Adopting Older Children

Are you considering adopting a child over the age of 5? Join our discussion with Dr. Stephanie Bosco-Ruggiero. She has a PhD in Social Work from Fordham University and is co-author of the book Adopting Older Children: A Practical Guide to Adopting and Parenting Children Over Age Four.

In this episode, we talk about:

• The greatest need in both foster care adoption and international adoption is to adopt kids 5 and older.  
• Adolescents have a bad reputation in general in our society and those in foster care or international child welfare institutions have an even worse reputation. 
• These kids and youth may have challenging behaviors that will be hard to parent. (They also may not have challenging behaviors.)
  • Why have they developed these behaviors? (grief and loss, trauma, mental health)
  • What are some typical behaviors that are more difficult for parents?
• Tips for creating trust and attachment with older children. 
• How to prevent these behaviors from influencing other kids in the family?     
• Special issues specific to older kids adopted internationally.
  • Lack of ability to communicate. 
  • Cultural differences. 
• Safety concerns, especially if there are younger children in the family. 
  • Sexually acting out. 
  • Physical abuse.
• Sibling relationships when adopting an older child.
• Contact with bio family members and former foster parents
• Trying to establish rules with teens/tweens who have had too much freedom. 
• Helping kids academically. 
  • Neuropsychological evaluations, IEPs,
• Support for adoptive families

Transcript

Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.
Dawn Davenport  0:00  
Welcome everyone to Creating a Family. Talk about foster, adoptive and kinship care. I'm Dawn Davenport. I am the host of this show, as well as the director of the nonprofit creating a family.org. Today we're going to be talking about adopting an older child. We're going to be talking with Dr Stephanie Bosco-Ruggerio. She holds a PhD in Social Work from Fordham University, and is the co author or author of 10 peer reviewed journal articles, most of which focus on child welfare, workforce issues or mental health. She works at Oasis consulting and is the co author of the book adopting older children, a practical guide to adopting and parenting children over the age of four. She is also the adoptive mom to an amazing 14 year old boy. So welcome, Dr Bosco-Ruggerio, I'm so glad that you're going to be joining us to talk about this topic.

Speaker 1  0:52  
Thanks for having me. Dawn. I'm so happy to be here to talk about older child adoption.

Dawn Davenport  0:59  
All right, so, the greatest need in both foster care adoption as well as international adoption, is to adopt kids five and older. And you know, adolescents have such a bad reputation in general in our society, and those in foster care and international child welfare institutions have even a worse reputation. And these kids and youth may have challenging behaviors that will be hard to parent. They also may not have challenging behaviors. I think we need to acknowledge both, but I think that what puts people off is the fear that they are going to have behaviors that they won't know how to help the kids with. So why do we see what we euphemistically will call challenging behaviors in these older kids. And remember, older kids can mean upwards of the age of five. We're not necessarily talking about 18 year olds here. Yes,

Speaker 1  1:50  
Dawn first, I want to tell your listeners that I am so excited that they're considering older child adoption, because it's a very special journey. I am the adoptive mom of a 14 year old. My husband and I have a 14 year old who we adopted at 10 days old, so he wasn't an older child when we adopted him. But like any parent, adoptive or not, we've had some tough times and some tough behaviors, but we're coming out the other end of the tunnel, so to speak. And I can say that at this juncture, I can look back a little bit, I can see the forest through the trees, and I have lot more wisdom to share now than when I started this journey when he was just 10 days old. But it's been I wasn't actually sure I wanted to even be a mom, but I want to tell people, please, seriously consider having a family in general, right? But consider older child adoption, I think that you will grow so much from the experience, and it's so important.

Dawn Davenport  3:13  
There's certainly a need, for sure. Yeah, there's certainly a need.

Speaker 1  3:17  
So people are they have questions, and they are a little unsure about older child adoption.

Dawn Davenport  3:25  
So what can lead to some of the behaviors that make people uncertain? Why have these kids developed what we would consider challenging behaviors?

Speaker 1  3:36  
So older child adoption can either be through the domestic child welfare system, or what we call inter country adoption. And as you can imagine, these kids have had a tough start because abroad, there's more family foster care in other countries now, but they may have been in an orphanage, right? They still have orphanages in other countries. We think of that as like a century ago here, but the kids here, they are in the system by no fault of their own. But they've experienced a lot of things, so the number one thing that they have experienced, almost every one of them, is trauma, yeah, and there's sort of theories that even children adopted as infants also experience a certain sort of trauma, being separated from the only birth parent they knew for nine months. Right? So the these are kind of theories. It's less theoretical with older children, because they've ended up in the system for mainly one of two reasons, and most of the time. 75% of the time, it's neglect by the biological family. 25% of the time it. Abuse, abuse, which could be physical, sexual, emotional, and so they have been removed from their home,

