Adoptive family excluding adoptee

Like Ravensong said, As AP I'd be turning over in my grave if I thought my DD wasn't being loved/included in Afamily after my death. Of course I don't believe that will happen as we have a very close family and DD is loved and spoiled to the max! Often included when I can't attend something. But glad you brought this up so I can continue to be aware of family interactions and assure this doesn't happen! However, we do have some "odd" family dynamics w/ my brother's adopted child "J" and he could probably write your post. In our case, "J" rarely wants to be a part of Afamily. He recently became a widow and did ask we support him @ visitation and funeral. We of course went to support him as soon as he ask. It may be years before he even talks to us again and that is ok. We are his family and will be there if he wants us again! But on a day to day basis he will be excluded from a lot of family events because of his desire to not be a part of Afamily. I know all family dynamics are different!!

I seriously believe that to my adoptive mother because I want to achknowledge that I am "adopted" and that I have "birth parents" (neither of which is a parent due to my complicated birth story) that I no longer am part of my adopted family. In my family I was only welcome there as long as I "believed" I was biologically related to them. My mother and I were no longer in contact because I told her we needed to have an open and honest relationship and she wasn't willing to do. My adopted father died and she choose not to tell me when he was dying or about his funeral. I didn't think her hatred would go that far but apparently it did. He raised me from birth until about 20 when he got sick and went in to a nursing home. In a situation where a person grew up knowing they were adopted and the family still does not accepting them, that is horrible. I just try to remind myself that people like this probably aren't really people we need in our lives. In my mothers case, she is fake, materiallistic and selfish, all of my life she caused a lot of drama and made me have to compromise the person I am so that I could fit in to her life. I'm much happier being me without judgement or constantly being criticized, not to mention how opposite our values are I don't think I would want her around my children.

i get the ' nobodys picking on you, your just looking for problems' . why, because im not invited to christmas again this year? excuse me for having feelings.

Growing up I was excuded by a couple of family members. One aunt in particular went out of her way and made it a point to let me know about events a I missed out on. no matter how much my AParents pleaded with her she was just a rotten person full of jealousy and a very evil person. Today I rejoice that I was never accepted by her. As long as my Aparents loved me and included me that is all that mattered but a as a young child being reminded of the pool party or sleep over I kissed out on made me feel like I did something wrong or wasn't good enough. I am sorry if you have experienced this type of predjudice.

You know, there are three adoptions in my birth family. EVERY person in our family, including extended family (relatives by marriage) have viewed these adopted members as "our relatives". Period. Aunts and uncles saw them as neices and nephews. Brothers and sisters saw them as brothers and sisters. Cousins saw them as cousins. People's children saw them as aunt/uncle. Grandparents, etc.I do not vaguely comprehend how ANY family could be so pin-headed as to care how someone joined the family, by birth or adoption. This is cruel and mean. The only advice I can think of is to suggest that the person does their best to create new family ties, with friends such as yourself. And leave these people to stew in whatever little game they are creating. So sad for them, that their hearts are so small.

[QUOTE=alys1]You know, there are three adoptions in my birth family. EVERY person in our family, including extended family (relatives by marriage) have viewed these adopted members as "our relatives". Period. Aunts and uncles saw them as neices and nephews. Brothers and sisters saw them as brothers and sisters. Cousins saw them as cousins. People's children saw them as aunt/uncle. Grandparents, etc. I do not vaguely comprehend how ANY family could be so pin-headed as to care how someone joined the family, by birth or adoption. This is cruel and mean. In my case this person was very cruel and mean and saw me as a "dirty little secret" treating me like it was my fault and that I was somehow intruding in what she percieved as her family. It took years, I am talking years to figure it all out. It wasn't until affter I discovered who my bmom was and put the puzzle together that her evil treament no longer affected me. Sadly, as much as we see it as unfathomable, there are some really mean people in ths world. This aunt would throw these huge sleep overs and pool parties(she had a house with a pool) invite all the cousins and exclude me. Then to add insult to injury at the next family get together she would remind the other kids about the great time they had specifically saying "tell P about how we jumped in the pool" tell P about my dog and the puppies" and the children would start talking about all the fun things I missed out on:grr:

If I saw someone in my family doing that, I would either limit my contact or have a good heart to heart. It burns me when people show favoritism. And I've ended contact with my sister for that very reason. Now that she has a son and I've had to cut her off 2 times, she knows it's not right.

it was always that way here too, i never was nade to feel different, i dont even remember being told,it wasnt a secret, it wasnt a shamefull thing. see, my aparents have a biological daughter older than me. mom had two miscariges, so she adopted me, the two years later adopted my brother ( he and i not blood) and we were matched so closely we actually looked kind of alike, but i never felt different about being adopted until mom died. then i turned into 'adopted kid' and it hurt horribly! it was my sister and cosin that had started with the adopted kid , what do you care mom died thing...i felt left out for one, nobody came up to me to say 'im sorry, how are you doing?'i was treated like i was a total stranger that crashed her funeral! is it that sister is greedy? realizing one parent is gone, the other will be soon, doesnt want to share in the will? that was the last thing on my mind...i dont know, has she always felt this way about me and i was just clueless? here i thought i was part of the family. but ever since then im nothing more than the slave careing for dad because sister doesnt want to.. so yeah, im family enough to care for precious father, but im the adopted kid when it comes to feelings.. ok...

Why? Because they are jerks. I was not adopted but I had one grandfather who started telling me as early as I can remember that he blamed me for ruining my mom's life. (because I was born before she got married, even though she married my dad and went on to have six more kids with him) He didn't like my dad either so by the time I was ten whenever he came to visit I would go off with my dad for the day. I did love that daddy daughter time, but I knew the reason for it and it still hurt to know this grandfather who brought gifts for my siblings hated me. My mom was offended that I didn't fly out for his funeral a few years ago. For me, I have cut off family members that treat me like dirt. Including one brother and my mom. I sure don't want those people spreading their poisonous attitudes to my kids. I cut my father off for a few years until he apologized for calling my daughter a commie. We had a good couple of years together once he overcame his prejudice. I am so sorry you have jerks in your family.

I am so sorry. I found and spoke with my birthmother on 11/18/2011. My adoptive family and their skewed views and treatment of me really dont bother me now. It is really odd. The first thing my birthmother I heard from my birth mother after I confirmed that I had the right mom, " Honey I love you, I have loved you everyday, I have thought of you everyday, I have worried about you everyday, I have missed you everyday. I love you." It felt like something dark had been lifted from my body. Now the battle to meet my birth mother face to face is on, :evilgrin: . I am her only living child. My birth mother has been raising what she thought were her only 2 grand children, who BTW are 29 & 31. My birth mother's 31 year old grand is doing everything she can to prevent my mother and I from meeting.. The 31 has made it a point to let me know that this has deeply affected "her" family and that it is not fair that I knew about them and they had no idea about me... Whoa back up there lil girl..... I had no idea what my given name was much less about you or your sibling until October 2011. She went on to explain that she doen't understand why my birthmother felt like she could not talk about to her about me.. Gee maybe it has something to do with the way your making it about you. I told this 31 year old that she did not need to add to the shame and guilt that my birth mother has suffered all of these years.. Ya know I am very thankful and filled with joy knowing that my birth mother loves me, and I heard that from her mouth to my ears. Her grand daughter, try as she might, cannot take that away from my birth mother or me.

