So going along with my last post about sibling connection\u2026another thing that doesn\u2019t seem to be talked about too much in foster and adoption is the impact when an older sibling going away to college. If you\u2019ve read any of my previous posts, you already know that in our case, our biological sons are 13 and 11 years, respectively, older than our youngest son who was adopted from foster care. At the time our youngest came into our home at three months old, the older ones were (you guessed it) 11 and 13.<\/p>\n
At the time the age difference was nice in that they were very helpful, and they were (mostly) interested in learning about him and how to best help him. Over time, they have grown close to him, and him to them, in spite of the huge age difference. They are definitely very important to him, and they are all securely attached to one another.<\/p>\n
However, when the youngest was 5, our oldest son went away to college. And to be honest, I kind of expected waterworks from the youngest. Instead I got anger.\u00a0 Looking back, I should not have been surprised, but I was\u2026maybe because my sad looked like sad, and even though I should not have assumed his would be like mine, I did make that assumption\u2026but unfortunately his sad looked like mad.<\/p>\n
Needless to say, the whole experience was hard for all of us, but especially for our youngest son. He didn\u2019t understand why his brother was gone and then back and then gone and then back\u2026every few weeks he\u2019d come home for a weekend. Unfortunately (and you may have already figured this out based on our oldest son\u2019s age), I finally had our youngest son somewhat understanding that his older brother doesn\u2019t really live with us anymore; he just comes home over breaks.<\/p>\n
And then Covid it happened and our oldest had to come home for months\u2026so obviously that was very confusing. Understandably, we had the learning curve all over again when he left again for college the following September. But honestly\u2026in spite of logically understanding what was happening and why his brother came and went, it didn\u2019t make the emotional piece any better for him.<\/p>\n
And all the while, sad looked like mad.<\/p>\n
And then in year three of this season of \u201cwhy is my brother here and then gone all the time?\u201d, the other older brother also left for college\u2026and the the fallout from that was immense.<\/p>\n
Our youngest had all sorts of behaviors leading up to it and following it. I personally believe it\u2019s because he was a little bit older, a little bit wiser and he KNEW what was coming\u2026that this other brother also would not live with us full-time anymore. And he just didn\u2019t like that.<\/p>\n
So he\u2019d be angsty and angry for a while and then he would smooth out\u2026and then inevitably, one of the brothers would come home for a visit. And the apple cart would be upset again for a few days.<\/p>\n
And please do not hear what I am not saying: in no way am I blaming the older boys\u2026 It\u2019s definitely not their fault and of course I was thrilled when they wanted to come home. It was also helpful that they tried to be as sensitive to his anger as they could (which wasn\u2019t always perfect because they were still teens at that point, but I do give them major props for trying).<\/p>\n
But especially as time went on, they would try to have their next visit home planned ahead so they could tell him when they left how many days or weeks it will be before they would see each other again. And that thoughtfulness definitely seemed to help him understand that this wouldn\u2019t be a really long time.<\/p>\n
In a now-nine year old\u2019s mind it\u2019s still long, but not unbearable.<\/p>\n
Now some of you might be reading this and are confused by his anger response, so just a quick word about that: sometimes kids from hard places don\u2019t process their emotions properly and so an emotion isn\u2019t displayed as it typically would be; for our son, sad comes out as mad for him\u2026and it took us a while to figure that out.<\/p>\n
So to be totally transparent, we say \u201chis sad is mad\u201d but truly it\u2019s more than just mad; the behaviors we were experiencing with him were escalated anger, (like explosive), as well as high anxiety (lots of chewing on his fingernails). Behaviors you expect in a highly-anxious person, so we, as his parents, just have to always keep that in mind\u2026even though he understands that his brothers are leaving, or they just left, or he simply misses them, he can be emotionally triggered by that and we have to be on our \u201cA Game\u201d to pick up the pieces\u2026and also to realize as soon as we see his mad, we have to address not only the mad behaviors, but understand it in the frame of sadness.<\/p>\n
And at the risk of sounding like a broken record: That\u2019s where keeping ourselves calm, and keeping ourselves regulated, even in the midst of his sadness, is where we can help him continue to heal\u2026and understand that the loss he\u2019s feeling is not a forever loss, it\u2019s just temporary, even though both losses might feel the same way to him as a nine year old from hard places.<\/p>\n
Obviously there are many other possibilities when a) a behavior could manifest that doesn\u2019t show true emotion, and b) it could be the foster and\/or adopted child going away first\u2026and the dynamics might be completely different than in this scenario. Regardless of the situation in your home, I hope this helps you understand that the behaviors or emotions you\u2019re seeing in your child might not be the actual ones they\u2019re feeling; true emotions might, instead, be masked under something easier for them to express. It\u2019s only when you come alongside them and walk through the struggle with them that you can help learn the code to decipher their actual feelings.<\/p>\n
Sincerely,<\/p>\n
Kris<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
So going along with my last post about sibling connection\u2026another thing that doesn\u2019t seem to be talked about too much in foster and adoption is the impact when an older sibling going away to college. If you\u2019ve read any of my previous posts, you already know that in our case, our biological sons are 13 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kriss-corner"],"yoast_head":"\n