Dawn Davenport  5:07  
which, let's be honest, it's traumatic in and of itself. It's it's traumatic,

Speaker 1  5:12  
and they have had to adapt. And they have a lot of grief and loss, potentially grief and loss and definitely trauma. So there's a number of issues that arise when a child has experienced trauma and grief and loss, and those are mental health. They're attachment issues. There's defiance, possibly. So when we're talking about older child adoption, you're right. It really is like five and above, and

Dawn Davenport  5:46  
there's a huge difference between adopting a five year old and adopting a 15 year old. So with variations in the behaviors, because a five year old will behave in some ways differently, but there are some similarities, struggles with self regulation. They might look different depending on the age of the child, but yeah, we could see, we could definitely see that,

Speaker 1  6:06  
yeah, there could be developmental challenges. Okay, no matter what age they are, and developmentally, they may be one age, and that's different from their chronological age. So every child is an individual, and you have to do your research in terms of speaking to their previous foster parents, the child welfare worker, in the case of inter country, the agency, and gather as much information as you can. But these behaviors come from what they have experienced, and it's a natural reaction. And it's like I said, it's trauma, it could be attachment, it could be a host of behaviors that can be confusing. Some can be misconstrued for one thing or another,

Dawn Davenport  6:54  
you know. And sometimes these are adaptive behaviors where the behavior they're expressing worked in their previous life exactly, exactly. It's annoying, as I'll get out in their current life, it's not it's not constructive for them now, but it was helpful for them, and so it was an adaptive behavior that made good sense where they came before. Now we find it challenging, but in fact, we have to acknowledge that it may have kept them alive.

Speaker 1  7:24  
That's exactly right, and developing that stable bond becoming their parent, you have to figure out what these behaviors mean with the help of professionals, right? But there was a function to these behaviors, and your job is to give them the security and the routine and the love that helps them move away from these behaviors and see that they don't need them anymore, that they are something different, that they can grow and they can develop in a different way, and they're absolutely capable of that. And through therapy with an adoption competent mental health professional, I want to emphasize that they will receive the help they need to move past those behaviors. But yes, there is a cluster of behaviors that are common in older children who are being adopted, and you have to do your research and understand these potential issues, and it's all in our book,

Dawn Davenport  8:23  
yes, and the book is adopting older children. What are some of the typical behaviors that you find that parents struggle with the most,

Speaker 1  8:32  
the oppositional behaviors, the defiance, the testing. There can be some aggression. It's common that there's this honeymoon phase, right? So you're developing relationship with your kids like you developed a relationship with a spouse or a partner, not in the same way, of course, but there's that honeymoon phase where things are great and then the routine set in and the long term sort of reality of this. This is my family for good.

Speaker 2  9:03  
I'm stuck with them now, yeah, forever, and

Speaker 1  9:07  
then things can emerge, right? But with children, yes, it's different than with a spouse, because with these children, they are trying to be so good, they're trying to be their best. They don't want to be rejected again. Possibly some of these kids have been moved a couple of times from home to home,

Dawn Davenport  9:25  
many times. I'm glad you raised that issue, because sometimes we think more often of the defiant, oppositional type behavior, but some of the behaviors that are also not conducive to long term mental health is the I'm going to be perfect. I'm going to be really good, I'm going to be a people pleaser. I'm just going to agree. These are also behaviors that you will see when adopting an older child. Yes,

Speaker 1  9:51  
yes. I'm glad you brought that up. So the honeymoon phase, you know, they're trying to be perfect, and then they are just then they're. Testing you, and they're making sure that this is permanent, and this is they're just going to be a kid, right? And well, that trauma is going to bubble up, and you have to deal with all of that. But there is something that happened with some kids, and they're calling it disinhibited social engagement disorder, and this is where they're, like, overly friendly to everyone, no boundaries. They can trust anyone. This can get, of course, dangerous for them, and it's rooted in certain trauma, certain experiences in their past. But it's almost like the opposite of an attachment disorder, right, where they're overly clingy to everyone, and it's not a normal attachment.

