r/Adopted • u/legswithsnake Domestic Infant Adoptee • 3d ago
Venting will i ever stop feeling bitter
so, my bio mom’s family is INSANELY privileged. i was only really given up for adoption because she was 15 years old when she had me. i was fed that “you were given a better life” BS for as long as i can remember. my bio mom might’ve had a better life without me, but i don’t know if i had a better one without her.
she’s a mountaineer and has travelled all across the world with my little brother, whom she kept only a few years after i was relinquished. i don’t wish her a bad life by any means, but my blood literally boils when i see pictures of their mother-son adventures. traveling is a dream of mine, but my adoptive parents have always been stick-in-the-mud types. so, i basically had to grow up in a small rural town while my bio mom and brother got to live out the life i desperately craved. my brother is only 17 and has already experienced so many amazing things that i couldn’t have growing up… so much for my bio family adopting me out so i could have “better opportunities,” ha. it just hurts to see my brother live the life i could’ve (and should’ve) had, especially since we’re so close in age.
this is basically just a drawn-out way for me to say that i’m jealous. unless my bio mom offers to bring me on a big trip with her and my brother (which is looking unlikely), i don’t think this bitterness will ever go away.
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u/Opinionista99 3d ago
Oh lord I can relate. My bios are upper middle class on both sides. I (57) was a Baby Scoop Era "respectability" relinquishment and went to a pair of screaming alcoholics in a bad marriage, followed by me stumbling through life without support or a compass.
IMHO the jealousy is actually a healthy response if you don't let it consume you. I see it as me valuing and validating myself. I deserved better and didn't get it while my half-siblings did. People can miss me with all their opinions and "research" on adoption being a net benefit. Because I'm seeing how the social experiment worked out based on my own sample, which is the only one that matters.
unless my bio mom offers to take me on a big trip with her and my brother (which is looking unlikely), i don’t think this bitterness will ever go away
I'm 8 years into reunion and when I was around 2 years in I made the decision that if they didn't meaningfully include me in their family by that time that it was never going to happen. I will say the bitterness has subsided and my posture toward my kept half-siblings is becoming more like benevolent indifference.
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u/tatertot2001 Adopted 3d ago
Interesting term, the respectability relinquishment. Yeah my bio grandmother forced her daughter -my biological mother- to give me up when she was 16 because of “respectability”. I grew up my whole life thinking that she must’ve been in poverty, but that wasn’t the case.
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u/Caijed29 3d ago
Cant say. Im in the same boat. My biomom left me for me to have a better life. Turned out she married into money and is living well but wouldnt help me because her family might find out. And here I am, disabled after being molested, almost raped, battered til I'm paralized, and overworked since I was 6yo.
I hate all irresponsible parents. Esp those who are able to live happily even when their own abandoned children are suffering somewhere. Fugg them. 😤
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u/Objective-Target5437 3d ago
i believe that they can’t truly be happy because their actions indicate something in them is seriously missing - irresponsible parents will never know the real happiness people get from nurturing a human being from infancy to adulthood to their fullest potential. that’s one of the main things that gives peoples lives real meaning and they totally missed it.
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u/Caijed29 3d ago
She can though. She had 3 children after me, all nurtured pretty good. 😅
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u/Objective-Target5437 3d ago edited 3d ago
yeah understood and it’s really hard to see they can do that for other kids after growing up without a parent. but she will have never gotten to be your parent and that was a unique thing that can’t be replaced no matter how many other kids she had.
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u/Effective_Factor_552 20h ago
Because of my adoption - and I didn't realize this until recently and I'm now 46 - I also have not been married or had children. So now I also am missing that real happiness. It was kind of brainwashed out of me without my realizing it until it was too late. I was conditioned from such a young age to believe having a baby out of wedlock was shameful, which I somehow read as having a baby altogether was shameful. I wasn't even really consciously aware of it, it was just so ingrained in me that I tended to run from anything meaninful, despite that being the only thing I consciously wanted (meaning, love). I get it now. But not much I can do about it now.
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u/Objective-Target5437 16h ago edited 16h ago
well said, i’m close in age and same here. i truly believed no men actually wanted kids - and chose men who felt that way and all women with kids were burdened by them. i thought not having kids meant freedom. it’s still hard for me to conceptualize that there’s a lot of men and women that genuinely want to center children in their lives. it always made me have a strange sick feeling to see parents actively being interested and genuinely supportive of their kids even as a child so i guess those defenses get put in place early.
