Letterbox

[MissFenella]

Is it usual/typical for letters from parents to include 'when you are 18 and we meet again....' type stuff.

Letter from birth mum included a few 'wonderful future together' type references.

Putting aside the heart crushing 'she thinks I am babysitting' element (because that is about me not the girls) how would you couch the tone to your children?

You have your view adopted about how we should be raising our children-and we have our own. I am sorry you feel your parents didn't get it right. I hope they tried their best with the information and knowledge they had.

We are open with our children on the whole, and I would say quite positive in the circumstances about our children's birth parents. That does not mean to say that I am comfortable reading my young child a letter that says when they grow up they will go back to live with their real family where everyone is waiting for them- can you not see how disconcerting that is for a child-who thinks like a child?

Your paragraphs about teaching them emotional intelligence by showing them the letter and all the feelings that are bundled up in it- is what I am responding to by saying that we should train them to meet the emotional needs of the birth parent. I have no doubt that a wound is left where the removal has happened, my child cannot be exposed to that raw grief whilst they are processing their own. They will grow to understand what has happened and THEY will choose whether they go back to their birth family. They will be raised to know that is their choice-and I wont have anyone disrupting their security by telling them it will happen.

kewcumber and tangerine, what I have said in fact is that:
(a) I believe that the SW's comments were correct, and that this is an opportunity to do some work on emotional intelligence - do you not agree? I didn't dictate how to do it.

(b) you are both frequently dismissive of input from outside your circle and accepted views (there is a group of you who agree with eachother a lot and are dismissive of other views a lot....) - do you not agree?

You have taken my comments to levels I didn't go to. I am not critical of everything I experienced as a child. I was referring to specific things raised in this thread.

I am very critical about the adoption system on many levels but I am not writing about that on this thread. Here I was responding to specific things raised in this thread.

Kewcumber, re your 30 years I learn new things all the time - your post last night referring to people who drop in to opine - highly dismissive, and in fact the majority of people who post have something useful to add and you could be learning new things from them, just as we all can.

tangerine, re your final para I think you should read what I wrote first off again, because you have misunderstood it. You cannot give them choice unless you give them that choice - they will not have the choice unless they learn to identify and cope with their feelings and their responses to other people's feelings. Once they do this, they will be able to make better informed choices about their lives. By withholding info you are denying them the ability to grow and make choices. I didn't say do it all in one go - timing is crucial and without knowing more about the actual circs I would not presume to advise.

You seem to miss the point Adoption- my children are little- too little to be handling the baggage of the grown ups in their life who made mistakes-when they are bigger they will be able to do that with our help and support-I am not going to mess with their heads to try and get them to understand the needs of the grown up who messed up. Because
THEY ARE NOT READY YET-You might think they are- but they are not. They are learning about other every day feelings.
You are the one who seems inflexible about seeing things other people's way.

my children are little- too little to be handling the baggage of the grown ups in their life who made mistakes-when they are bigger they will be able to do that with our help and support-I am not going to mess with their heads to try and get them to understand the needs of the grown up who messed up. Because
THEY ARE NOT READY YET

Not only is this so obviously and absolutely right, I would go further and say that when children have to handle the baggage of adults in their lives that have messed up, or for that matter who are messed up, it almost always leads to damage for those children. You have no choice but to protect them from this.

Forgive me for commenting here, I found this thread by accident but I am truly shocked at the social work response.

Kewcumber, re your 30 years I learn new things all the time I have no idea what you mean about this - I'm not 30 (I wish!)

I'm sorry if by disagreeing with you that you have labelled me dismissive and apparently I am regularly - I can only find one other thread you were on and I don;t think I contributed to that but obviously you have much of what I've siad in the past and you have formed an opinion of me. I don't have that luxury with you so I can only judge by what you actually say.

For the avoidance of doubt - you appear to be saying that in this specific case you would read the contact letter (which you don;t have the details of and neither do I) to the child (of whom you know nothing and neither do I) and use it as an opportunity to built emotional intelligence. I don't agree that it is necessarily appropriate and that these things should be judged on a case by case basis.

Perhaps you will be relieved to hear that DS's psychologist has no issues with his emotional intelligence and commented on how (given his severe executive processing disorder) surprisingly mature and perceptive he is emotionally.

I'd like to think I contribute and learn from many adoption threads including those by adoptees and birth parents - of course you can disagree with that (would I be within my rights to call that "being dismissive" on your part?).

And to be dismissive once again and continuing the trend I have to go do some work.

I seem to have set some hares running.

My annoyance at the 'open and honest conversation' comment was the inference from the 'letterbox' monkey that we have anything other than open and honest conversations. Bloody cheek!

hey Kew do not worry as a big grown up woman you are allowed to dismiss and be dismissive - AND NOT GIVE A HOOT!