Dawn Davenport  10:42  
Again, could have been a survival technique. It could have been, but nonetheless, not good. Now, did you know that we can answer your questions individually if you submit them to us, we have a podcast called weekend wisdom, where we take one question each week and answer it. We need your questions, so send them to us at info, at creating a family.org, or you can click on the link in the show notes. Now back to the show. So what are some specific things that you would recommend. Let's start with just talking about creating trust with an older child, because that's what the foundation is, is trust that they trust you. Yes,

Speaker 1  11:31  
yes. So the trust is going to come from you keeping your word from the very beginning about the small and the large things. So if you tell them, we're going to go to this supermarket, you know, life changes for parents, it gets hectic, but try to stick with what you're saying. Establish your routine for all of the kids in the family, and that will benefit all of them, but especially your new child, who has come home, do fun things, laugh, spend lots of time together in the beginning, to the extent that they will permit and they're comfortable with right? You don't want to smother them in the beginning, but the trust also comes from the parent not getting carried away with their own emotions, with their own anxiety, with their own anger, and it's hard for all parents, and we all lose it. Oh, my goodness, do I know that, but trying to create that stable environment where you're modeling good relationships, you're not making threats in the heat of the moment right when there's misbehavior. You're understanding. You're trying to be patient, and you're trying to figure out what they need in terms of a listening ear, or what is the best thing for them right now in order to uncoil all this trauma and all of this grief and loss. It may look different for each child, but you're developing trust because you're getting to know them as an individual, and you're not being authoritarian. That's not the parenting model we want to say. We want to see authoritative, which is you set the rules and you be consistent, and you try not to get carried away with your own emotions, but you're not just a drill sergeant giving orders, and really, you're not punishing to the extent. Look, I've been there. It's hard when professionals tell you it's the rewards, not the punishment, but I would not recommend the traditional punishment and rewards with these children that you're bringing home that have so much trauma, but get to know what they enjoy. Engage in technology with them. Watch the YouTube videos together, play some games, play Playstation, the the console, whatever they have together and accept them for who they are. You're not gonna nitpick about their tattoos or their piercings or whatever. At this point in the game, you're going to instill in them, that, especially with gender identity, sexuality, that you absolutely 100% accept them for who they are, and you're not questioning that part of things. But of course, you're having rules, you're having boundaries, and you're being consistent with them.

Dawn Davenport  14:40  
That's something you said that I think is so important. And we we harp on this, and that is, have fun once a day, you should be doing something that is fun for you, but you also need to engage with your children. And this is especially important when you're adopting an older child in doing something fun, and it should be fun for both. Of you now as the parent, you're going to have to be more flexible, but you absolutely can find something, be it gaming, be it bike riding or whatever, going to a movie or, you know, watching a particular show. Don't miss all at once. But you know, every night after homework and everything is done, you sit down for 30 minutes and watch something together. But when we are parenting, it's easy to overlook that, which is really what bonds us as a family, and that is enjoying each other's company. And it sounds so easy, and it isn't because, number one, you're busy. Another so much you got to get done, and some of the time you're really irritated at this person, and so that reminder that you need to be doing something fun, and then, as a family, do something fun at least once a week. Have family movie night or, you know, go out to eat junk food, you know, after church on Sunday, or whatever. You know, just do something that everybody enjoys. And that's how you're also teaching the concept of family. You know, is that family is not just someone standing on high, issuing the rules and enforcing them, but that you're also somebody that cares about them and what they enjoy doing.

Speaker 1  16:15  
Yeah, I would add to that try to let the small things, the smaller things, go for a while. There's the big problems and there's the small things. So when you mention the junk food, I'm like, Yes, you know, I have engaged in a tug of war with my son for years now, about McDonald's, about Wendy's, all these things, oh, my goodness, this is so bad. And sometimes I just have to take a breath and say, relax. Just go to the darn McDonald's or Burger King and enjoy it and let him have it. And you know that can almost be a bonding thing for a new child, because that might be one of the few things happy memories they have in their life, of like a fast food place or so, you're re establishing some kind of bond and activity there, and you want to be like the best parent, the perfect parent, when they come home and you're kicking yourself or allowing your kids to eat this and that. But relax. Don't harp on the little things, which, in the beginning, food is, unfortunately, the little things, it could be harmful in the long run. But it's

Dawn Davenport  17:28  
hard though, because parents, oftentimes kids come to us with eating habits that we would not want to encourage, that we don't think in the long run. But there is something when we go back to talk about creating trust and attachment is to understand what it is just something as simple as, what are they used to eating and providing that provide it, and then, if it's really something that you feel like that, you need to shift away from give it six months and gradually start introducing other foods without taking these foods away, if they would only if that, you know, Kraft macaroni and cheese are actually store brand. Macaroni and cheese is all that they have eaten. Are the only thing that you can find that they will find out what it is, okay. This is the brand. Then get it. Fix it. Yeah, yeah. And then next thing you could do is, you know, introduce maybe a higher quality if you don't want to eat the cheap brand, exactly.

Speaker 1  18:23  
But of course, there can be those problem eating behaviors, and I'm not talking about indulging in that, because they can be dangerous, right? So these kids may come to us malnourished, even if they're obese. You know, they're not getting nutrients. They're eating the fast food. They were eating the fast food every day for three years, right? It's hard.

