When to tell an adopted child that they are adopted, if ever?

[thumbwitch]

Asking on behalf of someone else - her oldest child is not biologically hers and she has decided not to tell the child until it is 18 that this is the case.

What is anyone's experience of this - is sooner better than later, and if so, what age is a good age to do it? I realise people will all have different experiences of this and what works for some won't work for others necessarily but am trying to get a "feel" for general experiences.

Am not a journalist - this is a family member but I am being cagey to avoid potentially outing her by accident (haven't namechanged to avoid being called troll/journo etc.)

I also realise this isn't the best time to post this but hey - if I don't do it now I might forget.

She has to put her own fears in the background and put the DC first. I can't imagine the horror or finding out at 18 yrs that you are not the person you thought you were-it turns your whole life topsy turvy and is so easily avoided if you start when they are too young to understand. DCs will throw anything in your face-from a very young age-you have to rise above it and understand that they don't mean it.

Secrets will always out. My own father is an example of this.

At school I was good friends with two sisters, their mother had divorced their violent and abusive father when the youngest sister was 2 (she has no memory of him).

Two years later their mother met and married a lovely guy and he adopted her two girls. They went on to have a daughter of their own and she was led to believe they were all 'full' sisters with the same dad.

One day in front of the youngest my dad asked the eldest girl "How is your stepfather?"

Not earth shattering for her in the grand scheme of things but it only takes a momentary lapse to let the cat out of the bag.

Be honest from the start.

maryz, thank you - a direct example of how this situation can go so badly wrong is very helpful.

Thank you all the rest of you as well - I'm putting all your comments together and the person in question will be given a copy when the discussion happens, so that she can read for herself what a mad idea it is to leave it.

Unfortunately for the lovely plan re. the photos, afaik there are no available photos of the birth mother (too revealing to explain why) so that wouldn't work.

It is better for the whole family to be honest. My cousin was adopted as a baby and it is something that I have just always known, even though I can't remember being told, I must have been very,very young. If you know early on you just accept it-I think that I would have been very shocked to find it out as an adult so it would be far, far worse for the person. My cousin was quite happy and secure and has never sought her birth parents. She wouldn't have had that security if her parents had dumped it on her when she was an adult.

re photos - i just meant that if you have some you need to be prepared to give them to the child. if you dont have any you just need to explain why

best to get some if its at all possible - its one of teh the first things a child if that age will ask

your relative REALLY needs to be honest with her DD. she cant fix the past and make everything ok for her. She can tell her the truth in an age appropriate way and help her deal with her feelings about it. as other have said, she needs to put her own fears about this aside and put her Dd first

very hard i knwo, she will want to "protect" her. but she cant, her Dd had alreday lived though this and has experinced the loss. All she is doing is denying her the knowledge and oppertunity she needs to make sense of it.

They should always grow up knowing they are adopted, anything less is cruel. You are otherwise denying them a coherent life story which will be profoundly damaging later on.