I am a first(birth)mom. I placed my son in an open adoption at birth almost 7 years ago. My son’s adoptive parents conceived a daughter just 3 months after my son was born(and placed with them). Though I know that my son is loved by them and their community, I can’t help but notice a bias towards his sister. Often the adoptive mom posts more pictures of her daughter(on Face book) than of our son. Since I have had the fortune to have visited with my son, I know personally how difficult it is to get good pictures of him(constant motion). I have noticed that his sister seems to get just a little more than him in many ways. Now, I could just chalk that up to there being more for girls to do at Disneyland than for boys. Or that, when I comes to fashion, my son is probably like me in that he will decide to wear the same things again and again, for comfort. While his sister wears different things as much as possible, so it just looks like she has ‘more’. I can’t shake the feeling that their is a bias toward my son’s sister because she was born to them. The problem is that I doubt that my son’s adoptive parents, or anyone they know, are really even aware of the bias they have towards her. She is an ‘easier’ child to care for, while my son is starting to show signs of ADD, which both myself and the birth father have struggled with, and my son’s adoptive parents are aware of this. How do I tell them of my concerns without offending them? I know they are doing their best, but I think you can’t improve or change a behavior that you’re not aware of. All I want is to make them aware of the obvious bias I see without offending them.
How do I tell the adoptive parents of my concerns about bias without offending them?
– October 13, 2012Posted in: Community Wisdom
That’s a tough one. I guess it depends on the level of closeness you have in your relationship. If you feel like you can sit down and talk with them, I would. I wouldn’t bring any of this up in an email or letter since that can be interpreted the wrong way. Bring up your concerns – that you feel like he is being treated differently – in a calm/concerned way and maybe ask how they feel about it. I guess you might have to prepare yourself for them to react badly to you bringing it up, too.
I have to say that I don’t think there will be a good outcome if you bring it up in the way you’ve written here. I’m not saying that it isn’t a legitimate concern, but I think that there’s a very good chance that they will not react well and, if it comes from you, it will be easy for them to think that it has more to do with you being sensitive with your child. No parent will react well to being told they treat one child better than another and they would likely only be able to hear that, if at all, from a few people and probably only very close friends or family who they don’t perceive as having their own potential bias towards one child. Telling them that they have a bias towards their daughter comes across as judgment and I can’t imagine them not getting defensive.
I think there’s a way to bring up issues with your son without bringing their daughter into it at all and I think that’s a better approach. Perhaps you can tell them that you’ve noticed your son is showing signs of ADD and that you’d be happy to talk with them about how that was for you growing up and what would have made life a little easier on you. That would likely come across as wanting to be helpful and share your own history and experiences in a way that would be relevant to them and their parenting approaches.
I only parent one child, but I think it’s important to remember that children can be so very different. On the outside, it may have appeared that my parents favored my sister over me, but that wasn’t the case. She just desired attention in a way that was more public and more material, so it was obvious to others. I was more withdrawn and liked one on one time and didn’t like being the center of attention at all. My parents tailored their approach to work within the natural desires of me and my sister so that we both got everything we needed, but it certainly wasn’t identical. It’s clear you’ve considered this as a possibility, but I just want to put it out there since it is certainly possible that your son and his sister also just have different needs.
Good luck – this seems like a very challenging situation.
Thank you, those are good ideas.
I’m kind of afraid of ‘telling them how to parent’ because I know that open adoption isn’t co-parenting, but just telling them about my experience would probably be an really good idea and I will try that when I get the chance.
I know things about children because in the past, I did work at a day care and had in my care about a dozen children. All with varying needs of course.
That was years ago, but I sometimes think about how I meant to give more attention to some children, or when I tried to give equal attention and failed.
Young children are keenly aware of differences in behavior towards their peers.
I’m also wondering, the next time I get the chance, if I talked to my placed son, asked him about how he feels about his sister.
I agree that I don’t want to really bring my son’s sister into the issue, because she hasn’t done anything questionable. I care about her as much as I do my placed son.
You are right that I have a very strong bias towards my placed son, and a person who does not have this bias is actually available to me.
That person is my placed son’s first father’s wife.
She has come to a few visits with us(along with her children)
Again, when I get the chance, I will certainly ask her if she notices what I notice and if she would be willing to talk to my son’s adoptive parents.
They get along pretty well because they are both parenting young children.
At visits, I am sort of a fifth wheel in the social realm.
I’m there physically, but my placed son’s first father and his wife really do most of the talking.
Currently the visit that has happened this month for the past 3 years has not yet happened, and there’s no sign that it will. I can only hope for another chance to see my son. It’s not that they won’t visit with me, it’s just that life is busy.
Thanks again for your wise words and insight!
Just wanted to say that I agree with what Bob wrote…I especially like the idea of talking about how it was for you growing up with ADD and how that info could be helpful to them.