I’m a 47 year old male, the adoptive Dad of a 5 year old boy.
I showed up at the hospital in West Texas about 2 hours after his birth, and yes… the connection I felt was intense and immediate. Luckily, it hasn’t worn off yet, despite his best efforts!
I had my son when I was 18, natural childbirth, breastfed for 4 months and *never *entirely connected with him. I love him in that “I’d sacrifice stuff for him, sure!” sense, but I don’t understand how he thinks, nor he me, and we have very different interests and ways of interacting with the world. Even as a small child, he’s felt more like my little brother than like my son. I think part of it is that he’s always been an easy kid in so many ways. Eager to please, we never had struggles over toilet training or bedtime or whatnot. I’m so easygoing, I never struggled with him over keeping his room clean or anything like that. He was always, even as a toddler, great at playing by himself and keeping himself occupied. If anything, I should have been *more *hands-on, especially as it related to schoolwork, but it was mostly like having a small roommate I was fond of. He had his life and I mine and we’d hang out together when we weren’t busy with our other lives.
I had my daughter at 31, super early in pregnancy by emergency c-section. And I’m overwhelmed with the intensity of our connection and my emotions for her. Much more like the classic dyad bonding you read about, even though I couldn’t hold her for weeks after her birth, she never got the hang of breastfeeding, and she’s the most difficult stubborn little asshole sometimes! We fight over *everything *- what to eat, what to wear, how to use the toilet, how to hold a marker, how to pet the cat… She’s so demanding, there’s no such thing as being hands-off with her!
The thought of losing her sends me into a panic attack; the thought of losing my son makes me sad, but somehow, as always, I just know he’ll be okay and doesn’t need me much. Even if he dies, it’s his business somehow.
I love them both, but it’s very very different love.
Can uncles join in? I saw my niece when she was 5 days old and as soon as I held her I was smitten.
No instant connection, I’m female and I don’t like babies. Oh I sobbed at my son’s birth from joy but i didn’t get that instant connection.
I think it took about 2 months when he started getting more of a personality that I fell hopelessly in love. Now at almost 5 months, I think he’s great and the joy of my life. Of course he’s also the cutest baby ever.
He’s also made me more tolerant of other babies.
Male. No instant connection. Felt like a strange, small animal had entered the household. It grew from there, and keeps on growing now that my daughter communicates in a way a doofus like me can understand and does things that amaze me. I intuitively feel my love for her will grow throughout her growing years, as the real person inside her skin materializes more and more. Don’t know if this sounds weird. It looks that way now that I read it.
In light of last night’s House episode I’d be interested to hear what adoptive parents have to say about their experiences.
Not a parent but my mom had my half brother when I was 17. I’d say I was fairly attached while he was still in the womb. When he was born I was kind of afraid to hold him much, but once he became less fragile seeming I formed a pretty intense bond.
It hasn’t faded for me and mine are 10, 17 and 19 years old. I have trouble understanding that some mothers just can’t tell (or else there’s lots of ignoring going on at the mall/grocery/park etc).
No matter when or where it happens, like WhyNot said–each one is loved, but so differently. I never believe people who say “we treated them all the same.” Maybe in material things, but how can you? They’re all so different! I love the differences.
Yes, she looked me in the eye within a few minutes of being born. Outside of the hoopla around making sure she was ok, the time when the Doctors were monopolizing her time, it was pretty instantaneous.
Female, 2 kids, ages 4 and 6.
With the older one, it was instantaneous. She got stuck in the birth canal and there was a lot of hoopla, but we got her out and she was just so…intense. She looked up at us with this big whale eye and was very alert, but quiet.
With the second, it was a little more difficult. I had a lot of the same feelings and issues that C3 described. Mainly I wondered what impact this would have on our older child and whether I would love the younger one as much. Right from when we was born, I constantly badgered myself *Do I love him as much as I love her? Am I feeling warm enough towards him? Am I good enough to be his Mama as well? *. Also, a second baby is just not fussed over as much, so there was a lack of fanfare that my first one enjoyed.
It was actually his health issues that allowed us to bond. I felt like it was him and me against this thing that was making him uncomfortable (reflux and food sensitivities), and I was the one who could solve it. Again like C3 said, he is such a mama’s boy now and I love him to pieces.
But those early days of doubting myself and not knowing how or who to talk to about that were brutal.
I always thought that the instant connection was the umbilical cord.
As I said in the other thread, I didn’t get it. I felt an overwhelming urge to protect her, a feeling that from this moment on my whole life would be lived with her in mind and I knew absolutely that I would kill or die for her without a real second thought. I don’t think that’s hyperbole, and I still feel the same just-over-two-years later. But it wasn’t love, not straight away, or at least it didn’t feel like love to me. That came soon, but it came gradually. Now, I love and adore her: she’s funny, smart, witty, sweet, great company.
I’m female, and I kind of like babies in a ‘aaawww lookit the cutie’ kind of way, and I’m desparate for another, but I can take or leave other peoples’.
My husband did get the rush - he will still tell anyone who listens that he was the first person to hold her, and that he put her up inside his shirt to keep her warm whilst they were stitching me up etc etc (another horrible birth experience, starring pre-eclampsia, induction and endless hours of pain…)
The connection I felt with my child some hours afterward was “father feelings” I probably would have felt with any newborn on my chest. - The feeling was amazing, nonetheless.
I’m a male, as you might have guessed.
Yes. Very much.
I’m an aunt only, and I was there for my first nephew’s birth. I have a HUGE connection with him that I don’t quite have with my sis’ other 2 kids (whose births I didn’t attend—I think my ‘cheerleading’ that first time was a little overwhelming for my sister 
). I love and treat them all equally, but the awesomeness of my oldest nephew blows my mind regularly.
I always chalked this up to having been there for his birth. It was a huge event for me.
Honestly, I don’t want kids of my own at all, I try to limit my time with non-family members’ kids, and I’m often vocally thankful (within my own earshot) that I don’t have a kid when I hear one melting down in public.
Coincidentally, I watched ‘Waitress’ last night, and that instant connection scene with the baby at the birth blew me away. What an awesomely acted scene.
Did you have an instant connection with your child?
Oh yes - I would have killed or died for both of them the moment they were born. Still would.
Are you male or female?
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Female.
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Do you generally like babies?
No - in fact I had never held one before my own, and when people brought their new babies into the office to show them off I would ignore them. But the first moment I saw my baby I fell in love with her, and again with my son. I can still take or leave other people’s kids, however…
As mentioned elsewhere, we just brought our first home.
Yes to the instant connection. Totally in her thrall. So far she has been an “easy” baby, but I don’t any amount of difficulty will change that. My wife is the same, and I think her feelings about that are maybe tinged with a certain amount of relief, because she spent an inordinate amount of time worrying that she might not instantly bond with her.
I generally like babies, but until now the thing that I’ve liked most about all of the ones that I’ve met is that they came with some other responsible adult that I could hand them back to in short order. 