Sibling Contact

[Emu1969]

Am taking our 2yo adopted DS to contact with older siblings today. He sees them three times a year and is only one who has no contact with birth mother. Their ages range between 6 and 13. He's been with us since 7 months and is very happy and settled. We're becoming a little uneasy about sibling contact. I have two older daughters who we always refer to as his big sisters. How do we refer to his birth siblings when he sees so little of them and doesn't really know them? And it sounds very stand-offish, but the adoptive / foster parents aren't the kind of people we'd normally be friends with or we'd normally go out of our way to get to know.

Most contacts involve rough play in some soft play centre within a scuzzy pub, where the older girls perpetually try to pick him up and carry him around.

DS is talking and more and understanding more and more. When we're driving to the contact, what do I tell him we're going off to do. It sounds like a question that has a very simple answer from the POV of an objective outsider; but for us it's more complicated. We feel we should be keeping the contact going, but frankly it would be easier and preferable if it wasn't there.

But it really isn't complicated - call them by their names. All the time, just we are going to see X & Y today.

DS went through a phase of being confused about having more than one mum so I called him birth mum by her name for years. At 9 he is now happy to call her "birth mum" and when the time is right you can introduce the term Birth sister/brother. And he will get to know them over time and so will you.

Of course it would be easier or preferable for you if contact wasn't there. But it is and it might be important to him in the future so you just have to suck it up I'm afraid. Unless it gets to the point that you feel contact is doing more harm than good but you can't have done this for long enough to know that yet.

Take it in turns to pick a venue so you get your way at least once a year.

Thanks Kewc. That's really sound advice. Names is good. We have no intention of not honouring contact and do realise it might be important to him later. But the reality of it is always more complicated than it seemed, isn't it?

Yes - I did get that you were going to keep it up - but that you'd really prefer not to!

I'm with you - why would you want to meet a group of what feels like random strangers 3 times a year. But DS has no contact and that was lovely in the first few years but now that he is 9 I think it would really be better for him if he had some contact there is such a big void for him.

That sense of not knowing may never impact your DS if he has good contact.

The names thing (rather than labelling) was advice I got from a social worker when DS was so resistant to anyone else having the word "mum" or mother in their label.

I would say this is not just important in the future but important now too. I lost my brother and sister through adoption and although we have very regular contact now we cannot get back all those lost years and it breaks our hearts. People make adoption very complicated as they worry about hurting peoples feelings or saying the wrong thing but the truth is the right thing to say and children and never to young to be told about adoption as that way they grow up with it being just a normal part of their lives. These children are his sisters are just that. I am adopted and a social worker and in my experience the importance of sibling contact is often overlooked and not very well understood. In research it often comes out that children would generally choose contact with siblings rather than birth parents. I would agree with the suggestion to choose a venue as soft play often leads to rough play. The main thing is they just get time to spend time together. It may seem complicated and difficult now but honestly my brother and sister and I would have given anything for the opportunity when we were growing up. You cannot turn the clock back to what has been lost in childhood. Good luck - keep going it seems you are doing great in a very challenging situation.