Adoption & Biological Mother problem

  • Thread starter Thread starter God_Seeker_1
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
G

God_Seeker_1

Guest
Hi friends,

I wanted to bring my situation to the wisdom of the forums. I plan on sitting down with a counselor from my diocese, but I thought I could start here.

I was born and raised Catholic. At the age of 18, I “married” a woman in a baptist church, and we remained together for about 4 years. During this time, we had a baby boy together. At the age of 1 years old, the woman left me to live half a state away from me, and initially brought the baby with her. After the civil divorce, she and I would exchange the child week on and week off. So for one week, I would have the baby, then she would have him the next week. We would have to meet at certain halfway points in the state to perform drop-off/pick-ups.

Within about 2 months, she stopped coming to pick the baby up, and I ended up being with the baby permanently. She came up to visit him a couple of times within the next year. But eventually, at sometime after the baby turned 2, the courts modified the custody arrangement to where I have sole parental rights of the child, and her rights of visitation were severely limited. She never did receive notification of her rights in this regard. Let’s say she chose a life that was not upright, and I was afraid of her influence in the child’s life, and so I let her move on in life, and did not contact her. She, however, had means of contacting me through email, phone, and family relatives of mine she knew. But she never sought me out for a very long time.

Periodically she would call to see how the baby was doing.

At the child’s age of 3, I “re-married” a woman in a pentecostal church, and this woman then legally adopted my son. To do this, the biological mother’s rights had to be voluntarily terminated. At the time, I was given the option by my lawyer to offer the biological mother forgiveness of all the child support payments she owed for years (which she had never payed) if she would terminate her rights so that my new wife could adopt him. Suprisingly, she accepted, but did not really express her true feelings about this.

The biological mother got into trouble with the law, ended up going through drug court, and then coming out graduating. However, her life took a real turn for a bad spot, and she has struggled immensely.

Now my son’s age is 5 1/2, soon turning 6, and I’ve since been received back into the church and received the sacrament of marriage with my current spouse (who also entered the church), who is the legal mother of my son. He calls her “mommy”, but he knows (as best as a 5 year old can) that she is not the original biological mother. He does not know his biological mother, even if he sees her. We have tried all ways of explaining this, but he understands. He has a baby brother now too:) that he loves dearly

The problem that I am having right now is that the biological mother has gotten back on her feet, and desires a relationship with the child. She at least wants to see pictures, know how he is doing, etc,etc. My current wisdom tells me that this should not be introduced right now. But I am being viewed as a bad person because I refrain him from seeing her, and I also refrain her from seeing pictures of him, because I lost so much contact with her that I do not know who she is anymore, nor the people she hangs around with.

How should I go about dealing with this situation?

Thanks for your time!
 
God_Seeker said:
How should I go about dealing with this situation?
Click to expand...
There is no “I” anymore, there is only “we.” The child is legally yours and your second wife’s by virtue of adoption. Her decision holds equal weight to yours, and you must include her in your decision.

As far as my own personal opinion goes, I believe that your ex should stay out of the picture at this point. I believe that is what is best at this point in time, given the child’s age. Events may unfold over time where it may be appropriate to introduce her back to her biological child, but I don’t think she should be rushing back into the child’s life at the point. I can understand a (biological) mother wanting to do that, but she has to start thinking with her head, not her emotions. Since she is no longer the legal mother, you and your wife have complete control over the situation. Please proceed wisely.

FWIW, I am an adoptive parent (biological parents unknown).
 
I would consult with an early childhood expert about what is best for the child. That is what should guide you and where your responsibility lays. I suspect that the child does not need to meet the birth mother until he is much older. You could send the birth mother a picture and a letter describing how well the child is doing. That seems harmless enough.
 
I’m a birthmom. I get pictures/letters twice a year from my daughter’s adoptive family. I don’t have any physical contact with the child and neither family has “identifying information” on the other family. We only know first names and we send our letters/pictures through an agency.

I get that it’s an interruption to your family life that bio-mom has cleaned up her life and wants contact with her kid. Legally, you aren’t under any obligation to allow the child to meet her. They can, however, search for each other when he turns 18 and there’s nothing you can do to prevent that.

