Dear “that mom” whose kid screamed, “I wish I lived with my birth mom!”

I understand what you are going through. I’ve be on the receiving end of those words.

Ok, actually we have dealt with this for 13 years, and I have some experiences with this that may help. This is long, but I feel like it might be helpful. So, I may have a less popular approach in the grand scheme of foster and adoptive parents, but I find that taking these words very seriously, and believing them to be true, and treating them as true, can change everything. We have an daughter who was placed with us at 8 months, and she is now 13 1/2 years old. She is an amazing, generally even-tempered, helpful, integral part of our family. I adore her. She adores her siblings. However, from day 1 of her placement with us, she has had an issue with women. She hated me for the first 2 months, and at 8-10 months old would physically attack me. She was terrified of me. This has meant that part of my job as a mom has been to figure out how to help her trust and attach to women. It has also meant that I had to get my parenting act in gear fast, because she was our first, and I became pregnant with our second within weeks of the placement. Parenting came fast and furious to our quiet lives. All of the women in the family jumped on board immediately when she was placed with us, figured out their place in helping her trust and love women appropriately, and she now has very healthy relationships with the women in our family. What has always remained in her, though, is a touch of anger toward me.

Now, we are both spunky personalities, and we talk things out in intense ways, and our communication style is very loud, but very bonding for us. I am not afraid of her no matter how loud she gets, and she needed to see that from day 1. Unlike other women in her life up to that point, I wasn’t going to allow her to be afraid of me, I wasn’t afraid of her, and once she realized that I was her greatest ally, she slowly began to give up her insistent hatred for me. Up to that point, she had kept women on their toes. She had been in control. I kept her on her toes and offered cooperation. I somehow understood, from the moment I met her, that I must remind her of her birth mom, who she was with for the first 6 weeks of her life, and she was mad as heck at her birth mom. She was rightfully concerned that I would destroy her life in the same way her birth mom caused her life to be destroyed. Not that she understood this at age 8 months, but her subconscious and instinct sure did understand it! She has, from the time she could talk, asked about her adoption and her birth mom. She always knew that she was part of a loving family with parents who would fight to the death for her, but when she asked, we didn’t hide her story from her, as was age-appropriate. So she has always said things like, “You are not my real mom,” or “Maybe I’ll live with my birth mom someday.” Over time, we have had good conversations about her origin, why she needed a family other than her birth mom, her worth as an individual apart from her family, her place in our religious practice as a child of God first and foremost, etc. She is a confident, smart kid who KNOWS that she is adored and safe where she is at, and KNOWS that her birth mother, while loved and considered part of our family, is not safe to live with. She understands that genetics do not make a person a mom or a daughter, but that genetics does mean we have special feelings for and curiosities about those we may not know, like birth moms. And yet she has an inborn wish that things had been different. That wish is part of her story. It is a beautiful wish, and should never be ignored.

Yes, sometimes she has yelled at me in anger that she isn’t my daughter to see how badly she can hurt me. She takes it out on me because she has nobody else to take it out on. Moms are supposed to lay down their lives for their daughters. Her birth mom didn’t do that. Now she’s angry at her birth mom and takes it out on me. That’s ok. I signed up for that. I’m the adult, and I can absorb that, knowing that what she really means is that she is angry at everyone else in the past who didn’t do things right, and so created this situation. I KNOW that is what she means. And now, at 13, she is beginning to understand that.

