to think that you aren't obliged to form a relationship with a chid you've given up for adoption

[Northernlurker]

Aplohies this is from the Daily Mail but I think it raises some interesting questions.

Susan Jameson has been honest with her daughter about her son's existence, she's given him medical information and told him who his father is but she doesn't want to try and turn back the clock for fifty years and I can understand that. Or does biology oblige one?

(All that aside - selling his story to the Mail is a deeply unclassy thing to do!)

I think he needs to grow up. Self-pity and self-indulgence only get you fame in the Daily Mail.

I think that if you give birth, you have an obligation to that child, whether or not you have raised them is irrelevant.

I don't think this man did the right thing by going to the papers, but I don't think it's fair for anyone to judge him for doing so. I agree with Kewcumber that maybe it was his only way of regaining some control of the situation. Possibly it was unkind to the birth mother, but maybe she should have thought about that when she rejected him for a second time. You can even make a fair judgement on this even if you are in a simelar situation, people cope with things differently, and the same experience can have a very different effect on two different people.

I feel for the adoptive family, but presumably they knew something like this might happen if they chose to adopt.

The only person who didn't have any choice here is the son, and any way he choses to deal with what he has gone through (within reason, of course)is up to him.

Or can't even! Oops.

"It doesn't help anyone." well maybe it helped him. Maybe it was selfish, maybe it was cruel, maybe he thought it was his turn to be those things.

It is quite probable that certain characteristics are inherited, maybe a lack of empathy is one and he is his birth mothers son. He (IMVHO) hasn't behaved any worse than his birth mother and doesn't deserve the condemnation some of you have applied.

His birth mother wasn't 16 she was 20 and she isn't 20 now, she didn't have to tell him that she wasn't prepared to continue any kind of relationship in a letter, she could have met him in person to explain how she felt, it would have been the kinder and braver thing to do.

"Maybe they both thought they would finally get the fame and showbiz lifestyle they clearly crave" are you sure you read the same article as me? Fame and showbiz lifestyle! She's hardly an A list celebrity!

Pain can make you behave badly.

I don't agree that being adopted gives you carte blanche to behave badly. But I think his 'punishment' is likely to be the loss of his relationship with his biological sister and her children. I would be very wary of this man if I were her.

She is certainly a bigger celebrity than he is, and is married to a British TV star. They are both in the BBC's top rated primetime drama. He says how much he longed to be famous etc. Going to the papers looks like the action of someone who is bitter and angry, but who also wants to be famous by any means. It is as reasonable to assume this motive as any other. In an ideal world they would fall into each other's arms, but maybe she didn't like him? Maybe she felt he only wanted to see her in order to coat-tail her and her husband's celebrity/career? I doubt she will ever go to the papers with her reasons.

"I don't agree that being adopted gives you carte blanche to behave badly" - neither do I and I'm not sure in his position that I would do the same. Maybe he will live to regret it but maybe he has been raised on the age old story "your birth mother gave you up because she loved you so much and she wanted you to have a better life" and it was a terrible shock to find out that wasn't true at all.

Personally I think judging someone so harshly (even someone who has behaved badly) who has gone through the kind of trauma he has is poor form.

I think it is poor form to try to destroy someone as he is trying to do with his biological mother's reputation.

I don't think giving birth to a child means you have an obligation to them TBH. I think if a child is given up for adoption (for whatever reason) then that is the end of the birth mothers involvement. If you are saying that the birth mother always has a responsibility towards the child then you are not only undermining the adopted parents relationship with the child you are also possibly going to increase the number of abortions. If someone really doesn't want a child and was originally going to give them up telling them that they are forever responsible could well be the tipping point that makes them abort. It would be for me in any case.
The guy behaved badly by going to the papers but will probably pay for it because if I was the bio sister I would want nothing to do with him after this.

I think he looks a lot like the other likely lad.

As an adoptee - I feel sympathy for all in the case. My overriding feeling is that we all have members of our family that we write to at Christmas with a little note - send a birthday card etc. Would it have been too hard for his birth mother to have kept a modicum of contact? After 10 or so years of this - he would come to know that there would never have been anything else, or an alternative ending, they could have gone on to have developed a genuine friendship. Neither will happen - it's a shame for all.
On a separate note, i think boys have a different view on natural mothers than girls. My brother is adopted too - and we feel very differently about our birth parents.

How is he trying to destroy her reputation? He is telling the truth about what she did to him. Quite crass, but his choice.

As a celebrity, she wil have known that he could go to the papers when she rejected him. She could have chosen just to keep him sweet if she had wanted to. She didn't care about his feelings any more than he has cared about hers.

