A Curious Experience

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FullerH

Joined
Nov 25, 1998
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I left the office last night and got caught up in the huge crowd leaving the immigration demonstration on the Mall. Since I walk with a cane, I was able to get a seat, even though I had to backtrack three stations on the subway's Orange Line to even get into a car. I was sitting amidst a family of Hispanics, all very excited and very happily chatting away in Spanish. I was directly facing a 3-4 year old grl sitting in a lap and she looked so like my daughter, Teresa, at that age that my heart went out to her. I finally asked if the family came form El Salvador, which is the country from which we had adopted Teresa. They said that they were, indeed, from El Salvador and I said that I had an adopted daughter from there. I showed them some pictures, including one of her when we got her at 3+ years old and some taken recently. Everyone, the women especially, were sighing and and getting all misty-eyed. One of the older men, sizing me up as a relatively well-off American, asked how she was doing. I said, truthfully, that she had come out of the war there and that she had had a very hard time of it. I said that she was now 19, was living with friends, and working as a waitress at an expensive restaurant. I said that I had wished for more, but that I cannot make her do more than she is ready to do, and that includes college. The fellow just shook his head and said that he was sorry for her.

For those of you who have not followed my various postings on Teresa, she suffers from Reactive Attachment Disorder along with various learning disabilities that resulted from her malnutrition and other infancy problems. She has struggled very hard with all of these for the fifteen years that she has been with us and so have we.
 
I wish her a happy , enjoyable life FullerH.
Sometimes the past is hard to put behind , perhaps as she grows up she will deal with the past okay and learn to look towards a brighter future.

Best of wishes.

Todd
 
FullerH,
Early childhood trauma, whether it be physical, mental or spiritual, hits a person hard and stays with them for the rest of their lives. It makes life really tough, too, because the damage never really goes away. You can't think it away or wish it away, it's just there to affect about every aspect of your life. It's very sad that, in human affairs, the innocent always seem to be the ones to suffer first, and most, simply because they're weaker and more vulnerable.
The good thing for your daughter is that she had you to make things much better for her after that early stage of life. You couldn't undo what had already been done, but I'm sure you did everything you could to make her growing up years better and much more positive. Her life, I'm sure, is infintely better for the commitment you made to her and all the love she was given, and her future is better, also. Of that I'm certain.
 
Probably the best thing in the world that happened to her, was being brought into a family that loves her so much.
 
Hugh: We adopted a daughter at 4 1/2 years old from Tennessee who was later diagnosed with reactive attachment disorder. She is now 24. People who have not been through it cannot appreciate how much pure hell raising these children can be.

Let me assure you that if you have kept her alive and out of prision until age 19, and she is holding a job and making some progress, you have done exceedingly well.
 
Thanks, MikeH, it's really good to hear form one who has been there. We feel pretty much as you describe it. We also feel as if we have been through a war ourselves.
 
Hey Hugh,

We've talked about your daughter in the past via email. I still say that she's much better off than she would have been without you.

These days I find people's experience with adoption especially interesting. What amazes me most is how cavalier people are about the issue of adoption. As you know, I've been trying to get pregnant for quite some time now. It amazes me how idiotic people can be about it. I cannot tell you how many people have said, "You need to adopt a kid, and then you'll get pregnant." :mad: I cannot begin to tell you how angry that makes me. I feel like ripping their heads off. :mad: First of all, adoption is NOT something you do to take your mind off of infertility. An adopted child needs to be a wanted child. It needs to come as a result of thoughtful deliberation and planning. You need to want that child. I still believe that I want to adopt, but I want to adopt after I have any natural children that God may give me. That way my adopted child will always know that he/she was truly wanted and not just someone to fill a gap for a period of time. :rolleyes:

I must admit that your story was one that scared me. It must be so difficult to lovingly raise a child where the feelings aren't reciprocated. I wonder is she is capable of having any loving relationships, or is she simply cut off? Feel free to email me if this is too personal. Or tell me to shut up if you wish. I get that all the time. :D
 
Thought I'd chime in on the adoption thing.
I was adopted at about 4 weeks old , I have no idea nor do I care who my "blood" folks were , the folks I consider mine , are the ones that adopted me , that said.... I am eternally grateful my parents adopted me and gave me the interesting life I have had.
I love my folks to no end despite past problems and would do anything for them anytime , anywhere.

FullerH and others who have adopted on BF , I take my hat off to you and tip my cup of coffee in your direction. :thumbup:

Cheers ,
Todd Fries
 
FullerH,
I have several family members who are adopted. No, it often doesn't work out as well as the parents might hope, but I assure you that Teresa is better off because of what you've done for her.

I'm about to become a dad too, and it's been on my mind lately. I'll do what I can until the child becomes an adult, then hope for the best. It's what my parents did, what their parents did, and to be honest it's all you can do too.