I was adopted at age 6 to a minister and a school teacher, very conservative family. I was the model child; made honor roll, did the extracurricular activities, was in "Bible Club" in school, leader in my youth group....did everything I could think of to gain their approval, which was fleeting. My adoptive parents were very strict; no dating, no "hanging out" with friends, pretty much no social activity outside of youth group events, which were extremely closely monitered. I graduated high school with honors and went to college 2 hours away and went bananas. I drank, I smoked, I met my first real boyfriend and had sex, and my adoptive mother completely flipped out. She immediately made me move back home after my first semester and go to the local college. She went straight back to "17 yr old" rules: no friends, no social life, home by 9...she treated me like some juvenile deliquent who broke the law or something when I was only experimenting in what I have come to determine is a pretty normal way for an 18 year old girl. I never did hard drugs, I never participated in dangerous activities, I never broke the law. I drank beer at frat parties, smoked cigarettes, and had a boyfriend. That was the extent of my "sin". Only a couple of months after living at home with her, I just couldn't take it. She was starting fights at every turn, driving by my job to make sure I was there, following me to school (in college)....it was ridiculous. I called my boyfriend (the first one, whom I was still dating), and he came to pick me up. I moved out and ended up living in his dorm with him until I saved enough money from 2 waitressing jobs to get an apartment. I couldn't afford to go back to school, so I worked through the next semester. My adoptive dad continued to keep in touch with me, however, and encouraged me to go back to school. He pulled some strings (remember, he's a minister) and got me into a Methodist private college upstate and paid my tuition. I went back to college and my mom begrudgingly had a quasi-relationship with me while I was there for that semester. I made dean's list at that college, making all A's with one B, but during the course of the semester my first BF and I broke up (mostly due to the way my mom had behaved towards him and how he felt completely neglected by my family) and I met someone else towards the end of the semester, my math tutor, and we were casually dating. Towards the end of the semester, my mother didn't call, email, or communicate at all....I figured it was another one of her "silent spells" and didn't think too terribly much of it. Towards the week of finals, I called my parents to ask about moving out of the dorm at the end of the semester (they didn't have summer school and you couldn't live there through the summer), and my mom said, "Well, since you haven't maintained contact with us, we didn't prepare to provide you a place to live this summer. Obviously we both know you can't live with us....we thought since you weren't communicating that you had something arranged." Something ARRANGED?! So, I was essentially homeless after exams. I passed all my exams with flying colors but then had nowhere to go. I asked all my girlfriends if I could stay with them but many of them were staying with their parents and they all said no. My math tutor said I could crash with him for the summer until I got on my feet, so I agreed. Which was a horrible mistake. He was an alcoholic who took great pleasure in beating the crap out of me, locking me in the apartment for days on end, knocking me out, etc. I finally got away and went to a homeless shelter, where I called my adoptive parents....who proceeded to drive 2.5 hours to the shelter only to sit down with me and tell me they were disappointed that this is how I ended up but they couldn't let me live with them....[disclaimer: again, I am not doing drugs, drinking, doing anything illegal at this point...I'm in a crappy living situation because of a decision my mother made]...and walked off and left me there. The shelter informed me that I could stay there only one week and had to find someplace to stay. At this point, I called one of my best friends, who is to this day one of my best friends, and she and her mother picked me up from the shelter, went back to her mom's house and got her mom's handgun, and we went to the apartment and her and her mom held him at gunpoint while I got my belongings and left. We drove to the city where my best friend lived and I stayed with her while she helped me look for an apartment and get back on my feet. During this time, I realized I needed to get back in college but there's no way I had the money- I had waitressing and bartending jobs. 9/11 had just happened, so I decided to enlist in the military and do my service. I enlisted but there was a long waiting time, so my best friend connected me with a girl she worked with who was looking for a roommate. I moved in with her (ironically, only about 4 miles from my parents' house) and lived there until I went to boot camp. Now, as soon as my mother found out I was going to boot camp and to serve my country, she all of a sudden wanted to be in my life. Per her usual style, she suddenly began calling and coming around, like NOTHING ever happened. So I went with it. We communicated regularly, I would go hang out at their house after church on Sunday, she met my new bf who became fiance, etc. etc. Then I shipped off to boot camp, she wrote me letters the whole time I was in boot camp, etc. Just like NOTHING EVER HAPPENED. So fast forward a few years....my first husband and I had one child, I found out he was cheating when I was out to sea, we got divorced, the whole time she was in this weird quasi-state...one foot out of the door, you know? After my divorce, I began being determined to "find myself"....I met my current husband just before I got out of the Navy, I filled him in on the situation so he didn't feel hurt or whatever when she inevitably treated him the same way, I had a government contractor job and went back to college....after having our son, I stayed home and went to college full-time and began working extensively with the nonprofit community where we live. Initially the plan was to go to law school- I got my degree in Political and Legal Studies, double minored in English and Public Service, and got accepted into a few law schools....none of which I could afford. Then I got offered a job at the nonprofit for which I was volunteering, which is an AIDS agency, and that's where I have found my "niche". I am also on the Board of Directors for the local Pride (gay pride) nonprofit. I'm passionate about my work, I feel fulfilled and content in my work, but I know my conservative adoptive parents would NEVER, ever approve of my work. Speaking of which, they were speaking to me up until a year ago. I make no bones about the work I do, and it's been all over my Facebook, which they are both on. They haven't called or spoken in over a year. I think it's weird, but it's becoming the norm with them...although this is a long stretch for them with no contact at all, not even over holidays. They will send presents in the mail to my kids for their birthdays, but it's not like my kids have a relationship with them at all, especially now that we're not visiting at all. I've pretty much given up on ever having a relationship with my adoptive parents. They seemed to be eternally disappointed in me, that I didn't turn out the way they wanted. To me, that's just not the definition of parenthood. You love and accept your child, no matter what. Is it because I'm adopted that they don't feel this inherent desire to accept me and my family? That's how I feel. Sorry it's such a long post, and thank you if you've read it. It's a very disfunctional, and now nonexistant, relationship with my adoptive parents, but I don't know how to change it. I'd love for them to be more open, but open, honest communication has NEVER happened in our house. When I was a teen, the very thought of talking to my parents about sex or drugs or alcohol was insanely outrageous...never would have happened. I've never shared with my mother details about my friendships, my social life, my dating, nothing...she didn't want to hear it and made no bones about it. Any advice anyone has to make this less painful is very welcome! Thanks so much!

