Transitioning - Observations and Queries

[PeanutButtercup1]

Hi All,

So, we are expecting 2 wonderful siblings joining us in a few weeks. We are going to be their adoptive parents. They have gone through a bit of a tumble through their lives and have moved from one foster carer to the other. We are in the day 2 of - what I believe - is a very short transition phase and have a few observations and queries to people who have gone through this before.

How does one handle transitioning of a child younger than 2 years old to our home? It seems scary when we see the child running to their foster carer every time they need something. When they eventually disappear, what should we expect and how do we deal with any tantrums when they ask for their "mum"?

The elder one seems to want to take every single toy they have ever received from their birth parents, while we are good with it - except we will run out of space in our garage soon - there is a real risk that they may have attached apple tags for location tagging (they are apparently pretty clever for doing stuff like this). How does one balance the needs of the child in this case? One idea was to ask them to select the really important toys for them and take them to a local laundromat, run it through a cycle of wash and dry - hoping any tags will basically be unusable - and take them with us. Then there is an electronic "tablet" which everyone is advising us to not switch on due to the potential for location tracking - which the elder one thinks is important for them.

An observation though: The LA, the system, and (to an extent) the foster carers have sadly let the children down. It all seems to be, superficially, a "get-them-out-of-my-books-asap" form of working. You can appreciate why we would be angry at these "adults" who have collectively ruined the lives of these wonderful human beings.

Hi @PeanutButtercup1

Yes it is scary!
The FCs should gradually hand over care to you, but yes the children will miss them. My son is 19 and has been with me for 11years, we still talk about his foster family.
It's important that you don't see them as having a 'tantrum' over their FCs. They will be very scared babies expressing appropriate emotions at being separated from what they know.
You need to validate those feelings and offer comfort.
It's also important that the FCs don't disappear. Keep a photo available for them to see, there should be a plan for a phone call or meeting.
Finally those toys are very important - don't make them choose.
I"m sure a quick Google will come up with solutions to detecting and removing and tags. Take the ipad to a computer shop in the FCs area and ask them to look at it and remove any tracking devices.
As I said my son has been with me for 11 years, he came with a massive amount of stuff, he let go if it very slowly but still has a box of important things. We are only just going through his nursery records - he finally agrees that as he is off to uni it has limited value.

Forgot to say

Congratulations and good luck !

@PeanutButtercup1 Sending you lots of strength! It’s such a massively painful and complicated process for everyone involved. There’s nothing else quite like it.

It sounds as though you’re already thinking lots about what both children need and how to balance that with the pace the system goes at, and keeping them safe.

I think the feelings you mention - terrified, confused, got rid of, angry - are how the children might also feel. Noticing those feelings and being honest with yourself might really help you get alongside them. Those feelings might pop up when you and they least expect it, they don’t vanish.

Our son was 18 months old when we adopted him, after a very rushed 4 day introductory period during covid. It was very very hard but he’s now 4 and that part of our lives seems a long time ago now. Although at any time of transition it comes up again (for us the end of nursery now is very raw).

He was very distressed when he moved, he was scared and traumatised and for him it showed up most at bedtime. It’s painful to be part of those very raw emotions at a period of time that you had been looking forward to - creating a family. I felt very guilty that I was part of his distress. But I now 100% feel like his parent and the one he comes to when he needs care, support, a cuddle, or someone to have a meltdown with!

Your little one (and the older one) will really need you to be empathic and there for them, with no pressure on yourself or on them about how things ought to be. It takes time and routine and like any relationship things don’t happen overnight. You can really help them feel understood by wondering about and naming how they are feeling. ‘You might really miss…. This is all so new and different…. You have such big feelings inside…. I am here and not going anywhere.’ Or whatever feels right in the moment.

Hopefully you have some good support around you, and you can do what you need - eat comfort food, take a bath, watch rubbish telly. And you can let them have their comforts too. don’t be worried about too much CBeebies!

We kept a photo of our son’s foster carer up and had phone contact and still talk about her often, and he slept with his old familiar toys. He now calls her his ‘baby carer’ and we can talk and think about her without it feeling destabilising or threatening (to us or him).

It’s very difficult for you that there is real anxiety about being traced by birth parents and that you’re not feeling properly protected by any planning. I had an irrational fear in the early days of the bp finding us, I think that’s a common fear, so to then also have some actual concrete worries about devices (even if the likelihood is minimal) must feel very scary. Ask for some support from the social workers with that and help eg if the tablet is genuinely unsafe, then social care need to guide you in making a decision and risk assessing that and communicating that to the older child. So that you don’t just feel you’re depriving him of something important to him.

