The agency probably knew perfectly well. I knew a couple who adopted two Russian brothers. The younger one was difficult but finally adapted, whereas the older one (7 at the time of adoption) was a fire-setter, violent and aggressive to the family’s other children and a thief. They found that he had something called “attachment disorder,” which is evidently very common among Russian orphanage products, and would probably never bond with another human being. They’re like feral children.
Because the couple wanted to keep his brother, they didn’t send him back, but he had to go into a residential facility by the time he was 10 and it cost them every dime they had to keep him there. I don’t know what has happened to him since.
Also, do you remember that horrible case in Connecticut, where two criminals broke into a families home, overpowered the father, raped and killed the mother, and then raped and killed the young daughters (by setting fire to the house with them in it)? The ringleader in that was a USSR orphanage adoptee (from I don’t remember exactly which country) whose US adoptive family had had problems with him since the beginning - fire setting, killing of pets, threats towards other children, convicted of serial house burglaries by the time he was 12, etc.
Whatever happens to them, they never seem to make up for those first few years in a Russian orphanage.
I had a foreign exchange student from a foreign country who stole things from us (which we didn't discover until after he'd left). Background information we get from agencies handling children coming to us (whether temporary or permanent) are NOT indicative of the personality or traits of the child in question. I had an emergency surgery and couldn't keep my student as long as I had promised, so he went to another home in another city, where he stole items from that home as well. He was returned to his country of origin upon theft discovery at that location. What surprised me most about the tendencies of the student who left our home was that his parents were both professional people of high regard. Their child was devious and deceitful.
I also know of two instances where the parents adopting Russian children weren’t told the true extent of their problems. Both stayed with their families, but the parents had to spend thousands of dollars to deal with the psychological issues (and in one instance, the parents were in fear for their lives, and the lives of their other children.)
It was very interesting what you wrote. I am familiar with several families that adopted children from Russian orphanages.One family lucked out and adopted three lovely teenage girls originally from the Ukraine. They are bright and loving, and have acclimated beautifully to America. Another family adopted two children from Russia over the course of several years. The first child is very sweet but seems to have mental disabilities. Her biological parents were rabid alcoholics. The second adoption was a little girl, very cute, but once brought to the USA was a terror on wheels. They are having a lot of difficulty with her. WHen they met her in the orphanage,she had run up to the mother and began hugging her which melted their hearts. She is a handful for a set of parents who are well into their sixties. Another family I know, are one of those compulsive adoptive parents who seem to be adopting children every year. This family adopted a girl from Russia when she was about 9. I was her teacher at one point, and she seemed very nice and well adjusted. However, I recently heard that the mother tried to give her back to the orphanage in Russia because she has “attachment disorder”, the condition you mentioned in your post. I am wondering if that has become the catch all phrase for adoptive families that no longer want the child they adopted. It seems to me that many adoptive parents have unreal expectations of what the adopted child should be and when the child does not meet those expectations, the family no longer wants them. In this case, the mother sent the kid to a private Catholic boarding school in PA where they house wayward children. She is not allowed contact with the outside world since her old school friends have tried to call her and the administration there refuses to comply. Many of the children in Russian orphanages are the product of alcoholic parents and have mental and physical conditions that are not discussed by those in charge. However, there are some, like this young lady I mentioned, that are adopted by American families who tire of them when the going gets tough.
My cousin and her husband adopted a boy and his sister from a Russian Orphange. I suppose they were four and three years old at the time. Lots of problems but they have come a LONG way, they are 16 and 15 now.
I’ll never forget the little boy when asked by his momif he would like to take lessons on learning the Russian language. He said “I will never speak Russian again.” He was 6 or 7 at the time.