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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be taken aback by what friend said

120 replies

honeycoco · 18/02/2015 14:24

My friend is gay and is hoping to start a family. Her wife is a bit too old to carry a child and so friend will be the biological mum: however, she really, really doesn't want to be pregnant.

I asked if they'd thought about adoption and she said 'oh NO definitely not, we don't want someone else's child, we want ours!"

AIBU to think this wasn't very nice?

OP posts:

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 17:13

The obvious way around it is to add 'I would feel' or 'for me'

I can completely understand not wanting to adopt - wouldn't myself - but saying you don't want to raise someone elses child is I feel 'too' honest and forthright.

Weathergames · 18/02/2015 17:21

You are being VVU.

My friends went through 15 yrs of fertility treatment with various surrogates before they had their own biological child with a host surrogate. They heartbreakingly lost many babies to often be confronted with this attitude.

Why on earth should they adopt a (usually older child with attachment disorders) just because they struggle the conventional route.

Adopt a child because you want to adopt a child not because you HAVE to to.

GraysAnalogy · 18/02/2015 17:23

I'm the same. I wouldn't adopt, because for that reason. I don't see anything wrong with it.

LadyPenny · 18/02/2015 17:27

My adopted dd is 100% my daughter. I have exactly the same love for her as I do my two birth dc. If someone pointed a gun at me and told me to choose between my dc I simply couldn't, I love them all equally.

However, not everyone is the same and lots of people couldn't do that. It's not wrong. The person the op is talking about is very insensitive but she's just being honest about her feelings.

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 17:29

So you think the child I gave birth to in 1998 and have not seen since is nonetheless 'my' child!

But the people who loved her, stopped the nightmares, paid for ice cream, took her to the zoo, the beach, the park, saw her first day at school, taught her to swim, dance maybe, told her about the birds and the bees and not to be as stupid as her biological mother wipes her nose, wiped her eyes - they're bit her mum and dad? All along, they were just raising my child?

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Hopefully that girl wherever she is has learned to overcome other people's stupid prejudices. And you'll just never know, will you?? Because no ones slating YOUR choices. But if you choose to adopt a child - and no one cares if you do not, that is NOT the point - but if you do, it's your child. Not someone elses.

That girl isn't my daughter. She belongs to her mum and dad. Don't people get it?

slippermaiden · 18/02/2015 17:30

Bit weird to say they want "their" child, when it will obviously be a bit of someone else's! I personally think there are so many children need adopting, this is a perfect family to adopt. Makes me sad to think of all the poor little souls who need a good home but are overlooked because we have IVF.

Kewcumber · 18/02/2015 17:34

I am an adoptive parent - so nice to see so many non-adopters up in arms about something that happens really breathtakingly regularly. But I do think people are misunderstanding the OP's point.

Of course it is OK to not want to adopt. Of course it is different to giving birth to a child related to you by genes. To many many people that is a very important part of parenting (or at least they think it is) Those who claim it isn't important never have their bluff called anyway so they become one of the "oh well we would have adopted but..." brigade.

the wording was I felt, clumsy and as someone said potentially insulting to adoptive families.

This ^ however is a perfectly reasonable statement along with...

"real" parents - where are his real parents [tilted head emoticon], what do you know about his real parents [nosy emoticon]

It really isn't worth getting cross about it - a very calm "I think adoptive parents do consider their child to be theirs and not on loan I think the word you're looking for is biological but I can understand the urge to have a pregnancy and a biological child from birth"

Kewcumber · 18/02/2015 17:40

its not at all insulting to adopters or adopted people. - COuntess I should try telling your friends who adopted that their children aren;t actually their's and see how not insulted they feel.

How can you decide something isn't insulting to a group of people when you aren't in that group. When you have a child who grows up constantly having to deal with "she's not your real mum" your skin gets a little thinner and your tolerance for language which isn;t meant to be offensive but stings none the less gets lower.

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 17:45

slipper the only such thing as a 'perfect family to adopt' is a family who want a child and think adoption would suit them.

I am NOT in the school of thought that says people 'should' adopt a child but as kewcumber had beautifully explained - try saying to someone with an adopted child 'so what's it like bringing up someone else's child' - can't see them being thrilled!

LadyPenny · 18/02/2015 17:45

mytartanscarf

You sound lovely, I hope you're ok.

LadyPenny · 18/02/2015 17:48

I remember a child running up to my dd at school to tell her that I wasn't her "real mummy" because her mummy had told her so.

My dd was so upset. Five years later I still snarl at that insensitive cow every time I see her (the mother, not her dd).

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 17:49

That's lovely of you Lady although I'm not sure I'm lovely - I was certainly a very silly and vulnerable 15 year old and was taken advantage of by someone who looking back was vulnerable himself.

