Reply to Tell me about adoption

Forum Index » Parenting -- Special Concerns

Reply to "Tell me about adoption "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]I think this is pretty bizarre. I would think that we've had enough years of experience with blended families to know that kids in a family will have special people in common, and then maybe some special people who are just theirs. I don't think everything has to be "evensies" among kids in a family. Kids are different and come with differences.

If I were an adoptive parent, I would consider it my role primarily to be my adopted child's parent, and yes, of course I would expect all of my family to treat the child as ours. It would also be my role to facilitate healthy relationships between the child and any biological relatives who wanted to be involved. I think it would be a mistake, and very poor boundaries, if I and my biological children were to have our own relationships with the child's biological relatives (other than polite, warm and friendly relationship). I did not adopt the entire family; I adopted the child. I would never in a billion years think that the adopted child's grandparents should act like grandparents to my bio children.

It's interesting that this argument is focused on grandparents exclusively. Are we also adding on aunties and uncles and cousins for our biological child, when we adopt a child? And what about the adopted child's biological parents, if they are also in the picture here? Do they get some honorary relationship with my children? Hell no! You are not marrying the adopted child's family. You only adopted the child, and the child comes with some pre-existing family relationships that you must honor, however those do not become your family relationships.

I think the relationships governing situations like these are marriage and adoption. Marriage flows up and down and family tree - Grandparents take on a new daughter-in-law, for example. A new member of the family! And now they might have new grandchildren, the DIL's children from a previous marriage, and the grandparents (should) treat these kids as their own grandchildren because of the relationship of marriage between their son and the DIL. Then the son and DIL adopt a child. This is their grandchild because of the relationships of marriage between their son and DIL and the adoption. The marriages and adoptions make the relationships.

There is no marriage or adoption between your biological children and your adopted child's relatives. That's the difference. It's OK for your adopted child to have special relationships that your biological children do not.

I guess a scenario might be that you actually want for more loved ones in your biological children's lives. OK. But I actually think you'd be doing your adopted child a disservice to make his bio grandparents belong equally to your other children. The adoptive child should get to navigate that relationship without a lot of other people in the way. That's confusing.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics