When older children argue and act out, it’s often connected to events from their past. How could any child move through 14 foster placements unscathed? But last night, another clash, followed by a heart-to-heart, brought us one piece closer to feeling like a solid family.
Ask AF: Your Older Child’s First Day Home with You
A parent-to-be who’s adopting a four-year-old from foster care solicits advice about what to do that first day home and how to make it easier on the child.
A Helping Hand Through the Foster Adoption Process
Have you considered growing your family through adoption from U.S. foster care, but don’t know where to begin? Contact the experts at AdoptUSKids for personalized guidance and the reassurance that “you don’t have to be perfect to be a perfect parent.”
“Parenting After Foster Adoption—Like Playing Jenga, Backward”
As a father who raised a child from birth and is now parenting older children adopted from foster care, I’ve come to see that the game and pieces may, indeed, be the same, but you have to play in an entirely different way.
Ask AF: Explaining to Our Child That We Can’t Adopt Her Foster Sister
“We just found out that we won’t be able to adopt the child we’ve been fostering. How do we tell the child, and explain to our older daughter?”
Ask AF: Family Interactions After Kinship Adoption
“We are adopting my sister-in-law’s teenage son after fostering him for five years. What can I say to her at family gatherings, to family who still don’t get that we’ll be his legal parents—and to my son, who hears all of this?”
Ask AF: Transitioning Children to Calling Us “Mom” and “Dad”
“My husband and I are working to adopt from foster care. How do we transition a child from calling us our first names to calling us ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’?”
“Letting the 13-Year-Old Drive”
How do you empower a child entering his teen years in a state of defeat, powerlessness, and utter self-disregard? You give him a key and tell him to take off!
“Anniversary”
One year after my daughter came to live with me from foster care, the memory was still too bittersweet for her. But today, two years after becoming mother and daughter, we are ready to celebrate.
Ask AF: How to Encourage a New-Sibling Bond?
“We adopted our 10-year-old daughter as an infant, and adopted her seven- and eight-year-old biological sisters last month. How can we help all three girls bond with each other?”
“Where We All Belong”
When I was a teen, my parents decided to grow our family by adopting from foster care. How did it feel to suddenly gain four new brothers and sisters through adoption?
“We’ve Always Done It That Way”
The uncharted journey of our first Christmas together etched a road of new, heart-warming traditions.
Finding Belonging in Pictures
After adopting older children, these parents found that maintaining a family photo album was a useful tool to encourage bonding.
“Front Porch Children”
Being a foster parent is not for the faint of heart. Your heart swells, loves, breaks, and heals with each placement—and it is all, every moment of it, worth it.
“We Are All Adopted”
From my own search for my roots through adopting older children from foster care, life has taught me to treasure my children’s biological connections while knowing that we don’t have to look alike to belong together.
Ask AF: Handling a Difficult Adjustment After Older Child Adoption
A single mother who’s adopting a boy from foster care seeks advice on a challenging older child adoption adjustment. Parents who have adopted older children respond.
News Brief: Children in Foster Care More Likely to Have Health Problems
For the first time, a study compared the health of children who spent time in foster care with those who hadn’t, and it found higher risk levels on several fronts.
“Adoption Is Not Second Best”
Near-strangers feel compelled to tell me about friends who got pregnant after adopting and say, “There’s still hope….” But I don’t hope for a biological child; I hope for a healthy relationship with my two kids.
Ask AF: When Kids Don’t Ask for Birth Family Contact
A mother who adopted older children asks what to say to her children’s birth grandparent when her children don’t ask for contact.
“Bonding with My Teen in the Baby Department”
My daughter came to me at nine years old, so neither of us knows what she looked like as a baby, but walking these aisles is a way for us to recreate what we both lost.