Clearly, you love your son and you want to protect your son. That’s what any good dad would do.

However, one of the biggest ways you can help this woman continue to heal and move on from her former life is to help her know that her son is growing into a healthy young man and has a good family life. That she made a good choice leaving her (bio) son with you and your family.

You don’t have to be this lady’s new BFF. However, for the birth mom, it’s like every major holiday wrapped into one every time you get a new set of pictures and a letter. It’s very healing and it reaffirms that you made the best decision for your child.

For the moment, this is strictly a conversation about her having some form of contact or information about her (bio) son. Honestly, I wouldn’t even put physical visitation (or a telephone call) on the table, but I don’t see anything wrong with sending a picture/letter once or twice a year. She has a new life, You have yours. It’s probably best if contact is limited.

I think it’s time to show some mercy and compassion. It’s normal to be skeptical. I’d be skeptical, given her past history. However, you control the situation. You can control how much contact your child actually has with bio mom. It’s not up to you to judge bio-mom’s new life and friends. It sounds like she’s been through a lot and is trying hard to build a better life for herself. A lot of people don’t have the courage to do that. I’d, at least, give her credit for that.

Not all bio/adoptive families have good relationships. That’s just reality and we have to deal in reality. I’m blessed that I’m in one and thank Jesus everyday for that. However, I think that you are doing your kid a disservice if you don’t try. Kids are curious and they want to know where they come from. They want to know their ‘real’ families, even if there is no real family to know. My birthdaughter’s adoptive family has a “keepbox” where all my letters/pictures to her are stored and she can get into it anytime she wants. (In fact, her brothers (through adoption) have them too).

Feel free to PM me. I’ve already written a ton and I don’t know if it’s helpful. All I can do is offer my insight and perspective. Good luck to you.
 
Kal2012,

Thank you so much for sharing that information.

One of the issues that make it difficult is that the biological mother feels that I handled our relationship the wrong way, and that I handled the custody arrangement the wrong way. I had intentionally sought that custodial rights be removed from her in the beginning, and the courts did end up reducing her time allowed based on “abandoning the child”.

Be that as it may, I am willing always to confess the wrongs I have done and move forward. However, the biological mother does contact some of my family members asking for pictures, and then adding in information about how she didn’t really want to terminate her rights and that she was threatened by my offer to forgive her all her child support payments.

I really did want her to terminate her rights, but I also made it clear in letter form that she didn’t have to, but that if she didn’t I would not forgive her child support requirements per month. I did really struggle financially when it was just me and him alone. At the time, she understood, or say she made it seem.
 
Dacinom said:
Thank you for sharing your story, please be assured of my prayers for you and your family.

First I have a question (and it’s not one you asked, sorry but I wanted clarification) you mentioned that your attorney asked your former spouse to terminate her parental rights and in exchange you would forgive her all of her past child support that she owed. Now I am not an attorney but from my very limited experiences with the family court system it was explained to me that this approach was not only frowned upon but immoral. Are you certain that this is what happened? The reason I am asking is because it could be viewed by some that your former spouse was drowning in debt and broke and was coerced into giving up her parental rights because of financial reasons.

I would urge you to look through your papers because if your attorney was ethical, I would imagine that the reasons her parental rights were terminated were because she was a drug addict, had abandoned her son and all sorts of other reasons that were VALID. I am only mentioning this to you because I would like you to please be careful how you present this to your son, it would probably not be healthy for him to believe that his biological mother was “paid off” I hope that makes sense.

Another question, who exactly is “viewing you as a bad person” because you are not letting him see her and send photos? Is it her? Is it her family or friends? Is it your family or your friends? You were not specific where this pressure was coming from.

My practical suggestion is to pray about this and after send her a letter with specific details. Tell her that you have decided you will send her a letter every 6 months or every 9 months or every year or every two years (whatever you decide) via certified mail or whatever that will arrive telling her brief information about how he is doing in school, how his general health is, how he is growing or whatever information you decide to share IF ANY. Whether or not you decide to send a photo is up to you. Also inform her that you will not respond to phone calls, emails, letters, texts or otherwise and you desire no contact from her whatsoever and that any contact from her is unwanted and BLOCK her number. If you decide not to send her anything that’s okay too, it’s your decision completely.

