Population studied
Thirty-seven families were eligible for the study (). We failed to contact six families because of changes of address or telephone number. Seven families refused to participate. The reasons for refusal to participate included protection of the child, fear of discussing life difficulties, and fear of “exterior espionage” in the form of a link between the investigators and the service of Mother and Child Care. After exclusions, 24 families were interviewed, for a median time of 45 minutes (). Data saturation was estimated to be achieved at 20 interviews, and was confirmed by four additional interviews. The characteristics of the families are described in .
| Table 1Characteristics of the 24 families who agreed to participate in the study. |
How the decision is made to choose adoption
The most frequent reason for choosing adoption was infertility; 14 couples had a long history of medical assisted conception (MAC). For these, the interviews aroused a great deal of emotion in the mothers, who admitted that this period was a physical and mostly a psychological ordeal, in which MAC was viewed only as a technical science with little place for humanity and emotional support: “I'm not angry with the medical staff… They are technical, that's their job, but at the same time, they are not psychologists”; “We are only numbers”; “Somebody with less character than I, it would break them”. Families also experienced psychological resistance to stopping the procedure of MAC after several years of unsuccessful attempts: “It wasn't the choice we made and then it's difficult to reach the milestone and to imagine that one won't have a child who comes from yourself or your husband”. For infertile couples, the decision to adopt is also made difficult by the fear that the parent–child relationship won't be established and “the fear of not loving him”. Most of the time, the decision to adopt was made after meeting friends, acquaintances or relatives who had experimented with adoption, rather than by following a suggestion made by the MAC medical staff. In fact, the adoptive couples stated that MAC staff did not make such suggestions: “Specialists in MAC never talk about anything other than medical techniques”.
In some cases, the reason for adoption was to continue with life as a single person, combined with the desire for a child. Other couples adopted when they already had a natural child, either because they were experiencing difficulty in having a second child, or because the mother did not want to experience pregnancy for a second time, or because she had had experienced problems with delivery the first time and did not want to repeat the experience.
The long route to international adoption
Obtaining agreement for adoption was described by most families as an ordeal; they had the feeling that they must justify their desire to be parents. Moreover, the administrative procedures were experienced as being complicated. The information documents provided were experienced as being too dense and complex, whereas the oral information provided was insufficient and sometimes contradictory.
During the application process, prospective parents must determine how many children they can and want to adopt, and they may express certain restrictions on the gender, phenotype and health condition (medical and the carrying of disabilities) of the child they project to adopt.
Phenotype was a major criterion used by families. Seven families felt reluctant to adopt a black child because they feared that it would be subject to racism from other members of the family or inhabitants of their village or city. Some wanted the adoption to “be as invisible as possible”, in the sense that others would not perceive the child as being different in any way. At the opposite extreme, two families chose a black child at the initial phase of their project because they wanted “to avoid any possible confusion with a biological one”.
The health of potential adoptees was another major criterion. Most families refused children with special needs from the beginning of the procedure: “We didn't want to endanger our family”; “We felt unable to educate a child who would have problems at the beginning”. However, some of them faced a dilemma when they received a proposal for a handicapped child when they had refused a child with special needs in their initial project: “Here we had a terrible Thursday because we had to say if we would take him or not […] my husband helped me because I couldn't say no […] It was a tough episode.”
Criteria used by families that were of lesser importance were age and gender. All wanted a child “as young as possible” because older children were considered “at risk”. The age of the adopted child on arrival was compatible with the one desired by the family in 81% of cases (). The vast majority of families were indifferent to gender, except for two who wanted a girl, either to reduce the delays in the procedure (in China, girls are less difficult to adopt) or to have a girl after a previous boy.
The families had chosen international adoption because they perceived the procedures as quicker and because they may not meet the criteria to be allowed to adopt nationally. After obtaining agreement, the family has to choose the country from which the adoptee would come. The most important reason for choosing a particular country was the knowledge of a relative or friends who had successfully adopted from this country and who may provide help with local contacts and/or information about the administrative process. Other reasons that may have determined the choice included the existence of a relative who originated from the country (or another similar link), the phenotype of the child, and the knowledge that the time needed to complete the adoption procedure is shorter in certain countries.
The majority of families chose to apply on their own, rather than engage the services of Accredited Adoption Bodies (AABs are private-law legal entities that act as intermediaries for the adoption of minors under 15 years old). This was because being admitted to the AABs is associated with lengthy procedures, selective criteria such as age limitations and the proposal of children with special needs or older children, which may not fit with the initial ideas of the future parents. In support of their choice, families who used AABs said that they did not want to have any doubt about the legality of the adoption and that they needed support to go through the administrative process and to organize their stay in the adoptee's country.
