No Clever Title - just What I learned during Day 1 of Pride...

This Past weekend... Marc and I embarked on our First 2 Days of our Pride Training.

Suffice it to say, it was pretty emotionally draining. We learned about the "Process" - I think I've got that DOWN to a science now. We spoke about the children that we would be adopting - including the challenges they would 1-come with and 2-potentially develop.

One the greatest most awesome things we learned was "Positive Adoption Language".

Words to avoid and words to Use instead to assist with Bonding and also assist with not making our children a victim.

• Instead of Real Mother or Father use Birth Mother or Father
• Instead off Natural Parents use Biological Parents
• Instead of My own child use My Birth Child
• Instead of My Adopted Child use My Child
• Instead ofMy Children are Adopted us We are an adoptive Family
• Instead of Foreign Adoption  use International Adoption
• Instead of Give away; put up for adoption; abandoned use Made an adoption Plan.

Not Bad eh? Have you ever used the "instead of" words? I have. 

Another awesome eureka moment was the concept that as an adopted child, they should not think/feel "I am adopted" they should feel "I was adopted". Why? Because they are not in a state of adoption. They are not perpetually to be defined by the fact that they were adopted. It was a moment in time... it's done.. and now, they are MY CHILD.... the end... nothing more. LOVE IT.

We spoke about Grief and Loss... that was hard - and relevant. Sofie assured us, that grief and loss is a part of Adoption. And said that every Adoption begins with "Loss". Loss to the child who is either losing their Birth Family or Foster Family - often times the family they've learned to love....And for "us", the adopting Parents... oftentimes, this conjures up the losses of our past- like in my case... the grief of being reminded of your own infertility, or the miscarriages of the past, your inability to carry a baby naturally... 

Wow... pretty deep stuff :-( We need to continue to remind ourselves that

Loss comes with Joy

And that sadness is something we are going to go through... it's normal; It's how we get through it that counts the most.

So what type of Emotions are these little one's going to be experiencing (to generalize):

• Lost - they don't know where they're going
• Angry - something (good or bad - it's all they've known) has been taken away from them
• Hurt - a sudden turn of events changes their whole life and they were never even asked/consulted
• Overwhelmed - feelings of an unpredictable future 

Funny thing is... I feel like I myself have experienced all the same emotions with how everything has unravelled. 

So how can we create a Successful Plan:

• keep the Child's birth name - don't go switching everything on them. 
• learn about their favourite foods - we all know the comfort one can find in their food
• keep the same school if possible
• collaborate with other vested parties - foster parents, parents if they're still allowed in the picture, social workers, aid workers etc
• learn their language - if there is a language barrier...

At the end... remember this...

Children are Ressiliant. They Can and Will Conquer this with our Love, Patience and Support... 

It is NOT impossible!

Another good thing to remember:

"All things are Difficult Before they 

Become Easy!"