Your son can meet with her when he is older, perhaps a teenager? Right now he is young and she is a recovering drug addict that you are not confident enough she has turned her life around. Contact with her will only serve to confuse him and you cannot (unfortunately) trust her at this time. Building trust will take years, she needs to accept that. Hope this helps a little, God bless you.
Click to expand...
The bio mom is in particular express being upset to a relative of mine.

Yes my attorney did tell me that is she would not terminate her rights and allow my current spouse to adopt, that it was my free choice on whether to enforce her child support payment or not. I sent her a letter the week before we met up to sign all the paperwork, and in this letter I explicitly told her that it would be the best thing for the child and that if she would not, I would not forgive her the child support payments. She has already owed thousands of dollars to me.

She now claims to have been threatened into the decision, but this was not made clear at the time of signing. All is written and signed now. This happened in the beginning of 2012.
 
God Seeker,

This is a very difficult situation and it sounds like you did the best you could with the information you had at the time.

I think your instincts are correct about wanting to keep your child’s biological mother at arm’s length for the moment. It does not sound like she has a well-established track record of stability and competence yet. I think I would:
  1. Tell her to stop harassing your relatives for photos and tell her that every time she does that, there will be a 3 month delay in information and photos from you.
  2. Send her a long written update and a few photos every 3 months. Ask her in turn to write letters to him that you can share with him at your discretion and tell her that weepy and manipulative letters are not going to be read to him.
  3. See how stable she is. If she has a year’s track record of being clean, sober, employed, and not harassing your relatives, and being civil on the phone, it may be time to start thinking about arranging a (supervised) meeting between her and the kid. At his current age, I would only introduce her into his life if you are 100% sure about her.
  4. As he gets bigger (say 7 or 8 or so), it will be possible to give him a kid’s version of his mother’s struggles, emphasizing that she loves him very much, but she has had a lot of trouble living the sort of life that would be compatible with creating a good home for him. At this point, you can probably do supervised visits, even if you are only 80% sure about her. A 7 or 8 year old can deal with a lot more than a little kid can, and a 10 or 11 or 12-year-old can deal with a lot more than a 7 or 8 year old can.
  5. I think there’s actually a window of opportunity between 7/8 and the teenage years when you can most easily deal with this issue. I would not wait until the teenage years to introduce her into his life, because that is just asking for trouble.
  6. Just play this by ear. See how well she deals with the access you give her. If she is responsible with it, you can gradually give more–by the teenage years, if all goes well, she might be able to have a very normal non-custodial relationship with him. If she’s not responsible or is weepy and manipulative, tread water or dial back her access. Explain the basic principles to her, being friendly and civil, but very firm, and not raising her expectations too far.
I have some concerns about your son’s mother’s recovery from addiction based on your account. From what little I know of the 12 step process, there’s a lot of emphasis on taking responsibility and performing restitution to the people one has harmed in the course of one’s addiction. In your account of your behavior, she sounds really me-me-me and most focused on wrongs done to her, rather than on thinking about the wrongs she did to her son and to you during her bad years. I think that’s something you may want to point out to her. (And if she wants to argue about that, that kind of proves the point, doesn’t it?)

Best wishes.
 
Our daughter’s birthmother suffered with drug addiction, and spent a lot of time off and on in jail. We allowed a visit at a relative’s house when my daughter was about 7 or 8, at which time the birthmom told her how much she was loved, and apologized for not being the mother she wanted to be. My daughter cried a lot afterwards but I think it was good for her.

Nine or 10 years later – The birthmom tried her best but doesn’t have good support and ended up in jail again – though I think she’s out now. My daughter really is not interested in visiting at this time. It’s good that she knows her birthmom and what she was up against, so that she’s not an imaginary perfect parent in my daughter’s mind.

Your son is very young to have the confusion of two mothers – i would wait several years at least for a visit. Send her photos and updates every six months. In my opinion every 3 months is too often. You have other things to do, and she has missed her chance at involvement in her son’s life. It’s sad, but a consequence of her choices. When he’s older, perhaps they will have a good relationship.
It doesn’t sound like you did anything wrong in getting sole custody. It was in the child’s best interest, which is all that matters.
God bless.
 
