does anyone else have a situation where you need to keep yr home location and personal info secret from yr child’s birthmom?
my daughter’s birthmother is very mentally unstable and becomes very fearful when she’s not doing well. So her family and the social workers suggested that we keep our address, phone number, daycare location etc secret from her. We use her family members to arrange visits and there was one incident where it became clear that they are right. But this has become stressful to manage and I realize soon my daughter will be able to tell fm her address and name of school.
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If this first mom is getting therapy, maybe it will be ok for her to know some small things.
What are you afraid she will do?? Take your daughter away from school?? or your home??
If your daughter is smart enough to know her address and school, then she will be smart enough to know that she can’t go with her firstmom if she were to try and take her.
Was this placement the firstmom choice? or was your daughter removed from her?
How many visits have you actually had with this first mom?
How old is your daughter?
I hope that this first mom becomes more ‘mentally stable’(can you explain what you mean by that???)
Hi Cindy
thanks for responding! sorry took me a while to respond because it’s summer
to answer yr question: yes, birthmom is getting therapy but she’s in her thirties and has been seriously mentally ill since the age of 20, so it seems unfortunatly unlikely that she will totally recover.
re birthmom’s situation, she’s been diagnosed as bi=polar but those diagnoses can mean a whole range of things. So it’s more helpful perhaps to describe her limitations – she is unable to focus to the extent that she can’t have a job or study. she lives in a supportive housing facility for people with addictions and mental illness. She abuses drugs off and on. I suspect that she was sexually abused as a child and I know she had a lot of difficulty in her childhood – her mother committed suicide when she was a teenager and was an alcoholic.
When she’s doing a bit better she makes grandiose plans for herself and then when they don’t work out she gets very depressed.
I must also say the positive things about her – she is generous and kindhearted and smart. But we can’t leave her alone with our daughter. One time when when we accidentally let her be with our daughter for a few minutes at a family party she gave my daughter a cigarette. And she is somtime innappropriate in other ways.
the placement was the birthmom’s choice, but basically the family connected with us and pressured her to make the decision. if we hadn’t adopted our daughter she would have been taken into care.
re visits, we have visits every month or two and my daughter just turned 3 so we see her (and family) often
re my fears – I’m afraid of birthmom showing up at our house repeatedly or possibly trying to kidnap my daughter if she’s not doing well. I don’t necessarily worry that she would succeed but it would be a horrible situation to have to deal with if she even tried.