Dawn Davenport  18:44  
You see a child who is significantly overweight and you think, Okay, we've got to help this kid. Or you have a child who comes to you with some hoarding issues, and you think, Okay, this is this is not acceptable. But that desire to create attachment and trust, part of it's listening and meeting their exact their need where they are right now and then slowly, but surely and very gradually, make changes. Yes, yeah. One of the issues that we often will hear is that, okay, this child comes in, they use curse words. Are they don't obey? Are they won't go to sleep at night, or, you know, don't eat the food that is prepared for the family, or whatever. And parents worry, how do we prevent these behaviors from influencing the other kids in the family?

Speaker 1  19:32  
Yeah, because you don't want to be too you want to have a routine, but you don't want to Nick pick about everything in terms of if they have to eat something a little different the beginning from the rest of the family, that's okay, and you can explain that to the other kids. So kids picking up maybe some negative behaviors from their new sibling. First of all, I would strongly. Commend that an older child be the youngest in the family. So if you have a seven year old, you're not bringing in a 15 year old, you're bringing in a four year old, right?

Dawn Davenport  20:10  
Well, I think there's some debate on that now, I think you definitely have to there are things that you can do, but you need to be aware if you're disrupting birth order of some special we'll talk about that a little later. Because the reality is, oftentimes, when you're adopting older kids, you will be disrupting birth water. So you need to go into it with your eyes open. But we'll talk about that special circumstances. Yeah,

Speaker 1  20:35  
yeah. In terms of the siblings picking up behaviors, be clear with your you know your existing children as the child joins the family, that they can come to you about anything they're concerned about, so any concerning behaviors or activities that their new sibling is engaged in. Of course, you have to gage your child also, are they a follower? Are they someone who will pick up on some bad behaviors, God forbid, substance misuse or aggression or cursing or acting out defiantly? With Parents,

Dawn Davenport  21:15  
talk with him ahead of time and explain why this child may be exhibiting All right? So, yes,

Speaker 1  21:20  
yeah, and that they can always come to you with any concerning behaviors that they're seeing that confuse them or they're just not sure about.

Dawn Davenport  21:29  
So talk with your the if you're concerned about behaviors rubbing off, talking with your kids ahead of time and saying in our family, we do not yell curse words at each other. Joaquin may not know these it probably doesn't know these rules. So we have to gradually show him exactly how to, how to but, but we're not going to expect that he's going to understand this at the beginning, but reinforce your family values as well at the same time, I

Speaker 1  21:56  
would introduce them if it's an older child coming home, not through foster adopt, where the existing children have already had a chance to get to know them, and you're adopting them, not through the foster process. They're available for adoption. They're coming home. You want to introduce the siblings, the kids, to each other, and absolutely, talk about the struggles that kids who have been in orphanages, abroad or in the US child welfare system, foster care have had, and why they might be seeing certain behaviors, you must educate your children and talk frank with them about what they might See, what trauma is, what a developmental issue might be, and you're gonna know at this point some things about some health, things about your adoptive child that you can talk to your other children about before they come home. For example, if they have a particular physical health issue, or if they have a history of a certain mental health challenge. You can talk to the kids about that and educate them so they understand.

Dawn Davenport  23:08  
Let's talk about two special issues that we see specific to older kids adopted from abroad. One, when a child arrives, most often there's going to be the lack of ability to communicate. And if you've ever been traveling in a foreign country and not speak the language, you have some appreciation for how hard that is. So suggestions for helping kids when they first come home?

Speaker 1  23:34  
Oh, of course. So first of all, I want to say about inter country adoption, that it is become a lot less prevalent from when I we were doing the research and we rewrote this book, and I got into the whole field and everything. So there's a lot a lot less inter country adoption, but to the extent that you adopt from abroad, an older child, the communications that you can have with them prior integrate fun language learning activities, you know, find out if they have ever spoken English and where and to what extent, and make it fun. But of course, you have to plan for when they come home and you have to talk to the school district, make sure they're getting all the services, bilingual education services that they need, and again, make it fun. At Home With other siblings, they learn their language, some words in their language, as your new child is learning English, but that could imagine how scary that is there. It's so coming into a new now. It's a, you know, there's different ages, right? Regardless,

Dawn Davenport  24:50  
it's scary, yes, you know, once we're past infancy, we are used to being able to communicate our basic needs. One thing to consider doing would be to. Before the child arrives, find somebody in your community that speaks this language, and have them at least come over a couple of times in the first week, and then each week, have them at least once come by so the child can express more complex thoughts through the translator. To you, I think that's something that you should consider doing, especially when you're adopting an older child. But even if you're adopting a five year old, they need to be able to say, I don't know this food you're serving, or I don't like this, or whatever, so that you can understand it. Put

