Introducing extended family to adopted child

[UKABC]

We are adopting a 12 month baby in 2-3 weeks. Our extended family live abroad and will want to travel to the UK and stay with us to meet the baby at some point this year. We understand that we have to play it by ear and we are keen to do what’s best for the baby, even if that means delaying introductions of our extended family by many months.

How long have you waited after you adopted, until you allowed extended family members (including grandparents and aunts/uncles) to stay at your place?

Thanks for the advice

firstly congratulations on your new baby

I think there are a few factors to be taken into consideration

how many people are we talking about, are they all going to turn up at once or in succession, how long will they stay for, will they abide by any ‘rules’ you put in place
As well as the baby I thing you need to take into consideration your feelings.
I don’t think I would be thrilled at the idea of having to host relatives for extended periods in my home when I’m still trying to get to know my child, the first year will be hard enough as it is.
But I understand it may be hard to resist the pressure from family
Is there any chance they would stay in an air bnb, that would take some pressure off the situation

As @Ted27 said can you explore alternative accommodation near by? Our family all live close by and we introduced them early by way of a brief bump into a in the park, building up to brief visits to their house where we were in control of when we arrived and when we left. We could read their cues and leave when we could tell they had had enough. It was a long time before visitors to our home where we had no control. Also we insisted on doing all the care for at least the first six months. If in others houses we have the children food/snacks, changed nappies, provided comfort. It was important that the children learnt that we were mummy and daddy and we would meet all their needs and not any random adult as they had been used to up to that point. I think this would be very hard to achieve with someone staying in your home. It would be natural for them to begin to take over some of the care. You will need/want your own space.

Do all the extended family live in the same place? Just wondering if you travelling to them might make it more on your own terms rather than people staying in your home?
Although I appreciate going on holiday brings up its own considerations too.

Congratulations on your baby

Congratulations at bringing your child home.

I think most families will understand that descending on new parents in large numbers or for extended time is not helpful. Maybe once you feel settled into a routine with your child then they can come to visit. I didn't see my God son for the first 3 months of his life because his mum needed time to adjust to mum life routine and getting some much needed sleep. The month after this Covid hit and it's made her anxious and I have rarely seen him. But I completely understand that when she has them pockets of time when she is ready she will send videos pics and even face time.

Sure they will also understand

I’d go very carefully for a couple of reasons, if he’s just 12 months, he will have lived his whole life with a very small circle of people, and you’re removing him from that group of people albeit for very good reasons. He may have had very few visitors to his home and then someone who does visit takes him away so having new people at your house for a period of time might be quite tricky, more than it usually would.

I’d give it a good few months, then look at one or two people who stay just for a couple of days rather than an extended break if you know what I mean. Otherwise in addition to the triggering mentioned above, you run the risk of him getting used to people in his home who disappear again. I’d also really space out visits.

With our two it took about 2 years for them to meet everyone. We have a very big extended family and we introduced them gradually, so seeing people individually a few times, then in a group, then going to larger family parties etc. Starting with the people most likely to see them often through to the folk we only see every year or so. It’s going to be difficult but pacing yourself, and him, will pay dividends in the longer term.

It was 2 years before we had anyone stay at the house although by that time my kids had slept over with aunts etc.

UKABC we introduced our new three year old son to extended family within a few months because we felt he could handle it. And he did.

Personally, I would not have anyone to stay at my house in the current Corona virus situation.

Personally, I would not have anyone to stay at my house with a new child either. The child may feel overcrowded, be toddling soon and might feel swamped by new family members.

I would suggest people come and stay at local B and B or whatever and meet you for lunch or cuppa etc. And not all at once.

Remember also that your baby will not know these people or remember meeting them when so young. I'd show pictures and talk to baby about who they will be meeting. Make a record with photos of who they are meeting etc so you can talk about it later.

Make visits short and sweet.

Take stress out of visits, not cooking big meals etc. Offer simple buffet food or get the guests to bring the food. I know that this may not be how things are done in some cultures but I think it is very fair to say you cannot cook and clean and do stuff for other people while looking after your new child. And if people come to stay with you at your house this is most likely what you will end up doing. For the sake of your new child, you need to be a bit selfish here, IMHO, and say no overnight guests.

We are people who pre children were away every weekend or hosting people here. Once our son arrived that stopped for a while and once it restarted although I loved people staying here , the stress (sleep disturbance and being hard to settle at night) was not worth it for anyone.

Thank you for everyone’s responses and advice. When I said extended family, I meant grandparents (our parents) on both sides who we haven’t seen for over a year and also our three sisters. We actually have two adopted children so the baby will be our third. Our family haven’t seen our adopted kids who are fully settled for over a year as well. I think waiting around 2-3 months before having people over is feasible. We can then assess if it’s right for us and our third child depending on how they have settled.

I think meeting family is great and necessary. It's the hosting others at your house that sounds like it will be difficult.

Hope your new baby settles in well.

Congratulations

As the @Thepinklady77 said, it best to make sure you do all the parents tasks. The baby needs to know where the primary care is coming from. This was the advice we were given and seemed to work well for us.

I know grand parents want to help when they come over, we prepped ours in advance so they did not think we were pushing them out.

Congrats on your new little one. 12 Months is a great age. Wish you all the best.

Don't over think it! Just go with the flow when it feels right!!!

We're also in the situation where one set of grandparents live abroad. They first met our LO when he'd been with us about 4 months. I'd recommend making it very clear what the boundaries are in terms of care for your LO (another poster mentioned they did all care for 6 months). I have a photo of the grandparents holding our LO within a few minutes of meeting him. (Swooped in and picked him up) The look on their faces is complete joy but on his it is complete confusion. I really wish we had briefed them more thoroughly on how to behave when meeting a newly adopted child. They also invited friends to come and meet him without asking. I think we'd talked through a lot more if this with the grandparents in this country because it was easier to do as we were seeing them face-to-face regularly.

@Jacketpandbeans
We're hopefully about to be in this situation for the first time. What advice would you include in your briefing?

Explaining why it's so important that you as the parents, have the best chance to bond and help your child create a strong attachment and therefore, hard as it may be for the grandparents, they may just have to watch from the sidelines! Explaining that it'll only be you doing nappy changes, feeding etc. for the first few months because your child needs to see you as the consistent people in their life. Maybe give them some brief reading on attachment theory?? Depends how knowledgeable of UK adoption practice the grandparents are too. I'm still trying to educate mine that adoption in this country is usually due to a child being removed from the birth parents because of things like drug and alcohol abuse which can have long term consequences for the child. I think mine still have the view that children are 'given up' for adoption.

Try and emphasize anything you've been told during your adoption training about giving yourselves as a new family time to adjust. Wider family can be so keen to meet the new arrival (and you'll feel excited about the meetings too) but don't be rushed into anything.

@Remy7, it would be useful to explain about attachment and early trauma and to support relatives in sitting back and letting the little one come to them in their own time, that you need to keep the child’s world quite small for a good while, and that you need to do all caring tasks (including them pointing the child back to you instead of getting a drink etc as they might normally do). It’s difficult because extended family are likely to be very excited but giving a bit of information ahead of time might help them go at the child’s pace more easily.

Thank you, very useful