Attachment

Peaches has been with us over a month, now, but obviously, I'm still meeting people on an almost daily basis who haven't met her yet, or spoken to me since I got her. Inevitably, I get asked 'how is she settling in?' and 'how are you coping?' and 'how are the girls finding her?'. This is great, because these are the main three questions, the biggies, the crux of the matter.
That my replies to all three can honestly be positive, I am happy and grateful. But I must also be bland and saccharine, necessarily skirting issues which are not for public consumption, not giving too much detail, when all folk actually want is reassuring that the adoption is 'going well'.
Every prospective adoptive parent gets tutored about attachment disorder, and most do their own private research, drinking in the signs, memorising the minutiae, hoping that it won't happen to them. But, to my understanding, any child adopted over the age of six months (or otherwise experiencing an incident or disturbance regarding their primary carer) can experience problems with attachment (attachment disorder has to be formally diagnosed), resulting in significant to huge issues affecting family life.
Now to all intents and purposes, Peaches is 'settling in well'. She looks to me as her primary carer, and I suppose like many 11 month old babies, wants to be in my very close vicinity, likes to be held often and cries if I am out of her sight. She also is lively and bright, exploring whichever room she is in, responding to baby games like 'boo' and knocking bricks over, and giving loads of smiles, causing general merriment and joy. She's got good eye contact, and when it's just me and her at the end of the day and she is almost in bed, and I'm staring at her intently, absorbing her eagerly, loving the very smell of her, I feel like there could never be a problem in the world with this little scrap. But...
How do I know? I don't. You can never be complacent. Pasta is well and truly firmly attached, and I to her, but that doesn't mean it will happen with Peaches. A well-meaning social worker acquaintance from school had the 'how is she' conversation with me, and then proceeded to scare the living daylights out of me with casual comments about how all adoptive parents think their child is doing so well, because at first, 'she goes to anyone, she's so friendly', and 'she's so well-behaved'. 'You want tantrums, you want bad behaviour', she said. Not sure how much of this to take with a pinch of salt, really. I know what she means - we should all be looking out for The Signs, and not take anything for granted.
One effect this conversation had, though, was to make me think again about attachment issues with the adoptive children I know; there is at least one with diagnosed, and a couple with undiagnosed attachment disorders. I think adopted children should get a social worker for life. I know the new adoption act enables adoptive parents to be entitled to access a social work assessment if they feel there are issues with their child which have directly arisen from adoption, but that feels a bit weak.
Meanwhile, at Chocolate Towers, Peanut tried to put Peaches to bed for the first time, with me reading Pasta a story in the next room. She did a valiant job, almost succeeding in settling her, but not quite! She wanted that woman who had been putting her to bed for the past month, thanks very much!