Speaker 1  25:36  
labels around the house. Label things in English. Make it fun. Put pictures

Dawn Davenport  25:40  
if it's something written, and you have to come up with a picture to show them, yes, if you're doing inter

Speaker 1  25:46  
country adoption, you must, you must become, I hope this is common sense, but familiar with the culture of your child. And I think it's critical to build that community and even adopting children of a different ethnicity or race. Within the United States, you want to consider the community that you live in. Is it diverse? Are they going to have role models? Are they going to have people to speak in the case of inter country, perhaps their language? Are there a lot of Spanish speakers, for example, in your community. Even

Dawn Davenport  26:24  
if you have to, as for the translator, you have to find somebody who is not in your community but can do it over the phone. I mean, it'd be worth it, yeah. And

Unknown Speaker  26:33  
then there's phones, there's Google Translate.

Dawn Davenport  26:37  
Google Translate is a godsend, yes. So we should mention that that you can absolutely make avail yourself of all the technology. I'm glad you mentioned cultural differences, because that's another issue that we face with older child adoption. We obviously face it adopting internationally, but you also face these issues when adopting through foster care, because we can also see cultural differences there. It seems to me that one of the basics is just respecting that some of what we think of as air quotes around this normal is a cultural thing, and that some of what we see may be very culturally appropriate for their culture. So understanding, as you point out, learning as much as you can about their culture through people in your community would be must. Yeah, and if not in your community, then online. You

Speaker 1  27:28  
know you want to think about the community that they're coming into. You may even want to change communities if you feel that it's not going to be welcoming for your child, if they're of a different culture, race, etc. Unfortunately, that could be the case. So some older children in the United States actually can have a say about the race or ethnicity of their adoptive parents. They can express those opinions that they want. Yeah, you're right. And even beyond race ethnicity. They want a single mom, or they want two parents, or they want an African American Dad, the gender of the parents, etc, so they're gonna have, they're gonna be thinking about this, and some older kids are gonna have opinions, and they may not want to be in a transracial adoption situation. So you have to figure out also learn how much say the teens, the teens in particular, maybe 12 and up, 10 and up. To what extent have these older kids expressed their needs in terms of the cultural makeup of their adoptive family, The gender makeup, even, etc, because they're gonna have some opinions. So it's not just you going in there and you learning, and you saying, I want this child or that child, and I think it'll work, or what some kids are gonna have actual preferences. And it would not work. It would not work with your family to adopt a particular child. So that's very important. I just wanted to mention real quick, ICWA requirements to Indian Child Welfare Act if you are adopting a Native American child, there are prescribed regulations, stipulations through this federal legislation called ICWA around that which you absolutely must be familiar with, because it can be more complicated, but again, you have the cultural competency and cultural learning issues with Native American children as well

Dawn Davenport  29:34  
Indian Child Welfare Act for those who are and we refer to it as ICWA. Let me take a moment to thank the jockey. Being Family Foundation, they have been supporting our nonprofit, creating a family.org as well as this podcast, for many years, we are very appreciative of their support, and through their support, we are able to offer you free courses that can be used. To as foster parent, continuing education, or could just be used as parenting, improving your parenting skills. They're focused on those who are actively parenting, focusing on those who are actively in the midst of either fostering or adopting or kinship care. You can check out these courses at Bitly slash j, b, f, support. That's B, i, t, dot, l, y, slash, j, b, f, support. All right, I want to talk now about some safety issues to be thinking about, and this is especially the case if there are younger children in the family. The reality is that with many older child adoptions, we are disrupting birth order, and an older child is being brought into the family where there are obviously children who are younger than them. One of the issues is sexually acting out. The other would be physical abuse. I think we could talk about both of those things we need to do before the child comes that can protect all the kids, both the kids who are existing in the family, who are already here, as well as the new child coming in. Yeah, so what are some things that parents should specifically think about doing, especially with the children already in the family, to help them anticipate and handle any of the safety issues that may arise.

