BellaOnline Forums Relationships Married No Kids Advice Column bonanza

Dear Abby has been interesting from a CF perspective lately. Does anyone read that?

There was this one:
Five years ago, my husband and I adopted two siblings who have "special circumstances." The problem is my youngest child hates me and does everything possible to get me to leave.

Is it me she hates, or could it be her birth mother? She was 3 when she was removed from her birth parents and 6 when we brought her and her sister to live with us.

Do you think my child has forgotten how to love, or maybe she was never taught?

Do adoption agencies bring this up when arranging adoptions? I just can't believe adoptive parents would be this ignorant about the risks and challenges of adopting. It pisses me off because everyone pressures infertile/CF people to adopt, and no one gives a thought to the fact that there are tons of unique challenges for adopted kids. There are no guarantees that the child will be grateful and loving and well-adjusted. I can't believe someone who adopts wouldn't have the slightest clue about that, especially if the child is adopted after their infancy. Duh!!

Then there was this one:

I am a 50-year-old mom with three grown daughters. I gave up my whole life to be a stay-at-home parent. I was a room mother at school and a bus driver, and did everything I could to be the best mom my kids could have. Now they are grown with children of their own. I help with the grandkids, but I never feel appreciated.

I tried to do everything the opposite of how my parents raised me. My mother was absent, and my dad was a drunk who abused us. I'm beginning to wonder -- have all the sacrifices I made mattered? Or have I wasted my life trying to be a good mom and no one cares? -- SUPERMOM IN WELSH, LA.


Am I the only one that is incredibly annoyed by mothers who want their kids to feel forever indebted to them for raising them? SHE decided to have kids. SHE's the one who brought them into the world. If raising children is so dang fulfilling, then she should be satisfied she had that experience, and not hold it over their heads for the rest of their lives because she doesn't feel appreciated enough. I think PARENTS are the ones who OWE their children something, not the other way around. Hopefully they will give back when they are adults, but to depend on them for constant foot-kissing and eternal devotion because of YOUR choice to have them does not make sense to me. Maybe she was a [censored] mother. Just because you're a SAHmartyr does not mean you're necessarily an excellent mother.

Luckily the pseudo-Abby gave good answers along those lines.

There was one other that was of interest, but I can't find it now. It may not have been Dear Abby. The jist was, this woman wrote in because her favorite restaurant created a "family" room, and everyone with kids had to sit there from now on. She was offended and didn't want to cooperate, because she wanted peace and quiet and not to be surrounded by a 100 other kids when she was out dining with her family. The advice giver straightened her out on that fortunately.

Raising the kids should have been enjoyment enough for her. And anything else is just icing. If you give 20 years to a company, you stayed there for 20 years b/c you hopefully wanted to be there. People should do things they want to do, because they want to do them. Period. And if she doesn't feel appreciated, she should babysit less, and do something that is more rewarding. It's real basic. With that said, I think a lot of parents are entitled, and do expect grandmom to always be available. Things will change moving forward b/c women have other interests now, and will probably want to do other things once their kids are raised. There's a whole world out there!!! And, you can explore it if you don't have kids!!!!

There's a fine line between being a doting parent and a door mat and this lady obviously can't see that line. When you do everything for someone, you run the risk of being taken for granted. It's unfortunate that in her desire to be the kind of mother she never had, she created spoiled, entitled, selfish daughters. However, that being said, if you do something nice for someone and they don't appreciate it, you stop doing it. That's just common sense.

Thanks so much for posting these Frieda. It's interesting and always helpful for me - in the immediate aftermath of deciding to jump off the fence - to have the realities of raising children reinforced for me.

The second issue (50-year-old Mom) is quite an insight. It is quite a sad story. She definitely needs to disengage from her children and focus on herself and the wider world. As Happy says, you should always do what you do because you love doing it, and not expect rewards or eternal gratitude from others, or you are setting yourself up for disappointment. I am guessing those grown children feel a subtle emotional pressure all the time from her and this might make them pull away slightly.

The thing is, this woman knows the value of a good upbringing, because she had a bad one. Because her children have had a good one, they have nothing bad to compare it to and don't show obvious gratitude for it. This in itself demonstrates how successful this woman has been in raising them. I'd like to give her a big hug, tell her she's done a magnificent job and to give herself a pat on the back for her achievement, advise her to now let go, and lead her by the hand to show her all the possibilities that now lie ahead of her for her life.

And watch and smile when her children suddenly realise she's not focussing on them any more and has her own busy life - that's when she'll start to feel truly needed and they'll start to recognise what they have :-)

Re the first adoption issue. I've posted recently about our friends who have fostered a little girl with an eye to permanent adoption. Here are a few realities that have recently come to light:

- The Child, Youth and Family dept encouraged them to foster the little girl and virtually promised them that within a couple of months they would be her legal guardians.
-About six months later they still have to take her for weekly supervised visits with her loser (and I mean serious loser) birth parents and endure not knowing what they are saying to her during the two hours they have her. Also, now the birth parents are claiming they have had counselling and they now have to have endure a court case to fight for the little girl.
-Constantly they have the anxiety that the little girl may be given back to the birth parents (not that it's likely, but until they have legal guardianship it's always a possibility).
-Our friend's wife T is struggling as a first-time Mum and to a foster child to boot, and is finding the hardest thing that the child pushes boundaries all the time and is quite nasty to her, but is completely infatuated by our friend (foster Dad) K. That makes T feel really hurt, especially as she is the one who's given up work and home all day with the little girl.
-K is rather disinterested in raising a child as he has grown children of his own - when he is home he wants T's attention and she is going crazy as she therefore NEVER gets any time to herself.

I take my hat off to them, but it's a hard life they've taken on.

I agree you have to be careful with fostering...
My DH & I toyed with the idea of fostering a teenager - we quite enjoy the company of teenagers - AND, yes...I know they're not all like our nephew...
The idea started when I was approached by a colleague - she fosters 2 kids and knew we had a close relationship with our 16 year old nephew and thought we had a lot to offer a teenager in need...
We carefully considered the responsibility - we both have FT jobs and travel a fair bit...the agency suggested 2 weekends a month...
We were prepared to take on a 13 year old boy for 2 weekends a month - we were told his mother was an alcoholic and also, suffered from hepatitis and his father was unknown - he had cared for his mother for years and was quiet and responsible.
The agency then left us hanging for months on end...we rang a couple of times and were told they were amalgamating with another group and they would get back to us...
After a year of delays we became concerned - if we ran into problems, could we rely on the agency for prompt assistance?
In the end our concerns mounted and we decided not to contact the agency - 6 months later we still haven't heard from them!
Heaven help the kids that are relying on prompt placements...
We understand the boy's mother has now passed away and he is in a group home awaiting adoption. (my colleague knows one of the social workers at the agency)
My DH was never all that keen - he was concerned we'd be taking on someone else's problems & that foster kids are often very damaged - it could turn into a disaster...we were jeopardizing our happy life.
It was a risk...
My colleague is furious with the agency - she feels the 13 year old boy's life could be the richer by being part of our lives instead of coping in a group home.
His new situation would also, have concerned us - 2 weekends a month and adoption are two very different things - I think we'd have needed some time to work out whether it could have worked full time and long term given our other responsibilities. (also, whether we even wanted to go down that road)
So, we're content with our cats, nephews and niece, family, friends, sponsored child and moon bear - that's enough for us!