Very recently, though, she has begun to tell her siblings in anger, “You are not my real sister/brother.” Ok, that doesn’t fly. They are younger and don’t fully understand what I, as an adult, do understand. They didn’t sign up for that, and so we immediately banned that kind of talk with respect to them. She and her sister have always had the most amazing bond. From the birth of my bio daughter, my AD has taken her under her wing, protected her, treated her like a precious gem. I think she has that protective instinct because she doesn’t want anything bad to happen to her sister as happened to her. My daughters find joy in one another, but these recent angry words from my AD have cut deep in my younger daughter. So I sat my AD down, told her that she’s 13 and old enough to really dig into these feelings without cutting scars into her siblings hearts. We dug WAY deeper into the process of facing the facts about who to be angry at, and then how to use justified anger for good. We are working on turning anger into compassion for her birth mother, for the homeless, for other foster kids, for her siblings, for strangers in other nations. It has been an amazing growing time. She is in the throes of early puberty, she is in a society that makes her feel strange because she is black and living in a very white area, and for the first time people are regularly noticing her skin because of current events, she has a lot of really big emotions right now. 13 is a crazy adventure even when you are a privileged bio kid, but she has all of this other background to integrate into her story. It’s a big job for her. But talking about her history, and allowing her to reason it through, is amazing. She really gets it. We also gave her the one letter her birth mom wrote that is positive (usually they are pretty negative and almost creepy, and we don’t believe she is old enough to process the others yet). In that letter, her birth mother laid out what we have always told her, that she is dearly loved by her BM, but that her BM is not a safe person to raise a child. She has become more joyful over the past weeks and months. The sparkling stars are coming back into her eyes. She is verbalizing things like, “I feel angry right now, but I am thinking about the uncle who hurt my birth mom when she was little, and it makes me mad that her foster mom didn’t do anything about it! She was a really bad foster mom, and that uncle was a really bad guy!” She is still learning how to manage translating her feelings into statements about reality, but she’s getting there! We are cooperating with one another on this.
I am sure this story will unfold with twists and turns and tears and joy over the next many years. Her childhood is not over yet. However, I want to encourage you, as a mom in a similar situation, not to ignore, but to dig, even at this young age, into exactly why your kid-o is doing this. It’s not to hurt you. Sure, that is the surface reason in the moment, but why does she say those particular words at that exact moment? Is she feeling like she is not given enough freedom to be part of a decision? Does she have infant trauma and this situation is reminding her of that? Is she feeling unsafe even though your actions were to enhance her safety? I would dig into that, and then, when things are calm, have some ice cream or a fancy little tea party with her and begin these discussions. “I have noticed that when you are angry, you say that you are not my daughter. I know you feel loved and safe here, and I know that you are my daughter, and I love you so much. I also know that you love me and your family. I also know that when you say those things, you are really unhappy and maybe you just don’t know what else to say. You know what? I believe that you are amazing, and that we can figure this out. I wonder if you were maybe not feeling listened to at that moment? Let’s talk about how you and I can work together on that so that in those moments, we can say “I have a suggestion,” rather than “You are not my mom!” Then I will work on knowing that I need to stop and hear your ideas. Moms sometimes get so distracted that we forget to listen! Will you help me with this?” And then have a conversation about her birth mom. “Now that we have figured out how we might work together when you feel not listened to, let’s talk about what you said when you were angry. You said that you want to live with your birth mom. I really respect that. The way things are supposed to be is that mommies have babies from their tummies, and then they are supposed to take really good care of their babies and love them forever. When it doesn’t happen like that, it is normal to wish and wonder about your birth mom. That is so normal. You should be proud of yourself for being open to talking about it! I know you are worried about your birth mom, and that shows that you are a very caring person….etc. etc…I think it is really good that you are thinking about what a family should look like because that means that you will make a really good mommy one day! And I know that you are thankful and joyful that you made your family what it is today. I know you know that without you, this family would not be complete! What a special place you have as my daughter!” Reassure her that even though she has said these things in anger, that you not once think of her as anything but your daughter. Talk about how she is so loved by her birth mom, and the evidence you have for that. Talk about where the anger should be properly placed. If her birth mom is how she is because she was molested, had bad friends as a youth, didn’t have involved parents, etc, talk about that in an age-appropriate way. I have found that compassion for a bio parent is so important with my AD. It helps my daughter develop compassion, to understand that she is in a special position of understanding those who are far less fortunate than she is, and that it’s kind of a super power in life to have that kind of compassion and understanding. It helps my daughter to place anger where it belongs, which is at the root of the problem, and not at me or her birth mom or her siblings. The anger should be placed on those who harmed her birth mom, and make it clear that her birth mom was and still is in a far worse place than my AD because of those bad people. It helps her to connect with her birth mom in compassion and to appreciate that while nobody was there to say yes to helping her birth mom, there is an entire extended family who came along to say yes to helping my AD NOT to have the life her birth mother had. So let’s be angry at people who said that helping her birth mom was too hard and so walked away from her. This doesn’t mean that we are an amazing family or anything. Instead it means that we should be always there to say yes to helping and loving others, even when it seems hard. These are all really important lessons for a 13-year-old. These are really important lessons for a 4.5 year old. If she is verbalizing that her connection with her past is important to her (and indeed, yelling that she wants to live with a birth parent she really never knew is exactly that), then take that very seriously and build her story in an age-appropriate and therapeutic way.

Anyway, this is just one family’s experience with this. Now that my AD has used these words to try to hurt her siblings, we have prohibited that in the house. She doesn’t get to aim those words at her siblings. She needs to aim them at the people who signed up for it: her parents! She understands why and agrees that it isn’t helpful in maintaining the wonderful relationship she has with her siblings. As the oldest of 4, my AD values her place as the leader of the pack, and saying that she isn’t really their sister destroys that position. She gets that. She doesn’t say it any more to her siblings. But she is allowed to use me as her sounding board, even if it means yelling that I’m not her real mom when she is overwhelmed by emotions and doesn’t know what else to say. She is allowed to do that. That’s what I am here for. I signed up for that. I’m the adult, and I can use her angry words as an opportunity to help her understand her own story and place in the world.
Does it hurt me? I’ll be honest. It took me maybe 4 years to really sort out my own fantasy about what my family would be like. I never in a million years thought my first child would scream that she isn’t my daughter. Not in a million years. My family fantasy included a lot of unicorn and rainbow-type situations. LOL! It was Debbie Stoltz who helped me understand that it’s not about me or my unrealistic ideal I developed as a kid. Instead, what is important for all of our family is to file that fantasy into the “fun things I used to think could happen” folder and let our actual, real family unfold without expectations. The only expectation I should have is that I act like the mom these kids need. That’s it. That is where I need to put 100% of my energy. Then I won’t have the time or mental space to be hurt. The mom I need to be is the mom who translates the hurtful words of my children into statements of fact about their thoughts and beliefs. And then to work with them to have true and appropriate feelings and beliefs. Debbie’s advice changed my entire approach. So does it hurt? No, not anymore. It did hurt for a few years, because I’m a normal person and those kinds of words hurt until we understand why they are said. I remember the moment, when my daughter was about 4 years old, when I had this amazing revelation that her words were no longer hurtful and instead inspired compassion and thought about what was behind those words in the moment. I am a slow learner like that. LOL!

