AIBU to have expected information from birth mother?

[FeetZelet]

Lurker & grateful beneficiary of advice, first time poster...

Looking for thoughts or experiences to help me understand the response I have received from my birth mother. Background - adopted at 8 weeks in 1970's, legally no access to identifying information from my adoption file but publicly available birth records & internet have led me to my birth mother & her family, they have some public profile. As was the norm, my father's name is not recorded on BC. It is on file but not available under data protection.

I am seeking genetic & medical information and wrote to a business address to seek to engage with BM 7 hopefully to progress to corresponding & exchange of info. My first very brief letter received no response for months so I wrote a second in which I asked for the name of my birth father and nothing else information wise. Gave some background info about my own life in the hope that this was a more human approach and that the details might have been of interest or of comfort but did not outright state she was my BM in case someone else read the letters.

Have now received a short reply, no name, no address included, some weeks later, stating that there was no information to be given and questioning my incorrect approach & the information I had illegally! I am shocked that a mother (she has multiple other children) could be so harsh and accusatory about something she knows to be true. I am also ashamed of having made contact after many decades to be rejected and made feel that I caused the problem. There is no possibility of mistaken i.d., also, some family members are physically very similar to me.

AIBU to expect that she should have replied to my first letter to state 'do not contact' me rather than risking a further approach? Also many months later, to basically tear me a new one for persisting? Feeling lost in this and would welcome other opinions.

I think you are right AP

It just rankles when someone who is neither an adoptee nor a BM feels entitled to tell adoptees that they should be ashamed of themselves for their lack of empathy to their BM whilst demonstrating no empathy as to how the adoptee felt to be on the receiving end of poor behaviour.

Not all adoptions are good. I was adopted by an alcoholic father (at time of adoption) and mother with mental health issues which developed into drug abuse during my childhood and frankly had a horrible childhood. Staying with my birth parents would not necessarily have been better but I certainly have little to feel grateful for about my childhood experiences.

I’m sorry for what you went through. I think that all too often society romanticises the idea of adoption. How adoption is this selfless act carried out by would-be parents in order to get their much longed-for child, and how, being adopted you will all live happily ever after with the parents who “chose” you rather than those who gave birth to you and so on.

I remember watching some programme on discovery health about adoption and couples who waited to meet their adopted children, and how there were tears and those children bonded with them immediately and everyone was happy.

But the reality can be far far different from that. Because not everyone who desperately wants a child is going to be a good parent. Not everyone who adopts a child does so out of some kind of desperation for children, especially not back in those days. And not everyone who gives up a child was a good person.

And these days there are far more complicated issues with regards to adoption which mean that over half of adoptions where the child is school-age break down. So it’s not at all the romantic happy ever after that people would have you believe.

It always makes me when people on here talk about their feartility struggles and someone comes out with “well, you could always adopt.”

drifting

Your friend changing her name makes absolutely no difference to a DNA match, the name is irrelevant.
If some distant cousin of hers uploads their DNA and your friend is a match, the cat is out of the bag. Your friend needn't have been involved at all. If she is the registered mother from birth, she can be found.
I found lots of my family before I even did the DNA part.
I feel sorry for her because you say she has understandable reasons not to be contacted and I believe you.
I really do hope that the child in question doesn't want to know.

Do a DNA test with Ancestry/23&me etc. It will show up relatives and will be pretty easy to trace your BF.

Katrina

I was Jane too. Apparently it was a name often suggested by nursing staff in the hospital.
I have two birth certificates and three names though, one original and my name post adoption, that was changed. Plus my married surname.
Were Younique

Andy

I have over 80k matches and all my bm side.
Could I be doing something wrong, there must be someone out there related to him.
I don't even have a name as a family member told me my bm just made up a name and said that'll do. It was a boy they'd bullied at school name. Huge family that someone may recognise, I don't care, tough shit to those who deny my existence.

I sympathize with your situation greatly OP and I can't imagine what it must be like, although I do have a close relative who was forced to give up her child in the 60s and I have to agree with Brackish regarding the lack of understanding here of what a different time it was. Women were often forced to give up their babies in horrifying and traumatic circumstances and the shame of their families and communities enforced a veil of silence. In the case of my relative she was packed off to an isolated place (don't want to give too many details) as a very young girl by her family to do her pregnancy and give birth alone while the family hid it, she had absolutely no choice and it was deeply traumatic. No one, absolutely no one knew until the child came looking as an adult and then they basically rejected her because they couldn't deal with the idea they had been "given up" when in fact it was nothing of the sort. She had spent every day thinking about the child only to be reunited again and then be rejected herself.

@Drabarni, you say that the very least they could do is reply with health info and the father's name. What if they were raped? Then they may well not know the name or any health info. They may also feel it is not going to help the child to know their father was a violent attacker and that they were born out of something so awful.

It is an absolutely terrible thing on all sides (and I don't believe that there are many BMs who "couldn't wait" to give up their child). I have the utmost sympathy for those who are unable to know their birth parents. But I do think many posters here are lacking empathy for the BMs too and looking at it very much through the eyes of today's society and circumstances when in fact, those of the past were incredibly brutal and cruel.

