Not bonding with child after 9 months

[Papalan]

Hi all, sorry if someone finds this topic sensitive, but we have been living a nightmare and we don’t know how to continue.
Me and my partner started our adoption journey a few months ago when we were matched with a newborn baby girl. We were incredibly lucky to be able to pick her up from the hospital and experience parenthood from the very beginning as we wanted.
Only a few weeks in I felt like there was “something” with her behaviour. She would never look at me when feeding her a bottle and wouldn’t really pay much attention to us. This started to affect us as with the lack of eye contact there were not many other ways to bond with a newborn.
Fast forward a few months, she is the happiest little girl. She is meeting her milestones, eats well, sleeps well… but she is not bonding with us. We feel like we are 24/7 babysitters. She does give decent eye contact when on the pram, mat, high chair…but she would do everything she can to avoid eye contact when holding her on having her on our lap. This is making us impossible to build a connection with her. We went through a stage of thinking she could be on the ASD spectrum, or maybe it was trauma from separation from birth mum, or just her personality… but the truth is that whatever the reason is we don’t care, it’s this behaviour what is affecting the attachment. She won’t really engage with us when singing to her or trying to play with her.
We care about her, but we don’t really love her. It breaks our hearts because we have had her for 9 months now and we are still feeling this way. We want this to work out but we don’t know if this bond will ever come as there’s no biological bond.
If the baby was ours biologically we wouldn’t really have a choice but to power through it, but as we still have to confirm the adoption we are considering if this is right for us or not. It breaks our heart thinking giving her away, but I can honestly say these have been the unhappiest 9 months of my life, and that makes me wonder. I’ve been on therapy for a few months already. We are depressed and crying almost everyday. We just don’t want to spend time with her because it’s a constant reminder of the situation and we feel horrible. Sorry for the vent, but we don’t know what to do or how long to delay a decision as it’s not fair for anyone. We just want our little happy family, and this is breaking us.

Please remember this is the ante/post natal depression forum, many mums experience thoughts and feelings that are not considered “normal” ,its important to recognise this is often part of the illness…and post- adoptive depression can bring about similar effects in adoptive mums. It is better to express those feelings and seek support rather than suppress them, mums with PND feel a lot of guilt and self judgement as it is.

"She does give decent eye contact when on the pram, mat, high chair…but she would do everything she can to avoid eye contact when holding her on having her on our lap. This is making us impossible to build a connection with her. "

If her sometimes avoiding eye contact with you is making it impossible for you to build a connection with her, please think about whether you want any child. It sounds like you aren't ready to work on building up a relationship with any little human, much less one that has already had a rough start in life.

She is at an age where she will still be working on how to engage with other humans and probably doesn't realise that she needs to make eye contact all the time. Also she will not understand what is around her, and will become easily distracted with other interesting lights, sounds, movement etc around, so unless you are sitting in a room where you and she are in a spot light and the rest of the room is dark, she will likely look around at movement and different lights and colours as they will be more interesting than gazing into your eyes.

"We feel like 24/7 babysitters".

"We went through a stage of thinking she could be on the ASD spectrum, or maybe it was trauma from separation from birth mum, or just her personality… but the truth is that whatever the reason is we don’t care, it’s this behaviour what is affecting the attachment."

"If the baby was ours biologically we wouldn’t really have a choice but to power through it, but as we still have to confirm the adoption we are considering if this is right for us or not."

What am I reading here!!???

So so sad for this poor little baby.

I hope she is not in danger and social services step in soon.

We feel like we are 24/7 babysitters

How on earth did you pass the criteria for adopting?! Who do you think should be looking after the baby that YOU adopted. Babysitting? Jesus. There are no words for this mentality.

I don’t understand this? Isn’t it totally normal?

We feel like we are 24/7 babysitters. She does give decent eye contact when on the pram, mat, high chair…but she would do everything she can to avoid eye contact when holding her on having her on our lap.

Granted my baby is younger and not adopted but of course I’m a 24/7 babysitter - it’s what’s keeping them alive! And there are so many ways to bond beyond this.

Okay, I found this tough too. But that's what being a parent is - it is being a 24/7 babysitter (except you aren't a babysitter as you're their parent). I found it hard to be 'on' all the time and still do (but now they're a bit older I can leave them in a different room to have a bit of down time). But yeh, this is just what parenting is.

The reason might well be autism, please, please push for an assessment, this is so important. Also do your own research on autism in babies.

That way you can meet your daughters needs and learn her ways... and bond.

Eye contact- as well as autism- can be as straight forward as eye sight. As others have said, speak to your GP or HV as whatever it is (if anything) it will help you to understand why she is the way she is.

Unfortunately OP, whether you birthed your child or not you have to learn to parent the child you have, not the one you want. You can’t blame adoption for you not bonding as plenty of bio-parents also struggle to bond. Birthing isn’t an automatic guarantee of bonding. It can take years of work. But there is zero point wishing for one of the children you looked after at the nursery, they are not yours, THIS child is.

