck to you and your little princess

Just dashing in to say that the book by Caroline Archer "First Steps in Parenting the Child Who Hurts - Tiddlers and Toddlers" is excellent and practical in this area. Must dash - children to put to bed - but I'll be back!

Issymum (42 and adoptive mum of DD1 now 5.5 and DD2 now nearly 4).

Hi AliceRose

I would second what Issymum says about the Archer book - it is excellent. your daughter has been through very traumatic time and you need to address this. i suspect you will need to work on attchment issues - it may not " come naturally" as it can with biological children who are with you the moment of conception.

You said "However, I feel "funny" about being mother of such a young child at my age. I feel compelled to explain our situation". I underatand you feelings but would caution you against this. Its fine for you to give inforation about YOUR life . You are an adult and its your choice. But I dont see how you can "explain our situation" without giving out your LOs private information. Which is very wrong IMHO

please bear in mind you may not be able to post freely here in future

I third Issymum's book recommendation and one quick tip which may help. Try having her on your lap facing away from you to play/read etc at first gradually move up to eye contact, face to face hugging etc

os yes and agree about the attachment issues and that it won;t come naturally - you will need to work at it.

Thanks for your feedback. I just spent 4 days home with her our dd, taking the advice given.

I spent a lot of time getting her to help with jobs around the house as someone suggested. She was thrilled to be "helping". Althou she isn't saying many words yet she and I had a running dialog of sorts.

She invented a game where she would drop down on a pile of pillows, pretend to cry,then crawl-up on my lap for a cuddle and a laugh. Her pretend "fall" and pretend "cry" became increasingly dramatic and comical. we were both giggling.

I also appreciated KristinaM comments about exposing the details of our little ones turbulant start in life.

It was useful to me just to articulate the compulsion to talk about my situation. by writing it out I was able to examine what was behind the compulsion. For me it is I am still second guessing myself. Therefore I have a desire to "explain" everything. Because the adoption was within the family I have had very little to do with adoption agencies.

I decide to do some writing. Which help probably more than telling some stranger my life story.

When I posted my note I was facing a long weekend home with our dd. by following some of your advice we had a great weekend! Thanks.

Hi Alicerose, glad to hear your weekend went well. Why don't you start a life book for your DD? It will also help you get down in writing some of your thoughts, you can edit it before including anything but it would be worthwhile starting now whilst everything is still fresh.

If you haven't come across the idea of a lifebook before, they are recommended for adopted children, it tells the story of their life, includes photos, momentos and is for them only. It's not like a photo album, its much more personal, it might give detilas of her birth parents that she might not want to share but might want to think about. As she gets older, she can help fill it in and is a good way of encouraging older children to think and talk about their adoption and how they feel about it.

I think you can get books (try amazon) to help you start a life book. If you can;t find one, I'll try and post it for you.

Thanks for the idea of a life book. i have used my laptop to capture my thoughts as i took each decision and step. But perhaps that isn't the stuff for my daughters life book. I'll take a look on Amazon and see if they have it.

try EMK Press They do adoption related books and also you can downlaod a leaflet about tips for life books.

thanks for the link. Very helpful. Not just about the life book but the other stuff about issue that manifest themselves when a child is adopted.

Very helpful in helping me realize this experience is different from mothering the children that I gave birth to. Every time Ifelt that i was upset with myself because I kept expecting it should be the same as when my other daughters were babies. It is not the same. It doesn't make me bad. I would gladly walk on hot coals to help my little one. i do love her to bits. But it is different and differnt issues arise.

As one of the articles on the EMKpress site said that my birth children didn't feel abandon or angry as babies. I can't ignore that my adoptive daughter has these feelings.

Suejonez are you an adoptive mom? Your comments have been spot on.

I will be an adoptive mum in about 6 weeks! I'm travelling to Kazkahstan in late Sept/early Oct to meet "junior".

The one advantage (there aren;t many!) to going through all the hoops they make you jump through normally is that you have to do a preparation course (three days spread over 6 weeks) which does make you confront various differences to raising birth children.

Adoptive children often regress (and need to regress) a bit in order to make them feel secure and to establish a bond with you which they have oftened failed to do properly with their birth parents (don't know the situation in your case). Non-adoptive parenting would disapprove of some practices (bottle feeding older than you would normally etc) but they need to learn to trust that you will provide for thier needs and that you will be stable and constant etc etc.

I wish you all the best and hope that some of my purely theoretical knowledge will be useful to me in a few weeks!

What joy awaits you! Please keep me posted on your progress.

Your feedback has been more than helpful because I have had no support from agencies. I am a bit afraid to ask for help less my age make the authorities take a negative oppinion of me.

