adoption reaction!

When Peaches was placed with me, I knew this would have an effect on Pasta. I'd read all the books. I'd been to the support groups. I could have predicted that her excitement about her impending little sister would fade, change, mutate into something entireley different....

Well, here it is, folks, it's an adoption reaction, it's big, it's ugly, it's hard to deal with! Otherwise known as 'challenging behaviour', this adoption reaction has sapped my energy over the summer holidays and turned me into a stressed-out, snappy shouter, who hasn't got a proper strategy for dealing with it, because she used to have an amenable, biddable youngest daughter who was text book co-operative. Now Pasta is suddenly a middle daughter, and NOT THE BABY ANY MORE (crucial, that bit), she is a demon fairy.

Pasta is six. Most six year olds would be able to hold their one-year old sister safely with a bit of initial tuition, on their hips; not Pasta. In the first few days of having Peaches, she dropped her three times on her head. Pasta is mildly dyspraxic, and doesn't have the co-ordination to do this at the moment. Peaches began to become nervous around her, and I banned Pasta from picking her up. Ban - what ban? Every time my back is turned, Pasta tries to pick Peaches up. I can tell immediately from the type of noise Peaches makes what is happening. Poor Pasta, she is only trying to do what she has seen girls everywhere doing.

She swears black is white - she is so oppositional, she frequently has me marvelling at her ingenuity and persistence. She flares up at the slightest provocation (sometimes obligingly provided by Peanut, for her own entertainment). She has worked out which of her behaviours wind me up the most, and specialises in them - these are delaying tactics when on the way to school, and making a fuss about eating her evening meal. She always apologises to me after it is all over, almost as if she has been posessed, and hasn't wanted to behave like that, but has had to.

Peanut gave Pasta a Tracy Beaker dvd, which she watched avidly for weeks on end. She started asking me lots and lots of questions about her birth mum (Tracy is in foster care and is 'let down' by her birth mum, eventually being adopted, but displaying many 'behavioural issues' along the way). She was really identifying with it all, and while I'm so, so glad that at last there is a series on primetime tv which deals with sensitive issues like fostering and adoption, I kind of wish that it were a bit more realistic... I guess then it wouldn't be kids telly, would it... She said to me a few times at bedtime, 'I really miss my birth mum', so we went through some questions that she wanted to ask, and I tried to answer them the best I could. I also snuck in some stuff about how was she feeling about Peaches being around, and suggested that she was feeling sad she wasn't the youngest any more. She liked this as an explanation of how she was feeling, and after a few weeks, this birth mum questioning stuff faded - for now...

I think she's angry. I think she's probably angry at me, she growls at me a lot! I've told her I think she's angry with me.

I try to use humour. I try to ignore. I try the naughty step (though I hate the idea of it). I try reward stickers, and praising good behaviour, blah, blah, blah.

I try shouting. It feels horrible, I sound like a witch, and it gets me nowhere. I get a sore throat. It serves me right. I'm going to stop.

This weekend, Peanut went to a friend's, and co-SLAP#1 looked after Peaches. Pasta and I went to the pictures ON OUR OWN!! This is the first time since having Peaches, it's just been too hard to organise previously. Pasta was lovely. She was so happy! We went on the top deck of the bus! We had hot chocolate! We bought popcorn, and afterwards (whisper it) sweets! I told her that we are going to do this every now and again, that it will just be me and her, because Peaches gets me in the day while she's at school, and Peanut gets her dvd nights. I could tell that she really took this on board, that she now knows that it's actually okay, she's still my lovely girl. The other day, she was carrying too much down the stairs, and I heard the distinctive sound of Pasta falling, hard, from half way down. She was okay, but she must have landed on her back, as there was a bruise down her spine. Poor love, she was justifiably sorry for herself, and so I let her sleep in my bed. Normally, this is verboten, as she sucks her thumb very, very loudly, and is such a wriggler, I get no sleep. But actually, I got plently of sleep, and when I told her in the morning that it had been nice to share a bed with her, and that she hadn't disturbed me, and that we could do it again, the look on her face was worth a million quid.