How much control do APs have over their adopted children 'bonding' with them?

celtic.piskie

More than they realise, less than they want.

The AP's can make bonding a helluva lot easier, by allowing the adoptees to grieve for, acknowledge, and love their first parents.

Even in a genetic family, personalities can't gel, and some siblings i know just don't like each other.

I believe that bonding is a process, not a binary 'there or not' thing.

You can never mesh two completely imcompatible people.

But, an AP who provides a good, open, honest home for an adoptee out of love, not need, would have a much better chance than someone seeking to cure their infertility with the perfect little adoptee who we're never going to tell is adopted.

I don't think anything can 'ensure' it, because we don't even know what 'it' is.

But a home built on love, respect, honesty and trust, is much better, much more loving, and much more likely to survive than a home build on greed, personal gain, lies and deception.

Jennifer L

My answer is somewhere in the middle.

I don't think there's anything an AP can do that will guarantee that bonding will take place. Nothing in life comes with a guarantee.

But there are things that an AP can do (or not do) that will definitely affect the chances of a bonded family. Things like, not being honest with the adoptee, not having realistic expectations, not being able to simply let the child be whoever he/she is, etc.

Calling it a crapshoot implies that there is nothing an AP can do that will affect a bonding/attachment at all. But conversely, there's nothing that can be done to ensure that it happens either.

kateiskate

Well it's easier to bond with them if they are honest and allow you to grieve over the loss of your first family rather than behaving as if you came from a cabbage patch and did not exist before they adopted you.

It's also easier to bond and become attached to your adoptive family when they do not make you feel guilty or that you should be grateful for being adopted.

This will be a largely unpopular view but I also think it is easier to bond with your adoptive family when you are not the "odd man out" so to speak and are in a family that is of the same race and culture as you.

IDK!!

Control?????? None.

Influence?????? A ton.

Same goes with biologicaly people bonding. There is NOTHING anyone can do to ensure bonding between 2 people, relasted or not. All relationships are a craps shoot. there are things that can improve a childs sense of security and attachment.

Like a said in a previous answer, my daughter seems to have bonded more to her dad than me. I was SOO sick after giving birth, that he took care of her and then when i recovered it was time to go to work. Had I been healthy, able to breast feed or stayed home with her, things might have been different. The opposite happened with our son.

aloha.girl59

I think that APs can take steps to ATTEMPT to get their kids to bond with them, but there are no guarantees. Right off the bat, I'd say that staying home with a newly adopted child -- just like most women who give birth do -- is paramount. How is an adopted child going to bond with strangers if s/he is stuck in daycare all day and most of the time s/he is at home is spent sleeping?

IMO, the whole breastfeeding an adopted child thing is icky. I'm glad my son was 2-1/2 years old when I adopted him so that was never an issue. I wouldn't have done it, but at least I never had to answer stupid questions about why I wasn't! It's none of anyone's business why a bio mom chooses to breastfeed or not, but people still ask and have their opinions. I can't imagine having to 'defend' myself to the La Leche League types because I didn't want to breastfeed another woman's child. Would it promote a bond between amom and baby? Maybe. But I'd rather bond in another way that's not so icky, thanks.

Yep, it's a crapshoot.

Gaia Raain II

I think that AP's do have a lot of control over creating an atmosphere where attachment is possible (i.e. honesty, sensitivity, validation, listening, making it their job to learn and continue learning, being open books and sponges at the same time, etc.). But what the adoptee does with that is a crap shoot, and that should be ok. Sometimes, people just don't gel. Hopefully the AP's will continue to create that safe atmosphere whether or not their adoptee attaches to them so that they can at least have a good relationship.

Bonding, as I understand it, is a process involved with gestation. I looked up the definitions of attachment and bonding before, and bonding does, by definition, seem to be exclusive to those who are directly related. However, both biological and adoptive families can participate in attachment parenting (NOT attachment therapy...the two are very different) to foster strong attachment. (Biological families don't necessarily have attachments...I am very bonded with my mother, but I'm pretty sure I never attached to her as she was abusive and did not create a safe atmosphere in which to foster attachment. I couldn't help but to bond with her, I had no control over that.)

BLW_KAM

No one can control another person's emotions. Life comes with no guarantees. The only thing any of us can ensure is our own behavior.