I live in the UK and have lived here for 15 years. My 19 year old niece lived in the States. When she lost custody of her baby there was a window of time that a family member could step in. Normally this would include the authorities doing home checks and providing support. But as I lived in the UK that was skipped. My niece and her boyfriend had an opportunity to go to court and ask the court to give me custody of their daughter. I had wrote the court and social workers daily sending pictures of my family,house,town, job. My employer wrote a recommendation. I returned to the states for a large family conference with all the interested parties and several social workers. Then there were 3 days in a US court where the judge went thru everything and questioned the parents long and hard about their decision. Then presto bingo. She was out of care and back home in England with her mom and me .

My niece never managed to bond with the baby despite honestly loving her. My niece was never comfortable being alone with her daughter. She had a lot of support and help with the feeding. bathing, and changing routines... but the connection never happened. In May, after living with us for a year, my niece chose to return back to the states. When she left she had plans to return. but as soon as she wrote from the states she made it clear that she would not return.

For me it was shift from being auntie to being mommy. the baby had bonded to us during the year, especially my husband as he was with her more. Still everything seems new and different.

We have seen our baby regress, she does a 'play cry' and sometimes goes back to crawling (she has been walking for a year now). Because my niece was so emotionally cold there have always been issues with the baby accepting/enjoying cuddles.

I've wrote more than I thought I would.

every day when I get home from work, My little one and I go to the park . yesterday was the first time she stayed with me and wanted to hold my hand. Joy, joy, joy. I am easily pleased. All that it takes to keep me happy is for her to come to me because she wants to.

that the best thing about parenting. the challenges are real and it matters that we take the energy and education needed to address the challenges. But the simples joys are real and sustain us with a happiness that the challenges can't deminish.

How old will Junior be when you meet? Like I love your insight and feedback.

Your deep affection for your daughter shows in every word alicerose.

I met SueJonez today for the first time today, and I can assure you that she's just as wise in real life!

What a fantastic breakthrough that your daughter wanted to stay with you and hold your hand today. How wonderful.

You may be interested in reading some of the research concerned with "nurture groups". There is an idea that when children have had chaotic early lives, they need to go through a nurturing experience again, no matter how old they are, before they can be expected to cope emotionally with being at school. Some enlightened schools have nurture groups where very small groups of children spend time together with teachers and other supportive adults, and are given the time to experience early childhood development such as sharing toys, eating together, preparing food etc.

I realise that your daughter is much too young for school, but you may find some interesting ideas in the research.

Why Littlefish how kind... but you wouldn't be saying that if you'd stuck around to hear JackieNo's dd and I singing "Twinkle Twinkle little star" in the restaurant.

Did I say anything wise? - oh yes I remember, "that'll be a very large garlic bread with extra cheese please"!

Yes, the garlic bread was a very wise choice!!

I wish I'd stuck around for the singing

Thanks for your kind words ?littlefish?.

As the title of this thread suggest, I?ve worried about being of mom of a toddler while I am in my 50s. And I felt that other people would judge me odd or worse.

Interesting all the feedback received on this website has focused on the issues I have in common with other moms. So far no one comments on my age.

Well I have just met a woman whose mom was 52 when she was born. A nice well adjusted woman I hasten to add. She had a very positive attitude about having mature parents and older siblings. It was a relief to feel this deep-seeded worry, which I had about my age, dissipate.

And once again I realize that I am worrying about something I can do nothing about and something which doesn?t really matter any how. I have decided to a mental ?spring clean? and rid myself of other pet worries. Such as ?I worry what others are thinking of me when my little darling acts-up in public?

I am getting a button made to remind me to? ?get over yourself and be happy?.

Parenting isn't really about being perfect though is it? But being good. Who was it who said "Perfect is the enemy of Good"?

What is good for your little girl is that she has a mom who will love and care for in a way that no-one else will. That's far more important in my humble opinion than being the perfect mother - right age, right size, right money etc etc.

Of course we have our own insecurities about our own personal situations - I'm very overweight, and you can;t escape them, but you do need to put them into perspective and think about what life your DD would have if you weren't her mom. You have already made such a vast difference to her life and I'm sure will continue to do so, you should take great pride in that.

BTW, my SIL is 55 now and I could easily imagine her with a 5 yr old, wouldn't seem that odd to me because of her attitude and appraoch to life which is kind of ageless. I on the other hand was born old (according to my family) and generally behave about 72 yrs old

Great post SJ.

Also just to re-assure you Alicerose, one my dearest friends adopted 2 boys just before her 50th birthday. They were 3 and 4 at the time. Together with her husband, they have given these boys an incredible homelife - full of love, security and acceptance. It's been a hard road as these children had been in a very difficult situation before adoption, but they change in those children in the last 3 years has been wonderful to see.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is just what you've come too, that you can't do anything about your age, so just enjoy the fact that you have maturity, patience, and wisdom on your side! There are many, positive benefits to being an older mum.

Good luck.

thanks for telling me about your dear family and the boys that she is raising. I do not know why but it helps knowing i am not doing anything too unusual.