Viki63 said:

“Send her photos and updates every six months. In my opinion every 3 months is too often.”

I’d agree with that, except that she has the OP’s relatives’ info and a track record of harassing the OP’s relatives for photos and info. A 6 month schedule will leave her harassing the OP’s family, while with a 3 month schedule, there’s a little more hope of motivating her into better behavior, as with a 6 month schedule, there’s much less motivation for good behavior. (I have to say, her kid-seeking behaviors sound a lot like what her old drug-seeking behavior must have looked like.) The schedule would be every 3 months, but she could lose her privileges with bad behavior and wind up with every 6 months or 9 months or a year or even more–it would all depend on her. If her behavior improved enough, the schedule could be made more frequent–every two months, every month, every week even. But it would all hinge on her conduct.

If you choose to go with this method, I would talk to the relatives she has contacted and explain the system to them and that you are not being “mean” but just realistic and careful.
 
Any contact, such as letters or pictures, should be done sparingly once or twice a year and done through an attorney.

Your attorney sends the letters/updates to the bio mom via his office address and letterhead; the bio mom can respond with her own pictures/letters to the attorney, but not through other relatives/persons.
 
Ditto.

This person has no legal right to this child; for all practical purposes she is a stranger. An order of protection can be obtained if she continues this course of action.

With regard to how to deal with the biological mother, personally I would not, at least until child expresses interest in doing so. This is about what is best for the child, not what’s best for the parents, or the biological mother. That’s all that matters.

But everyone deals with such situations differently. If you wish to contact the birth mother, I’d recommend dealing with the situation through an attorney. While well intended, things can go wrong very fast, with adverse consequences for you and your child. Legally, this woman is not you child’s mother.
 
TheWarriorMonk said:

“An order of protection can be obtained if she continues this course of action.”

Yes.

I don’t want to scare the OP, but it is not out of the question that she might attempt to kidnap the kid.
 
Personally, I would not send photos. I know what it is like to be a biological child and have an older brother who was adopted. For the younger kid to know that his older brother has another mom who sees his picture will make the younger kid jealous. It will also emphasize to the older kid that the woman he calls mommy isn’t his real mommy and make him jealous of the younger one.

If the bio mom has pictures, I would be petrified of my son going to the park without me. I have a friend whose family rejected her for being pregnant in high school. Ten years later, her brother regretted not knowing his niece and just showed up at her school to say ‘hi’

I would keep all the pictures in a special box and when your son is old enough let him decide if she can see them. After all, the person this will have the most impact on is your son and he should have the right to make these decisions when he is old enough

Angie
 
I understand the desire to do the “right thing” for the birth mother. But my opinions are tempered by all of the truly wacky things I’ve seen in my life. FWIW, when my wife and I decided to adopt, we decided to go international and adopted abandoned children where the parents were nowhere to be found. It was specifically because we didn’t want the birth parents coming by and causing chaos in the child’s life.
 
Xantippe said:
Viki63 said:

“Send her photos and updates every six months. In my opinion every 3 months is too often.”

I’d agree with that, except that she has the OP’s relatives’ info and a track record of harassing the OP’s relatives for photos and info. A 6 month schedule will leave her harassing the OP’s family, while with a 3 month schedule, there’s a little more hope of motivating her into better behavior, as with a 6 month schedule, there’s much less motivation for good behavior. (I have to say, her kid-seeking behaviors sound a lot like what her old drug-seeking behavior must have looked like.) The schedule would be every 3 months, but she could lose her privileges with bad behavior and wind up with every 6 months or 9 months or a year or even more–it would all depend on her. If her behavior improved enough, the schedule could be made more frequent–every two months, every month, every week even. But it would all hinge on her conduct.