This is not much fun for me, but just to be absolutely clear I wrote:

""You need to be open and honest even if it upsets your children" - if this is what the SW said it sounds absolutely right to me. Absolutely correct. I say this as someone who went through it, and someone who has wonderful children of my own. A part of them raising them to be emotionally intelligent is allowing them to be emotionally intelligent. This is an opportunity for you to talk about the issues - eg, point out that the BM has said something, you don't agree it is a wise thing to say because x y z and allow the child to identify and express their feelings, and validate their feelings."

There is nothing there about reading the letter and certainly not the entire letter. I did however go against the general tide of comments.

kewcumber - just to be clear I wasn't objecting to you disagreeing with me, I objected to your post in which you referred to opining. And yes I have read your posts on some other threads and remembered your username and I have found you to be dismissive - though not of me.

tangerine - we weren't writing about your children. I don't think that I have absolutely missed the point. I am not being inflexible - I wrote one post and since then have been clarifying what I wrote - the discussion has gone no further than that, sadly. I say sadly as it is a discussion worth having.

But can you not see that you are projecting your thoughts and processing as an adult adoptee on to children very much younger than you, who do have very different adoption stories to yours-who may well be scared to hear all that stuff
Can you not see you give no credit to any of us, that we aren't constantly discussing these issues regardless of letters
We are capable of raising emotionally literate children without you bombarding us with what to do. Reiterating it over and over because we wont agree to what you are saying which is what it comes across as you doing.

I'm sorry but I wholeheartedly agree with Kew!
Of course we want our children to be emotionally intelligent and do everything we can to enable that to happen but there is a line! Not everything in a contact letter is appropriate for a child at a specific age to hear, yes when they are older but not when they're young. Our children have already been robbed of enough of their childhoods without making them grow up even quicker to take on board adults feelings that aren't their responsibility.
You wouldn't sit a 6 year old child down and go into graphic detail about the birds and the bees and I see this as no different. It's filtering at an age appropriate level. When a child is older then it is the time to discuss the more difficult content of these letters.

By the way I do know other adoptees adults who have been through this situation who have and who haven't made contact with their birth relatives. I haven't just formed opinions out of my bottom!

when I saw we aren't I mean we are.
My son knows a lot about his birth family- his reasons for being removed. Some reasons why they may have been the way they were.
He knows how to express his feelings and feels free to raise this subject and is going through a phase of doing it often, probably once or twice a day at the moment-so really I am ok with where we are as a family on this.

It's clear that Once (as she's already said) is influenced by her own needs and fears from childhood; this means that the letter does not seem emotionally damaging to her but rather something that she would have appreciated in childhood. It would be interesting to know if she would have felt there was an opportunity for learning in the same way if the letter had triggered feelings in a negative sense. If you weren't advocating reading that letter, Once, it's difficult to see how the 'dialogue' you were advocating could have taken place.

I don't believe adopted children should be expected to go through 'emotionally growing' experiences more than any child in any family. If anything, they may already have experienced too much in terms of exposure to adult emotions and would actually learn more by finding out what it means to be in a stable environment with caring grown-ups who filter out unduly upsetting or demanding things. Not the same but possibly still relevant - my foster-child was a bit freaked out when I tried to protect her from aspects of life that seemed too adult to me - she'd been forced to mature early and almost felt I was asking her to play a part. She simply tuned out needy letters from her mum - who was still her mum though, so as I said, not the same.

(sigh)

What I said was sound advice. No, I am not influenced by my own needs and fears from childhood, no I am not projecting. I still get the feeling some of you have not read what I have actually written.

I apologise for using the verb "to opine" - will henceforth use "to have an opinion" instead or maybe "to express an opinion"

There is something very freaky about someone who doesn't post but knows who I am and my apparent character flaws. Another good lesson in not posting anything on the MN adoption board these days that is anything other than in agreement with anyone who posts.

I apologise for misunderstanding that you were not in fact talking about the specific letter in question addressed to these specific children - I made the mistake because you insisted that your opinion was relevant to the OP's comments so mistakenly assumed that you approval of OP being "open and honest" was in fact a reference to the fact that you thought she should read the contact letter as it stands to her children. I wouldn't have assumed that you were generally talking about OP (or other adoptive parents) needing to be "open and honest" with their children because as you regularly read the adoption boards you must have come across many threads where adopters urge other to be honest with their children.

Is that actually what you're saying? That you have no opinion on the letter OP asked about but that you think adopters need to be more open and honest generally with their children and try a little harder to make sure they develop emotional intelligence perhaps using a contact letter as a handy learning exercise even if its upsetting for them. I wouldn't like to misinterpret you again.

I think the feeling is mutual.
And perhaps you ought to read how you speak to project yourself to some of us.
You can have your opinion on sound advice- but it remains that your opinion. You wont even consider anyone elses but still accuse others of being dismissive-and actually you do come across as it being about what you feel you needed from your childhood. Your perception of what your parents did.

(sigh) comes across as at best patronising it doesn't add anything to your post- it substracts efforts of others to take you at face value. This is not AIBU it is a support thread. support doesn't always have to be hear what you want to hear- but neither is it supportive to drill away at everyone's efforts.