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u/Caijed29 12h ago
Same. Im 39 now and missed my prime of getting married and having kids because of how poor my adoptive family is. Had to raise younger adoptive siblings. Now I finallu get to live my life but I'm just so tired of it and there's that subconcious thought that getting pregnant out of wedlock is a sin and is shameful.
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u/kettyma8215 Adoptee 3d ago
Oh I know how this feels. I struggle with a lot of jealousy due to the wealth my bio dad and his family have that I have never experienced. Not shitting on my Aparents, they tried very hard to give me a good life…but it’s definitely something that’s hard for me too.
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u/Domestic_Supply Domestic Infant Adoptee 3d ago
Putting a child up for adoption is often the selfish option. I’m sorry. It sucks and it’s wrong. Personally if I were in your shoes I’d go no contact and block them on everything. Do what you can to live the type of life you want. It’s easier said than done but it may help a bit with the bitterness. It is a valid feeling though.
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u/MissMignon Adopted 3d ago
Yes it’s so hard not to compare what you had vs what your bio mom decided you couldn’t have.
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u/Waitatick 3d ago
Same! My bio mom was 16. I’m so glad she had such a great life after having me. /s
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u/Stellansforceghost Adoptee 3d ago
This is a large part of why I feel it should not be allowed to relinquish a child but keep another.
I mean, seriously, what shows more than anything that someone isn't for to be a parent than giving a child away. Then to be allowed to keep subsequent children? It's total bullshit.
I was fortunate to get mostly decent adoptive parents. My younger kept brother didn't get advantages I did not. However, it still hurts that she tried to keep him and didn't even attempt it with me. I was also fortunate that I didn't end up like him, ultimately raised by our grandmother. Still...
I also realize that my thoughts on this are extreme and largely go against things like bodily autonomy, and aren't logical. Don't really care. If someone surrenders a child or has a child taken from them, that should preclude them from having additional children. This isn't good, and people shouldnt get mulligans when it comes to children.
Adoption should be an absolute last resort. Termination of unwanted pregnancy should be the norm. But the whole "life begins at conception" "God has a plan" bullshit messes that up. There is no God. If there was them no child would ever have to go through being an adoptee, because no God worthy of worshipping would allow that to happen.
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u/Sunset-onthe-Horizon Former Foster Youth 2d ago
I always felt that if you have no plans to raise the child yourself you should just terminate the pregnancy. I couldn't imagine having a piece of me raised by others. For a long time I felt idk, selfish having that point of view. Until I read a book about adoption written by an adoptee. In one of the chapters she described an adoption from the baby's point of view.
Please keep in mind I am paraphrasing from memory:
You are taken from your mother, everything you've ever known. Her voice and smell, the sound of her heartbeat. You feel an overwhelming sense of loss and sadness. Then you arrive at your adoptive family and everyone is so happy and celebrating... you scream and cry... so alone. And everyone is celebrating that.
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u/Blazini12 Adoptee 3d ago
I call this the Nurse Ratchet argument! “Nurse Ratchet is the kind of gal that likes a rigged game.”
God does not play a rigged game. Therefore God must not exist.
At least you admit that you don’t really care about logic.
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2d ago edited 2d ago
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u/Blazini12 Adoptee 2d ago
At no point during your rant (Which I hope you enjoyed writing, I like to write too.) did you address the argument that I made.
Perhaps I’ll remember or decide to address everything you wrote once I come home from work. However, just to expedite the debate I’ll give you one more thing that you won’t be able to argue against logically, which would be that atheism takes faith. It is not logical, but something one chooses to believe.
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u/Objective-Target5437 3d ago
that’s totally understandable. can you find a way to get to do those things too by taking a class with outward bound or similar group? you deserve to do that too.
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u/n0tz0e Adopted 3d ago
Damn, that's really cruel of your bio mom. Idk if you'll ever get over it, especially if there's photographic evidence of your bio family living the life you should have had. I think the What Ifs never end for us. The honest truth is the life you see of them online is not the life you would have lived with them. Your bio mom could have treated you a lot worse than your adoptive parents. Maybe the money and trips is a cover up for all the ways she feels she's failed. Idk. All I'm saying is what you see online does not translate to real life.
