Bad relationship with adoptive mother

This talks to the need for the Aparents to grieve the fact that they cannot have their own children. The grief process should be completed before adopting. [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3pX4C-mtiI]Lecture on Adoption - YouTube[/url]

If your mother hasn't talked to you about her feelings already, it's probably best to let her feelings regarding her infertility remain unspoken. You have stated that the two of you do not have a good relationship. And, infertility and the feelings that surround it can really only be discussed when someone feels emotionally safe. Since your relationship isn't on solid ground, it probably isn't the best topic.You feel empathy for you mother. But, I fear that she will just feel that you pity her. I also fear that she may feel you are prying into her personal affairs.

I've seen that lecture before on Youtube. It's excellent. I thank God for people like him who are insightful and understanding enough to understand and research the adoptee experience, and adoption triad, and be real about the issues. I think there's some level of pain and loss for everyone involved. It's just a very sad thing. I feel like she is very immature sometimes about our relationship, and selfish. Like years ago, when I was in my early 20's, we kind of had a heart to heart talk, and she lashed out at me that as an infant when they first brought me home I pushed away from her. Apparently a lot of adoptee infants either are really clingy or push away from their new caregivers, from what I've read and understood as I became more educated about issues with adoptees. But at any rate, she let it be known that she still resented that I did this to her as an infant. Like I could help that as a grown adult. I was adopted in 1970. It's not like they encouraged adoptive parents to be educated about the adoptee, or needs and issues of adoptees. They (they being Catholic Charities) pretty much just told my parents to "Love the baby like it was your own", and that's about it. Her ignorance is not her fault, but it's not fair that she still harbors resentment and lashed out at me. I'm sure twenty years later, she still feels that way.She still harbors a lot of resentment from my teenage years, when teenagers go through the normal tumultous years. Everything's always been about her, she's never looked deeper or tried to have any insight about things. Now, I'm not saying I've not contributed to any problems, but I do feel she is unfair and immature about things, and you can't develop a good relationship harboring ridiculous resentments, unforgiveness, and bitterness. Sometimes I feel as adoptees we are given a hard role to fulfill, sometimes an impossible one. I feel like I've suffered the brunt of her unspoken deep down resentments and bitterness.

We can't fix other people. We can only change how we react to their behaviors.My take on things: take care of yourself. Develop healthy boundaries in which you can interact with your mother without taking any addition abuse from her.

Hey Cajjk, I would suggest you first to not to rent so much of space to such thoughts as they would modify your perception into more bitter ones. Try discussing the problem you are having with your adoptive mom with no premonition. Tell her what you want her to do and how you want to reciprocate to them. Gradually things would be fine and settle down. Just take your step without premonition. It would work for sure.

" Sometimes I think her poor treatment of me in general, is due to possible bitterness and resentments. Should I try to talk to her about these things? Or is that one of those things better left talked about?"-Have the two of you discussed adoption in general? Years ago (before the happy adoption veil dropped)I told my mom that adoption was second best for all concerned. I said that people do not try and try and try to adopt and then give up and say "well, lets have our own child since we can't adopt". She understood and I think she understood that I understood her position too. Neither of us was the first choice for the other. Two peas in a pod .

What "I" heard was a whole lot of grace for her mom for decades with a great many excuses/justifications for why her mom wasn't the adult in the situation, and didn't seek counselling whether it was for her grief over infertility, or, lack of bonding to her daughter (regardless if one caused the other). The child should not be the one who is responsible for fixing the adult - or making excuses for her behavior for the last four decades. L4R once again has good advice. Kind regards, Dickons

Laurie,I keep seeing posts where you tell people what they should and shouldn't think and feel.If I were to get answers such as this, I would feel very unheard... perhaps even that my concerns were dismissed. I might get annoyed at that, or worse.

What L4R said above is very true. It's also much easier to say than it is to live. I also have a very difficult (though not to the level of abusive) relationship with my adoptive mom. Logically, I *KNOW* I can't make her treat me with more kindness and respect. But I constantly fall into the trap of wishful thinking, somewhere in my head, going through "well, if I just do THIS, maybe things will change..." So yeah, I understand how you can get caught up in thinking that maybe if you address her issues surrounding your adoption head-on, MAYBE, she'll finally be the mom you've always wanted her to be. But honestly, it sounds to me like that same trap of wishful thinking. Sadly, after so many years of the same behavior patterns, your mother (and my mother, for that matter) is unlikely to change. I'm just not sure what talking about her infertility/your adoption gets you - even if she's willing and able to discuss it all, I'm simply not sure what positive outcome will come from that discussion. (And, in general, I'm wary of entering into a discussion believing I know what the other person is thinking/feeling. Even if you're right, you aren't letting the other person speak their own thoughts for themselves.) The best thing you can do is to be kind to yourself. Do what feeds your happiness. Try not to let your mother's issues bring sadness into your own life. I'm sorry it isn't easy. Wouldn't that be nice...?

