My daughters birth mom found us on facebook and contacted us a month ago. We corresponded and everything is great. We decided it was best to tell our daughter about her. Well one thing led to another and now we are going to meet her and my daughters biological sister tomorrow. I am very excited but don’t know how to set boundries. It is just moving so darn fast. Any comments or advice would be more than welcome.
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Please don’t fear that boundaries will immediately be an issue. They might be, they might not be… wait and see.
A thought: it isn’t necessary to add the caveat of “biological” sister… a sister is a sister.
Yours,
Shelton
How exciting! How old is your daughter?
Unless you already know that there are probable boundary problems, the approach I’d probably take is to just more forward slowly and address issues if/when they arise. In lots of open adoptions, just the normal, unspoken social boundaries that most everyone follows in their everyday relationships are all that’s needed.
I think it’s okay to be honest about the fact that you’re head is still spinning from how quickly and unexpectedly it all happened. If something is proposed that your daughter and/or you need a little time to think through before responding to, it’s fine to say you’re going to take that time. I’d just be sure to couple it with (a) assurances that you’re excited about this new connection and (b) a specific date you’ll get back to them with your response. Lots and lots of communication helps keep people from guessing at what’s going on for you (and assuming the worst).
One helpful thing that a counselor did with us and our daughter’s first mom at the beginning of our open adoption was to get us talking about how we approach relationships in general (sort of the love languages stuff mixed with family culture). What makes you feel connected to your friends and family? How do your families celebrate holidays? What is gift giving like in your family? What did your relationships with extended family members look like when you were growing up? Then when we got to deciding on more practical details of the open adoption, we knew better where the other person was coming from. So if one of us said, “I’d really like to stay connected by phone,” for example, we knew that meant talking once a month or so and not the once a week it might mean to someone else. Or, if we knew they actually did mean once a week and that would be overwhelming for us, we could talk about that up front. It’s not talking about boundaries, per se, but it can help head off possible boundaries issues in the future.
Best wishes to all of you!