adoptive extended family issue

I'm not in a similar situation, but you have my sympathy for what you've been through. For your father's family to treat you poorly for any reason, after you lost your dad when you were so young, is awful. For them to claim you aren't "really" family because you were adopted is just plain offensive. For better or for worse, a child who's been adopted is a member of their adoptive family. That's what the altered birth certificate/adoption paperwork/legalese is all about. My instinct is to suggest that maybe these are not people you need in your life, even just a little bit, via Facebook. An aunt who cuts off her brother's child in a dispute over a will... cousins who treat you as something less than themselves... Sounds like they aren't worth listening to at all. To me, they sound toxic. As for how you're feeling about your cousin's child, but not your own child, being genetically-related to your dad... I'd like to ask you a question, if I may. Your dad - if he were with you today - would he look at your little one with pride and love and say, "That's my grandson!" (Or granddaughter, as the case may be.) Because your child IS your dad's grandchild. Your cousin using his name as a middle name doesn't lessen that. As you well know, blood isn't the only measure of family. (And it sounds to me like that's a lesson your aunt and cousins could stand to learn...)

Thank you so much! That really helped; my dad would love my little guy.

I'm in a different situation; I'm an adoptive mom, but I have had worries about my son being seen as "less than" by other family members. He is named for my grandfather, who helped to raise me, and one person did give me a hard time about that at first. However, I know my grandfather would have adored him, and he turns out to be my grandmother's favorite, so I've decided that is what's important.

I have almost no contact at all with my extended adoptive family either. No one cut me off, but they haven't really tried keeping in touch, either. My cousins are close to one another, and my brother (also adopted) and I are not close to any of them. I live far away, but he's geographically close to some of them and never sees them anyway. Maybe they really are just kind of awful people, but I guess we always just assumed being the only adopted cousins was why we were left out. And yeah. Sometimes it really hurts.

I have almost no contact at all with my extended adoptive family either. No one cut me off, but they haven't really tried keeping in touch, either. My cousins are close to one another, and my brother (also adopted) and I are not close to any of them. I live far away, but he's geographically close to some of them and never sees them anyway.Maybe they really are just kind of awful people, but I guess we always just assumed being the only adopted cousins was why we were left out. And yeah. Sometimes it really hurts.