Milo Otis

I am and adult Adoptee that reunited with my birthmother when I was 18. (Closed). That was about 30 years ago. The reunion was full of emotions, and happiness/eagerness to reunite. I was also still a child at that age. I would talk with her about once a month which worked for me at that time. In my twenties, my bmom actually backed away from me and was busy living her life. Over the years I would visit, but the last time she visited me was almost 20 yrs ago. It felt like I was expected to go to her home and spend time with her family but she wouldn't come see me and my family. I love my bfamily, but they are not the same family that has given me years of familiarity. It has felt like she wanted to forget I have a family here, and sometimes its felt like she wants me to forget my family here. I doubt that's true, but it's a feeling that's been had. It's not the birthmothers fault, it just is what it is. For a long time I tried to be the child I knew she wanted. Now that I'm older, I know better and while I try to be polite and cordial, I don't bend over backwards to people please anymore, and that's ruffled quite a few feathers of late. She wants more communication than what I am capable of providing or giving...to anyone. It's not a lack of love or caring, ...or empathy, it's just something within some of us adoptees as adults who want these sorts of expectations lowered significantly. I do not wish her any harm, I love her dearly, but I cannot and will not be her emotional punching bag, or an emotional support person/therapist, I cannot be that daughter she so badly wanted but had to relinquish. I can't fulfill that fantasy because I am not that baby anymore. I've had to learn a lot lately about what it means to be codependent when in family relationships with vulnerable narcissists. I pray someday she will accept me as I am, not as whatever mental health disorder judgements have been rationalized upon me within her reality. Some birthmothers badly want contact with the adoptee and a relationship as if they were never ever placed for adoption. This is in no way meant to hurt my birthmother or bmoms in general. This post has been edited because of adoptee rage that floated to the surface and into a post. This is one of the realities of being an adult Adoptee. The trauma can stick and if it sticks to you, it's a difficult road for adoptees and their relationships with birthparents. We are not extensions of our biological parents, as in, we are individuals that have grown into adults. We are no longer children. We are not the child you dreamt of. We are adults with our own personalities, dreams, and behaviors. If we reunite and have a healthy relationship, that's fantastic and beautiful, celebrate it. If we reunite and cannot have healthy boundaries, that's when one has to back off contact. No one is entitled to treat people as less than, no matter the age difference, no matter their role in adoption relationships. We had no say in the way we were introduced to this world, and some of us are still trying to work through abandonment issues, attachment issues, various other mental health diagnosis with a common denominator. Obviously I'm still working through my adoptee rage because it's a traumatic experience for a child to 1) be relinquished and 2) are left without a primary caregiver for 3+ weeks. No matter how much I don't want it to hurt, it still does at times, especially when she's hateful and overly judgemental. I'm in therapy, but when I asked if she'd attend one, she said no. I want a healthy relationship with my bmom. I've read from birthmothers who long for their child they were maybe forced to relinquish, or pushed to. It's horrible that this happened to you and your pain is valid. I'm sorry from the bottom of my heart that you had to go through that. If Bmom would research about adult adoptees and see the commonalities, maybe that could help tone down things....maybe? In regards to my amom, too, I've felt pulled between my mom's since day 1 of reunion. Neither of them consciously wanted to put me in the middle, but I was, and that still messes with me. Not in a victim mindset sort of way, but in an (as an adult, I've learned that healthy adults don't do this). There needs to be lateral respect between amom, bmom, and adult adoptees. This is why it is imperative for every person in the adoption triangle to be in therapy.