But you know what? It DOES hurt that our birth mom (because she is part of our family, even if we have never met her) was harmed as a child, she was not loved well, she was abused and neglected. When she cried and screamed, she was not rescued or understood. I hold my daughter and we cry tears of compassion together over that. We both cry when we find that she is, yet again, in prison. Our hearts are both broken for her. When my daughter realized that I cry for her birth mom, and I took my daughter in my arms and we shared this sadness for the first time, it utterly changed our lives. I was no longer an enemy imposter. I am her ally. I also wish things had been perfect for my AD, and what that means is that part of me wishes she was never mine. It might even mean that in that perfect world I never knew her. I mourn the loss of that perfection for my daughter. She knows that, and she respects me more for that. But we don’t dwell on that fantasy. She is learning to file that fantasy into her own folder of “fun things I used to think could happen” and look with gratefulness at her current life. The life she has been living is filled with goodness and joy, and she is finally old enough to appreciate and love that.

So where do they come up with these threats? Well, they come up with it because it’s what they are actually thinking. They are too young to understand filing that fantasy away. Some adopted kids simply have a longing to live with their birth parents. It’s a fact, and we need to accept it and turn our hurt into compassion. It’s not a threat, it’s a statement of their pain and realization that their fantasy cannot be real. It is like the realization that unicorns don’t exist. There are many things we desperately wish were so, but they are not. They have the added pain of not even remembering their birth mom, which turns into guilt in a way that we cannot understand, as moms. So their little minds, in their quiet moments, consider the possibilities. Did I do something wrong to make my birth mom not love me? Did I cause my mom to be on drugs? Am I not lovable enough to get my mom off drugs? Am I so terrible that she choose crime and drugs and jail over me? Once I realized how horrible it must be to be 4 and having these thoughts, thoughts my bio kids will NEVER have to endure, I was able to grab onto the source of her words. She needs reassurance that it as not her fault. She needs reassurance that she is very valuable. She needs reassurance and proof that what happened in no way reflects upon her future abilities to be loved and valued and cherished. Part of my job as a mom, also, is to help my other kids translate my AD’s words into statements of fact as they get older. I encourage you to listen to your daughter’s words, form a habit of transforming into a listener rather than a feeler when your daughter says these words, and have a LOT of amazing conversations with her. I PROMISE you, it’ll change your life, and it’ll make raising that daughter the most joyful challenge and adventure you have ever encountered. It’s raw, it’s messy, it’s more extreme than any extreme sport you could attempt, you’ll say things to her in the heat of the moment that you later will wish you had not, and you will cry buckets in the night when nobody else is awake. Learn to say you are sorry and translate your own feelings into statements of reality. Recognize that you are also mourning the loss of a fantasy. Your own experience as a mother is not what you believed it would be. Begin the hard work of releasing any expectations or your relationship with your daughter. Be compassionate with yourself. Allow those tears. Don’t grow a thick skin. Get rid of your skin altogether so that all of your insides show and can absorb the words of your daughter so that you can see what they really mean. And know that you are not alone! You are part of a sisterhood of foster and adoptive moms who understand what you are going through and who are also crying buckets of tears in the night with you! But in the morning, we will be stronger, more tender, more able to be what our children need because we listened with compassion rather than felt hurt. And you are in it with your daughter. You are in this together, mourning your own very deep looses of your fantasies. Work together, and you will both come out as co-workers in this business of making the world a much better place, and please believe me: That new reality is infinitely better than either of your original fantasies! **hugs**

Ok, sorry for the novel! I’ve just been so hard core 100% in your shoes, and want to make it perfect for you, but alas, that in itself is a fantasy! LOL!

Something to consider is that not all kids care about their bio story. I have an AS who has never, not once, ever mentions his birth mom, even though we have mentioned her and opened up the possibility of talking about her. He just doesn’t care. His personality is completely different. I am sure that one day it’ll come up, but he is a soul rest in our family. I love it all, every challenge and parenting adventure with our oldest, but it’s nice to have his care-free approach to life as a respite when I need it!