Life book/story - from whose perspective?

[oldnewmummy]

Just done a first draft of DS (2.5) life story.

From what perspective should I write it?

I.e. "We adopted you", "you were born" or "mummy and daddy adopted you/X".

Or does it really not matter and I'm over-thinking it?!

I would go for "Mummy and Daddy specially chose you" but thats just my opinion!

my social workers reccommendation is to write it in the third person. And start from the present - ie - thisz is a book about x. X lives with his mummy and daddy in ..., his favorite things are his toy and swimming blah b3ah b36ah,

but x wasn't always called x because he was adopted. explain that adoption means that you weren't born in your mummy's tummy buit that many other children were.

t5ake a look at joy rees's research on life books i think its very interesting.

www.emkpress.com/pdffiles/joy%20rees.pdf

social services do them either in 3rd person or 1st.

'this is a story about johnnie, johnnie is special because he was adopted...'

OR

my name is johnnie, I was born on......

3rd person usually used for younger kids who will have their story written for them and read to them to start with, 1st person used for older kids who have input into their own book and will read it to themselves.

family books written from your perspective can be useful when the dc are older and want to know how your story fits in with theirs.

So I'd go for 1st or 3rd person, whichever feels easiest for you to write in.

Thanks for the advice, ladies, and the link.

We're "unusual" in that we're overseas so DS joined our family at one day old and came straight to us from the hospital.

So I've made it about DS's family as a whole (i.e. us) and with pictures of DH and me as kids, mentioned that BM couldn't look after any baby at that time, and put in lots of love memtions and emphasised "forever child" a lot.

ONM - I just had a newsletter from my adoption team talking in depth about a life book course they ran. If I can cat you, I'll forward it to you.

I think you can but I've never actually used it!

If not, you can e-mail me on oldnewmummy at yahoo dot com dot sg.

Thanks!

OK sent

IMHO don't start with 'you were adopted' or 'we adopted you' at all. Why not start with ' a little boy was born on .... at.. He weighed xlbs and had x hair. He was very precious and beautiful and he brings joy to the world and those who know him.
Start with the child. Then talk about bringing him home. You are his family now. If you start with anything else that will have a disproportionate impact: what he knows now is you and yours. You can talk about the other stuff next, but start with the wonder of him and that you are his family.
That would be my suggestion! Sorry if it sounds to forceful I am not used to the style of these discussions. I don't think social service life books are often a very good model, with the best will in the world. He will read it again and again.

Tenar - this is the advice our social services give (based on Joy Rees's research) start with what the child are they know themselves now, so whilst I agree with you I think you are being slightly unfair to tarnish all SS's with the same brush!

adopted children were born in their mummy's tummies!!!

then they got another mummy too right?

that was in response to kewcumber:

'adoption means that you weren't born in your mummy's tummy buit that many other children were.'

I should have said "grown in your Mummy's tummy" of course.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean Sophable?

kewcumber, isn't it v important to acknowledge that an adoptee has two mothers. the mother in whose 'tummy' the baby grew, and his adoptive mother, his current mummy?

yes of course but I wouldn't ever describe her as "mummy", it would confuse my 4 yr old no end! I only gave one possible line of a whole book - I wasn't excluding the importance of his birth mother. Just not the place to get into that kind of detail. I emailed the OP offline with the research I was talking about and the link gives good information on life books including how to deal with information on birth parents. FYI the current advice is where known to refer to birth parents by name.

You aren't thinking that any adoptive parent approved under today's regimen would be in any doubt of making sure that DC's are aware of the importance of their birth parents in understanding who they are. Even if the story is unpleasant.

not you kewcumber clearly, but i'm very acutely aware of many examples where that is the case sadly. sorry if i got your back up!

I've never met any parents where my view isnt the case, but I take your point. Am being a bit over sensitive after a bit of argy bargy on the adoption boards previously. Will stop inventing criticism where none exists!

sorry kewc. i am extremely critical of the stance we're describing but you're on the other end of that spectrum.

We use birth mothers first name i.e. DS grew in XXXX's tummy not in mummy's tummy.

He has difficulties with language and we have to keep it very simple.

His life book is all the photos I took when he was being fostered by us before we adopted him. Loads of pictures of birth mum with him, birth mum with me and him and our birth kids, contact workers etc.

I made him a book using one of those story book drawing books. It has space for a drawing and ruled lines underneath. I have used drawings and photos, magazine cut outs and then written very simply underneath.

He loves it. He calls it his XXXXX (birth mum's name) book.

We want him to feel good about his birth family (of which we are extended members) but still give him the info he needs right now.

Back to the orignal question - we use his name. i.e. DS grew in XXXX 's tummy. DS lived with XXXX in a special house before he came to live with mummy and daddy and .....

If I sounded as if I was tarninshing all social workers with the same brush I apologise. I thought I had qualified what I said but if it was not clear I would say that I have a lot of respect for social workers and the difficult, sometimes impossible job they do. I nagged DS's sw for his life book which came eventually made with great care. But there are problems with it and like many others I am going to write a book myself with DS and he can help select what goes in it. I will have to do the first bit though so thanks for the tips on what theory to read.
I do think there is a problem with prevailing orthodoxy which infuses work in this area. This is not to do with individual social workers who are doing their best, and the pressures they are under to write these books given the very pressing other tasks they have. Apart from anything else the information that goes into the book from the social worker cannot take into account when we, the parents, are going to tell the child what. I still get the feeling though that the birth family is seen as the 'real' family, and the adopted family, which the child actually experiences day-to-day is not equally weighted. Problems with the birth family are played down and there is a stress on 'they loved you so, so much' which may be true but is not enough. Perhaps the whole area needs re-evaluating since social workers, who have vital information for the child, and who spend a lot of time and effort on these books are not asked to do something that is all too often re-written or shelved for a much later date.

"there is a stress on 'they loved you so, so much' which may be true but is not enough"

Thats interesting Tenar because I found there was no emphasis on that at all - either on the prep course or subsequently (and I've had nearly 3 years of social workers). The emphasis was very much on telling the truth whatever that may be. That a life story book is a tool to help your child process and make sense of their adoption and put it in the context of their life - it isn't sugary story with flowers and hearts.

Obviously not much consistency in approaches.