Living the theory

We’re having sibling issues at the moment. Or more specifically, Little is having sibling issues. We’ve had a massive increase in CPV and violence towards Tiny from her in the last couple of weeks and we’re at a loss as to how to stop it. It’s always triggered by the same thing - Tiny getting something she sees as unfair. Saturday’s outburst was triggered by him having a play date (she has play dates all the time, this was his second ever!). Sunday’s was triggered by him using my computer (they’re allowed an hour each for games at the weekend and she’d already had her turn). She was intent on hurting us and him, constantly running off looking for new missiles to throw at us then running back with a grin on her face. She ripped up and knocked over things he had made and would not let up shoving her face in his and intimidating him. It culminated with me and him locked in the bathroom while she tried to bash the door down with his toy guitar, and then, when she’d eventually run ...

We’ve recently braved travelling abroad with the children for the first time. Staying away from home is a challenge for us all, and is an area where we’ve been gradually building up their tolerance over the past year or so. We started off with one night away at my parents’ house and have very gradually increased the number of nights. We’re up to three nights now, so the time felt right to attempt a trip to see their other set of grandparents, who live abroad. The trip involved a number of firsts… namely their first trip abroad, and their first time on a plane, and we’d done a lot of thinking about possible triggers and had planned accordingly. We paid a bit extra to secure a sensibly timed flight from a small airport not too far away and created a plan together of how we’d get there, what the flight would be like, some of the things we’d do while away, and how we’d get back. We made both of the children visual planners to track how long we’d be away and how close we were to going h...

Little has had a really good few months. Something clicked with her over the summer holidays and she seemed to be feeling so much more settled and confident in herself. I don’t know if it was the adoption order finally being granted (she was very aware of what this entailed and had been anxious to legally change her name for ages) or us having all spent a prolonged period at home being a family without the distraction of school, but things just felt a lot calmer. She’s had the occasional wobble since and we’ve still had to be very aware of her triggers and head things of at the pass, but on the whole things have been stable for the last 5-6 months. With her at least anyway. Tiny has made sure to fill the void so we don’t get too complacent, but that’s a whole other story... Something has happened in the last week or so though that has sent Little into a tailspin. We’re still not entirely sure what is at the heart of it... her behaviour was gradually slipping over a few days last we...

As far as looks go, our children are very obviously siblings. Personality-wise, however, they couldn’t be more different. I’m not sure whether these different personalities are innate, or as a result of their unique experiences in the birth family and in the womb - one, by virtue of being older, spent a lot longer in their birth family, while the younger one, due to circumstances at the time of birth mum’s pregnancy, probably had a more difficult in utero experience. Where one is a thrill-seeker, and doesn’t even seem to see danger, the other is naturally over-cautious and really struggles with high anxiety levels. Little will launch herself into a new situation without a backwards glance, and constantly wants to go faster, higher and longer. She relishes new experiences and is very happy with changes in routine. Tiny, on the other hand, hangs back in any new situation. Unpredictability leads to heightened anxiety - sometimes to the point that it makes him physically ill. He has seve...

This is a guest post I wrote elsewhere for National Adoption week, but thought I'd reproduce it here since I haven't posted in a while. Trauma is a bit of a buzzword in the adoption community at the moment. The overwhelming majority, if not all, children who are adopted today will have experienced trauma of some kind, be it in person or in utero. The erroneous belief that a stable, loving home is all that is needed to make this go away is starting to give way to a deeper understanding of the effects of trauma, and the fact that whether  they consciously remember it or not, this trauma will have a lifelong effect in several areas of that child's life. "PTSD is a good definition for acute trauma in adults. (However when the trauma occurs in childhood) because children’s brains are still developing, trauma has a much more pervasive and long-range influence on their self-concept, on their sense of the world and on their ability to regulate themselves.” (Bessel van der ...