Honestly it sounds like the reality of having a child has shocked you. This is completely normal. Perhaps because you had a difficult road to parenthood you expected to instantly be able to love it. It’s the same mistruth sold about women instantly bonding with the child they birth. It just isn’t always the case. Perhaps you are suffering with PND and need to seek support for this.

Equally 9 months is still so young. I won’t lie to you…. In those early days there is very little you gain from it. Babies at that age take, take, take, it’s just how they survive. It’s only when they get older you begin to feel the work is paying off and you are rewarded for it. This stage isn’t forever.

You cant assess till older.

What did you expect when you took on this baby?
It seems like the baby is there to provide you with something, to make you happy. But what you should have done is offer a home, love, care to a baby. I understand that adopting a baby isn't the same as giving birth, but I can't believe you weren't aware of the sheer grind of caring for a child.
Unless you have a major rethink, I genuinely don't think you should consider adopting, as no baby will fulfill you.

Don't be an idiot! She can't have PND, she's not been lregnant/given birth.

Yeah, return it, it sounds faulty.

Back in the real world how on EARTH did you two pass any criteria to adopt? Frightening.

Some women after adoption suffer from it

This can’t be from the UK, surely a person like this wouldn’t have passed the intensive process here, what the OP has said is so ignorant it’s unbelievable. A 24/7 babysitter indeed 🤦🏽‍♀️ ‘ try again’ like it’s trying on a new outfit 🤦🏽‍♀️🤦🏽‍♀️

I think you both need to pull yourselves together. It’s a 9 month old baby. Being a parent is being a 24/7 babysitter. What did you expect?

What are hard situation. I'd say give her up straight away, my dad was adopted at 18 months, his mum tried to keep him and he was damaged his entire life. The sooner the baby can move on and bond the less issues are being caused staying with your family.

So tough for you.

I agree with the previous poster’s recommendation for VIG therapy. Parent-infant psychotherapy would also be really useful to explore and improve your bond - can you explore this? Some charities provide it, or private, or possibly the adoption support? If you are crying lots could you be depressed? Are you getting support with this - your daughter is still under 1 year so you may be able to be referred to perinatal psychiatry (if in the UK).

taken from https://thechildpsychologyservice.co.uk/advice-strategy/post-adoption-depression/ Please have a read OP@Papalan although I’m sure your therapist must be telling you similar.

See attached hopefully!

If it was one of the adoptive parents, then I can see why people are suggesting some form of pp depression. But it's both of them, neither love their baby, or have a bond with them. To be honest neither parent seems to even like the baby, so no, trying again doesn't seem like the best idea for any potential child.

No judgement on the OP but I am dumbfounded that therapy is not mandatory as part of the adoption process - just handing someone over a baby and expecting them to bond is so problematic and short-sighted. There are dynamic interventions designed to promote bonding between parent and infant, other posters have also recommended this. Most, if not all, perinatal teams offer this and I strongly suggest you ask for a referral. There are so many ways of bonding and your little girl sounds very normal to me OP. So many babies hate eye contact. But at 9 months you can bond through games (e.g peekaboo), just being silly and interactive, reading, weaning, taking baby places and seeing her explore the world… the possibilities are endless, and a professional can help you with this.

All parents are different. I know so many parents who bonded with their children through feeding, I struggled more with this and much preferred the silly playfulness instead. I get a sense you had an idea in your mind of what parenting would look like and the reality is different - again this is so so normal, even if you had experience of fostering babies. The permanency wasn’t there. And the permanency changes everything! You’ve posted in the mental health forum and you do seem detached and anxious. When we are anxious we can latch onto ideas which can make it harder to bond - such as looking for signs of autism. Of course your daughter is different from other babies you’ve looked after, she’s your daughter. Try to shift your focus to all the wonderful things about her and all the milestones she is meeting. And do seek psychological therapy - you need help now so that this does not do damage later on down the line.

The OP is talking as if this a dog they're sending back to the rescue as it's not met their standards.
Saying it's the fault of a newborns 'behaviour', those saying it could be autism; that's a definite for the baby to go back; sub standard child not being adequate for OPs odd ideas.

I'm very confused by your expectations OP. My baby didn't look at me for weeks. Babies also don't look at you when they're feeding, they often have their eyes closed or are just focused on the bottle.

I worry you have been disappointed and anxious from the start and your baby has picked up on this. If you look at your baby with a blank or sad face they won't want eye contact and they certainly won't smile back.

I started getting smiles after I'd given several thousand. Are smiling at her? Singing to her, giving her a baby massage, cuddling her, playing with her toys with her?

In my experience the love and bonding came through the hard work, the midnight feeds, the endless giving...it's the moment they stop crying because you're holding their hand,or you picked them up and you realise they feel safe with you, you bring them comfort...that's the stuff that made me feel connected to my baby.

I promise you are her safe person, the one who comforts her. Please do your best to see how much she must love you xxx

So both of you are in tears every day over your disappointment with this little girl….but she is the happiest little girl? This just doesn’t stack up,,OP.

Either you are incredibly good at hiding your floods of tears from your baby, or your perception of her state of mind is way off kilter.

Frankly, you would both probably be better suited with a kitten.