Encouragement for those in early days of pmacement

[Thepinklady77]

To those of you who are in very early days of placement a word of encouragment. Just keep going. We are almost a year in to our placement of our siblings (aged 2&3). This morning I looked at my watch and realised the kids had been playing for 45 mins and I had not needed to intervene once!! This would have been a complete miracle in the early days! In fact five minutes seemed like an hour as I sat literally in the middle of the two directing play and deciding was it a reasonable hour of the morning to put them in the pram and go for a walk to get them out of the house! It was hard work and at times I questioned my sanity, but with time, patience, a lot of therapeutic parenting life certainly looks a whole lot different. 10 months ago I could not have imagined our day to day normal. We are still in relative early days too and I know we face a lot more hurdles and bumps along the way but I did want to encourage any of you in those early days to live for each day. Take it one day at a time, don’t look back, learn from each day and look after yourselves. It does get better and you will slowly begin to see a new family emerge.

Thank you so much for this. We're 6 weeks into placement with a sibling group of 3, it almost feels like your post was specially for me. Xx

3 weeks into sibling placement (1 and 2) and this is lovely for me to read too! Thank you

Hi pinklady, firstly, thanks for your post, we are newly placed and our two are current 'model children' (I really don't mean to be insensitive to those that are going through a hard time). Just wondering really, did you have a 'honeymoon period', before it all became quite hard? We believe we are in the classic 'honey moon'period, and we are expecting huge meltdowns at some point, but as the weeks tick on, we are being led into a (false?) sense of security. Did you have the 'honey moon'? TIA

Six months into placement with a sibling pair (now 20 months & 3) soon to be a third (6 months) and feeling the same. Very happy & feeling more settled every day though still easy to remember how tough those first few months of placement were. Would say it took 4 months to start feeling this way tho!

Hi giddygardner

I would say if I am honest I am not sure we are truly out of honeymoon period. We hit a particularly rocky period about 8 weeks in but nothing absolutely horrendous or unmanageable. The most difficult bit with our two was definitely in managing them both at home at the same time. The sibling rivalry and fighting over toys was fierce. The older one was testing boundaries around routines and structures. I know now a lot of this was to do with fear and a need to have control. On the whole though they are very manageable children. I often wonder to myself if we are still in a state of honeymoon period. I just have decided that there is no point in worrying about the future and just deal with it as and when it arises. I have spoke to my Sw about this and her advice is to reach out for support early if behaviours start to change. Her experience suggests that it is actually when families cope long term with spiralling difficulties without reaching out for support and advice that it becomes unmanageable. So if we start to notice a downturn we will reach out to the various supports available. I am on therapeutic parenting Facebook page and a member of the national association of therapeutic parenting, and whilst I read some pretty difficult things that some adopters face on a day to day basis, and sometimes I feel maybe I should just come off for a while as it makes me expect the worst from our two, I have come to conclusion it is better to be aware and also know what and who to turn to if it does start to change. Continue to enjoy your beautiful children and if in the future you require some additional support be ready and equipped to get support if needed.

Thank you pink lady, that is the same thought process that I am taking at the moment...if it continues as it is, fabulous. But if we are noting any changes and anything that we think is 'adoption related'. We are certainly not too proud to ask for help if required (which was seen as a strength during matching). And at the moment it is so good (currently hanging into the wooden mantle place for dear life...changing from career women to full-time mum was a really big deal for
me, so I am thankful that the children have been so accepting of our care and love...thus far). So we will keep monitoring (keep touching wood), and keep practising the strategies we have learnt as well as administering the ones we have learnt 'on the hoof'. I will look up those groups you have mentioned though (just in case). Thank you for your honesty, and thank you for your tips, me and my husband do regularly send a little prayer up ( even though we are not religious) to those that have gone before us and paved an 'easier route' for us, xx

2.5 years in after AD blasted a whole in our previously very happy family of 3. First 4 months were the hardest ever. Since then it's just got better and better, she is now at schoil and doing marvelously and I am besotted with both BS and her equally. Just hang in there.