What to Expect the First Year After Adopting

–Delana H. Stewart

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Nine-Year-Pregnancy/312101615473700

Pregnancy and Adoption

In the series of books What to Expect When You’re Expecting, is the book What to Expect the First Year. These are great resources for pregnant women (and the second can even be helpful for parents adopting infants).

Older Child Adoption

What about when adopting a child older than 1? What are some things you can expect in that first year?

Here are some excellent articles you may enjoy reading that can offer some guidance or encouragement for that first year:

Do I Love Him Yet? –deals with complex emotions of the first days home and post-adoption depression;

Helping an Older Child Adjust What happens after the honeymoon?

Of Sheep and Shepherds (Are you struggling parenting your newly adopted child?)

The Truth About Adoption: One Year Later Processing the stages of the first year.

Year for Year Advice and a review of the book Keys to Parenting an Adopted Child.

Tantrums and Meltdowns (And older child adoption).

Empowering Mothers: Dealing with Power Drains (part 1 of a 4 part series)

5 Pros and Cons of Homeschooling the Older Adopted Child

Have a New Kid

Into the Mind of a Child with RAD–A review of the book Detached

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Want to read a fantastic article about helping an older adopted child understand his/her past. It is called: 7 ways to give your child a history by Gregory Keck. The timeline idea (particularly the way they do it) is really neat. But, my favorite is the water pitcher exercise for integrating past and present. If you only have time for a short read, skim down the article to the water exercise. http://www.adoptivefamilies.com/articles.php?aid=2334

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***If your child has behavior that is different from his/her peers, it is a good idea to talk with a pediatric neurologist, a pediatrician, and perhaps an occupational therapist. Though some adopted children have reactive attachment disorder (RAD), there are some neurological, medical, and psychological conditions that have some overlapping characteristics. Things like ADHD, ASD, ODD, PTSD, FAS, SPD, Tourette’s, and others should be carefully considered by medical professionals evaluating your child.  See this article on Sensory Processing Disorder and the Adopted Child. Don’t rely on books, checklists, and blog posts alone, have your child evaluated. There may even be some medical concerns such as vitamin deficiencies or food allergies/intolerances that have an adverse affect.

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Adoption Videos on YouTube

Click here to view Delana’s YouTube Channel–http://www.youtube.com/user/9yrpregnancy Or, click the following for individual videos: Perseverance, Patience, Waiting, and Adoption http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtCRjxjocpI Reading the Preface to Nine Year Pregnancy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8MBjWC8Z_8 Singing “God Will make this trial a blessing” …

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