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Ethical dilemmas

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Original poster

I want to know my adopted husband's (bio) family

73 replies

EllipticalEggs · 29/06/2016 11:48

But he doesn't. He doesnt feel like they matter to him at all, he doesn't ponder they might be or have any desire to find them. I, on the other hand, spend quite a lot of time wondering who they are. It bothers me hugely that my son could walk past his grandmother, grandfather or aunt (because I know my husband has an older sister, other than his adoptive family) and not know them. When my son is naughty he looks like one of my older brothers and when he's scared he looks so much like my younger brother. This has made me even more keen to meet them, or at least try, because I don't think genetic inheritance is worth nothing. I understand if he doesn't want to meet them, though when we've talked about it he doesn't say that, just that he doesn't care either way and so is not prepared to make any effort toward it happening. I think that might be him covering a fear of rejection but can't say that to him without causing offence. Would it be wrong for me to ask him to meet with his adoption agency and get his file?

OP posts:

WannaBe · 29/06/2016 14:31

The insulting bit OP is the fact that you feel it is so important to know these people who are nothing to do with you.

There is a vast difference between an adopted child wishing to trace their biological parents with the support of their adoptive parents, and the wife of an adopted child wanting to trace his biological parents because she feels that she should have some kind of right to know them and feels that biology is so important.

Here's the thing. It's none of your business. And it's not even any of your ds' business. He has no right to know either. His family are the family he has been brought up with. If your DH is killed in a car crash then he has every right to take the information to the grave with him. Nobody has the right to decide otherwise.

PurpleDaisies · 29/06/2016 14:32

The insulting bit OP is the fact that you feel it is so important to know these people who are nothing to do with you.

Thank you-that's what I meant.

Original poster

EllipticalEggs · 29/06/2016 14:38

I find your attitude quite disturbing actually, and I wonder why you married someone who is adopted if biology is so important to you.
I didn't find it much more than curious when I married him, it certainly didnt bother me (it doesn't bother me now, I feel like you're missing my point.) It's been seeing my family reflected in my sons face that has made it feel more important to me. And I certainly don't rank it up there with raising a child and actually BEING their family, but I do recognise it. Is that really disturbing to you?

OP posts:

mamalovesmojitos · 29/06/2016 14:38

Op, I also find it very odd that you are so interested in complete strangers. As an adoptee, if my partner had this kind of attitude to my bio family id be really frustrated, and would soon run out of patience. Your posts are all about YOU. And you have to accept that, for many people, biology is worth nothing. It's can be absolutely worthless! Move on.

PurpleDaisies · 29/06/2016 14:40

Would you feel the same way of your dh's parents had abused him and he'd been forcibly adopted?

WannaBe · 29/06/2016 14:42

Yes. Wanting to see family traits from a family you know nothing about and who have never actually been a family is odd.

OP, what happens if one day your DS decides to adopt? Will you consider those grandchildren to not be your grandchildren because they have a biology somewhere else?

WannaBe · 29/06/2016 14:47

And as for knowing that he was loved etc, if you haven't seen the file you can't possibly know that.

I have a friend who was adopted. the story she was told was that her bio mum was too young to look after her and so had her adopted. That giving her up was a gesture of love. Fast forward 21 years and she managed to trace her biological family, who, when she contacted them, told her that she was dead to them and to never speak to them again. Her parents had gone on to have more children, none of whom even knew she existed.

Be careful what you wish for OP.

Jackie0 · 29/06/2016 14:51

I can see I'm not the only one rattled by your OP.
I don't know how to explain this but arrogance is the word that comes to mind, it really is nothing to do with you.
There won't be any happy ending if you go down this route.
This isn't a soap opera, adoption doesn't just happen. You don't seem to grasp the trauma and pain and actual real people's real lives your being so whimsical about.

Jackie0 · 29/06/2016 14:56

Mamaloves , if my dh started talking like this I'd think he didn't know me at all and he had no grasp of the magnitude of what had happened to me. I'd be heartbroken.

RebelRogue · 29/06/2016 15:02

My dd has my adoptive mother's nose. Figure that one out.

HandbagCrazy · 29/06/2016 15:09

OP I don't think there would be anything wrong in broaching the subject with your DH again, but in a very gentle way that is easy for him to say no to. After all this time, he may now be curious too.

I also understand your curiosity - my cousin didn't know his dad (he abandoned my auntie) and was desperate to know where he came from, and I always wondered what sort of man does that. That kind of curiosity is normal.

I would say though, that you absolutely must take your husbands lead on this. He needs to be able to say no, enough etc without any repercussions from you. You are basing this on wanting to know your sons genetic family history, but for DH, there are feelings mixed up. Loved or not, they are still the parents who gave him away, and if for whatever reason he doesn't want to pursue this, you need to let it go.

Gazelda · 29/06/2016 15:13

Can't you see how you are ignoring your DH's wishes? On a matter that is extremely personal to him, that you can't possibly fully understand (you don't say that you are also adopted)?
If I were him, I'd be looking at you in a different and less favourable light.

WannaBe · 29/06/2016 15:23

Curiosity is like wanting to know the family tree though. In this instance the OP is really bothered by not knowing these people

My grandad was never in the picture when my dad grew up, consequently I don't know him or what happened to him. I am curious as to whether he may e.g. Have had more children (word is that he did) so whether there might be cousins and such of mine out there that I don't know.

My dad isn't remotely interested in what happened to him. I believe he may have looked him up on ancestry or similar some years back and discovered he was dead, but he's not in the slightest bit interested in whether he has half siblings and the like. it would never even occur to me to suggest that my dad find out this information so I could know some more of my heritage or whatever. It changes nothing.