If you choose to go with this method, I would talk to the relatives she has contacted and explain the system to them and that you are not being “mean” but just realistic and careful.
Click to expand...
IMO, this system gives too much power to the biomom, and leaves room for harassment of the family, Going through an attorney is a much better idea. The father should not have to worry about motivating her to better behavior. She either sticks to what is agreed on, or loses any privileges, An attorney could manage this without the anguish it might cause the child’s parents.
I know several of us sound harsh, but the bottom line is what’s best for the child and his development. And having parents who don’t have to worry about sharing their child might well be best for all concerned.
 
I definitely agree that with the biomom’s current behavior and track record, she shouldn’t have any access at all right now.

However, the problem is that eventually the biomom is going to burst in on their lives (because she has all the information already that would allow her to do that–she can just show up–even at Christmas at grandma’s if she so chooses or a birthday party). The OP needs to have a carrot to use on her, because unless they get restraining orders and prosecute her for violation of restraining orders (and Lord knows how well that will work if they get a stupid judge), she’s going to be hanging around. And then the OP will have to explain all of that to the child some time down the road (before biomom has a chance to tell her version, “Your dad put me in jail because I wanted to see you!”). Obviously, there is a nuclear option available here, but 1) it will be tough to explain to the kid down the road and 2) even if you can put her in jail, it’s only for so long.

Biomom is a permanent problem, which is why I would suggest actively managing her, rather than just waiting for her to show up.
 
This is a very difficult situation that I am certainly not competent to weigh in on. Since others have given good advice, I would offer a simple suggestion: make a Holy Hour in front of the Blessed Sacrament at Eucharistic adoration. Ask our Lord for guidance. 🙂
 
Social media is going to be progressively more of a problem as time goes by. All the biomom needs to do is find one soft-hearted or scared auntie to lean on, and she’ll have a lot of access to stuff she shouldn’t have access to.
 
This is a very good point.

I have no contact with my parents now, and have no intention, barring significant positive life changes on their parts, to have any contact with them in the future. My mother is an alcoholic with sociopathic tendencies, and my father is narcissistic in the extreme. She has been physically abusive of me in the past, while both of them have been emotionally abusive to me as well. Leaving aside everything else, she refuses to face the fact that driving while drunk is a really stupid thing to do. (If you ask her, she’d say that she wasn’t drunk. Sure, she’d just drunk a bottle of vodka before getting behind the wheel, but that doesn’t mean she was impaired at all…well, you get the idea.)

My husband and I, having seen just what they’re capable of, have decided to not even tell them that I’m pregnant. They will never meet their granddaughter or have any sort of access to her. Thank God for the fact that we and they live in states in which grandparents have no visitation rights unless the parents decide to allow it.

We have made a point, however, of not posting anything at all related to the pregnancy on any sort of social media–blogs, Facebook, and so on. We figure that if there’s something important we want to share with friends, we can tell them in person, via email, or on the phone. If we never contact them except through a Facebook feed, just how close are they, anyway? Once she’s here, we’ll continue doing this: no posts on FB about her, no blog posts, definitely no pictures, and the like. In 13-15 years or so, when she may want to get on social media (and who knows what that’ll look like by then anyway), we’ll reassess.

When something gets put on the Internet, it’s there for good. I strongly advise you to consider this before posting anything on any kind of social media about your son. Assume that biomom will see anything you put out there, and act accordingly. Remember that if any of your friends or relatives are friends with biomom on Facebook and comment on a picture of your son, unless they and you have set your privacy settings manually then biomom WILL be able to see the entire album of photos in which you posted that picture.
 
Did your current spouse went through fully with your child’s adoption? Is there a court judgment on the adoption case declaring your current wife as the parent of your child? If your answer to those two questions is yes, then the legal mother of your child is your current wife. Adoption severed any bond between the child and the biological parent and there is no way of going back. If the adoption was finalized and your wife has a court judgment backing her up, the biological mother should stay away. Maybe when the kid reaches 18 they can have a relationship. If the bio mom thinks that you handled the wrong way or she was threatened then (and I answer this as a lawyer myself) bad luck for her. It is done and legally now she is nothing but a stranger to the child. She can get upset and say everything she wants, nothing and I mean nothing can change the current situation. O don’t think you should even argue with her. Just remind her that she can get in a serious legal trouble by this attitude and to keep her distance until the child is 18.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top