On the FRUA board today, someone asked a very good, very important question. How do you know when your child has attached? What is the goal to which you aspire? How do you measure your success (or lack of it?)


The person who asked the question had adopted an older child a little over a month ago. Certainly, in my mind, the answer depends considerably on the age of the child. As a side note, on one of the adoption.com forums, someone stated the belief that adopting an infant would preclude them from dealing with attachment issues!


I operate under the assumption that all children who leave a biological mother and go into care for whatever reason will suffer a profound loss of that biological connection. And that is true if the child is a newborn or 8 years old. That loss will manifest itself differently in a newborn or a one year old than it will in an 8 year old, but the core issue—the loss and the trauma of that loss—remain the same. If you add prenatal exposure to alcohol or drugs, denial of pregnancy, poor nutrition, poor maternal mental health (as in living in an abusive relationship, depressed, etc.) or a myriad of other factors that affect the fetus, you have just compounded the trauma.


If that child (with or without an adverse prenatal environment) is born into a dangerous, unpredictable and unwelcoming post-natal environment, you again compound the effects of the eventual loss of birthmom. So, you start with a profound loss—a given for ANY child who becomes an adoptee—and you multiply it many times over with each additional abuse the child suffers. There is, in my opinion, no way that child enters into an adoptive relationship without carrying SOME baggage.


I believe there are several factors that heavily influence the effects of those early losses on future development. Genetics, the environment of the adoptive home, and the child’s decisions all have a great deal to do with the outcome of their lives. So, parents, that leaves you with, at the very best, less than half the cards. Sobering, isn’t it?


I promise to get to “measuring attachment” in the next post.

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