Kinship adoption

Kim - posted on 06/15/2010

I know it's been a while since you posted this. I hope you have having less confusion about this situation.

I have a similar situation. My sister is the grandmother to my children! My mother wants to know if she is their grandmother or their great-grandmother and what do they call her. I explained to my mother, that the children will call her what they want to call her. By birth, she is their great-grandmother, but by law she is their grandmother.

I have three children. Twins (boy and girl) were in foster care and placed with me when they were 15mos. The adoption was final just this past April and they turned three in May. They have a younger sister who we adopted the day she was born as the parents relinquished rights in the hopes they could "win" back the twins from the state. She is now 16mos. They also have an older sister in which the maternal grandparents have guardianship.

They all know they have a sister in another state and have been to visit and talk regularly on the phone. Of course, total understanding and explanation will come as they all age and ask more detailed questions. Right now, the twins do not ask about their birth parents at all (have not seen them since Sept 09), even though we keep a picture with all of them before foster care.

My struggles come in in that the birth parents and my sister do not have anything to do with us now. They have walked away claiming we stole the children away from them. That's another story.

Your children will ask questions, it's the nature of children. You can only be honest with them to the best of their understanding. You will find that all will be just fine in the end.

Julie, thoroughly understand the struggles you are going through. My 3yo daughter gives me the same looks and attitute you are getting. I think as time goes on and you show you are there for her consistently, she will warm and you will find one day she will call you Mommy without even realizing she did it. Before the twins parents relinquished rights, we insisted everyone refer to me as Aunt Kim, because that is who I was. It wasn't until I was approved as the adoptive home that I became Mommy. The kids, long before that time, chose to call me Mommy on their own. It's in the hands of the child what they call you (as referenced above re: grandma/great-grandma). It's in your hands to just love them and take care of them the best way you know how to do.

Julie - posted on 04/01/2010

can you post a link to that group?

Gidgit - posted on 04/01/2010

Ambika, we are in a similar situation. My daughter is 4 months on sunday and we brought her home from the hospital. My sister is her bio mom and doesn't know who the bio dad is. My daughter has 5 half siblings via my sister. However my sister wants her to always see them as her cousins.

We have come to the agreement that since I could not carry that my little one will be told that mommy's tummy was broke and aunt K gave birth to her so mommy and daddy could bring her home to be a forever family.

Your sister is her aunt! Your adoption is final and she is YOUR daughter! It is not horrible at all! There are some great books for toddlers who are adopted and you can try those. Don't be afraid to use the word adoption around your children.

My daughter will call her birth mom aunt because she is. Our adoption will not be final for quite sometime but she will always know that her auntie gave mommy a special gift by giving birth to her so I can be her mommy!

I hope this helps and please feel free to come to my group Kinship/Relative Foster and Adoptive Mom's

Julie - posted on 03/31/2010

I am in a similar situation, our (neice) child is now 4.5 yrs old.. we are still in the adoption process tho (home study soon) and should be finalizing in the next few months. She has been with us since her 2nd birthday.

My neice does NOT call me mommy, she calls me Aunt Julie... She knows who her mother is and she sees her about once a month as she is my sister in law. The child DOES call my husband Daddy tho, right along with our other children. I am SURE this is because her has never known her father... so UNCLE IS DADDY to her!

I want to start having her call me mommy, and her Birth Mother Aunt, but how do you do this? I have had little chats with her about her staying with us forever, were changing her name to ours (and she wants this too) but since she KNOWS her mother, and I am not HER MOTHER, I feel as tho she is holding onto her. She hasn't bonded with me at all... some times she wont even talk to me. I ask her a question and she just sits silently staring at me! It is SO frustrating and I wish her mother was not even in the picture at all!

Debbie - posted on 02/26/2010

I would start mentioning it to her as young as you can. I told my kids before they could even understand. Since they did have other siblings, it was better that it was out in the open. I also had a book called, "I chose you". I don't think that she would understand the concept that her birth mom is her Aunt at this time. That is totally bigger than her thinking that she came out of her tummy. I would tell her that she came out of her aunts tummy and that her aunt couldn't be a mommy to her and that is why you are her Mommy. You wanted to be her Mommy and Aunt wanted her to be safe and happy so that is why you adopted her. When you saw her you just knew that she was the little girl that you wanted. It just needs to be an open conversation and very simply explained so that it isn't confusing for her. After the initial simple conversation, do not give her any more information than what she is asking you. Just answer her questions very straight forward and easy. As she grows older, her questions will become more detailed and so will your answers. Then aunt can help out with it too, explaining that she loved her but couldn't be a mommy, etc.

That is the direction I would take. Good luck and keep us posted.

Marshella - posted on 02/16/2010

Wow, bless you for coming this far and having her knowing that her "aunt" is also her birth mom. If she is fine with it, and it sounds like she is, I wouldn't really worry about it. She'll understand more as she gets older. I don't think it's "horrible" at all for her to call her bm "aunt" - that is what she is, anyway, as well as being her bio mom.