You sound so much like me and my relationship with my a-mother. I went through so many of the same trials and a lot of the same self-blame. One of the biggest helps was someone who actually saw one of my posts and linked me to [URL="http://www.daughtersofnarcissisticmothers.com/characteristics-of-narcissistic-mothers.html"]Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers[/URL]. Now I want to repay the favor and hopefully give someone else help and relief from all the guilt. I don't know how many a-mothers are narcissistic, but I suspect quite a lot. So much more made sense once I had read that page (and many others on DONM). It was like a light bulb went off in my head. It didn't change anything in my actual relationship with my mother because narcissistic people are basically incapable of change. But it made me realize that the problems were with her and any guilt I had was basically part of her mental illness (I believe narcissism to that level is a mental illness) so I just shrug it off now much better. I hope you get the same relief.

I too always had a horrible relationship w my adoptive mother. In fact, I haven't spoken to her in 12yrs. I chose to cut all ties & communication when she and my adoptive fam decided they wouldn't come to my wedding bc I wasn't getting married in a Catholic Church. That was the last straw for me. They never supported ME it was always about who they wanted me to be and the person I was wasn't good enough for them. I never felt loved for who I was, sure they fed & clothed me and said they loved me, but I never felt it. And my adoptive mother was the worst. She had an idea in her head who she wanted her daughter to be & I def was not it. I had my own mind, my own views & they did not mirror hers. My adoptive father, who I was close to but couldn't continue a relationship w bc of the rest of the fam, developed brain cancer and died in 2007. I didn't know. No one told me. When I looked up his obit there was no mention of me, like I'd never existed. He was listed as a father to his son, their biological child who was the golden child who could do no wrong. He was my father too but that didn't matter. My godmother told me of his death in a xmas card(what a way to find out!) bc she's the only one I stayed in contact w. I recently found out she is living 5mins from me. My greatest fear is running into her somewhere. I dk what I would do. Not all adoption stories have happy endings. I love my life, I'm blessed w a wonderful husband and a 2yr old son who is my everything. I couldn't imagine treating him the way I was treated. Can't help but wonder if it would've been diff if I was their biological child. Would they have truly loved me? I'll never know. But I do have hate in my heart for that woman who called herself my mother for years. She didn't deserve that title. A mother doesn't do this to her daughter...

Salesmskeeper, it sounds like your adoptive mother and my adoptive mother need to get together : / . That's pretty much my adoptive mother summed up. I cannot suit her or please her it seems no matter what I do. I have finally after now being in my 40's come to the whole cold, hard conclusion of things and that is, this woman whom I have called mother for four decades just does not love me as a mother should, and has not been a true mother to me. She's not been a mother like mothers I know others have had. I know nothing of a "mother's love" that I read about on those saccharine Facebook "Thought for the day"s. I cannot dream of treating my children the way my mother has treated me at times.

I've read "Daughter's of Narcissistic Mothers" before and a lot of rang true.

I think a lot of adoptive mothers really never deal with their issues in general. For instance, unfortunately society views adoptions as a cure for infertility. This thinking leads to so much disappointment because it isn't a cure for infertility. Parenting someone else's child will never cure your desire to have your own, your pain/disappointment/frustration/insecurity that you can't and if you don't deal with those feelings first (which almost none of them do), you will project them into your relationship with your [adoptive] child. I think with the current time period, I wonder if many older adoptive mothers felt in some way pressured by society because having families was basically just something that women were expected to do. People really just didn't decide not to have children 30, 40 and 50 years ago the way that they do today. Few people question it today. My adoptive mother recently admitted that she basically hadn't wanted children. I had suspected this might have been the case based on how she basically doesn't have a maternal cell in her entire being. My adoptive father had pushed to adopt after they couldn't have their own biological child. I'm sorry you're going through it but the problems are definitely with your mother and whatever her reasons or mental issues are.