For those that have open relationships with extended family but not bios

That gives me a lot to think about. I guess what I meant is that, if they were given alone time with the kids, they would continue to try and get the bio to see them. They have a hard time with things like the kids calling us mom and dad and often try to correct them. We aren't as close to adoption yet, but I'm feeling out the kinds of relationships we may be able to maintain in the future. Some of the family is misguided but I believe that same some might be capable of being a good influence on the kids.

In a case where trust has yet to be earned, but you feel they can be positive in the right situation, I would try supervised visits. I've met extended family at the mall for a movie, at the park, for lunch, etc. I was allowing the kids to spend the night with their maternal grandmother when we visited, she is my SIL (DH's sister) and lives 12 hrs away. That will not happen anymore because, after assuring me that I didn't need to transfer the carseats to her vehicle because they wouldn't be driving anywhere, 5 mins later she went to get food with the 7 and 4 yr old using seat belts only. Then, she told the kids to keep it from me or I wouldn't let them stay with her anymore. So she knew how I felt, broke the law, endangered my kids, and told them to lie for her. Given my experience, I would always supervise with extended family. If they can't be supportive of our family around the kids, then visits would cease.

I would not start out with unsupervised visits. I would definitely do supervised visits and go from there. If we adopt FA there will not be unsupervised visits between bio family (extended) and FA. One reason is because they all meet together or live in the same location when they are in town (gma is a truck driver and she lets bio dad and bio mom stay at her house) and the aunt visits there often and recently she told biomom about a question I asked her, as sort of a tattletail thing, and I don't think I could trust her to keep her safe and away from bios. I don't think bio dad is very dangerous, except for the fact he's with bio mom who has a severe drug problem and is a manipulator. Really, I'd be fine with visits, supervised, with everyone in the family except for bio mom, but she will come along with bio dad, and bio dad's family will always bring him along...

I would not recommend unsupervised visits or phone calls. If you are well into an open adoption (at least a couple years) and birth family has always been supportive of you and stayed within the bounds you set then and only then would I recommend trying any kind of "alone time" and it would have to be a gradual process of earned trust.

We were thinking it would always be supervised (unless something changed down the line) with the great grandparents as they can't handle the kids alone anyway. That is "if" they get adopted by us. We are discussing this now with the attorney (long story). Also, we thought letters mailed from our FFA would be okay. We don't want any phone communication and probably not email. Now, BIG question. What do you do about changed names? We plan on changing both kid's names completely. We don't really want the new names known right away. Is there a way to manage this?

We are meeting with our FD's half-sibs and their paternal (diff bdad) aunt next week for the first time. It is hard because I am definitely NOT going to give my last name/address, etc. (there is still contact with people I would not want to have it). And then I feel like I can't have my seven yo meet them because she would "spill the beans" about our names/where we live. The SW thinks it is important for the older kids to know that our FD is loved and cared for. I agree. I will have to "evaluate" after our meeting how it goes. But it's kind of stressful! And it doesn't feel very natural....hopefully it will go fine. I don't know what to say about the name change. Are you worried about them knowing the name or about not using the new names? Just out of curiosity, is DCF asking you to think about this (is this a good sign for adoption?!). PS: Doh! Saw what you wrote about the names. Would it be weird for them to continue to use the old names?

Depending on the age of the kids you may be setting yourself up for a difficult situation and confusion. Is there a reason why they can't at least know the first name of the kids so they can help support the kids in the transition. It can be confusing to children to hear their birthnames repeated after their adoption. It also helps the birth family adjust to the transition because it suddenly seems real that this child is sort of re-born and now have a permanent place in their new family. If anything maybe you can come up with a nickname for the kids that you can ask them to use with the child instead of their birth names, until you decide wether you will share their new names with them. For example "sweet heart", "baby girl" etc. Something that you use at home and they already identify with.

If "discussing this with the attorney" means it would be in some kind of agreement or contract, then I would not sign on for that. Visits should always occur in the kids' best interest and at the parents' discretion. Don't give that up and require the kids to see them. In the best case, it should be up to the kids to see them. In the worst, you should keep the right to restrict or end contact if it isn't healthy. I may be jumping to conclusions, but it kind of hits home for us. I would definitely let the extended family know of the plans (first name or what you call them) so that they are on board. Also, their willingness to accept the changes will help you gauge visit appropriateness. I would be matter of fact. You shouldn't apologize or deflect.

I have been wondering about names also. We plan on changing FA's name if she is adopted by us, which seems likely. If we did have visits with any of the family, I know that a name change is going to be weird for them and maybe even cause some anger issues. She's only 2, do I let them continue to call her by her birth name, or do I insist they call her by her new name. I'm not sure how much in person visiting will happen anyway, but if we get placement of FA's sibling when it is born, I am sure there will be some visits between bio parents before RU or TPR and I often have her with me when I go to town...don't want them to see her and talk to her if they can't cooperate.

