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Post by homebird on Apr 1, 2014 8:08:35 GMT
Sitting here quietly browsing my forums and having joined in a thread about contact on Facebook, I got to thinking about my daughter and her siblings. It occurred to me how amazing she is in the way she deals with her divided family. My oldest (birth) daughter got married last year and our nephew (a.daughters oldest brother) was there and was introduced to my brothers children who immediately claimed him as another cousin. My (birth) son is getting married next week and again, our nephew and their older sister are coming and I know our youngest will be quite open about them being her siblings. I suppose it helps that we are kinship adopters and obviously family know the circumstances but I think she copes with it all so well. She regards them all as her siblings. Its such a shame that her adopted siblings (outside of the family) aren't as open to it. I don't mean that I would expect them to come to birth family celebrations. Its just that they keep her at a distance, separate from their own lives, and even though they were the ones to contact her directly through Facebook, they do not respond to her attempts to "chat". I admire her so much for trying to keep communication going and am tempted to tell her to stop as it is so hurtful but, when they are adults, I hope they will look back and remember that their little sister has always been there for them.
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Post by esty (archive) on Apr 1, 2014 8:23:10 GMT
Aww she sounds as if she's doing amazingly well and all credit to you for handling it too!
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Post by Deleted on Apr 1, 2014 9:05:19 GMT
She knows where she fits in and she is happy there and that's thanks to her Mum - you.
That's all that matters, the rest will sort itself out when she is older if she wants to.
Try and not worry about it, try and not let it spoil what you have, she's happy and feels she belongs and that's the main thing.
Just enjoy, tomorrow will sort itself out.
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Post by littlemisscheerful on Apr 1, 2014 9:21:00 GMT
I hope that your dd's adopted sibs accept contact at some stage, bu sounds as if she fully grasps how her family works. Hope you all have a good day at the wedding,
My cousin sounds similar to your dd at taking blended families as normal. She grew up with step siblings, was found by an older sister who had been adopted, and then had half siblings born later. She would describe them all as brothers/sisters with no distinction (though her step sibs are who she considers to be her 'real' siblings.)
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Post by pingu on Apr 1, 2014 9:29:45 GMT
Maybe your dd siblings found it too difficult to handle the emotions of a link at the moment, maybe will later, or maybe just didn't know what to say to each other, I never found talking to my cousins easy as we rarely saw them and didn't have a lot in common! sometimes my boys birth siblings seem more like cousins to them and us because they don't live with them daily. They may have been curious about your daughter and not appreciate that keeping in touch means a lot to her. I am sure they don't mean to hurt her, but they do have their own family life and friends and teenagers are not good at " relatives" . I know from my oldest that handling birth family links is an added extra stress on top of his family life here, and he was not ready to handle it for a long time ( some kids may never want to, depends on their personality and their history.) Hope things go ok for your daughter and that she is able to understand that they might not want contact just now, best wishes
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Post by donatella on Apr 1, 2014 12:01:23 GMT
I do think it's different with your family set up than it is for me and my kids. My kids have numerous birth siblings between them but, at the moment, have no curiosity about them whatsoever. To them they're strangers. Their siblings are the ones they live with. Two of them have never had any sort of relationship (one younger and placed for adoption as a baby), all the others quite a bit older and we've no idea where they are or even who they are now.
We did attempt contact with the Los adopters but they really weren't interested - and that was their choice.
Middly did live with his birth sibs for a couple of months and had ongoing contact till placed. And the (implicit I think) memory of the distress that caused has ensured that - for now - he wants nothing to do with them and has stopped me doing lb.
Maybe things will change as they get older but for now this is their family and the children they live with are their siblings. Maybe that's the case for your daughters adopted siblings?
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Post by homebird on Apr 1, 2014 13:02:31 GMT
Thank you all. As usual you've given me lots to think about. I think what confuses the issue is that social services insisted that we maintained close contact with the oldest siblings and extended birth family but only letterbox contact with the adopted group. My daughter has never lived with any of them, although the others spent 2 years together in the family home and then a year with maternal aunt during proceedings. I don't suppose she'll ever be as close to them as she is with our birth children but I do hope they will have a good relationship when they're older.
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Post by pingu on Apr 1, 2014 16:09:50 GMT
I think I does sound as you might be right about the different types of contact for different siblings. we have the dilemma that any of the adopted or fostered ones who revives contact with those in birth family risks the contact with younger adopted and fostered kids being stopped ( due to security fears and also because it badly upsets things in adoptive families sometimes) even though the extended birth family are not a risk here, it's different for the carers and adoptive parents of younger kids at vulnerable ages, if older kids have contact and they don't/can't due to legal reasons and because the kids feel upset that they haven't got contact. Basically, it's complicated!
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