Speaker 1  31:23  
So you should be getting, you should be getting accurate information, in the case of the US child welfare system, about your child's very concerning behaviors a prospective adoptive child. There may be situations where the case worker believes that them being an only child is the best, and that's very important. The child may even have an opinion that they want to be the only child or the youngest or the oldest or the only child in the home, but more so, it's going to be about the professionals recognizing that having siblings is not best for this child. Now, you should have accurate information about the abuse or neglect and or neglect that they experience, and certainly any sexual acting out or physical aggression that they've demonstrated in the foster home, and talk to those foster parents. Of course, you're going to get insight into these behaviors now, preparing young children for the possibility of something scary, you want to try to avoid that situation. So if an adoptive child has some serious behaviors, and you know that maybe disrupting birth order is not the best idea in that situation

Dawn Davenport  32:44  
if you know in advance. The reality, sadly, is that, yes, we often don't know. So here's some suggestions that we may want to think about. One make sure that all the children, including the children who are in the family, know the family rules about nobody touches anyone without their permission. That's how we are in our family. When we're angry, we talk, we don't hit. So setting up boundaries, setting up rules that say your body is your body. Nobody can come in and touch. Nobody should tell you not to tell somebody else about something. So saying all this to the kids who are already in that family, as well as the new child coming in and letting the kids who are in the home already know that you will listen. Whenever they have a concern, they can come to you if something makes them feel uncomfortable, even if it's not a physical touching, if it makes them feel uncomfortable to come to you, you're going to listen. So setting those ground rules very, very clearly, we strongly recommend. And the second thing is letting children know that at the beginning, you need to be keeping strong eyes on kids. You don't leave them alone until you get to know the new child coming in, and this will be, regardless of whether he has younger children. You want to have eyes on that, on the kid, to when they are together? Yes, after a while, you'll get to know the kid, and you may feel like there would be less need for that, but especially for the first six months or so, it's a hassle. You know, having to constantly have eyes on on a kid. Those are and you may have to put alarms on the child's door at night, anything that you could help do to kind of if a child wanders in the evening and makes other kids feel uncomfortable, all of those are things that you need to think about before the child comes home, especially if the older child, if you're disrupting the birth order and you have younger children in the home, because you really have to protect all children.

Speaker 1  34:46  
Yeah, yeah. You know, there's a potential for the sexual acting out, for the sexual behaviors, which is not necessarily going to lead to sexual aggression, per se, but it's just weird in. Appropriate behaviors. I just want to say that certain sexual even aggressive behaviors amongst children, is different from sexual aggression in adults. We understand this now. We're not going to treat them like adults, like you have the brain of an adult, and you know morally certain things, right? So there's certain behaviors that are going on that they don't understand themselves, that they're engaging in. And there is evidence based treatment for this physical aggression, absolutely treatment for that. Now, if child is getting physically aggressive with you, walk out of the house, show try not to engage in it. Show them that you are still in control. You are not going to stand there while they throw multiple objects at you or dishes or whatever. You know, some things are going to get damaged, but you don't want it to escalate to the point of you're getting into a fist fight with the child. I think walking out onto the porch is a good thing, and they they, of course, should understand that none of this is okay. Physical aggression is not okay. But they may have a condition where it's not just as simple as a choice. They're not being a quote, unquote bad kid. These are symptoms of many different things that we could get into. You know, on occasions you may have to call like a mobile unit, counseling unit that comes to your home. I hope that people have these in their neighborhoods. We have them where the counselor comes to your home and calms the child down. It's amazing. These services, and you want to try to avoid, at all costs, just calling cops, right, calling cops for support, calling police to come into the home to deal with this. You really want a social worker counselor to be accompanying them for, you know, a variety of reasons. They may not have the proper training. And the child, their history, their trauma.

Dawn Davenport  37:00  
They're not trained for that, so yes, getting mental health support. And obviously it goes without saying that, or perhaps it shouldn't go without saying we need to provide kids with counseling. When you're adopting an older child, a child who has experienced trauma, we need to surround them with all the supports that they need, including counseling. Let me interrupt this interview for just a moment to tell you about our Facebook support group. I mentioned it in this interview, but it is a terrific resource for adoptive, foster or kinship families. You can check it out at facebook.com/groups, slash creating a family. Okay, kids who come to our homes through older child adoption, they have a family before us. If it's international adoption, they may not have contact or the ability to reach out, but they may also have the ability to reach out, even with international but certainly with domestic. So what are some things that we as parents need to think about, about contact with their biological family? That could include parents, it could include siblings. It could include grandparents, aunts, uncles, things like that.

Speaker 1  38:15  
Yeah, this is so important you have to be thinking about this during the process of course, so inter country adoption, there may be the agency will help you develop a plan, right? A communication plan. It may involve sending letters once a month to birth parents or other relatives that the child knows sometimes they may have no real family. They've been in an orphanage, they've been they may have been in family foster care, same thing as us, adoption, and they have grown attached to the foster parents. So it's not just biological, but you're developing a plan to keep up that communication inter country very far geographically, so you want to maybe send letters, photos, that kind of thing. Maybe try to make a trip once a year. I don't that's tough, but in the American system, you set the rules about contact with the biological parents. Their parental rights have been terminated. You are now the parent, and they don't tell you how often they want to see their child. Ideally, there's a nice relationship where you can sort of talk about it, negotiate it, but if there isn't, you decide what's best for your child. It's not about what's best for them, for the adults. But of course, you want to try to keep those connections. If the child's very attached to a birth sibling, a birth parent, a grandparent, aunt uncle, people do all kinds of things. I have a friend who adopted at the child is four, I believe four or five, and she knows her her birth mother. They meet at a park, or they go to the movies or something. Like that, and it's a once a month thing. So it could be a regular meetup like that that's planned once a month. This particular maybe date first Saturday of the month, something like that. We're gonna do something together.

