Length of transitioning varies from child to child. With older children, longer transitions are typically much more beneficial. Transitioning can be very critical to your child’s future and their sense of security.
Our second son was only five and a half months old when he was placed with us. His transition happened in one week’s time. My husband and I spent all but one day with him; we brought him home to play, try out his crib, then brought him back to his foster mother. Though there appeared to be some grief the first few nights he was with us, our son did not have too much trouble trusting us to meet his needs and formed a bond fairly quickly.
The situation with our oldest and first son was quite a bit different. He was in a foster home that’d wanted to adopt him but had been denied to do so. Our son was almost fourteen months old at this time. The family felt in addition to their own pain in saying good-bye, it would be better for our son to be in the position where he was forced to be dependant on us for comfort and therefore they sought a faster transition.
Though we were thrilled to have him with us, this transition wasn’t necessarily best for him. We’d met him for the first time on a Saturday afternoon and took him home to keep forever the next morning. There was not even a twenty-four hour transition! As a result we believe our son became very anxious. He was fearful of me leaving the room. I couldn’t walk a few feet from him without him crying, fearing perhaps I too would leave him. His cries of insecurity and pain were enough to make me want to cry too sometimes. For the first couple years he was with us, I couldn’t go to the store without him having some fear I wouldn’t come back for him.
While I don’t agree with unnecessarily long, drawn out transitions, I think it’s important for children to feel safe during the transfer to their new family so they are less likely to deal with feelings of abandonment.
Please visit these related blogs:
This is the House Where Your Forever Family Lives
Transitioning Your Child to Their New Home
This is Not What I Signed Up For
Melissa is a Families.com Christian Blogger. Visit her blogs at: http://members.families.com/mj7/blog.