And while that is not about adoption, the concept is the same.

Original poster

EllipticalEggs · 29/06/2016 15:24

Of course my posts are about me! I'm not trying to speak for anyone else, I'm telling you what I'm thinking and feeling.

I am interested in people generally, what makes them who they are, their experiences and their characters. I really enjoy getting to know people and appreciate their little idiosyncrasies and the things that make them individual. I am interested in the nature versus nurture debate. I am interested in relationships and how they work, and how they could work better. I am interested in adoption from the perspective of the child, the parents and the biological parents. I am not adopted so I don't have the emotional connection to the issue that many of you do.
I posted this in Ethical Issues because I was hoping for a philosophical discussion on the issues, I fully expect the internet to say it's not up to me and that's fine, I don't believe that it is either but I'd like to go through why a bit more, and I'd like to do that here rather that in real life because I feel like asking my husband any of this would be like asking him to contact his family but by stealth, and I'm not going to do that, it would be wrong.
Is it wrong for me to be curious though?

OP posts:

Jackie0 · 29/06/2016 15:31

Get a copy of ' the primal wound ' by Nancy Newton Verrier.
You'll be better able to understand and support your dh.

RebelRogue · 29/06/2016 15:31

Oh is not your own little case study to satisfy your curiosity and interest.
And as to why... Not your past,not your life,not your family,not you decision.
You want to satisfy your curiosity on the subject.. Read books,research studies,watch interviews and documentaries not your bloody husband. And if you really have to accept it for what it is....he doesn't care!

LaurieLemons · 29/06/2016 15:32

It's not wrong to be curious, my DP is also adopted and plans on contacting his bio family one day and it's a curiousity for me (we also have a son), but getting the files without his permission would be wrong. You should ask him, he might be perfectly happy to keep his options open or for his son to find out if as you said he gets hit by a bus or something, but I think he's perfectly within his rights to say no.

WannaBe · 29/06/2016 15:37

You're not curious though OP. You're hugely bothered that you can't know your husband's biological family and that you can't place traits of his family in your children.

This isn't a standard interest/fascination with people as a whole, this is an obsession to know your DH's heritage to the point that you would like him to request his adoption file so that... What? So you can get in touch? You've already stated that you want to get in touch with them and introduce yourselves, and feel that it's unfair that if your DH were to die your DS will never know his family....

The philosophical debate is around whether or not adoptees have much success in being able to trace their biological family. And the answer to that is mixed. For some they find them, get in touch, have a relationship of sorts. For others they get in touch and realise that the biological family were unpleasant, abusive people who are possibly even responsible for the issues the person now has throughout their adult life and previous. And sometimes they discover that the family just don't want to know and couldn't get rid of them fast enough. It's rarely a happy ending of families coming together.

titchy · 29/06/2016 15:43

You weren't hoping for a philosophical discussion at all - don't kid yourself.

QOD · 29/06/2016 16:03

There's so much wrong with your thinking that ... I'm almost speechless

My mum, dad, step dad, sister and cousins, grandparents etc love my dd so much
They'd be devastated if dh suddenly decided he wanted to get to know all of her bio mothers family (straight surrogate)
Your train of thought is fucked up AND quite possibly what you THINK is the story behind his adoption, is complete bollocks

A friend has an adopted son who is the product of date rape. That's not how her son has been told it .. Yet - he can see his files at 18 and they are stressing about that already and try to lay the foundations of it with news stories

Original poster

EllipticalEggs · 29/06/2016 16:12

You want to satisfy your curiosity on the subject.. Read books,research studies,watch interviews and documentaries not your bloody husband.
Right, which is why I'm having the conversation here, and not with him.

OP posts:

PurpleDaisies · 29/06/2016 16:20

Would it be wrong for me to ask him to meet with his adoption agency and get his file?

This is the question you posted on your op. Can you understand why people didn't guess you wanted a theoretical discussion on nature vs nurture, relationships and how they could work better and adoption from the perspective of basically anyone.

AnecdotalEvidence · 29/06/2016 16:37

it bothers me massively that I can't know them

it certainly didnt bother me (it doesn't bother me now

I think you need to start being more honest with yourself and see that you are being completely selfish and this desire is ALL about you. Just read back through your own posts and see how you have tried to lightly breeze through other people's concerns and contradict yourself in the process.

It isn't curiosity in a philosophical sense, it's downright nosiness, without a moment's regard for the feelings of any of the people involved.

RebelRogue · 29/06/2016 17:00

Which conversation is that? Nurture vs nature? How adopted people feel,their bio and adoptive families etc? Do they have happy stories,bad stories or no stories? Or a conversation about you husband in particular and wether you should push you own agenda on him,even though he made his feelings clear on the subject?

mountaintoclimb · 29/06/2016 17:31

I have had the opposite dilemma. I have been researching my and dh's family trees on line and someone contacted me saying he was the ds of an illigitimate child (still living) of my deceased mil ie half brother to my dh. He provided a birth certificate that appeared to substantiate this. He wanted me to be go between between him and my dh. I spoke to my dh who was in shock as his dm had never spoken about this in her lifetime and as far as we know nobody in the family ever knew-all her family and contemporary friends are dead. my dh cant accept it and so I have let it drop. I feel sorry for the nephew who said his df (my dh's half brother) would like a photo of his mother but my dh wouldn't even agree to that. I haven't spoken to my dh about it for ages and he appears to have blocked it from his mind. I have been tempted to send a photo but I know its not my place to do so.

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