Dawn Davenport  40:14  
Maybe perhaps part of it is just recognizing that this contact, even if they're not asking for it, they are usually wondering about what has happened to their body, family, or as you write, former foster parents, I'm glad you mentioned that, because that's also is that it's a natural desire, this is their family, and not making that a taboo subject so that they feel like they're hurting your feelings when they bring it up. It's not about us. So knowing that that our children are probably thinking and experiencing this, we have the obligation to be the ones who talk about it. And is it important? Is there a safe way in their safety concerns? That's Yes, but is there a way that we could reach out that you perhaps we look on Facebook and we'll find out information that way, if we're concerned about having any direct contact, but they're understanding the importance seems crucial to me, a topic I want to raise that often happens, especially with older child adoption, is very often the kids Come to us, or the youth come to us. Having had what in our families would be way too much freedom, having had a lack of rules, it's hard. I always say in parenting, it should be a V. You know, as as they get older, we have an inverted V, where we're we have a lot more rules as our children are younger, and then as they get older, we reduce the number of rules, and the idea is for them to start self controlling and setting up their own boundaries and their own rules. But with kids coming in who have adopted an older age, this has been turned on its head, because often they've had no rules. There has been no bedtime, there may be no requirements for bathing on a regular basis. There may be no requirements for going to school when you don't feel like it, things like that, and you've got rules in your family that differ from that, but you're trying to impose rules on somebody who hasn't had them before. Give us some thoughts on how to do that. How do we then add rules when the kids have not had it, yeah,

Speaker 1  42:22  
this kid is coming into a different every family has, like, a culture, right, a norm of how they operate, and they're coming into a new culture. So they have to get to know your family culture, and as they're not going to get it at first, they're just not going to understand if they've never had a lot of rules. So again, the routines is important, and constantly repeating the baseline rules and not getting too upset at the small infractions of the rules, right, but trying to be consistent. We have a couple of chapters about behavior. A lot of it was written by Gloria, who's our licensed mental health counselor on the team of writers there, and she has helped me so much as a parent, but she is an absolute adherent to the rewards, rather than punishments. Model the sticker books, the small rewards. When kids are getting those rules, when they're following those rules, they're doing something right. Just go all out in make a big fuss. Oh my goodness, you did that. So nice. You you decided to go take a shower without all of the pushing you to get in there at a certain by a certain time. Oh my goodness, you are doing so well with that rule, you know. So so there's a method, there's a method that's better for the older kids that are coming in without necessarily having had great structure in their lives, and it's also helping them to see that things can be different and they're and you're not being mean or punishing them that by having standards, by having rules. But it's just, it's our family culture, it's our expectation, and you can absolutely adapt. You can grow. You can overcome. GLORIA talks about the growth mindset. That's a whole theory in itself. You can, you can, you can. And when they do, you make a huge fuss and you instill in them, you did it, you did it. You're the one who is making this work, and we really appreciate your behavior. You know exactly.

Dawn Davenport  44:32  
I think that it helps to think through what your rules are. Be clear to yourself, with yourself, and if you're partnered with your partner, what are the important rules in our family? What are the baseline important rules? These? We're going to stick with these and some of the others we're going to let slide, but these are the ones that are very important, and then try to explain the reasons to the child coming in. To your older child as to why these are our family rules, and then be very consistent with the application of those rules. And as you have mentioned, just repeating what you said, reward compliance with the rules, it's almost crucial that we approach with older kids the fact that they haven't had it. Approach it with this mindset of decide what's important. Explain why be consistent and reward compliance as much as we can absolutely. Oftentimes, kids coming into our homes are going to be struggling academically, partly because they have had sporadic attendance. Some will have not had much attendance at all at schools. So we can expect kids coming in not all. Some are doing extremely well. They affect schools where they excel. But assuming that's not the case, what do we need to have in place or to be thinking about as parents adopting older kids to help our kids thrive academically, or at least survive. Yeah,

Speaker 1  46:04  
yeah. The laws around making sure that kids can transfer from school to school if they've moved around between foster homes is better, so their continuity of schooling should be better than it was in the past. But you know, you have to find out. You have to get the school records, education records. A lot of the kids, the older kids being adopted, they have not had proper mental health care, proper attention to their physical and mental health. And that could mean, and, you know, our minds can be neglected Absolutely, if and their academic