Rowan

I dont know if they can control it, but i think theres stuff they can do to encourage bonding. My aparents(my mom especially) always did stuff with me and my twin bro. Took us out to eat, the movies, stuff parents do with their kids. Whether this was intended to help with the bonding process, i couldnt tell you.

My a mom was my babysitter at some point(shes related to my bio dad) so maybe that helped.

Shelby

None, you can only provide them with love and security so they feel comfort and trust around you. Whether they bond to you or not depends a lot on their personalities and past history. If they are resilient, then they will tend to form an attachment. But if they are not resilient and have had a trouble past, then there is a chance they may never bond. I think, just like life, its a lottery.

monkeykitty83

I think there are things adoptive parents can do to facilitate a bond, and mistakes they can make that get in the way of attachment. So it's not entirely out of their hands.

That said, ultimately, it's not something they can totally control, as it does depend a lot on the child as well. It's not a guarantee, so there's no "ensure"... just "facilitate."

THAT said, it's no excuse for giving up or not even trying. Adoptive parents need to be committed to doing their best, for their part, to make things as conducive as possible for attachment to take place. Whether the adoptive parents are loving and supportive or alienating DOES matter, even if it's not a magic bullet.

ETA: Sunny, "ensure" was correct usage in your question. Putting it in quotation marks is a "your word, not ours" thing, not an attempt to correct your word use, which was right in the first place. :-) Note I do the same with MY OWN word "facilitate" to separate it out from the rest of the phrase when I compare it to the word you used.

myst1998

I don't think children 'bond' with their adoptive parents, they attach. I am personally of the opinion bonding is a process that happens at/around birth and is a physical thing....not just an emotional one.

Even if a natural mother who raises her child and has a poor bonding experience at/around birth, they can still go on to form a strong attachment with their child.

I don't think forcing things like breastfeeding will help an attachment grow. Love, nurturing and being accepted for who they are will help a child form a stronger attachment. A non-threatened a mother who is honest with their child and talks about the nat mother in a positive way would most likely help the child form a strong attachment as well. I do think in some instances it depends on personalities and whether or not they gel - sometimes it is a lottery.

But I do believe if adoptive parents are honest and truly love the children they adopt and accept the fact the natural family DOES play a part in their child's life regardless if they are around or not, attachment would be stronger.

DevonChaos

I really think it is a crapshoot. My a-mom and I never shared a bond. At least I never shared one with her, and her actions show me that she never bonded with me either. I knew I was adopted as far back as I can remember. I don't think this did anything one way or another. I think that in my case (the only case I'm comfortable speaking of, as it is the only one I fully know) the bond was just never there to begin with. I can't imagine that anything, any single experience, any difference in the way I was raised, that would have changed this.

Opedial

We cannot control whether bonding occurs or not, but we can create opportunities for "bonding". We have a weekly smudge, prayer and talking circle that the children take part in, if they wish. (they always want to). We ensured we gave them enough love at the beginning, and held true that "there is nothing you can do that will make us not love you". They have tested that for sure, but we do indeed love them no matter what.

Other things we do is ensure we are open to discussing their feelings about adoption, their First mom, their abuse, or whatever they want to. They are not to be afraid to come to us to talk, nor can they feel guilty about saying "I miss my old mom". This alone I think has been very bonding for us, to discuss how they came to us and to ensure them that they are still loved and that they have two mommies now.

But maybe it is a crapshoot and we got lucky. I know that there was much work done into creating a positive match, not necessarily so personalities melded, (although that is great for the most part) but so we had the skill set to match some of their behaviors and challenges.

I cannot comment from adopting from birth or young age, but i do believe very strongly in nurture in the primary years and that while nature may dictate many of their personality traits, these traits can be nurtured by adoptive parents, and children will be much more adaptable (hopefully) if the home they are in is the only home they know. This is assuming adoption is a normal topic and their is no secrecy surrounding the adoption.

Serenity71

So many dymanics to it...

Yet your question has made me think about a man's bonding with his children. He doesn't carry a baby inside his body, and at times he's not even there when she gives birth due to commitments like milltiary service. Yet a bond forms...even without DNA tests in some cases. (And at times its years later he can find out the child isn't genetically his, he still bonded...)

I know its not the answer you're looking for.

But its something to consider since my husband never questions his bond with our two children through adoption. And he'd think the term attachment was more related to people you don't know very well. Bonds aren't just exclusive for blood relationships. Thank god for that!

