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My daughter was adopted at the age of 8 from foster care. We have contact with her grandfather and recently I have talked to her birthmom. Last night I got a friend request from a young girl who said she was my daughter's cousin and missed her and just wanted to talk to her and catch up. She had also sent my daughter a friend request.
Even though I am in favor of openness, this shocked me. I felt the need to protect my daughter. I did some checking around and the girl is a distant cousin who was around when they were young.
She and I have written back and forth and I told her that my daughter doesn't like to discuss the past, her abuse, or her time in care.
My daughter is 13 and we live in an area where this was bound to happen. I am still unsure of how to handle it all, if there is anything to handle. I'm not worried about her birthmom at all. I think my deep down fear is that this 16 year old will parrot something she's heard from her mom that "they never should have taken those kids".
That was something we had to talk about with the grandfather. He thought the same thing but had no idea about what actually went on. I want to protect her privacy, not open old wounds, and not have her question everything that has happened. She remembers enough and we have all the case files, but I don't really want to dredge through that now. She has seen enough to know.
Maybe I'm borrowing trouble. I just hope that this is all good. Am I doing enough or too much?
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I really have no words of wisdom to share with you, but I feel the pain of facebook with you.
My hopefully-will-be-adopted-soon son is friends with some of his extended birth family on FB. And because I am the FB police, I have read the posts. They're all just trashy people. I have removed them from his account and he gets so mad at me -- "But she's my sister!" To which I reply, "Removing her from your facebook doesn't make her not your sister, it just prevents you from seeing the inappropriate things she posts." And I go on the explain that I would remove anyone who posts inappropriate things on any of my kids' accounts regardless of who the culprit is. The conversation usually ends with an eyeroll and a "whatever."
Maybe you she could have supervised visits with the cousin via Skype or something. I really don't know what the right answer is. I'm sure whatever you do is right for your daughter.
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Due to my son's special needs he currently does not have a FB page however, I am FB friends with his 3 sibs as well as his oldest brother's wife. I have tried to see if birth mom is on there but haven't found her as of yet. The oldest sib has had contact with her in the past year and a half so I do have some updated info on her. The first thing that I noticed in OP post - is that the cousin made a friend request to parent and child. To me that says alot and that there is a level of maturity there. I was absolutely dumbfounded over the level of maturity of my son's 2 older sibs. They have been raised very well. The other sib unfortunately was never adopted, has remained in foster care or residential for the past 12 years and some of the posts on his page are not all that great esp for a 15 year old. If and when my son sees them it will be used as a teachable moment. Even removed at age 2 my son has alot of horrible memories but at 13 he is at an age where he will say if he doesn't want to talk about something. though I suspect in this case since the relative friended both parent/child there is a level of maturity that would respect any perimeters that are placed on that relationship ---- just my 2 cents....
scandi
though I suspect in this case since the relative friended both parent/child there is a level of maturity that would respect any perimeters that are placed on that relationship ---- just my 2 cents....