Dawn Davenport  46:39  
health? Yeah, we're talking about academic not health, but their academic progress, right? If kids

Speaker 1  46:46  
didn't have a whole lot of attention in their homes, they may be cognitively behind. There's so many things that could be going on if you suspect something, get that neuropsychological evaluation or get that developmental pediatrician. How do you do that? Through the schools? Yeah, a developmental pediatrician or through the schools. Now the schools are going to do the short, quick version of a neuropsych I'm going to be completely honest with you, talk to your network of mental health providers and make sure that the school is doing everything they're supposed to, most schools will not do an evaluation for autism All right, which is not great because it's not good at all, because you have to look at the other cognitive markers and evaluate the mental health and behaviors and all of that in concert With the autism assessment. That's really a complete neuropsychological exam when something called ados, a DOS is included, and that's the gold standard for autism evaluation. So you may want to get your child evaluated for a number of reasons.

Dawn Davenport  47:57  
Who does a neuropsychological evaluation? A

Speaker 1  48:01  
neuropsychologist, neuropsych, and they would be part of an office that has mental health practitioners. Most likely they may be a standalone the school will provide something, and they will pay for something, but it's often inadequate. So if you're noticing behaviors and cognitive and learning issues, get all of this done because certain learning disorders, or being neuro diverse, which includes ADHD, can affect those behaviors at home, the aggression, not just the learning and the Defiance right either at school or or at home, Things can be very complicated, and when you get that neuropsych evaluation, it can shed a lot of light on not just the learning, but the behaviors that could be mistaken for traumatic reactions. There's going to be trauma there, but it could be mistaken also for attachment issues, when, for example, if you have a mildly autistic child who is examining behaviors that seem aloof and maybe would be labeled an attachment issue, there might be something else going on there. And then what you do is you get an individual education plan based on the diagnosis and schools are responsible for providing the services and the support that your child needs based on their diagnosis, but helping kids academically also cultivate that growth mindset. You can be smart, you can achieve. Maybe no one expected any thing of them academically in the past, you have so much room to grow light that spark in them that help them find it actually, you're not going to light that spark for learning in them, but recognize their talents and their interests and just really cultivate that and show them they are capable praise all the achievements the. Chronic absenteeism, they often have issues with that. A lot of kids are still having issues with that, and there's a whole like sort of cottage industry of people studying school refusal and chronic absenteeism now, and there's a lot of specialized help for that as well, but it could be related to having a learning disability or being neuro diverse,

Dawn Davenport  50:21  
okay, a neuropsych evaluation, and then, if warranted, an IEP and I would throw out. Also, remember, academics aren't everything. Make sure find a place if your kid is not excelling in school, everybody needs to excel at something. So find something your kid can excel at. Maybe it's acting, maybe in getting them involved in a play, maybe it's a musical instrument. Maybe it's working with animals. So you volunteer at a shelter. Yes, we shouldn't get too hung up, particularly with older kids coming in who've come out with such an academic deficit,

Speaker 1  50:58  
they may be more career and technical education might be better for them, so find out what their options are, too the older kids, the teenagers, sure,

Dawn Davenport  51:05  
yeah, all right, last word here, how can parents find support? Because I so believe that if we can support parents, we can do so much of a better job at stabilizing families and stabilizing these placements. The great

Speaker 1  51:22  
thing about older child adoption is you're going to have this community built in the agency, the child welfare agency, or the private agency, if you go with it, is going to have all of these contacts and referrals for mental health and family counseling, and you will qualify for a range of services, even financial help. So we're talking about your child having Medicaid. We're talking about respite care and, yes, low cost or free mental health counseling. And of course,

Dawn Davenport  51:53  
those who are adopting international are going, No, my kid's not going to get some of those. So it's true, and that is a challenge.

Speaker 1  52:01  
Yeah, it could be different. It could be different, but there will be inter country adoption too. There will be a network of experts and support people dedicate their whole lives to helping adopted kids and adoptive families. You want an adoptive, competent professional to help you out, if someone's not familiar with adoption, especially through foster care, they may not be the best choice, because they're going to be viewing behaviors, possibly in a more traditional way. You want someone who has studied the particular issues of adoptive kids. I

Dawn Davenport  52:34  
would also put in a plug for the creating a family Facebook group. It is a large online group. If you're experiencing something, I guarantee somebody in the group has already experienced it and will reach out. You can find it at facebook.com/groups/creating a family, or just type in creating a family in the search box in Facebook. Thank you so much. Dr Stephanie, Bosco rogeria, for talking with us today about the ins and outs of adopting an older child, we truly appreciate your expertise. You.