Dr David Brodzinsky, a professor in the U.S.A, has undertaken extensive research into how children understand adoption and offers the following framework to explain this:
Level 0: aged 0 – 4 years:
At this stage your child will show no real understanding of adoption but they will be able to pick up whether adoption is a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ thing from the way those people around them, particularly you, their adoptive family, talk about it. So do use positive language when you are talking about adoption. But it won’t be just the words your child hears but also more imperceptible attitudes which can come across in a variety of non-verbal ways. Therefore it is extremely important that you become comfortable with the use of the word ‘adoption’ and familiarise yourself with your child’s story so that you will be ready to raise the issue of adoption with your child. Talking it over with your partner or your child’s social worker will help you to work through any concerns/ anxieties that you may have about your child’s story.
Level 1: aged 4 –6 years:
At this age your child cannot really differentiate between birth and adoption as a way of joining families. Adopted children often believe that all children are born into one family and then go and live with another! They may look as though they understand that they are adopted because they can tell their own adoption story but in fact they do not fully understand it. However they may well be asked questions by and hear comments from other children. At this time it is important for you to help your child by providing them with a simple ‘cover story’ which is founded on truth but is easy to tell.
Level three: aged six to eight years:
By now your child will be able to clearly differentiate between adoption and birth as different ways of joining a family. They also accept that the adoptive family relationship is permanent but do not understand why. Brodzinsky describes how a child may be relying on the fact that their adoptive mother has told them adoption is permanent or they have some idea of possession, in that they ‘belong’ to their adoptive parents. You now need to give more concrete information to your child. However this needs to be at a level which your child can understand. As indicated above it is important for you to feel comfortable in discussing this information as any discomfort you have will be conveyed to your child who may then believe that adoption is not so positive. It is crucial that your child is able to express their feelings; they may well be having difficulty understanding their story and also (particularly the older children in this stage group) may be starting to feel a sense of loss.
Level three: aged eight to ten years
Your child can now differentiate between adoption and birth but may begin to question how permanent their relationship is with your family. Sometimes children in this age group may think that their birth parents can reclaim them or that their adoptive family may have an experience which could lead to them abandoning the child. During this stage your child will start to develop empathy for other people and this can lead to them worrying about their birth parents or indeed about you, their adoptive parents.
Your child begins to understand that both their birth parents and you have felt some loss. Brodzinsky talks about the child going through "adaptive grieving" as the child begins to make sense of their adoption at a deeper level. This may not be manifested in obvious sadness but may be expressed in changing behaviour patterns. You can help your child by enabling them to express their feelings and also help them to gain a more sophisticated understanding of their adoption – this will often mean taking the initiative by using opportunities that present themselves to look at this. It is vital that you support your child by being sensitive and patient while also accepting their feelings .
Level 4: aged 10 to 12 years
At this age your child begins to describe their adoptive family relationships in semi-legalistic terms and will talk about judges, lawyers, doctors and social workers who somehow make the parent-child relationship permanent. Your child can now explore the issues in more depth and hear with some understanding the more distressing parts of their history and the reasons for adoption. They can understand that certain facts may be of more importance than others in leading to their adoption.
Level 5: aged 12 years +
Your child can now see their adoptive family relationship as permanent. They have an understanding of the legal transfer of rights and duties from the birth parents to their adoptive parents. It may be at this stage that your child will want to find out more about their birth family and may even want to meet them. All adolescents, whether adopted or not, want to find out ‘who they are’ so please do not feel unduly alarmed about this search for identity but it may be helpful to seek some guidance from your adoption agency.
Your feelings:
You are likely to experience all sorts of feelings yourself at these different stages. Try not to bottle them up – talking to your partner or social worker will help.
Often adoptive parents can feel threatened or inadequate in some way because their child wants to talk about their birth family. Try and put yourself in your child’s shoes and respond as positively as you can.
Also don’t assume that if your child is not talking about their adoption they are not interested. Several things could be happening – they may be having difficulty making sense of what they have been told already, they may have sensed some discomfort/embarrassment on your part, they may not yet be able to put their thoughts into words or don’t know what questions to ask.
Difficult stories:
You may be very worried about talking to your child about some aspects of their story. You cannot change what has already happened to your child but you can separate the deed from the person and still value your child’s birth parents. You may find this very hard in the light of your child’s experiences but condemning the parents can give your child the message that they too are no good as they were born to these people.
At the same time it is important to be honest about the facts – use simple words that a young child can understand, filling in more detail as your child grows older. Thus if your child has been physically abused you might say “your birth mum didn’t know how to look after children and sometimes she hurt you”.
Explaining adoption to a child has been described as a bit like learning to play with Lego – small children start off with large manageable pieces of Duplo and as they develop their skills gradually progress to making very sophisticated constructions with smaller and more intricate pieces of Lego.
There are many different ways of sharing adoption with children -
Take a look at other articles we have [on the side menu] such as Life Story Books and the Book List.
We shall be adding new articles all the time, so do check the menu list from time to time.
If you would like to read more about Brodzinsky’s work, look at ‘Being adopted – The Lifelong Search for Self’ by Brodzinsky, Schechter and Heing.
(New York:Doubleday.1992)
Another very useful book is ‘Making Sense of Adoption – A Parent’s Guide’ by Lois Ruskai Melina (Harper and Rowe 1989) which has lots of ideas on talking to children about adoption.
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