Deuil et adoption. Attentes inconscientes de parents adoptifs sans problème de fertilité

Abstract

The French Law of December 22nd 1976 favored the appearance of a new type of family, constituted of a couple and several children, some biologically conceived, the others adopted: adoption is no more synonymic of infertility. ObjectiveThe purpose of this study is double: to understand who are these couples and to identify their unconscious expectations in their choice of adoptive filiation. Patients and methodsOur research leaned on the study of 52 couples answering the following criteria: to have both biological and adopted children, without difficulty to conceive the others. We met each of the couples and led an interview established with a semi-directive part, a free part and a projective test (drawing of the tree). ResultsThese couples (with Franche-Comté and Alsatian origins) present completely singular psychosocial characteristics that distinguish them significantly from the classic population. They have an upper level of studies (more than 3years), militate in associations and work in sectors of health, social care or education. The project to adopt, even if it involves both parents, is mainly worn by the women. The first result was to notice the existence of an adoptive process, characterized by six factors that are going to reactivate a phenomenon starter. It is about events in the genealogy, about altruism, about the project of adoption in the story of the couple, about the project of starting a large family, of “debts” of the couple and of bereavements. The second discovery was that grief was an important marker of the story of every adoptive couple. These losses were lived during the childhood and the adolescence, but also frequently after the marriage. We counted mainly three unconscious expectations: first of all, repairing the injustice of the loss lived by the couple and by the adopted child, pay an unconscious personal or transgenerational debt, and finally accomplish themselves by the realization of a life program. ConclusionThe adoption is built on an indestructible link with a new child, foreign to the couple due to his origin, but close to them by the echo produced in their experience of grief. The adoption is the meeting of two losses and bereavement stories.