Generally, the financial compensation for the adoption was fixed at the beginning, with no subsequent problems. However, several families, who adopted in Eastern Europe, reported corruption to an amount of at least 11 000 Euros to pay such persons as go-betweens, translators, and legal representatives. Several also had doubts about the real necessity for repeated expensive administrative procedures or repeated journeys. Some families said, without any prompting, that the cost would prevent them from starting a new process of adoption.
The adoption process after obtaining agreement lasted from 1 to 4 years, a period that was perceived as quite short for most of the families, especially for those who had experienced MAC: “Once decided, it goes fast”.
First contacts and attachments
Some transitory reactions of fear or shyness were reported, but generally these lasted for only a few days: “[…] he was very panicked, he was afraid because I was white […]. Therefore I didn't manage to hug him. He screamed as soon as I touched him […]. It lasted 3 days”. When several journeys to the country of origin were needed, the separation was traumatic for both parents and child: “When I came back to get him, he was sulking […]. It was horrible. It lasted at least four to five days. It was as if I had neglected him. He had this feeling of abandonment.” After the first few days, sometimes after a few hours, a phase started in which the behaviour of parents and child became progressively more relaxed: “He adopted us quickly and we adopted him quickly.” However this progressive process of becoming attached was sometimes affected by episodes of doubt and guilt: “[…] At the beginning, I felt a little bad, because he was attached only to his mother […]. Daddy didn't exist… And then, he went to daddy. Daddy, daddy…all the time. There was no mom then!! It was tough!”; “In the first period, it was tough because he was angry about being here […]. He was clearly unhappy; […] I realized that […] what we were offering him at that time did not suit him.”
Routine life
Many families reported difficulties for their child when going to bed, sleep with frequent waking, and nightmares for 1 month to 2 years (in one family with two children, the adoptee woke up every 90 minutes for 2 years). Physical contact was felt to be necessary for sleeping and many parents fell asleep with their child, arguing that they needed more closeness, given their history, or that they were not used to falling asleep alone in their previous life: “[…] we are occidental, one decides that children sleep at the opposite side of the house […] whereas in most countries, they [parents] sleep with their children…”.
Hyperphagia was reported in 10 children during the first few months. Restricting food was sometimes problematic and gave rise to a feeling of guilt. Some needed the help of a paediatrician to control the diet and the weight of their child. Three children had a follow-up examination by a doctor because of excess weight. “He was always hungry. All the time, all the time…”; “We felt as though we were restricting his freedom, because we didn't allow him to eat outside meals…”
Learning French was not a problem for any child and a level that allowed basic understanding and speaking was achieved in about 3 to 6 months. Apart from one child who remained at home until they were 6 years old, all the children who arrived in France before they were 3 years old went to school at the usual age of 3 years old. Older children tended to be sent to school soon after arrival because parents thought that their child was looking for contacts with other children who reminded them of their previous life in an orphanage: “We realized that he was very keen on contact with other children […]. We thought that he had lived with plenty of kids… He must miss them. So we registered him at school.”
Most families were proud about the school results of their child (“brilliant”, “excellent”), but some reported problems of concentration and attention with “hyperactivity and disruption”. Two of them required a life scholar assistant at school but, overall, none of the families reported their child having repeated a grade between 2003 and 2009.
Six black children out of 11 received discriminatory remarks related to the colour of their skin, especially at school: “stool colour”, “you're not pretty because you're brown”, “mud colour”, “little black blooding sausage”. Some children asked their parents if they could have white skin so that they would look like their parents. Reactions to discriminatory remarks were sometimes aggressive, with violence against other children, but, in contrast, some avoided other children or preferred to stay in the background. Two families reported that grandparents had been apprehensive about the foreign origin of the child: “She [grandmother] was afraid that the children would be ill, badly educated, or be this or that…”.
Behaviour and, relationships
Most of the time, the parents reported no peculiar problems with the behaviour or comportment of their child. All but one came to feel very quickly that they were the child's parents, even while recognising clearly that they were not the biological parents: “And I can't say my adopted child, because he's my son”; “It was always clear, we are not the ones who conceived him, we are his parents, we are those he loves, who are to help him to grow, to learn life.” The relationship was characterized by a strong need by the child for demonstrations of affection; they frequently asked for cuddles or proof of love: “There is a threat of abandonment: she has periods of anxiety, during which she takes the phone: Mum, come and pick me up.” Some kept their distance without looking for physical contact: “That's a child who never had loving cuddles and it was very difficult to give him a cuddle! And that's still the case; if he gives us a cuddle it's in secret!”
