Today, I went back to work.
Things are wild on the home front tonight!
I honestly had not realized aspects of the impact it would have on some of my kids.

Were they not ready for mom to go out to work?
Will they ever be ready? How can an adoptive mom know?

I’ve worked before, but it has been a couple of years. (Even then, my part-time schedule was so varied and odd that I think some kids weren’t even aware that I had an outside job!)

Two years ago, we moved to a new city. My husband returned to school full time at night and was home during the day. I was also home full time. Both of us were around nearly all the time. We learned that a move is a HUGE deal for a house full of kids with attachment and trust issues. Two full time parents were necessary to settle things and get us to a new “normal”. We feel blessed that we had the ability to provide that.

Since then, we’ve also adopted three children (all 13yr olds). The kids are clearly not babies, but older children from previously disrupted adoptions and with attachment problems.

As we signed to withdraw our license to provide foster care, I was asked if I would be interested in providing trainings for the agency we were leaving. I was. I applied. I got the job.

I told the children. I went over my days/hours, how to get hold of me, who will be home, who will be in charge. I’ve talked over what will and won’t change. I’ve gone over concepts of work and what jobs include (i.e. bosses, having to ask for time off, following rules, etc.). I thought I’d covered it all, so much so that it seemed a little silly.

So, what DOES it look like in a big family of adopted kiddos when mom heads off to an outside job??

We’ve had an exorbitant amount of behavior problems, stealing, issues going on over the last couple of days. Efforts to keep mom home interspersed with a fear of mom leaving and/or a fear of being abandoned once again.

When I walked in the door after work, the children home ALL expressed surprise that I came home! As other children came in the door from school, one by one, they did the same thing! “Mom, what are you doing home? I thought you were going to work.”

Now, my children are pretty smart. I’m certain that they can vocalize the concept of a parent going to work and returning home later in the day. Their emotional understanding is showing to be quite a different thing! These kids, old as they are, do not truly grasp the idea that a parent who leaves always returns. That is not their history. Their evening behavior is also showing me that they had/have a great deal of anxiety, that they have some anger and resentment, and that they are likely still uncertain about how this “mom works thing” is going to work out for them, regardless of how many times we’ve discussed it.

I can show them with time. Every time I leave and come home, I start to reinforce that belief for them – when mom leaves, mom comes back. I can add a LOT of extra love and touch. I will reinforce all of our routines and structure to be sure their home still feels safe. I plan to limit the rest of our activities for a while, just focusing as much as we can on our own little family. I'm taking these ideas from my head, the same ideas I used when I left my 9mos old son with a sitter as he was dealing with his very age appropriate attachment issues. The same ideas that work for little ones can often work for the biggest kids, too!

In my next blog,Remaining Successful With an Outside Job, I’ll talk more about these steps and about helping make sure that a parent’s return to work can be successful for everyone.

Sandra Hanks Benoiton, on her Older Parent Adoption blog, wrote these great blogs about moms working:
To Work or Not to Work
To Work or Not to Work, Part 2

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