Would this Make you Angry and Bitter?

Question

Here is an example of one of the many many comments made about adoption that really makes me 'angry and bitter' This is an answer to a recent question in this section. I'm so 'angry and bitter' about these types of attitudes and it's not hard to see why - (is it????!!)

QUOTE" The adoptive parents take a child in, treat them as family, support, educate, love and provide food and shelter.

Why is it when the adoptive child is grown, their bio family takes an interest.

Your bio parents did not want you when you were adopted out, why now?

Have your bio parent pay back your adoptive parents for raising you if they now want a relationship."

Answer 1

I think it makes sense. As long as the adopting family was open to have the bio family involved throughout it's whole life and then the bio family steps up later. It's almost as if they wanted someone else to do their job. But if they closed the doors to them during their child hood, then of course when the child is of age the parents would come into the pic. But yes, that would make me angry that they missed out on their whole entire growing up and all their accomlishments and milestones and then all a sudden took interest later. I'd be like "WHERE WERE YOU???"

Answer 2

I am both adopted and an adoptive parent. I have no interest in finding the bios but if my son finds his, i'm ok with that. It is an individual's choice. As far as hurt feelings of the adoptive parents or whatever the answerer was talking about in "paying back", if ANY parent raises a child and hasn't had "hurt feelings" before their child reaches adulthood,  either the child or the parent have something terribly wrong with them. Don't be bitter, just realize that either as an adoptive parent, or adoptee, your life experience is VERY different and special.

Answer 3

yes i agree. i was adopted by my biological grandmother, after biological mom abandoned me in a hotel room for days when i was 6 months old. my bio grandmother raised me as her own. my bio mother was in and out of my life growing up mostly out. but as i became an adult she wanted to be my best friend. i simply approched it as you didnt have time for me, i dont have time for you.

she could have cared less when i was a baby if i lived or died, so why am i going to give her the time of day, or why should i help her with her guilt issues. i have my own issues and abandonment is one of them thanks to her.

yeah i guess im a little angry and bitter.

Answer 4

Are there children who seek adoption?  Who asked to be adopted?  Maybe a few older children but by in large it's ADOPTERS who are desperate for the 'experience' of being parents.

They want kids (usually infants) to 'complete their family', or whatever the latest cliche is...it's NOT the other way around. They signed up for the 2 a.m. feedings, the Little League, paying for the braces.  No one forced them--they had a CHOICE, in fact, they sought it out.

When you really think about it I think ADOPTERS might owe the children something.  

That's the thinking that HAS to be changed.  Adopted kids COME with family.  Just because you can't SEE them, doesn't mean they're not there.

If that makes adopters nervous, I really think a Lab would be a better choice.

Answer 5

final answer: "crack kills."

Answer 6

While I don't agree with the comment, and think it is over the top, I can understand it.  

When we adopt a child (or children) we take that child as our own.  We are not a "temporary" family there to look after the child while the biological family gets their act together.  We are "a family", and consider ourselves that child's parents for the rest of our lives.  So, I think a certain degree of defensiveness is understandable when anyone implies that we are something less than the child's real family.

Answer 7

I completely agree that that comment is out of line. I was adopted when I was two months old by wonderful parents that will do anything for me. In fact, they are so great that they taught me to be thankful for my bio mother. She gave them the greatest gift of all. And my mom always told me, " It takes a h**l of a woman to go through 9 months of pregnancy and labor when there are much easier solutions." My bio mother gave my parents a child and she gave me life. I am now searching for her to say thankyou! =)

Answer 8

Heather, I have to kinda agree with that quote. I wasn't put up for adoption as a child, but my mother basically allowed my father to take us....with no fight. I had many abandonment issues as a result. THEN, as I become a successful adult...who comes a knocking at my door? One guess.  How do you think this makes me feel. That when I actually needed her to be around...she wasn't. But when I'm doing just fine without her...she wants a relationship.

