I don't have experience in this but I'm glad you are considering adopting a sibling group and older children they need a home too. Everyone wants a baby.

Hello. This is a great undertaking and it is nice that you are gathering information. I also adopted a sibling group of three. The boy was four and the girls were five and six. I fell in love with them immediately. Every child is different and every sibling group is different. They will come with a lot of baggage and habits that may drive you crazy but if you are able to take one day at a time and let ALL of the little things be overlooked, you will do well. Our oldest (6yr old) was the Mother of the group and refused to give up the position, so it made it hard for me to parent the three of them. She used to say "She's not your mother, so you don't have to do that!" I had to very slowly take over parenting, starting with her. They used a roll of toilet paper a day as they were given "2 squares" in the foster home and thought they had died and gone to heaven when they had a whole roll! The boy (4) was a pack rat. Let me state first that they had no toys in the foster home and their clothes did not come with them, except 2 outfits each that were too small for them. The boy would take everything and anything he could get his hands on and pack-rat it under his bed. I left it there unless I needed a particular spoon or other item and then I took only that.
The three of them had been sexually active for two years, so after the foster home was closed down I had 3 children who were physically needy.
This is not the case with all of the children available. I was a stay at home mother at the time of adoption so I had the time to donate to them. They were in special needs programs as one was visually and hearing impaired and one was dislexic. They were not socially educated either so they needed a lot of early learning experiences. Things are much more advanced now in the school systems so you probably won't have the delays I experienced.
I don't think I would have wanted a sibling group of three as my first experience with adopted children. I had a boy that was 18 and a girl that was 8 when this adoption went thru. Sometimes the state will place a sibling group with inexperienced parents only because no one else will take them together and the adoptive parents become the dumping ground and everyone looses. My three should have been separated as they were all too needy to be in one house with another child thrown into the mix.
I do not mean to rain on your parade, but want you to go into this with open eyes. Adopt with your head and not with your heart. This is so important. I always thought that all you had to do to "have this child become a member of your family" was to love and support them. This is true with some children and not true with others.
My friend has adopted 16 children (that is not a typo error!) and she has had tremendous success with some and not with others. Each child is different.
Ask me any questions you please. I will be happy to try to answer them. My e-mail address is lained1944@aol.com.
I wish you and your husband the best of life with a new child.
Laine

Thank you for your response.

We are expecting there to be A LOT of challenges. When I was in high school I was in a mentoring program that put Juniors & Seniors matched with a child in each elementary school in our district... There were 5 elementary schools so each day of the week we would go spend a significant amount of time with our kids. They were all children who were either dealing with learning disabilities or various issues at home.

I also grew up with a family that was not so well off & with parents who probably shouldn't have been parents. We often had the same school uniforms for 3-4 years until we completely outgrew them. There was various forms of abuse in our household. (I was the lucky one out of the three of us and didn't deal with nearly as much as my younger siblings) but I was also the "Mother" type when it came to taking care of things. My mom was either doped up or gone half the time, and if my step-dad wasn't wasted and taking his anger out on someone he was gone. There was a period of about 4 months when I was 14 where it was just us kids & we lived out of the closest convenience store using my mom's food stamp card that I had taken from her to buy my siblings and I dinner. When my parents were around, we were allowed to go to school and back. I've never been to a friend's birthday party, sleepover or even just hung out at someone else's house for a few hours. We were very "sheltered" socially and it didn't leave much room for understand how to act normally and communicate with people outside of our siblings.

When I was 18, my mom kicked me out of the house. I ended up living between friends, not really anyone to depend on, and I had no idea how to act in the "real world." I didn't know anything about rent, bills, taxes. I didn't even have a drivers' license.

Luckily for me, I ended up with a boyfriend who was willing to help me deal with my past issues. He helped me learn all the things my parents should have taught me. He helped me get a good job, my first apartment, helped me get my license when I had never driven in my life. He also helped me therapy-wise.

This is the same man that is going to be the father of the children we adopt. So I'm pretty sure that we can handle whatever gets thrown our way. We're willing to put the time, effort, love and patience into a child or children with any issues they may have.

Thank you so much for your response. I will email you if I have any questions or anything. Thanks again!