When you decided to adopt, you were all in and said yes with your whole heart. And that hasn’t changed. But lately you sometimes catch yourself just going through the motions: make dinner, help with homework, drive to therapy, handle the meltdown (yours and theirs) … You’re there, but you feel strangely far away from your own life. The love is still there; it’s just harder to feel as excited about this journey as when you first started out.
If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone. There’s a name for what you’re experiencing, and it’s more common among adoptive parents than anyone tells you going in. The term is called compassion fatigue.
What Is Compassion Fatigue?
It may sound like a fancy name for burnout, but compassion fatigue is more than that. As a term that was first coined in nursing literature to describe what professional caregivers experienced when repeatedly exposed to others’ suffering, researcher Charles Figley later drew a clear distinction between it and the phrase you’re used to associating with ordinary occupational burnout (source).
While regular burnout comes from depleted resources, like giving more than you have for too long, rest can usually refill your tank. With compassion fatigue, however, something heavier is added on top of that: Absorbing the secondary trauma from someone else’s pain, day after day, until it starts reshaping your own sense of safety and trust.
In a 2024 study out of the UK that interviewed twelve adoptive parents about this exact experience, three themes repeatedly emerged: Feeling like a therapist instead of a parent, watching connections with their child and their own support system grow strained, and discovering that the help they needed often didn’t actually exist (source). But if you’re experiencing any of what we’ve been talking about, this is where we state one of the most important parts of this blog: None of this means there’s something wrong with you, and you shouldn’t carry guilt about how you feel.
What Are the Common Signs of Parental Burnout in Adoptive Parents?
Compassion fatigue doesn’t really announce itself. It’s a slow build in the background of the kind of days you now call ordinary. Most parents write off the early signs of parental burnout as just tiredness. If you were a parent before adopting, this is easier to do because you may even feel like you’ve been tired since you became a parent.
But if you notice these signs, it could be an indication that it’s more than normal parental tiredness:
- Emotional blunting: You know you love your child. It’s an undeniable fact. But you don’t feel the warmth of your connection in the moment.
- Increased reactivity: You used to be able to give a calm, measured response to your child. Now, you’re quicker to snap, shut down, or lose your cool than you used to be.
- Intrusive thoughts: Vivid thoughts about your child’s history, either imaginary or real/known, when you’re trying to rest or go to sleep.
- Shrinking satisfaction: The small wins that used to make you feel connected and like it was all worth it now just feel like effort you have to put in. Hope feels unsustainable, and progress seems insufficient.
- Isolation and cynicism: You feel yourself pulling away from friends or your spouse, or having less certainty that what you’re doing is actually working.
When It Turns Into Blocked Care
Sometimes compassion fatigue deepens into what researchers call “blocked care”: a prolonged state of stress that makes it genuinely harder to access loving, empathetic feelings toward your child (source). This can manifest in your daily life and interactions with your child as resentment, defensiveness, or shame about the disconnect you feel. It’s important to know that this isn’t a judgment of your character or capacity to be a loving parent. Actually, it often comes from your adopted child’s own blocked trust; their nervous system is wired for protection instead of connection, so they push you away even when you keep trying to show up for them. Your brain’s response is to start trying to protect itself, too. Even some of our houseparents have firsthand experience with what this feels like.
What Helps Relieve Compassion Fatigue?
If you’ve found yourself reading this blog, you don’t just want to put a name to how you’re feeling—you want to know how to fix it. Here are some ways you can help relieve compassion fatigue as an adoptive parent:
Get Moving
You’ve probably heard this before, but that’s because it’s so beneficial to so many mental, physical, and emotional maladies. Physical activity, like brisk walks, a dance class, yoga, and other aerobic movements, gives stress hormones somewhere to go instead of piling up in your nervous system.
Get Out of Your Head
And by that, we don’t mean you’re overthinking or that what you’re feeling isn’t real. We mean, out of your head and onto a page with journaling, painting, or another form of artistic release. Using the pen and page or paint brush and canvas to process gives the weight of your emotions somewhere to go that’s outside your body.
Let Someone Else In
A real, in-person conversation with someone who knows you does something a text or phone call can’t. For a moment, it takes the responsibility of regulation off your shoulders and allows you to let someone take care of you for a change. Connecting with another adoptive parent who understands what you’re going through can help more than you might think.
Go Screen-Free
Your system is already overloaded. Scrolling through negative news and social media on your phone doesn’t help. Try to commit to no social media in the morning, or reserve a specific hour with no phone time at all, to give your mind and nervous system a break.
Reach for Real Support
Asking for help doesn’t make you a failure. God gave us resources to better show up for ourselves and our families, and therapy or counseling is one of them. There may not always be someone you can talk to who knows what you’re going through, maybe you don’t want to feel like you’re always venting to the same person, or you may just need someone who can give you valid, responsible advice and feedback on what you’re experiencing. That’s what therapy is designed to do.
You’re Not the Problem
Nothing about these signs of parental burnout means you’re the wrong parent for your child, or that you didn’t know what you were signing up for. It’s a documented, physiological response to sustained stress from being a caregiver to someone who’s been through trauma. It carries real weight and deserves the same compassion that you would offer a friend going through it.
At Alabama Free Will Baptist Children’s Home, we know that caring for an adopted child’s needs starts with caring for the parent, too. Our counseling services are available to Alabama families navigating this kind of fatigue and exhaustion, and we would love for you to reach out to us if you need resources. You don’t have to run on empty or carry this alone; let’s connect.