Complications in therapy with adopted children.

Abstract

HE present study arose because it was our impression that a rather T I arge percentage of the children seen at the Hacker Clinic were adopted children, and that they as a group were extremely disturbed. Beyond the seriousness of their condition, they and their parents presented unusually difficult treatment problems. It was our intent to examine these cases as a group in order to determine what specific role, if any, the fact of the a d o p tion played in the etiology of the problems presented and in the treatment difficulties.Our original material was based on 8 cases of adopted children under 12 years of age, these representing about 10 per cent of the case load of children in this age group. The over-all study dealt with the psychodynamics of both parent and child, but for this presentation we will deal mainly with the child-the meaning of the adoption to him, and how it seemed to enter into his treatment. For purposes of study, we discarded one case, considering it too atypical, for here the child was the older of two boys who had been adopted by an unmarried man! Of the remaining cases 3 of the children were highly schizoid, with severe withdrawal trends and bizarreness in behavior; one showed a beginning narcissistic character development with marked acting-out tendencies; and the others were anxious, impulse-ridden children, showing considerable oral aggression.All but the two youngest children had been in treatment previously, this being described as unsuccessful by the parents. Reports from the previous therapists indicated that the attitudes especially of the mothers had mitigated against a more favorable outcome. Warned in advance about this we made special efforts to help these parents to understand and accept the role they needed to play in the treatment process. In spite of this, we too hit snags which led us to feel that there were some factors at work which were a t least intensified by the fact of the adoption. Two of the children had to be placed in residential settings, because in one instance the parents' own adjustment was so precarious, and in the other, the mother took to her bed, forcing the husband to choose between her and the child. One child had to be seen without the mother's being carried concomitantly in treatment; she confined her contacts with us to frequent telephoning, complaining that her daughter was not progressing fast enough. Even in the four cases

Emotionally Disturbed, Adopted Adolescents: Early Patterns of Family Adaptation

“…ALTHOUGH approximately 2 to 3.5% of children in the United States under age of 18 are adopted (22, 43), adopted children are referred for psychological treatment two to five times as frequently as their nonadopted peers. This finding has been replicated in such diverse countries as Great Britain, Israel, Poland, Sweden, and the United States (7, 9, 15, 19, 21, 29, 33, 38, 42 ‐ 44, 49, 51, 56, 57).…”

Family secrets in family therapy: An ethical dilemma

“…It should be noted, however, that in biological parent-child relationships, overprotectiveness has often been interpreted as a reactive formation to unconscious feelings of rejection toward the children. Eiduson and Livermore (1953) found that adoptive mothers of disturbed children often had problems providing firm limits on their adoptees' behavior because the situation touched on their repressed rejecting feelings. When the child retaliated angrily to discipline, the mother reneged.…”

Open and Closed Adoption: A Developmental Conceptualization

“…A second line of evidence supporting the sentiment that traditional, closed adoption is a univocal, negative experience has been reinforced in the clinical literature primarily by members of the psychoanalytic community (7, 12, 20, 36, 51, 61, 73 ‐ 75, 84, 108, 119, 125, 147). Several analysts have acknowledged that adoption is often of great physical, psychological, and social value to all parties concerned (10, 58, 77, 149).…”