how to tell and when

I am sure that you will got much more sage advice, but it sounds like your daughter does know and needs your help in understanding things and how to deal with questions. If you are planning the adoption process now especially. She will be going to court etc. Please take the time to share your daughter's history with her. I know I hate not knowing things, but thinking that something isn't right in information that I receive. I would imagine that she is very frustrated and confused. If you don't begin to dialogue with her and as a family she is going to think that things are her fault, that she is a problem, that you don't want to tell her etc. If she is old enough to have sleepovers and questioning friends etc - she is old enough to understand her life situation and thankfully has a loving family to fall back upon.

This is my story... I did not find out the man who raised me was not my biological father until I was 36 years old. about the time I was 9 or 10, friends would ask me why my sister and I didn't look anything alike. I began looking in the mirror and realized I didn't look like anyone in my family.I constantly asked my mother why I look so different from everyone else. She would say "oh you look like your grandma when she was younger". Well, I don't look grandma! (Mother's way of putting me off) I knew my mother had me at age 17 and my "dad's" name was on my birth certificate, but I still had my suspicions. As a teen, my dad and I had few bad arguments and I shouted "I don't even think you're my real dad. He shouted back I don't think your my real daughter". Make a long story short, my parents got a divorce when I was 18 and dad no longer had anything to do with me. for the next 16 years I would in a "light joking manor" would ask my mother to please tell me that man is not my father. Tell my it's Elvis...anybody but him!! She would just say "Well" and walk away. I knew then she had a secret. I never pushed her. I just let it slide because I knew what that would emply. Four weeks before my mother's death, she finally revealed to me the father I was raised with was not my biological father. She told me his name, there was no conversation about the situation. (mother had cancer in her brain at this point) I just felt relieved to she came clean and I got his name.Had I been told early in life I would have had an explanation as to why I felt so different. I would have known why "dad" treated me differently than my sister.Yes, he did treat me different! I am more upset about the lies and hiding of the truth far more than the facts of the matter. I am finding I still have uncontrolled anger towards my mother and she has been gone now for 7 months. I should be grieving for my loss, instead I just want to dig her up, ask her why she would hurt me this way and bury her back up. Sounds morbid I know. Guess I should get therepy! Anyway, my point is the earlier she knows, the less tramatic it is. Start out with age appropriate facts then just answer her questions TRUTHFULLY as she gets older. She will respect you for your honestly and love you for it too. I hope this helps some. Just my perspective on someone who wish her parents had opened their eyes and saw the lies were hurting me more than the truth could have.

i think both of you are right about telling her something but how to explain something like this to my daughter at such a young age will be difficult... there are a few other twists that make it a little harder to explain....my daughter ended up with my ex husbands last name because i kept his last name after the divorce...however, i got pregnant after the divorce...by a different man...he was just a fling...someone to help me get over my ex i guess....i didn't love him and so i didn't marry him...i gave him the option of being friends and still being able to be a part of her life but he didn't want to do that so i moved on... being a new single mom...and seeing how my parents loved my daughter....i decided i would go ahead and tell his parents that they had a granddaughter and give them the option of being a part of her life....they have beena big part...in fact my daughter knows all of his family but him....weird, i know... so i met the love of my life...and we got married...had a son together...he's five and wonders why he never goes to visit my daughter's "mimi"...i usually change the subject.... all my daughter knows is that when i had her, my last name was the same as hers...and that's where she got her last name....i told her that today and thought she may ask me some questions but she was satisfied with that i guess so i stopped there.... so for now i'm sort of waiting for a good moment and a cue from her....and going over what i could possibly say to her....and thinking i will be leaving out a lot of the details.........

I'm not sure how old your daughter is, but I think it's a good idea to tell her, when she's old enough to understand. You might tell her at the same time that your husband wants to adopt her, because he loves her so much that just being her step dad isn't good enough....or something like that to make her feel very loved and special. If your ex-husband's parents don't know the truth about her, they should probably be told too.....and you should be ready for some backlash. Still it's usually best to get the truth out there and deal with it. Otherwise you'll be covering for the rest of your life.

When my Ex-husband and I divorced my daughter was 2 years old. Her father was in her live for about 8 months after the divorce and then dissappeared. It was very hard for her to understand everything....but i did alot of reading and found a great way to explain everything to her. We played games and used pictures of familys...and would play out the "story" of the little girl whos Daddy wasnt ready to be a dad." The more we played the story game the more questions she would ask and the more she would understand. I had a book to read that gave me great advice its called "Helping Children Cope with Divorce the Sandcastles Way" its not only for divorce, but children who have been adandoned by a bio-parent. As our lives changed so did the story...and when I met my husband Peter and as time went on decided to go through the adoption process. We explained it all to her as the story was ending...and we had to give her story to a judge so he could read it...and they could make Peter her only daddy. Which after being in her life for more then 2 years is all she wanted. I feel that you should be as real with your child as you possibly can. Of course there are alot of things children just cant understand...but dont under estimate them! Its important that they know! But always always assure them it was not there fault...that the parent just wasnt ready to be a parent...never put blame on the other parent because thats a part of them also and your only hurting the child. I hope that you find the strength to tell your child, and remember in the beginning things might seem hard, but talk talk talk and things will settle in and start to get better! My daughter is now 5 years old...and she knows shes got a father out there somewhere...but she knows who her daddy is!

My son is 6 years old. He has a very basic understanding that he came from someone else's tummy, but that I am his mommy. He is too young to really understand any of this - but we will continue to separate the biological aspect of his birth, and his family now. It's harder with a father situation, unless you want to start the birds and bees discussion already. But if your son is already 5 and your daughter is older, you should start. Gently, little tiny bits of information at a time. You were with 'mimi's' son when she was in your tummy, but you are a family and this is her daddy.. Something like that. Keep it casual, make sure she realized nothing is wrong or weird about the situation, families are made in many ways. She can get more info as she gets older and her understanding of the biological process increases. Don't wait too much longer. It could potentially cause her a lot of pain some day...

I am in a similar situation. I have 4 children, 3 of which are from my first marriage. When my older children were 6, 4, and 1 my ex left us in the middle of the night with no explanation. I met my current husband a year later. The older 2, my girls, are fully aware of the situation. They know that their step-father is adopting them. My son, who is 5 now, doesn't remember his bio-father and thinks my husband is. He never questioned the last name thing, but now that he has started kindergarten, and the adoption is in process, the school decided to start him with his step-father's last name. I feel he is just too young to understand things right now. I'm lucky because I have the girls to help me explain things in a few years when he's more able to comprehend the circumstances. The girls were abused by their bio-father and more than support the adoption. They want nothing more than to have my husband as their "daddy" forever. The oldest, who is now 10, feels that with all he has done for her being a "step" is not enough.My husband has always wanted children, but was told that he could never father a child. He went through a few surgeries, and I became pregnant with our son. My husband treats all 4 of them the same, and anyone looking in from the outside would never know that he wasn't their bio-father.As for the issue about grandparents and the like, My older 3 go to visit my ex's parents every other weekend. They support the adoption as well. My youngest, who is not their biological grandchild will start going to visit on the weekends when he is old enough. They treat him like he was their blood. I hope that when the time is right and I have to tell my son that the man he has always assumed was his bio-father is not that he understands that he was adopted not because mommy married daddy but because daddy loved him more than anything and wanted the world to know that he was "his".