Best Wishes,
-Bob
 
I am certain that Teresa is better off here than in El Salvador, given her temper and her anger. Had she stayed in that very patriarchal and macho society, she would most likely have been dead by now, killed by someone who could not deal with her. That is the simple God's truth. Neither Georgia nor I believe in hitting children; in our own experience, it did no good and taught nothing except hitting. But there were times when she provoked both of us to strike out at her. Her shrink said that it was understandable, that she could provoke a saint to anger.

Jennifer, one of the things that is most significant in Reactive Attachment Disorder appears to be that you have adopted a child that is beyond infancy, that has begun to form a personality without a proper mother figure with whom to bond. That child is then unable to bond with its adoptive mother and father. Teresa has bonded more with our son as her brother than she ever bonded with either of us as parents. It is the children adopted as infants that do not seem to ave this problem, as witness rebeltf. In Teresa's case, she saw her mother or a mother figure shot down in front of her by the police when she was about 18 months old and was then abandoned in San Salvador. But whoever abandoned her left her with a tomato selling woman in a market just across the street from the largest orphanage in San Salvador, thereby assuring that she would be taken tot he orphanage. Before you condemn too hard, remember that this was at the height of the civil war in El Salvador and war does strange things to people. Georgia and I feel that whoever it was cared enough not to turn her loose to run wild on the streets. It was another eighteen months of paperwork before we could adopt her, so she was something over three when we got her.
 
I am an avid advocate of adoption. We adopted my son, now age 29, at
2 1/2 months old. He has been nothing but a joy and never any trouble.

Kimberly's birth mother was, to describe it as briefly as I can, a bisexual bipolar drug addict pedophile stripper. Kim was badly neglected very early on, left to lie in dirty diapers for days, that kind of thing. She may have been overtly abused, I don't know for sure, but with the many people in and out of her birth mother's life, it is possible, even likely. As the woman's own mother said to me, "She was usually shacked up with a man or a woman and didn't really care which." In one of her really brief marriages, the guy brought a step-son with him, only to abandon him and leave. The step-son, in turn, ran away from her at age 15. Genetic tests have shown that the step-son is Kimberly's birth father. The birth mother was later murdered by a female roommate who stabbed her to death, tried to dispose of the body in a bathtub with household cleaners, lye, etc., and then dismembered her and moved her to a closet. We learned all of these things much later, when Kim was a teenager in counseling.

Kim was placed with a very good, loving foster family, and then adopted by us at 4 1/2 years, but by that time her path was set. Very charming, able to manipulate people at an early age, a natural leader, an accomplished liar, thief, drug user and dealer, unable to make any emotional attachments, recognizing no authority, whether God, law, parents. Psychologists told us to watch our back, that she was a sociopath, and that "this is where serial killers come from." She hatched at least one plot to posion us, but was unsuccessful. Accusing us of physical abuse, she tried to use the court system to get her way, and ended up in her teenage years alternating between conning various foster homes and being institutionalized. She asked to come back home at about age 20, seemed to be doing well, had some jobs, enrolled in a junior college.

Then, a month after she turned 21, she was hit by a car in a hit and run.
Not expected to live ,then comatose, then vegetative, at some point she had a profound religious experience. She swears to this day that Jesus appeared, told her that she was going to be ok, to hold on, it was going to take some time. She now lives with us, is 24, is able to prepare meals, do her own laundry, etc. She must use a walker and cannot speak due to brain stem injury. She is now one of the most upbeat, joyous people you will ever meet. I am retired now and take care of her full time, as my wife still works. Our relationship is as great now as it used to be horrible.

We loved our children. Our son was easy to love. With Kimberly we had to work hard at it every day. but now, that love is being adundently returned.

Kim will be at Blade this year. If you see a young, short, dark-haired woman using a walker or a wheelchair, speak to her. She is very outgoing, and will brighten your day, I promise.
 
MikeH, your story brings tears of sadness and of joy at the same time. I can only pray that Teresa will not need the same kind of trauma that Kimberly needed to see her way clear to appreciating what we have given her, including the love that we have given. What you describe is a classic, if extreme, case of Reactive Attachment Disorder, but you adopted Kimberly before anyone had thought of that problem. We were just before the cutting edge with Teresa when we adopted her in 1989. What brought on the study of the problem was the adoption of the children from the orphanages from behind what had been the Iron Curtain, especially Romania and Russia. These children, if above infancy, were unable to bond with their new parents and were causing all kinds of problems. Our first pshrink was a classical sort and had no idea how to deal with the problem and we wasted about 3 yerars and countless dollars with her. Then we found Amy Grier and Kathy Moss, two of the very earliest therapists in the field. They helped Teresa some and they kept us, and particularly Georgia, sane throughout the most trying times.

There is an online support group for anyone who thinks that they have a child with RAD, and it does not necessarily have to be an adopted child, or so I understand. Their address is http://adsg.syix.com/ and I cannot recommend strongly enough that you be in contact with them and that you get help. You WILL NEED it.
 
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