Help from birth parents whose family didn't want you to place?!

Just leave them to sort it amongst themselves. It really isn't your business to get involved in that side of things as far as I am concerned. Presumably, you will be organising counsellors and a lawyer etc for them (if they don't have them already)?

I agree with Kaths that you should stay out of this issue between this family and let them sort it out. My situation was not identical to this one but had some similarities. My son was born in 1983, after the official BSE, but I was raised in a Mormon family and I believe as a culture they were still fully in that era at the timeand in some respects might still be there! My family most certainly did not want me to attempt to raise my baby as a single mother and they knew that marriage between me and his father would have been a disaster (we saw eye-to-eye on that point), however accepting that a grandchild will forever be lost was very difficult for both of my parents. I learned years later that my father really suffered over it. In an attempt to find a solution my mom called me one day (theyŒd sent me away to live with strangers by this time) and asked if Id consider letting my older sister and her husband, who were expecting their 3rd child, raise my baby and pass him off as a ғtwin. My answer was an unequivocal ԓNO!!! What I wanted and begged for was for my parents to allow me to come home and figure out how to help me keep my son. I didnԒt want my sister in her horribly dysfunctional (but still Mormon) marriage parenting my son. I didnt want my parents raising my son. I didnҒt want to get married to raise my son. But, I didnt want to lose him either. In the end, I placed; though not happily. I donҒt believe my dad ever stopped grieving for the grandson he lost. I believe my mother still grieves in her own way. But I feel no sympathy for their loss as 28 years later Im still working through my own. I canҒt imagine how much more difficult it all would have been if pre-birth matching was the practice of the day. I dont count my lucky stars about much regarding my pregnancy experience, but on that point, I do. If one of my daughters found themselves in a crisis pregnancy situation today, I would do everything in my power not to lose another member of my family. I would offer every solution I could think of to help them understand that they could parent with whatever assistance they needed at the time. If they still insisted that they did not want to parent and did not want one of our many family members to parent, I would be supportive, but only after I tried to help them understand the lifelong consequences of relinquishing familial rights. Only then would I support their decision and IҒd offer them my shoulder to use as they spent their lives living with the unexpected consequences of relinquishment.

Not your business to be involved in what is a family choice for them. If I had a child and he or she came to me and wanted to place their child we would be having a VERY serious discussion about the repercussions for themselves and their child. I guess I don't see what is so wrong with a family wanting to keep a child in their family.

I understand - more background is that the e-moms mother & older sister friended me on Facebook; as did e-father and his mother. I'm not trying to sway anyone; in fact in the many conversations and texts with e-mom I've let her know that we are here to support whatever decision she makes. What I meant by what do we do if they are combative or hostile towards us, should we just go home and not move forward? I'm not approaching this in absolutes; I'm scared to get my heartbroken like the e-grandparents are and I feel horrible that they will be heart if e-parents go through with the adoption. I only wanted to come here and see if birth moms had similar scenarios and get an idea if we should move forward or let go of this one. Thank you for your responses.

I'm an aparent, but wanted to chime in. Hopefully the family members are being supportive and not coercing the eparents into parenting if that's not what they want to do. However, I do agree it's not something you can be involved in and I'd go so far as to recommend you not being friends with them on facebook. If you adopt the child, then I can see that communication, but not beforehand. Just from my observations reading the forums, you might consider the following. If you adopt this baby, I would make sure you have a family therapist for you & your husband to help you navigate the relationships. In turn, I hope the family members do the same (which is their responsibility) as you all try to get along for the sake of the child. It may be that it doesn't happen immediately though. It's hard to build a relationship with someone who is angry and grieving and they'll have to get to a point where they are in a place to do that. You might need to just give them a lot of space and realize the type of relationship you might want with them is not something they can handle or even want. It's going to be a kind of "play it by ear" situation with the extended family, imo. They have a right to their feelings and you have a right to be respected as the parent, so that's why I suggested a therapist that can maybe help you. Above all, you won't want to put the eparents in the middle of things, so this is why you need to be careful about your involvement with the family. They need to be in charge and not have 2 sides pushing or pulling them. Their family obviously has a lot more emotionally invested so of course if they are against the adoption, they'll have an opinion. As "wrong" as it is to coerce them (if that's what they are doing, and not just showing them all options to consider), it's still not something you'll want to be involved in. I know there are several bmoms on here who didn't even tell their parents they were expecting because they knew it would be an issue and didn't want them involved. They might be able to share a bit more in the direction you are hoping for as to how to handle communication & a bit more on what to possibly expect etc. :)

Crick thank you for your response...all responses are logical. The family actually wanted to friend me and get to know me. They really want the eparentsbto parent or have the maternal grandma raise the baby; the eparents want adoption and they've apparently been very clear about it. Emom wanted me to talk to family members; I think her hope is that in getting to know us and letting them know we'd like an open adoption is important to us (if that's what they all desire too) that they will be ok with it. I'm definitely not getting involved and telling eparents or egrandparents that they should place. Emom found us on a website and called us about three weeks later already knowing she wanted adoption and wanted us.We don't know if this is the match for us or not; time will tell. Thanks to everyone who responded!

Amen, sister.