I need to stop posting now because I'm actually trying to be dismissive now rather just naturally being dismissive.

Apologies for the hijack MissFenella - hope the children are well and you are feeling less pissed off by total lack (as usual) of support from SS.

That is not addressed to you Kewcumber- but rather the person who is explaining to posters on here about emotional intelligence and yet failing to see how she comes across, but rather insisting everyone else is wrong and she is right.

No what I was saying was that it is possible to convey the concepts in the letter in an age appropriate way and to talk about it and talk about feelings (so very important) without actually reading the letter word for word. Does that make sense now?

Yes, if it brings up negative feelings it is still important. Very important. Children will have the feelings you are afraid of whether you are talking about them or not. It is better to talk about them - in age appropriate language and concepts.

Kewcumber, it is not just the word opine. There is nothing freaky - like many people I read things sometimes but don't comment. I remembered things you and tangerine had written because I was just so shocked by it. That is just my perception - I am not saying I am right and you are wrong. I felt shocked and I remembered your username. I found your posts upthread shocking. Not just the word opine.

I am beginning to agree with those of you who think that you should have a special place to get support from one another, and think that there should be two sections on adoption - one for you to get support form one another and one for the rest of us to discuss things that are of concern without being accused of projecting (and looking at other threads, without fear of upsetting you and without fear of being called a conspiracy theorist etc)

This is nothing to do with me or my needs, believe me. I am getting nothing out of it whatsoever. I realised a few months ago when i posted on the aibu thread that not much has changed since I was adopted and I want things to change, to make things better for children.

I am not disappearing but I do have a lot of stuff to do around the home and this has taken up too much time today. We went out today and while waiting for dc to do their thing I thought about it and felt really sad - that all these people caring about children/sharing their life experiences/etc are beating each other up online! Does anyone else think the idea of two threads - once general and one support - re adoption a good idea?

tangerine, I have been defending myself, not drilling away anyone's efforts. If you hadn't come on the thread accusing me of this that and everything, all incorrect, I would have not returned, and would have been happier for it.

I was being patronising in my first post, in the second para (not the first), it is true, because I was incensed. I apologised for it. Not one of you has apologised for causing offence to me or any other posters you have been rude to.

Yes the (sigh) wasn't great either but I think it was a somewhat tame response to what had been said to me.

Any chance of an apology for any of your comments to me?

Adopted once - I am asking you very nicely to please stop. You have made your point.

if you want to say more please do so on your own thread where you invite discussion.

Thanks

I would like to say I am sorry that you are stuck with the belief that because you say it, then it must be so, no one can disagree with you- you don't even say I think or I believe you just tell us what to think or believe and you don't see anything wrong with that.
I am not sure what I have said to offend you- but you have said plenty to offend me and others. I am sorry if you don't like what I have to say but please just stop yes drilling away at us trying to get us to agree with you.

I found your posts upthread shocking

Really?! I'd love to know which bits!

Sorry Miss, will leave it alone now... but I've read and re-read my posts and can't find exactly what I've said that is shocking or requires an apology. I think I must have very low emotional intelligence.

This whole adoption board is a "support" board, having two support boards won't change people coming onto threads with views that aren't particularly helpful to the OP - it happens all across MN I don't see how you can stop that. The difference in Adoption is like the Special Needs section it tends to put people who are living some very difficult moments and need support in with people who have a general statement to make about how that parent should be doing things better. This thread is a good example. In my (dismissive) opinion.

Kew and Tange - nothing for you to apologise for. I find you help and assurance comforting and as usual bang on the money.

I don’t have any direct experience of adoption, but I do sometimes read adoption threads – partly for the same reason as I read other MN threads about matters I don’t have any direct experience of, just for education; and partly because both my adult offspring have friends who have adopted and, should I meet them and their children, I’d hope that at least I won’t say the entirely wrong things.

I’ve also read some Family Law judgments, which give me a clue about the circumstances of a child’s life leading up to an adoption order.

But, adoptedonceuponatime, I have to say that, even as a complete outsider, your attitude has rubbed me up the wrong way. You say: “it is possible to convey the concepts in the letter in an age appropriate way” – but how is it possible to convey the concept of “we’ll meet again when you’re 18” to a young child who quite possibly still has memories of a traumatic early life. I could imagine a young child seeing that as a threat.

And then you say: “Children will have the feelings you are afraid of whether you are talking about them or not.” That sounds to me as rather patronising, as though you think that adopters need to be told that.

I apologise to the regulars of this part of MN for intruding, but, from what I’ve learned, there isn’t enough support or understanding or (dare I say it?) respect for the challenge and love that’s involved in raising your children.

Wanda your adult offspring are very lucky to have a mum who wants to educate herself beyond her own immediate world. I thank you for that, if more people did, it would make life a lot easier and less stressful for adopters and their children.