The one thing that I do not want to do with this blog is act like our experience is every adoption experience. Every child, family, and experience is different. This is just our story. I believe that you get a beautiful tapestry by reading lots of adoption stories. I'm a member of 2 local adoption groups and I have already seen how different each story is and I love hearing God work in each of them.
I have read the suggested books and taking the online training required from my agency. Much of it was very interesting and enlightening but I believe the parenting my husband and I already did with our biological children wasn't much different than they suggested. We don't spank. We do "time-ins" with younger children so they can rethink their behavior within a few feet of us. We follow 1-2-3 Magic from Dr. Phelen and there really isn't yelling in our home. We co-sleep during naps and currently my 4 year old is laying on my back resting because she's tired from swimming. I'm a stay at home mom and my husband works from home so we spend as much time as possible together and our house is full of snuggles and family fun.
One thing that is pretty prevalent in the adoption community is the idea of cocooning. It is forming attachment with your child through staying close to home and limiting outside influences for weeks or months after you bring your child home. I think it can be a beautiful way to bond for most families. So far though, that isn't what we have done. Liam was ready to leave the orphanage and have a family. His nannies told us that he was asking when his family was coming for months before we arrived. He is an active 7 year old boy that will be starting 1st grade next month in a public school and he hasn't shown a single sign of not being attached to us. He wants us to hold him, snuggle, hold our hand and he doesn't look to any other adult for affection or attention. He loves going out every day and on the days we do stay at home and just play with playdoh or build legos, he seems bored. If I even slightly indicate we might be going somewhere, he's putting on his shoes and shouting, "car!"
Basically, if I saw a single sign that Liam wasn't attaching to us or couldn't handle our Summer schedule of play dates, splash parks, and vacation Bible school, we would stop immediately and slow everything way down. But he seems to love it and is just happy settling into what we normally do as a family. So I'm listening to all of you other adoptive moms out there. I'm listening to the experts as well. But first and foremost, I'm listening to my kid. And he's saying (in the cutest accent), "Let us go!!!"
Our Jason was like that. Our Sarah was a very different story. Although they came together as brother and sister, Sarah was four years older and had been through a lot more. She never bonded with anyone but Jason. When he finally met their mother at Jason's memorial service nine years after the children came, she said Sarah had never bonded with her or responded to getting touched by her, either, when she was very small. As you say, every story is different.
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