@Drabarni no I wasn’t Jane . I was using that as a pseudonym to protect the not so innocent. I was a Gill.

Sweetheart. She's not your mum. Not in any real sense.

Read some of these threads, especially the ones surrounding reluctant duty and expectation at Christmas-time, and you'll realize what a toxic bind the biological tie can really be. People put up with all manner of shit because of shared DNA that they would never, ever tolerate under other circumstances. I'm currently watching my poor DH go through exactly this situation with his own so-called mother, but besides supporting him behind the scenes I'm powerless to interfere.

Adopted children frequently report the fantasy and dream that their 'real' parents will turn up to claim them and take them off into a rosy (and probably wholly unrealistic) future. Well, I had the same fantasy. Only I'm not adopted. I'm the daughter of a beautiful, loving mother who died in her prime and a sadistic, horrendously abusive father (who, unfortunately, I look exactly like. There is no denying that biological relationship).

I had the exact same fantasy as the adopted child. That my 'real' father would turn up to claim me, would love me far more than the imposter ever did, and would hopefully save me from any further abuse by him. The only difference here was that I knew it would never ever be nothing more than a fantasy, as my hypothetical 'father' didn't exist. How much more painful must that have been if he had?

Moral of that story: we all have an innate need to know our own origins, but biology really isn't all that. Those who love us, are those who matter.

I'm sorry you've been through this. It may sound harsh (although it's intended to comfort) but she isn't worthy of you as a daughter. She let you go, and given her response, this was without any apparent regret. Now do the same for her

@AlternativePerspective, I don’t think anyone who knows anything about adoption does think adoptive parents are selfless saints and that everyone inevitably lives happily ever after.

Andysbestadventure - I think that's wildly optimistic! I'm on ancestry and I've never been matched with anything closer than a fifth cousin in America who absolutely no one in my actual family has heard of. DH is on ancestry and has no family connection closer than eighth cousin showing.

I'd say the majority of people just aren't on those sites and you probably wouldn't get anything as precise as 'this is your half brother' if one was on. I think there's a lot of misinformation about this subject on here.

So little empathy from some posters. You should be ashamed

You were the one who said the adopted child could just get fucked..

I am so sorry to read about your experience. I found my father who I had had no contact with but knew who he was. We met a few times and swapped cards and presents etc. And then he has gradually distanced himself, made himself unavailable for every contact attempt, stopped sending presents and then cards and we now have no contact.

He didn't know me but told me that he'd also had no contact with another daughter he had with someone else. And he brought her up for a number of years.

It makes me sad but it's obviously what he does. So I try to remember that it's him and not me.

@AwkwardFucker

You were the one who said the adopted child could just get fucked..

No, that was your suggestion. Context is all.

Lol. Read again.

You really are an angry person. Like a dog with a bone. Leave it and calm down, dear.

You were the one who first said adopted children could get fucked and then claimed I said it. I agreed sarcastically, obviously wasted on you.

You are very well named.

Good grief, can you go back and read again, or shall I cut and paste for you?

You’re a bit pot calling the kettle black.

Still gnawing the bone?

I didn't say adoptees could get fucked. That's your language not mine. I sarcastically agreed.

Sorry if sarcasm is above your comprehension level.

I found my sister through ancestry.com. My dna wasn’t on there, it was my nephew’s and uncle’s who had both been given dna tests as Christmas presents. I think my sister had her dna on other sites as well.
What happened was that it was highlighted as a close genetic match. After doing a bit of digging, we worked out that she was my mother’s baby, the time and place all matched.
I can’t tell you what a relief it was to me to find out about her. It is the biggest thing to ever happen to me.

Whatever happens in the future, I now know who I am. She knows who she is.

I have empathy for both sides. Neither are wrong.
It's impossible to imagine what bm's went through in the 50/60/70's. They would have had to cope in whatever way they could and if that meant denial, then who can blame them? However, I see why their children feel they have the right to know.

I have utmost sympathy for everyone on both sides of adoption.

The family member who found their bm after over 50 years was told by the birth mother that she had to put the whole event out of her mind. It was the only way she could cope. The biological father ran for the hills. She told her husband before they married but never told her children. The adoption agency, when contacting the birth mother was not as circumspect as she expected. The letter was sent to her pre marriage home address with a family member still living there. She was aghast because if they were nosey and had opened the letter...
But they didn't and the reunion was successful.

I haven't read the whole thread, but I think MrsDimmond's advice is right. Use a professional intermediary. Your letters probably blindsided your BM, especially if she did not know you could legally access information about her. She may fear an intrusion into her life that she cannot control. I would stress (through the intermediary) that your contact is for medical reasons only and that you will respect her wishes to not be in contact.

I don't want to give you false hope, but it is possible that somewhere down the line after she recovers from the shock of hearing from you out of the blue that her position may soften.

Please look after yourself and know that you have done nothing wrong at all.