Mom of adopted teen tells her story.

Close your eyes and picture a beautiful summer day. Outside your window, your five-year-old daughter is chasing butterflies. Her red ringlets are bouncing, and she’s giggling non-stop. That was my five-year-old.

Close your eyes again and picture a dark, sullen, irritable teenager.  She hates getting up for school, her grades are dropping and she has been skipping classes.  She’s secretive, ignores her curfew and has been making small, superficial cuts on her arms with her razor.  She listens to dark music with lyrics about death, blood and misery.  She says she hates her home, her family and, at times, talks about not wanting to live.

How is this the same daughter who once chased butterflies?

There are many teens like my daughter.  They come from loving homes with involved and caring parents. They are artistic, creative, intelligent, social and athletic. And like my daughter, they are engaged in self-destructive behavior.

I have gotten to know some of their parents because we belong to a support group for adoptive parents of struggling teens. Apparently, many adoptive teens have a difficult time in adolescence: their numbers in therapeutic programs are disproportionately high. Many adopted teens struggle significantly with identity, fear of abandonment, rejection and self-esteem.

In our case, the change in our daughter was gradual and, at first, appeared to be normal adolescent behavior.  She began to drift away from her activities and friends. She also began to identify with the alternative “Goth” culture.  We tried to be open to her desire to express herself differently.  We hoped that she was simply experimenting with different identities in order to figure out who she would become.

But for our daughter, her behavior moved beyond normal adolescent experimentation.  She became depressed and lost all interest in school and family. We became desperately concerned for her safety. When she refused to go to school and threatened to run away, we took rapid action that involved a therapeutic wilderness program and a therapeutic boarding school.

At the time, we did not know that her struggles might be related to adoption. We have since learned that these behaviors are not uncommon for adopted teens who may feel anger about abandonment by their birthparents and fear that it could happen again. These thoughts, while not always conscious, do drive behavior.

Adopted teens have an added struggle beyond typical adolescence. They need to connect to their past and we, their parents, must respect their feelings, talk to them about their birthparents and join them on their adoption journey, including the good and the bad. Their lives are a puzzle with many missing pieces.

My husband and I were surprised that our open discussions about adoption were not enough. In fact, the absence of specifics about her birthparents may have contributed to some of our daughter’s struggles. Since she was little, we talked about her adoption and how lucky we felt to be her parents, but we hadn’t shared details about her birthparents.  For instance, we never connected her artistic talent to her birthmother.  We just never thought to share that with her.

Some parents in our group have reunited their children with birthmothers. We have not yet facilitated a reunion, nor have we shared some painful specifics about her birthparents. Also, we have not shared that she has half-siblings.  Because of her current struggles, we are waiting for the “right” time.

The power of a parent support group has been enormous. I see people who, despite their deep love for their kids, still face serious difficulties. We are, in many ways, strangers to one another, but once a month, we come together and share intimate aspects of our parenting lives.  We reveal untold secrets about our kids because we all “get it.”

Just knowing other parents with similar issues makes coping easier for me.  We have also made conscious changes to our family life. We communicate better and more openly, and we discuss our children’s adoption more often. The most important lesson for my husband and me is that as parents, we cannot control or fix every problem. This is their life and their journey, and we need to “let go” so they can take it – with the ups and the downs. When they fall, we can help them up and show them love and support, but we are learning to let them experience the consequences of their mistakes.

Today, my daughter’s struggles are more typical of late adolescence. Her struggle with adoption may recur beyond adolescence and into adulthood, but our family is better equipped to cope. I believe, deep in my heart, that my daughter will become a wonderful adult and make contributions to society in her own special way.  I now have a sense of hope and optimism that all but vanished a couple of years ago.  And, thanks to my support group, I know that I’m not alone.

For questions or comments, email anadoptivemom@gmail.com.

Professional Reponse

By Joyce Maguire Pavao, EdD, LCSW, LMFT

Adolescence is complicated for everyone, but it can be especially complicated for adopted teens. The issues of identity, belonging and feeling different loom large for all teens, but are expanded for adopted ones, especially if it is a closed, international or trans-racial adoption.

During adolescence, it can be hard for a parent to see that the sullen teenager in front of you is the same giggling little girl who used to catch butterflies in the yard, but, in fact, she is.  Often, she will return, but the road is long and hard for many adopted children and for their parents and loved ones.

Adopted teens are, in fact, disproportionately represented in therapeutic programs. One explanation lies in their early experiences. Many of these teens have suffered loss and trauma, and many have been in multiple placements in orphanages and foster homes before arriving at their forever family.  Their early suffering can cause depression, anxiety and an inability to trust, and can lead to self-destructive behavior. The degree of trauma and loss may correspond to the complexity of these issues.

When gaps exist about their birth family’s history, the teen may fill in the blanks with perceived details. The resulting story may project an alternate reality.  Occasionally, teens visualize a lower socio-economic peer group in an attempt to bring themselves closer to their perception of the past. It is not unusual for adopted teens to hang out with kids who resemble a world from where they think they came.

Anger may be one of the prevalent emotions expressed by an adopted teen—anger about abandonment by their birth parents, anger towards their adoptive parents and a system that keeps secrets from them about themselves. Therapeutic wilderness programs and boarding schools might be helpful, but in some cases, they can exacerbate the feeling of alienation from others.  There is no one-size-fits-all for children and teens, and it is best to seek consultation in making decisions around how to treat these personal growth issues gone awry.

Generalizations are difficult because, in reality, everyone’s story (as I always say) is ‘a case study of one.’ Support groups help reassure parents and give them the strength to grow and change with their teen. My strongest recommendation is for parents to talk honestly with their kids. Details about the past, even the painful details, compose a person’s history.  When parents wait to share important information about their child’s past, the delay may feel like a breach of trust. Teens may interpret this as, “Things were kept from me, about me and you don’t trust me with my truth.” Omissions in truth may cause the teen to believe that you, the parent, cannot be trusted.  This is part of the downward spiral that an adopted teen may sometimes encounter.

Adolescence is complex; adoption is complex. It’s important to understand that an adopted teen may have struggles on top of regular adolescent angst. You can best support them through honesty and dialogue. In the end, most teens scrape through adolescence to emerge in their late 20’s, resembling that giggling little girl catching butterflies once more.

Joyce Maguire Pavao, founder and CEO of Center For Family Connections, Inc. (http://www.kinnect.org/) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a lecturer in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and a nationally known trainer and author.  She also works with individuals and families concerning foster care and adoption issues. Joyce believes her most valuable credential is living as an adopted person with wonderful birth and adoptive family connections.

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