Ive mentioned all the difficult things here…. It’s also the beginning of a very new part of your life with all sorts of new and amazing experiences too. Wishing all of you the very best.

I think you need to let go of the anger towards birth parents and the system. Your children’s lives are not ruined, yes they’ve had a lot of adversity and haven’t had a great start but if you start from a place of their lives being ruined, what hope is there. If you hold on to that anger it’s going to make their transition to you much harder because you’ll be using up precious emotional energy that will be better spent elsewhere.

Adopting is very tough, adopting two particularly so. Their transition is going to be hard for you and for them. They need anything that gives them security - which for my two meant an absolute tonne of toys and soft toys. It was a good two years before they let go of anything from their foster carers and they still have a couple of things 6 years later.

In terms of air tags I’d echo the advice to see how to detect and disable them - it’ll be possible, oddly enough a domestic abuse charity may be able to advise because it’s a common part of domestic abuse now. Similarly if you do a factory reset of the tablet it should disable location tracking - ask at a computer store or tech support place to be sure. Whatever you do, you’ll need to ensure it happens before the stuff is brought to yours.

In terms of emotions, they’re both going to be very unsettled. Expect them to regress and work with their emotional/developmental age rather that their chronological age, expect to see regression in eating and toileting particularly because those are things they have control over.

They will need you to be empathic, patient and present for them, routine is good so have a loose structure to the day. Talk them through everything you’re doing, you’ll feel like a babbling idiot but you repeatedly telling them will help them feel more secure. Emotionally be there for them, offer comfort in whatever form they’ll accept, cuddles, a familiar blanket, familiar food - think of what you need when you’re very upset.

I’d echo not thinking of emotional responses as tantruming. If you were removed from your home and sent to live with people you didn’t know, whose rules you didn’t understand, a place that didn’t even smell like you and left to get on with it you’d be scared, furious, uncertain, etc etc and you have the psychological processes to understand, they don’t.

And don’t forget you’re also going through a major transition - your have people in your home you don’t know, you’re wholly responsible for their care, you may have stopped work for a while, lost part of your identity. So look after yourself any way you can. Tag team with your partner if you have one, time with the kids is full on, don’t use any down time to do get more work, rest, chat to friends, get out for a walk - the house will be waiting for you when you’re better placed to deal with it.

A friend of mine said she spent the first three months thinking she was going mad - at the time I felt a bit put out that she wasn’t more positive but looking back I spent the first three months (and more) reminding myself it’s meant to be hard. It does pass, but it’s hard right now.

Good luck, keep checking in here - there’s so much experience on the adoption boards someone will be able to help.

I've done a quick google of apple tags and they are quite scary from a stalking point of view. They are also quite expensive so if they have done this then there won't be that many of them. The battery lasts around a year, how long ago were the children given the toys. The article linked below states that apple are aware of the issue and will send you an alert telling you are being tracked but it does require you to be using an apple phone.

www.macworld.com/article/345863/how-to-find-block-disable-airtag-moving-with-you.html

I would pressure check the toys and see if you can feel something and also look for evidence along the seams that they have been tampered with. For toys with battery compared I'd check the seams of that too. The obvious way around this would be a build a bear style toy because you can put it in before you sew it together.

As for the tablet, I'd as concerned about what is installed on it as it's ability to track you. It depends on how it is set up and whether or not it is connected to wifi/Bluetooth for it to be found. I personally would not allow my child to have a tablet that I don't have access to the email address used to set it up.

I would be pushing back at SWs about why this stuff has been allowed in the FCs house if there is a real risk the children can be tracked using it.

Personally , I would be taking every thing the children own with me and discussing where it came from with the FCs. Many of the toys my kids came with have since been donated to charity because they are not special ones but they still came for familiarity and safety reasons. Depending on the toys, there are ways to reduce the amount of room they take up including vacuum packing.

Lots of good advice has already been given here so I won't add to it other than to say, if possible find a way to check cuddlies without the need to wash them. The familiar smell and texture of cuddlies and blankets is so important to little one's. Slowly, surrounded by the new smell of your home, they can help you wash them. But for now, keep things familiar. x

Hello all,

Sorry, we were too busy with the kids transition to find some time to reply here. They are now placed with us and the first week has gone on without a lot of drama.

We have taken a lot of foster carer things with us, including toys etc. The clothes they gave them are still being used here. They are settling down slowly and we are setting up a good routine for them to follow.

The only thing we are training ourselves to do is to respond to them when they talk about foster carers house. Basically an "I don't like it here, I want to go to the FCs house" whenever the elder one is asked to do something they don't like. I believe we are not reacting to it but telling them how they are in their home and we are in ours. Hopefully they will feel safe enough in time to not have to do that. But let's see.

Thanks for all your great advises.