Aunt who regrets putting up her baby for adoption 38 years ago pressures adopted niece to search for her birth parents, won't take no for an answer: 'Finding my birth parents won't make her son search for her'

Advertisement
  • 01
    Cheezburger Image 10356977408
  • 02
    AITA for telling my aunt that finding my birth parents wouldn't make her bio son search for her?
  • 03
    I'm (24f) an adoptee and I have never ever wanted to search for my birth parents or any birth family. I'm happy with the family I was raised in, I did some genetic testing to get a better idea of risk factors so I don't need my birth family for that kind of thing and generally I don't feel any curiosity about the people I'm genetically related to. I'm also really happy with my life and I'm not feeling anything missing. Something could change in the future but I have never felt any other way abou
  • 04
    My mom's oldest sister aka aunt from the title, placed her son for adoption 38 years ago. She was young and she felt like she had no choices at the time. But she has always wished she hadn't given him up, she tried to get him back a couple of months after he was adopted, and she tried searching for him a few times, but it seems like he never looked for her and so she hasn't found him. It's a grief she carries around almost 40 years later.
  • 05
    I think my aunt's experience has given her this warped idea that if I were to search for my birth family and show an interest in meeting and being part of my birth family, her son will do the same. She has encouraged me to be more curious about my birth family for years now. Since I was a teenager and I never cared. She told me, not asked or suggested, but told me I should look for my birth parents. I told her I
  • 06
    didn't want to and she told me I didn't know what I was saying. She has used guilt trips about my birth parents missing me and about the family I could be missing out on. But I was clear I don't care. My mom spoke to her several times and told her to get help and stop dragging me into her grief. She refuses to leave it alone.
  • 07
    She has asked me why I have no interest and I have told her how I feel. She has really tried to make me say I'm somewhat curious but I'm just not. And then we had an incident the other week. She mentioned it for the millionth time and I tried to ignore her and carry on other conversations but she kept bringing it up, and bringing it up. She was asked to stop by my mom and other family members and finally I got so tired of her pressing the issue that I told her finding my birth parents won't make
  • 08
    My aunt called me callous to her experience and feelings. AITA?
  • 09
    Auntie-Mam69 1 day ago · edited 1 day ago NTA. You really cannot be too harsh (editing here to clarify that I meant that any level of harsh response from OP is justified) w your aunt at this point. You've every right to go completely no contact w her and the entire family needs to back you up. If she does both Ancestry and 23 & Me testing and makes her results public, her son can find her if he wants. But she's so desperate she's gonna need therapy regardless or she'll drive him away the minute
  • 10
    Complete-Clothes1390 OP 1 day ago She's done those and she keeps waiting for a match to him but it never came.
  • 11
    CatLadyNoCats 1 day ago Does she realise that maybe he was never told he was adopted? Or, sadly, he may have passed years ago.
  • 12
    Complete-Clothes1390 OP. 1 day ago She considered he might not know but not that he might have died. For a while she refused to believe he wasn't looking for her too but then reality dawned when she found no traces of him.
  • 13
    Figuringoutcrafting . 1 day ago ΝΤΑ You said that she attempted to get him back only a few months after giving him up. The state I was adopted in has, I believe, a 6 month change your mind before the adoption is solidified, for the biological parent. So I hate to think it, but
  • 14
    he may have passed then if she was still within that window, and it's just easier for her to believe otherwise.
  • 15
    Complete-Clothes1390 OP . 1 day ago They have a window where he was placed too but mom said people got in the way of her getting him back. Their parents did not want her to raise him and the agency they used didn't want to take the baby back from where he was placed either.
  • 16
    Different-Leather359 1 day ago Wow that's totally illegal. It's too bad she can't do anything about it now, but trying to force you into doing something you have no interest in won't help her. You're NTA and hopefully she finally gets help and healing. I lost my child and that pain will never go away, so I do feel for her, but that has nothing to do with you. (My daughter passed just a couple weeks before her due date, she wasn't taken from me)
  • 17
    Kckc321 1 day ago It was common back then (assuming like 40+ years ago?). There is a show on Discovery about people reuniting after adoptions and a large portion of the stories the birth moms were teenagers and had no say in the matter at all, it's really sad.
  • 18
    NotACandy Bar 1 day ago Or he could be like OP and never want to look.
  • 19
    cheesy_bees 1 day ago I think this is her real fear. She doesn't want to believe this is possible. That's what all the bugging of OP is about. Just trying to convince herself that deep down all adoptees want to find their bio parents. It is very sad.
  • 20
    Beneficial_Local1012 · 1 day ago NTA. Your aunt needs therapy to learn to deal with her grief and maybe some hard truth will make her see that. Even if it doesn't, she needs to learn that she can't project her issues onto you and maybe being harsh with her will do that. Also, tell her the only person being callous is the one that won't stop bringing it up, because she certainly hasn't shown any interest in YOUR feelings and experience.
  • 21
    Gnarly 314 1 day ago NTA. You could say your aunt is callous towards your experience and feelings.
  • 22
    The_Death_Flower · 1 day ago Especially since she misses her bio son, but some people wouldn't give a if the child they gave up tried to reach out. For all we know OP could have been an affair baby and if he reached out to his bio family, he could be brutally rejected, which would be absolutely horrible. Searching for your bio family is a jump into the known you have to be soooo ready for mentally

Tags

Scroll Down For The Next Article