Frequent behaviours reported were fits of anger, when there was a feeling of injustice or the child was upset, sometimes with a violent attitude (cries, hurtful words, breaking objects, aggressive behaviour). For the vast majority of children, these reactions were reported during the first few months following arrival and did not last. “She became hysterical, I don't know how to describe it, at the slightest vexation, even without vexation.” Some children remained highly irascible and two still have follow-up examinations with a child psychiatrist for behavioural problems (one for pyromania, one for violence).
The relationship between the two parents may be altered by the procedure of adoption or the arrival of the child. Three couples admitted to being over-focused on their child to the detriment of their own life as a couple, but they perceived such behaviour as “normal because we are parents”. Two experienced a conjugal crisis during the adoption process but said that they had not experienced any relationship problems since the arrival of the child. Two other couples divorced after having adopted, without a clear link with the adoption. Generally, the couples said that they were complementary: “we are a team”.
Many families estimated that, finally, “adoption wasn't so terrible” and that the media too frequently paint a black picture of this experience. However they admitted that they had to cope with many difficulties in the face of which they often felt alone. Two attitudes when confronted with difficulties were reported. Some did not look for help or did not think about it, sometimes because it reflected on their ability to be parents: “[…] we had to go ahead, there were two kids to educate, to feed, […] we were parents, we had to be up to the mark.” Others tried to seek help. Many consulted a child psychiatrist, most of the time in order to be reassured with respect to the normality of their child. Even if parents claimed to try “to be as close as possible to biological parents”, they maintained an increased level of vigilance with regard to behaviour or health problems, even minor ones, related to their adopted child.
Pathologies diagnosed, medical investigations after adoption
The parents were asked to describe the first medical consultation with the adopted child. The consultation was performed by a paediatrician for 58% and a GP for 42% of the participants; 92% of the consultations were done during the first month after the arrival of the child. Of the children, 27% (n
=
7) had no blood test performed, including one for whom the mother refused any kind of test. The recommended investigations that were not performed are described in . At the time of arrival, several types of pathology were detected: three parasite-related cases of diarrhoea (one with trichocephalosis, one with ascariasis; one with both amoebiasis and giardiasis; the children originated from Haiti and Ethiopia), five cases of scabies (from Haiti, Russia and Vietnam), four cases of tinea (one
Trichophyton soudanense, three
Trichophyton tonsurans) and two of impetigo. Two cases of scabies and two of tinea were diagnosed late after arrival and had been transmitted to the other family members. The GPs referred the children to a specialist (mainly dermatologists and psychiatrists) in 11 cases (scabies, tinea, intestinal parasites, early puberty, sleeping or behavioural problems). During follow-up examinations, three children, from Brazil, Ethiopia and Haiti, presented with obesity. One girl developed early puberty 4 months after arrival and one had symptoms consistent with fetal alcohol syndrome.
| Table 2Investigations recommended but not performed on arrival for 26 adopted children. |
Families' expectations
Several families admitted to feeling helpless on arrival of the child and appreciated the support of their medical doctor: “I needed to be reassured”; “We were lucky to be supported by our doctor”. Eleven families took the initiative to consult a psychologist or a psychiatrist for reassurance: “Some time after their arrival, we were a little confused… with this problem of sleeping: and so we asked for an appointment with a psychiatrist […] But sometime after, I realised that in fact young children are often afraid at night […] And finally, if I had had just a little help, just to tell me: it's normal, it has nothing to do with adoption, it would have been nice…”; “When you are the parent of an adopted child you tend to be over-focused, to be over-concerned, but perhaps too much […]”. Most families viewed the idea of a specific consultation for adopted children favourably: “Because the questions of health, sleeping, food… at first, it [the consultation] can be an interesting place where families find attention, a listening ear and advice.” Some families also thought that meeting a specialist may be of interest before travelling and when the child arrived: “It would be great to be able to talk with a doctor before travelling who could explain to us the risks of diseases there are in the country in which we'll adopt”.
Opinions of GPs and paediatricians
Eleven paediatricians and 18 GPs (all the doctors who cared for children included in the study) were interviewed about the usefulness of a specific consultation for adopted children. Eight paediatricians and 14 GPs were in favour of such a consultation and were interested in having contact with a specialist in case of problems related to adoption. Of these, six would refer only if there were problems, so as to avoid stigmatization. Three paediatricians and four GPs did not think that such a consultation would be useful: they did not consider it to be necessary in their medical practice or thought that these consultations might stigmatize the children.