The point is I care about her in a way but she isn't my daughter. Not in any real sense, that means anything.

I really hope she's happy with her mum and dad and I think she is. Adoption gave us both a second chance. But I'm more miffed on behalf of them - they are lovely people and they aren't blithely raising "my" child for me: she's theirs.

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 17:51

Lady - ime most adoptive parents are pretty strong and emotionally intelligent and have the sense and manners to bring their (their!) children up the same.

It does tend to come as a shock when you realise the rest of the world isn't as polite!

MrsDeVere · 18/02/2015 17:57

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

limegoldfinewine · 18/02/2015 17:57

No one is misunderstanding the OP's point. A friend with fertility trouble and in some anxiety opened up to her about those troubles. Instead of sympathizing with her, the OP immediately offered the most irritating rejoiner possible to someone trying to conceive "have you considered adoption?". No, because the OP's friend apparently has had no contact with civilization and is unaware of this concept. And then her friend replied in less than perfect PC language to this trite and unhelpful question, the OP ran to mumsnet, hoping we'd all give her friend a pasting. Except most people didn't because we're not all self- righteous know-it-alls.

OP - trolling mumsnet is an art form. You should have posted "AIBU to think adoptive parents are real parents" and excluded all the context about how insensitive you were being. Maybe thrown in a previous grievance with your friend to make her seem habitually unreasonable. And exaggerated the language so that it is beyond the realm of how 99.99% of normal people communicate. Then everyone would be falling over themselves to declare her evil and that YANBU.

MrsDeVere · 18/02/2015 17:59

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

adsy · 18/02/2015 17:59

tartan people who adopt do of course see the child as theirs ( I would hope the vast majority do) . But lots of people are saying they could never feel like that. They're not saying adoptive parents feel the same way as they do ( or I guess thay wouldn't be of the mind set to adopt).
I don't see how it's derogatory to either the child or the parents that not everyone feels the same.
ie. the adoptive dd of my friend I view as her child. If I was put into a position of having to adopt ( I know, forced adoption would be weird!) then I just know I wouldn't view the child as mine. my view in no way influences how I view my friend and her dd. IYSWIM,

Kewcumber · 18/02/2015 18:01

Why is asking someone who has said they don't want to be pregnant but wants a family if they have considered adoption trite and unhelpful?

I've been there random suggestions to people having IVF about adoption are irritating but I think when you've specifically said you don't want to be pregnant its a perfectly reasonable comment.

This is not someone in the midst of TTC.

Original poster

honeycoco · 18/02/2015 18:03

Lime - that isn't quite the case. I asked about adoption because friend said that she didn't want to experience pregnancy - more childbirth really - and because her wife cannot, that would obviously mean that becoming parents would be difficult, hence why I suggested adoption.

DC2 is adopted and is every inch my 'real' child. As such, it wasn't suggested lightly and I was taken aback as really she was in a sense saying I was raising someone else's child which is never how we've viewed it. Of course, you do get used to 'real mum" type comments, but somebody who you consider to be close to you revealing through an accidental slip of language that 'your' beloved DC is not, in their eyes, 'yours' at all does rather take you by surprise.

Thank you for the comments, at any rate: I do of course concede adoption isn't for everyone - nor should it be!

OP posts:

mytartanscarf · 18/02/2015 18:06

Adsy I completely understand but then the appropriate thing to say is what you just have - "I don't feel I could, I'd feel I was raising someone else's child" Which is fine; not "I don't want to raise someone else's child" which is not - small subtle but important difference.

adsy · 18/02/2015 18:06

Honey as I just said, maybe she views your dd as yours but wouldn't be able to do the same herself. I think that's quite a simple concept and I really wouldn't think any less of your friend over this.

UptheChimney · 18/02/2015 18:07

I have 2 children

Why is it always people with their own biological children who suggest that those who have shall we say "challenges" in bearing their own biological children suggest that they adopt. Don't you realise how arrogant & unreasonable that is? Should only the gay, the infertile, the single adopt?

OP why didn't you adopt at least one of your children?

Original poster

honeycoco · 18/02/2015 18:07

I did!

OP posts:

adsy · 18/02/2015 18:08

I think it's a teeny tiny difference in words ( which I don't really see!) which in no way conveys how she feels about adoptive parents in general, just her personal emotions regarding adoption

Mrsstarlord · 18/02/2015 18:08

FFS - This 'why don't you adopt then if you feel so strongly about it' is being done to death on here at the moment.
The OP wasn't saying that her friends should adopt she was saying that the phraseology was a bit out of order.
She's right IMHO, I have four kids and a grandchild and have never given birth once. They are my kids. End of.
Other people may feel differently and that's fair enough but there are better ways of saying that you want a biological link. I'm just pleased that some people are sensitive to that.

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