Post Adoption Panic

I think this is a really important topic to discuss...so I am posting it to two blogs!


Post Adoption Panic
Thanks June for kick starting this discussion. If you look on June's blog she has a great post about this.
I like that term...post adoption panic....because I think it describes perfectly what many parents experience in the first few weeks with a newly adopted child. Infant or older, I don't think it matters...everyone (well atleast myself and many others) can honestly say that in the first weeks of being home, there comes a moment (a second in time) where you think "what the hell did I do". I know that in Ethiopia I was extremly sleep deprived the first 4 days that we were there. It all came down to the fact that after flying 30 hrs with very little to no sleep, we arrived at the guesthouse at 3 am, slept till730, and left for the fosterhome at 10am. Can we say sleep deprived to the 100th degree. Was my decision to go to the fosterhome and bring home my son on such little sleep well thought and planned...ummmm NO...but when you get your child in your arms after 2 years of waiting for him and there is the opportunity not to have to leave him for one more night..I am sorry but I am going to take it!!!!
In the world of labour and delivery, Maternity and NICU, where I work we have this little saying...its called day 3 blues. And every single mother that I have worked with goes through it. Its kind of like a moment where you can breathe, and your baby is finally here...and woooowwwww too many emotions all at once. Well my "pregnancy" came to fruition on a Wednesday..and my day 3 blues were Friday night to Saturday morning. My sister being dreadfully ill didn't help either. The fact that we were up from 3 am listening to the most gawd awful retching (that people 2 floors up thought was right beside them) didn't help. But on Saturday morning, I was holding my son on our bed and just bawling...literally crying and sobbing. A release of emotions that needed to happen.
But you know what (not to freak out people who are waiting to get their referrals, waiting to travel or just about to travel). Things got better. That night we got more sleep, the next day we went swimming, things progressed, each day I felt less jet legged, each day Nathaniel became more and more comfortable with us. But its not to say that things weren't tough. I think its only disillusioning people if you say everything was perfect, everything went perfectly smoothly...no problems...Because I don't think you can be in a foreign country with a brand new child and not have those stressed moments.
And when you get home...things are still tough. Nathaniel would wake 3 times a night, be up for 530 in the mornings, and sometimes it would take me 1 1/2 hrs just to get him to sleep...but would I change it for a world, would I not go to Ethiopia, would I trade my son...NOT FOR A MINUTE!!!! HE is perfect for my family. ITs almost crazy how much he is like his other cousins. Loves to be in the center of attention and is so laid back and easy going its not funny! He is a great traveller and is so funny and sweet its amazing!! I love him beyond words and can't imagine life without him now. I find the house much much tooo quiet when he was out with his auntie for the first time Friday. Much to quiet. I kept expecting to hear him wake up from a nap but had to remind myself that he was out.

And after 2 months of being home, those frustrating moments are down to a bare minimum. He is sleeping more through the night (only woke once yesterday night), he is walking so much happier and independent little man, and we have settled into a really great routine (PS Gotta have a routine, he loves it!!!)

This is a little section of a quote I found on Melissa Faye Greene's site (thanks for the link June). It really states it quite well!
I think like June Said You have to prepare for the worst and hope for the best. Reality is it will probably fall somewhere in between and vary day by day!

TWO LITTLE GIRLS: A Memoir of Adoption, [NY: Berkley Books, 2006], Theresa Reid writes of despair after the adoption of a second daughter, Lana, a three-year-old from Ukraine:

“I have no patience for this new child, who gets up two or three times during the night, and never sleeps past five-thirty A.M., who is hungry and desperately needs to eat, who asks for food, and then, when I hopefully, lovingly put food before her—even specially prepared food she has eaten happily before—cries and whines and angrily pushes it away. “Nyet!” she shrieks. “Nyyyyyyyeeeettt!” as she shoves it off her tray, kicking and flailing, then slumps in her seat with her head down and cries.”
Reid phones her adoption agency for help (I did the same in 1999), expecting to be offered support. Instead (as I was), she is met with confusion and bewilderment.

“I may be at my wits’ end,” Reid writes of her thoughts after ending that phone conversation, “but I think I can objectively say that this is NOT okay, to put together extremely challenging family constellations and then walk away. I hang up, abandoned, angry…”

The good news is that, in most cases, these can be the disharmonious opening notes of a love story. An out-of-synch beginning is not predictive of the parent/child relationship.

My tips for getting through a rocky and nauseating depression after the arrival of your child:
(1) Take really good care of yourself; do whatever it takes to get enough sleep, including spending the night at a friend’s, including arranging for naps. Nothing else will work if you’re sleep-deprived.
(2) Make yourself eat and shower and exercise. (I agree there is nothing a good hot shower can't fix...Louise)
(3) Get help. Hire help if you need to. While a babysitter is there, sleep or exercise or read or eat.
(4) Put Feelings on a back-burner. This is not the time for Feelings. If you could express your feelings right now, you’d be saying things like, “Oh my God, I must have lost my mind to think that I can handle this, to think that I wanted a child like this. I’ll never manage to raise this child; I’m way way way way over my head. I’ll never spend time with my spouse or friends again; my older children are going to waste away in profound neglect; my career is finished. I am completely and utterly trapped.” You see? What’s the point of expressing all that right now? Just put Feelings to sleep. Instead, live a material life. Wake, dress, eat, walk. Let your hands and words mother the new child, don’t order Feelings into action.
(5) Pick up something to read that carries you away. I’ve found that reading about Paleolithic art engenders deep calm and a sense of remove. There’s something about studying 40,000 year old cave painting that makes you feel you can survive the sound of your new child’s voice the next morning.
(6) Let yourself off the hook. This is not your fault. You’ve done a grand thing—you’ve gone out into the world in search of a child and, despite every obstacle over tens of thousands of miles, you’ve brought the child home. You’re exhausted. This is all really hard. If it were easy, everyone would do it. You’re doing fine. Just rest up, find something to laugh about, and give Feelings the month off.