I guess I still really need to feel things out with the family. One of the family members who wants contact would be respectful of the name change. The great grandparents might be upset but they would probably do as we asked. My biggest concern is that the bio family already knows our last name and this would allow them to keep checking up on the kids. They would have the girls full new names. I guess it all doesn't matter until/if we adopt though. I just want to think through these things now so I'm prepared.

I'm possibly going to have the same dilemma and I'm worried about the name change too. We haven't decided 100% on changing it, but leaning that way. My worry is one of the main reasons we want to change it is for identification reasons (bio knows our last name too) but if we keep in contact with a certain relative, I'm sure it will get back to mom that we changed it. Now thankfully due to distance, in person visits would be rare, but it still worries me since I can't trust this relative at all, yet she isn't "unsafe" so I don't want to deny Lala a biological connection. If that makes any sense at all.

Gosh I feel "lucky" not to have to deal with this...in a way None of my 3 adopted kiddos have ANY other contact- no foster homes.. no biological family.. etc Its sad no photos no idea what any of them look like either..nor did they writer letters or anything..have nothing.

Mountain, I just read your posts here.If the extended can't be safe and healthy, then they don't get to have the relationship. You could always do only pics and a letter or open a facebook page if you wanted. Then it would be one way. Or have a post office box so you can hold onto things from them until later. But if my children's extended family did more than enabling, such as tried to give access to my children to someone I didn't choose to give access? They would be cut off or I would close things CONSIDERABLY (letters, pics, facebook). Their bad choice.Same with names. Fact is that I have the RIGHT to name my children. My children actually all have the name they were called as part of their names. Birth family didn't even accidentally call them their birth names this past weekend (2nd visit). I would have been fine with it had they. But they were all respectful and used the names the children have chosen to be called (new first name, new initials, nickname made from new middle name). I wouldn't accept anything else though. I mean, an accident is one thing; but they need to call my kids by their names, ya know.BTW, even biomom uses, at least partially, the children's new names on facebook and such. My kids can't even see that and have no visits with her or anything; but she still uses their adoptive names (though often with one name or the other in parentheses).

We have visits with extended family, but not bio mom or dad. Visits started with just great grandma. We have had visits with great grandma since DD was first placed with us as a foster placement. We have recently began to include maternal aunt and her son (who is a little younger than DD.) Visits are always supervised and will remain so. That family has convicted sexual abusers (of the bio mom and bio aunt) and they still have ongoing contact with the one's who abused them as children??????? No way will we ever go unsupervised. We don't have the name issue so much as we kept the first name, but changed the middle and last name only. Grandma and bio aunt do refer to us as mom and dad and are very respectful. They do know our first and last names and know our address. We send cards and pictures often and visit 3-4 times a year. However, if I feared for our safety, I wouldn't have given so much information. As far as future visits to include bio mom, we are open to that. (I actually hope that we do eventually get to that point.) But it has not been brought up and right now bio mom is back in jail and just has not gotten her life in a place where she can safely visit DD. I also think she is still personally bitter about the whole adoption. I mean she feels she lost her daughter (by actions of her own albeit, but she lost her) and I think she is a little resentful- and I can understand that. Given our situation, I doubt we will ever have visits with bio dad. Maybe pictures, and maybe, just maybe when DD is grown she can meet him safely if she chooses.

This is an interesting thread and you have posed a lot of questions that I have too. In our situation, we have been told both by the CW and by someone who has interacted with b-mom- that she is totally unstable and at the last visit, I was talking about openness and CW said "Yeah- probably not a good idea with this b-mom"...so, everything leads me to believe when(and if) we get to a goal change are really start discussing these things, b-mom will not be someone that we a. want to have ANY of our info, b. want to know Daisy's new name (which won't change drastically unless the CW recommends it, but we would legally change it to the nickname she already goes by which is just a shortened version of her given name. She would have a new middle name and our last name). BUT- Daisy has an aunt and much older sibling that probably know my name at this point. They expressed interest in communicating with us, and I allowed the CW to give them my email address. In hind sight- this was probably per-mature because all I know of these people is what the CW has told me. Supposedly they are decent people and have almost nothing to do with bio-mom because of her addictions and lifestyle. BUT- it would only take one time and they could share all of our info with bio-mom. I want Daisy to have some connection to her bio-family, especially her sibling. But I also don't want to risk her bio-mom finding her or us. So I have no real advice based on experience, except that "discretion is the better part of valor"- so I think be very cautious at first. Set up ground rules and let them know that you are only comfortable with supervised visits, so many times per month, year, etc. Are they trying to work out an OA to have b-mom relinquish do you think? I know court is coming up for you soon!