He doesn't say he longed to be famous does he HE said "they had no time really for the arts or music, which I always loved and was good at. So I made up this version of my life story where my mum and dad were famous actors and one day I?d meet them and it would all make sense". People who do degrees in Theology are reknowned for being driven by the need for fame and stardom.

When I was having a hard time in my childhood I would imagine I was really a princess and had been cradle snatched.

I suppose it is possible that a child would only want to meet their birth parents because they are famous in my experience thats isn't the reason but of course its possible that he is that odd and that all those years of wondering what his birth parents were like were really irrelvant until he found out she was so famous.

auntevil - I agree with most of your post though I'm nt so sure about he girl/boy thing. In my experience its more down to differences in personality than gender.

He's an unsuccessful musician/singer so yes, I'd guess he'd love to be famous and the idea of being part of a showbiz dynasty might be hugely appealing. Susan Jameson was born in 1944 so even if she shaved a couple of years off her age she was still no more than 18 when she had him. It was not what she wanted, and she was barely more than a child herself. I think it would be hugely painful for a very private person to have their personal life, including the most traumatic experience of her life, being splashed salaciously all over the papers. The comments on the piece are extremely nasty.

This is his side of the story only. Possibly embellished by the DM (surely not!). There also seems to be a distinct absense of any responsibility from his father and any discussion about him. The son didn't arrive by immaculate conception and the father's lack of support etc may have been one of what was probably many complex reasons for his adoption.

So that raises another question: Is it OK that he gets off scott free while Susan Jameson bears the brunt of what is, quite frankly, a nasty article? Could it be possible that we are expecting a different level of behaviour from the mother to the father?

I haven't read the commetns but the piece gives her age as 69 and his as 49 so at best (assuming correct) 19.

Not thats its relevant. She's not 19 now. She handled it very badly, perhaps so has he. But I don't think her trauma and need for "privacy" (I thought she was a famous person and part of a showbiz dynasty - how is that private) trumps his need to know something of his birth mother. Why?

She could easily have met him to explain her reasons rather than fobbing him off with a letter. She could easily have sent him annual Christmas cards and it would all have trailed off naturally as auntevil supposes.

They have both behaved badly - the differnce it that the situation is entirey of her choosing - both the adoption and the subsequent cut off and none of his.

"I'd guess" "I think" "unsuccessful" lot of suppositions here.

Time for me to vacate this thread.

I hope DS's birth mother never behaves the way his has, though I also hope he handles it better if it ever comes to that.

scallops - maybe he is in contact with his birth father? Who knows.

"maybe she didn't like him?"

Yes, I thought that also, or reminded her too much of his father.

Who of course also, along with the mother decided not to bring the boy up himself.

Has anyone noticed how much Nigel looks like his wife though????

Kewcumber - precisely who knows? It wasn't discussed. The father's role wasn't deemed worth discussing - only the mother's role and even then only from the son's perspective. Strange that your first thought was that the father could be in touch. Why wasn't that mentioned if indeed it was the case?

Different standards. Different levels of anger.

I think he's behaving very badly actually. I can understand that he feels rejected, but that doesn't mean that Susan Jameson is under any obligation to have a relationship with him.

My reading of this is similar to ColdComfort. I find the involvement of his wife a little strange and I do wonder whether she would have written again and chased up the contact if his birth mother had 'just' been an ordinary woman and not an actress.

The way he talks about his adoptive family is almost as if they are not good enough for him. Boring and not artistic enough. I find that distasteful.

Why strange? it seemed a perfectly reasonable assumption - if as most of us suspect his motivation in talking to the DM was revenge against his BM for hurting him then he wouldn;t have the same motivation for a birth father he is already in touch with.

I don't have the same reading of the discussion of his adoptive family - it reads to me that they were very different to him and didn't value his strengths which were very different to theirs (obviously only his perpective) and as a result felt very different to them.

It isn't uncommon for children who were adopted to feel this way sadly, adoptive parents need to work very hard to ensure their children are valued for the person that they are and that any differnce is respected and responded too. The adoption threads are littered with situation where (even when adoptive parents work very hard on it) some childrne have an intense feeling of difference and not belonging.

I don't find his wifes involvement at all surprising - don't you often feel anger/injustice/hurt for a loved one even more strongly than you do for yourself.

Defintely time for me to bow out. I find the lack of empathy for someone in his position quite upsetting so time to remove myself.

This is another supposition, but maybe she was just a little bit shocked and hadn't had time to properly think things through when she agreed to meet up with him.
So she met up with him, had a long think about it and decided that she just couldn't continue contact.

People make mistakes. This is also why first contact should always be done through a third party. I think people feel more comfortable telling a neutral person that they don't want contact in the first place.
This also enables the third party to offer counselling.