Why Adopting (or Waiting to Adopt) Can be Harder During the Holidays

It’s the holiday season and you have just received the best gift you could have ever hoped for: a child. But your child may not be as happy about the situation as you are. The reason? The holidays can be an emotional time for adopted children, according to social worker Ellen Singer, of The Center for Adoption Support and Education.

“…Children with positive or negative memories of what happened during this season — of how holidays were celebrated or not — are likely to experience powerful emotions related to their memories,”

Singer writes in her article “Adoption and the Holidays,” (available on adoptionissues.org). “There may be a resurgence of feelings of loss and grief, anxiety-related memories of traumatic events, etc.”

This time can be particularly tough if this is the child’s first holiday with his or her adoptive parents. Children may exhibit strange behavior, Singer says, as a result.

Madeleine Krebs, a clinical coordinator at the Center, says that this can create a significant feeling of letdown for parents who were looking forward to brightening their child’s holidays. “For parents who are eagerly anticipating sharing their holiday traditions with their children, there can be a real disconnect between their expectations and the children’s responses,” she is quoted as saying in Singer’s article.

So how can you make holiday time easier for your child? Here are some tips.

• If your child acts like she or he is in mourning for another person, place or time, treat the situation with the appropriate amount of reverence. “Light a candle, say a prayer, encourage the child to share stories,” says Krebs.
• Your child may feel odd if he or she was raised with a different religion than yours. This is an issue that is especially difficult for adopted children and their families. How do you respect their past traditions, and yet, also, if you choose to, introduce her to yours? Krebs says that while “incorporating traditions can certainly be more complicated if the religion celebrated is different from the adoptive family’s … many families do decide to incorporate aspects of the different religion to honor their child’s past if they believe it is significant for their child.” Ultimately, though, you must make the call, Krebs says.
• You can also incorporate holiday traditions that originate from your child’s birth country, says Singer.
• Remember, your child has expectations as well about how the holiday will be celebrated. Do you know what those expectations are? If not, you’ll want to find out, Daphne Saunders-Houston, a therapist from the Center, says in the article.
• Create new traditions, suggests Singer. “These new family traditions can help to foster the connections between the adopted child and the larger family network.”

Likewise, the holidays can also be tough on those still waiting to adopt. Dawn Smith-Pliner, of the group Friends in Adoption, offers these hints on the site library.adoption.com:

• Be kind to yourself and your partner. “Take care of yourselves. Talk to each other. Determine your needs. Compliment one another on your strengths; recognize difficult emotions (anger, sadness, jealously) are okay to have….” she says. “Help each other come to terms with these emotions or find productive ways to vent.”
• Don’t be afraid to back out of a holiday event or two if you are unable to cope with your emotions. Just be sure to respect everyone’s agendas by letting your feelings be known ahead of time, if possible. For example. “if even the thought of attending midnight mass with your entire extended family on Christmas Eve makes you feel sick, start talking now to family members to let them know of your feelings,” says Smith-Pliner.
• What if you determine you can’t manage the holiday season at all? Then don’t. “If you have excused yourself from your normal holiday routine, plan a vacation,” says Smith-Pliner. If you don’t have enough money for such an extravagance, then think of low-cost alternatives, she adds. The important thing is to have fun, and not stress over the waiting. With any luck, it will soon be a distant memory, once you get to hold your beautiful child in your arms.

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