Kazi

I don't think control is the right word. We are all our own people and therefore the only "control" we have is over our own actions and feelings. I believe both my husband and myself have strong bonds with our kids because we focused on trust. Our children were both sorely lacking in that department as our daughter was in an orphanage and ou son was abused by his first mom, so trust was huge. They had no reason to trust us. No reason to believe we would not hurt them. So we focused on addressing their needs, immediately when they needed it. It could be anything from being hungry to being sad to wanting to be held. They slowly began to realize that we would be there when they needed us, which meant they could trust us, which meant they could relax.

HappyMomAnna

The mother and father may bond--but, that isn't a guarantee the child will form a healthy and secure attachment with the parents regardless of adoption or not.

Adoption raises the odds there will be difficulties with attachment obviously...

I believe there are ways to make attachment more likely or to help a baby or child overcome some attachment difficulties. However, I also believe that adoptive parents are often led to think there is some magic way to make it happen which can and in some cases ends up leading to an unrealistic expectation...

I am the adoptive mother of a child with Reactive Attachment Disorder and for me--my hope is Not to force an attachment to Me--but, rather help my little girl learn the skills of a healthy loving relationships. I am viewing attachment as a Process not as a Person and rather then have an all consuming need to find my RAD daughter attach to Me my goal is to teach her how to interact with people she cares for and wants in her life...

it is OK that she does not Attach to Me as I might expect a biological child to attach. My role is to teach her how to have healthy relationship so that she will be able to experience a loving marriage or build a healthy relationship with her own children.

There are some attachment techniques I find completely acceptable and some I find utterly disgusting. Our daughter was placed at 5 years old and I wasn't about to rock her and feed her baby bottles--but, we do enjoy sharing milkshakes with two straws making eye-contact and feeding each other M&M's... as an example of helping her connect.

The issues with RAD however, are the lack of a secure attachment in the first place to any reliable care giver or the development of an unhealthy attachment in the first place. Which I recognize are very different then the attachment difficulties her little brother has experienced where he was in a home with a foster mother who did not form an unhealthy in the first place. His attachment disruption was more pronounced at the onset and his sisters was indiscriminant meaning she was eager to attach with Anyone--and he showed more genuine anxiety and insucurity.

There is No way to insure a child will bond with a parent. I consider personality to be a major factor which is why I find a great deal of the "attachment therapy" garbage to be more damaging then beneficial.

I do NOT believe that giving a child a better life is an attachment technique children (under a certain age) could careless about the "better life" they have. In the end that isn't the issue and what matters the most is helping the child--whomever they are become confident and able individuals who can lead meaningful lives and make healthy relationships.

Independ"ant"

There is a difference between natural bonding and stockholm syndrome.

Shelly P. Tofu, E.M.T.

Guarantee? No.. there's nothing ANY parent can do to "guarantee" but being a loving, affectionate, and supportive parent will go a long way.

Yes, some personalities "Go together" better than others.. It's that way through our whole life.. But no, I don't think it's a COMPLETE "crapshoot" because as a person I believe I have alot of control over how I relate to others and how I treat them. And to a GREAT extent.. If I treat others kindly, lovingly, selflessly, meet them halfway instead of expecting them to be just like me... there's a lot higher chance of us "gelling"

sizesmith

I think some have better personalities to bond with children.

My adopted son is totally bonded with us. Even social workers have commented on how much more attached he is to both of us than most kids, yet still confident on his own.

Ironically, his first parents moved in with us for a few months this past summer during some problems for them, and he never took up with his first mom. He does have something there with his first dad, but she doesn't respond to him at all, and he doesn't to her. I encourage both of them to love each other, but our son 99.9% of the time reached for me instead of her.

Even in natural families, babies bond with their fathers, even though fathers never breastfeed, so that shoots that theory in the head in my book. I know, I was a Daddy's girl.

Sophie

It's an adoptive parents responsibility to create some kind of bond between their children and themselves. That will help the child be emotionally healthy. There are many things that APs can do to foster a strong bond with their children. In the beginning, "quality" time is way more than just "quality" time, it's more of "building a strong foundation built on trust- quality time." That time together creates the bonding. It would definitely matter, too, how old the child was when adopted.

For me, it was instantaneous, but I knew I had to earn my son's respect before he'd bond with me.

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