I am so sorry your going through such craziness.... I found out what true unconditional love between parent and a child is when I had my one and only child. I will and have done everything within my power as a parent, a mommy to protector, nurture, provide for and be there for my child no matter what My adoptive family would not have ever defended me much less stood up for me. I grew up hearing that I should be very thankful they adopted me, LOL thankful for what I ask myself at almost 50. Thankful for an adoptive sibling who would try to sell me to total strangers at the supermarket, mall and other restaraunts(sp) and businesses my adoptive parents took us to as kids. Thankful for watching the bio kids being sent to europe on school trips, bought new clothing, beds and shoes just because they wanted it. Thankful my adoptive sister would lock me in the cedar chest in my adoptive parents room, she locked me in the back on the family station wagon under the fold down rear facing seat. As we got older her attacks became more viscious. It was like the more my adoptive mother loathed me the worse my sister treated me. I made the choice to sever my relationships with my adoptive family for the sake of my own physical, mental and emotional health. It is and was the best thing I c have ever done for myself, my family, my husband, my children.. My adoptive mothers treatment of me had my children asking me why is NaNa so mean to you mom. My children did not need to be exposed to that nor did I want to run the risk of her treating my kids the way treated me. Just recently I learned for a very old family friend that he and his wife knew what was going on, I was sexually molested over several years by a family member. He apologized for not doing anything to protect me back then. He talked about how my parents did not care about or for me. He said he never did understand why they adopted me, they had one child together and should have been happy with her. I do NOT like my adoptive mom and I do question wether I love her or not.... She is not someone I would choose to invite into my life as a firend nor would I have shared my life with her had I met her outside of the adoption situation. As an adult, a woman, a wife and a mommy you have the power to make the choices that best meet the needs of you, your husband and children.

What an awful thing to do to family! As a birthmom, it makes me crazy. I can report, however, that in my husband's family, where NO ONE is adopted, there is favoritism, bad feeling, brothers not speaking for decades. Crazy people are crazy people. Some will take anything they can find to divide the family--it's just an excuse. My second son was shocked when I finally told him about his older brother--but his reaction was, "find him, I want to know him!" When he thought about it, he also said, "well, that explains a lot." They have met, but didn't seem to connect, but then they are very different in interests, even though they have a lot of the same personality traits. They were very glad to see one another, though, and who knows how it might develop?

In my afamily, the exclusion started and was worse at home. Suddenly out of the blue, amother, would announce that I had to be out or in bed by 8 at night, so that the 'real' family could spend time together. The real family was her, her husband and bio son. They often excluded me from treats, food or events. Some people just suck, are petty and small minded. They hurt us, but we can learn we're better off without them anyway.

Too bad they can't screen for people like that! As a birthmom, I am horrified that anyone could feel that way, much less act that way. Such people shouldn't have children at all.