I read quite a heartbreaking blog earlier today http://goo.gl/d3nRU about retaining sibling contact post adoption.
It struck a chord with me as one of those actions that as a SW-er you really wouldn’t want to do – telling a child they couldn’t see their sibling again for a long time because he/she has been adopted, particularly if you strongly disagree with this decision.
I don’t really understand the rationale behind this.
Everything I have read on the topic places primary importance in forming attachments and it seems the primary objective with LAC is always to try to return them to their birth family where possible.
If this isn’t possible, where there is a loving relationship with a sibling, or at least not an abusive relationship, I would have thought following similar logic that even if one child is adopted, retaining a relationship with their birth sibling would be really important. It must be even more difficult to make sense of your identity if you are cut off from all members of your birth family.
“There is evidence that the presence of siblings minimizes the trauma of parental separations or losses. A twelve-month-old child spends nearly as much time interacting with older siblings as with the mother. Siblings may become transitional objects for one another during a placement. This is particularly important with very young children….Separating siblings can make it more difficult to children to deal with separation and loss, begin a healing process, make attachments, and develop a healthy self-image….Attachments are particularly strong between the caregiver child and the younger siblings. Separation of them may lead to lifelong grief.” - Vera Fahlberg, A Child’s Journey Through Placement.
I’m trying to understand the benefits of this lack of contact.
I appreciate from the adoptive family’s viewpoint that forming a new cohesive unit is important but I’m interested to understand when it is in the child’s best interest for that sibling contact to be entirely cut off.
According to S.P. Banks and M.D. Kahn, authors of The Sibling Bond, the bond between brothers and sisters is unique. “It is the longest lasting relationship most people have. It is often longer than the parent-child relationship. Most often it outlives the husband-wife relationship. While contact may lessen throughout the years, a person’s lifetime quest for personal identity is vitally interwoven with his or her siblings.”
I read that these are two of the potential reasons but to me they don’t seem particularly child-centred:
For some adoptive parents, fear is the reason they end contact between their child and his or her siblings. “We’ve had our son now for over a year. He rarely mentions his sister anymore. I guess I don’t see any importance in opening up old wounds. I am afraid of having to deal with his past,” one adoptive dad commented.
Other parents disrupt contact because they feel the child is now a member of their family. A fact that is true, but some parents desire to erase all memory of the child’s life before the adoption and begin with a blank slate. Joan, a new adoptive mom, put it this way: ” I want this child to have the opportunity to go on with his life, without the constant reminder of his past. Keeping him away from his two sisters will do that, won’t it?”
And I read this, which I guess is where my head is at – but I’d be interested to hear about when there are other factors (not things like abusive relationships between the siblings) which I’m not even considering:
• The best interest of the children must be the priority. For children who now have contact with their siblings, family must be open to some type of continued contact. If face-to-face contact is not possible because of distance or other uncontrollable factors, pictures should be exchanged and addresses shared so that the fear of losing the sibling to death or disappearance is minimized.
• Honor the child’s wishes about how and when he want to keep in touch with brothers and sisters. Contact between siblings who have been separated for a length of time must be handled with sensitivity and appropriate timing.
• Recognize that although the child has been adopted into a new family, memories of brothers and sisters cannot be erased, ignored, or denied. Although grafted into a new family tree, a portion of the roots may still cling to another.
I imagine it’s quite difficult for the siblings, particularly the one who remains in care (assuming they do) to see their sibling with a loving adoptive family if they have been less happy in their current situation – but could this be a secondary family for them, almost like distant relatives? Or am I expecting too much from the adoptive family here?
Apologies if this is a not a particularly well thought through post, I think I’m just thinking out loud!
I have adopted the youngest child of four siblings and long term fostered the eldest sib as part of their care plan. Both children consistently ask for contact with their looked after sister who is isolated from all siblings, however the local authority do not think it is in the childrens best interest to have contact even though they all ask to see each other. Sibling contact was a recommendation of a court report presented to the judge regarding separating the children.
ReplyDeleteI agree contact needs to be handled sensitively and with appropriate timing. I believe it may open up past reminders however it also opens up discussion which may enable all children to process their past and validate their feelings.
It's sad to see a child who has attachment difficulties being denied contact with her sister which may have helped with future attachments but we are not in a position to question the powers that be. We are just adoptors.
We adopted the (then youngest) of six siblings who came to us as a group when they were taken into care (we are foster carers with our local authority).
ReplyDeleteFor various reasons, it was impossible to place any of the children together and the four youngest were adopted while the two older ones remained in care.
The Local Authority decreed (I don't think that this is too strong a word) that, while ongoing contact between the adopted children was a good thing and should be encouraged, ongoing contact between the adopted children and their siblings in care was such a bad thing that it would never be allowed.
I did not agree with this at the time and have chipped away over the last five years and we have finally had contact between our child and her siblings in care. There is ongoing contact between the adopted children, but, given the delays before any contact was allowed between the adopted children and their siblings in care, it has been very difficult (i.e. it has not happened yet) to organize group contacts with all the children together.
I appreciate the importance of not allowing ongoing contact with birth family members to threaten or destabilise adoptions, but really fail to see why a Local Authority could come to the conclusion that there should NEVER be contact between a child and their siblings. Sensitively managed, carefully handled, well prepared, professionally supported, whatever is necessary, yes. But NEVER? My mind still boggles at how such a decision could ever be arrived at in any way consistent with the best interests of a child.
We are just adopters, but when it comes to questioning the powers that be, I am with the Dalai Lama: Never give up.
Thank you for your comment, that's the way I see it too, but it's interesting to hear it from adopters' viewpoints. With the fairly new issue that siblings or any members of the birth family can now get in contact through Facebook, it feels to me like trying to do it through official channels becomes even more important, where the support is in place.
ReplyDelete