I don't speak to her anymore. I tried for a few years to work on a relationship...but I found it all in vain.

Answer 9

WTF?

Answer 10

You mean those bio parents who were "giving the AP's this wonderful gift" and were so "selfless for doing the loving thing?"  Those bio parents?  Isn't it amazing how the writer of this quote sees them as no longer needed after having the child, and now they should be discarded as useless.

How rude, inconsiderate, uncaring and showing a complete lack of knowledge about adoptees and natural parents.

Firstly, I've never met an AP who expects pay back for raising the natural parent's child.  The AP's wanted a child and are happy to have this new family member.  They aren't babysitters, they are parents.  The rude comment about how AP's "take a child in, treat them as family" suggests that the AP's are not the child's parents.  How ignorant.

Further, what makes this person think the natural parents didn't "want" their child?  Most of them do, which is why the majority of adoptions now are open adoptions, which allow the natural parents to maintain a relationship to some degree or another with their child.

As far as I'm concerned, this comment is insulting to AP's, natural  parents and adoptees.

As far as people who had a bad reunion experience, please don't speak for the rest of us.

Answer 11

Don't take it so personally, isn't that what's been said to the APs and PAPs about comments that make them angry?

Answer 12

my birth mother has never came around much

but my parents would not take any amt of money 4 me

Answer 13

Neither.   It is normal to have an interest and the adopted parents should realize this before adopting.  If the adopting family is seeking payback, perhaps they shouldnt get in the the adopting program in the first place.

Answer 14

Again, every situation is different and as you can see by some of the answers, it does happen.

The quoted statement was harsh, yes.

Answer 15

Yep!  People just can't comprehend others reasons for adoption.  There's nothing wrong with Bio parents wanting to be in their child's lives.  Perhaps, they were extremely poor, ex-drug addicts, or lived in a communist country.  That quote is just plain ignorant! How do you come to a conclusion that the Bio parents were bad people for giving their child a better life, when they probably couldn't.

Answer 16

I saw that.  How completely insensitive.

It's this attitude that adoptees have no rights to make decisions about who we choose to contact and have a relationship with.

This attitude that adoptes are perpetually children, even when we'er in our 30's, 40's, and beyond.

This attitude that any adoptee who speaks out against a corrupt system has automatically just "had a bad experience".

The attitude that we should be grateful for our very lives, thankful we weren't tossed in a dumpster or scraped from the womb, that we don't have as much of a right to our lives as non-adopted people.

The attitude that we can be talked down to, belittled, scolded, shamed, guilted, told off, and it's all perfectly acceptable because, well, again, we just don't have the same rights and don't equal non-adopted people in human value.

The attitude that babies are interchangeable; that it's just pefectly fine to hand them around as "gifts" without a care for their emotional welfare, as long as someone else gets to become a mommy.

The attitude that we owe anyone, anything, for our existence - from our undying loyalty to on the knees gratitude to, in some cases, even having to PAY for things, monetarily.  (Yes, I have seen plenty of adopters actually CHARGE their children money for things they do wrong or the "work" it out of them...turning children into little housekeepers).

The attitude that we should all just shut up and maintain the status-quo, because somewhere out there, there might be a fragile infertile couple whose dreams of parenthood are far more important than an adoptee's lifetime of pain and struggle with identity issues, attachment problems, inability to trust & form healthy relationships, etc.

The attitude that people should actually contribute financially to help someone get a kid...when adoption is absolutely, ONE HUNDRED PERCENT their own choice and NOBODY is making them do it, so they should dam well be able to afford it on their own.  I didn't get a choice in being adopted, yet I don't beg anyone for money to pay my bills.

This is just a start...I could keep going.

Answer 17

Angry and bitter?  But why?  You know this poster has already repaid his or her natural parents for every diaper, every jar of baby food, every school supply?  Right?

Right?

Unless, of course, the poster meant to say that a'parents are not real parents at all, but landlords.

Didn't think so.