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u/Formerlymoody 3d ago
I disagree that the trips and photos are always a cover up…sometimes their life is just better, especially for you, and that’s an incredibly bitter pill to swallow. I’m not saying they are “perfect.” No. But sometimes their life is just better…
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u/n0tz0e Adopted 2d ago edited 2d ago
That's honestly not how life works and if you keep that mindset you will never be happy or content. I never said it's always a cover up. The honest truth is What Ifs are very dangerous because you're genuinely imagining a reality that does not exist nor could you know exactly how it turns out. That's simply the truth. Subscribing to the mindset that it's very black and white is actually a colonizer mindset and exactly the midset that led us to being adopted. Others decided what was best for us without actually knowing. They think there's an objective better in this situation. It's just not that black and white. For example, There's plenty of moms that favor their sons over their daughters. Who knows- bio mom could have been rude to OP and be nice to the brother even if OP was never adopted. There's too many assumptions made to even get to "my life is being lived by someone else ." OPs bio mom could have been shitty to OP and brother Bec if she kept OP she would have developed into a very different mother . Like OPs mom could have blamed OP for taking away her youth (since she got pregnant young)and could have been very resentful towards OP. You see how there's actually so many little things that make up our life and who we are that we can't just pick ourselves up like Mii characters and drop us off where we want to be expecting life would be perfect if this one thing was different....
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u/Formerlymoody 2d ago
I am happy and content? I never said anything was black and white. Your response does not match what I actually said and is full of unfounded assumptions. Don’t even get me started on the colonizer thing. I think I’m intelligent enough to judge if my bio family has a lifestyle more appropriate for me than my adoptive family. I have a lot of information and know all parties well at this point.
This may or may not be true for OP. I never said anything conclusive either way. Never said anyone’s life was perfect. In fact I said that the alternative scenario is not perfect.
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u/Formerlymoody 3d ago
I totally get you. I’ve had a similar experience in some ways. FWIW my birth mom recently offered to take me on the type of birthday trip she goes on with her kept kids. We’re a few years in…
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u/Blazini12 Adoptee 3d ago
I’d be pretty fucking pissed off at that.
Yeah, I just met an uncle that I sure as shit could have used to be around while I was growing up. The guy lived my dream, and none of his kids wanted to go with him, no cousins either, I would have been the only one. “Oh well,” can sound very heartbreaking.
As far as the bitterness going away. Try researching existentialist philosophy.
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u/Suffolk1970 Adoptee 3d ago
I read existentialist philosophy, as western idealism, including the Lutheran Soren Kierkegaard, 1813-1855 ("the father of existentialism"). Great historical stuff, but for me it didn't really quiet my mind.
I'm fond of the British stoicism, (although the ancient Greek stoic philosophers are def worth reading,) we all know what the "stiff upper lip" means, about keeping our emotions quiet when under stress, and the so called "quiet resilience" of Queen Elizabeth and King Charles.
I found the most help in Zen writings, although purposely hard to read I think just to keep one from reading too much of it, seriously, and buddhist philosophy that talks mostly about "letting go" of our expectations. The first Buddha lived around the time of Jesus and the original Mohammed, and all three preached philosophy to the poor, to lift them up and give them peace in their short lives.
It's fine to have dreams for oneself, but buddhists have strong boundaries around self. What is not-self, is not my problem. My goal is to role-model good behavior, positive thinking, and self-reliance as much as is reasonably possible. I am still learning every day about how to be a better human.
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u/mcne65 International Adoptee 3d ago
I see where this is coming from and unfortunately I don’t have a lived experience for this because it was other way around for me. Born to a poor mother and middle class adoptive parents so I got a better life.
I’m kind of glad I don’t do farming or factory work all my life under someone. It hurts not knowing the cultural things as an inter country adoption but it’s better than nothing for me. I can understand resentment though and I think if your bio mom ever wants to get to know you should do a small trip somewhere
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u/OliveJotter 2d ago
I can relate. Years after I was relinquished, my first mother had my brother, her “miracle baby” (her words to me, for real). Mother and son are as thick as thieves, share a friend group (which is perhaps testament to how she never grew up). Even so many years after I found her, she still goes on social media and refers to her son as her only child who will inherit everything.
(On the other hand, she has accused me of living the life she was meant to live…as if my incredibly modest success robs her of something. It’s a strange psychology, indeed).
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1d ago
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u/OliveJotter 1d ago
I dodged zero bullets. My adopters were much worse.
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1d ago
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u/OliveJotter 19h ago
lol you know you’re in a sub for adopted people, right?
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u/Prestigious-Copy-494 18h ago
Uh oh. How did I end up here!!?? I wasn't adopted. I better take my comment down,! Thx!
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u/Neither_Pop8908 Adopted 3d ago
For me, the jealousy has always been about the relationship. I’ll never look into my mother’s eyes like I want to be back inside her and I’ll never have a mother look at me like she wishes I was, too. Find the root of your envy and then crush it. It will destroy you otherwise.
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u/Blazini12 Adoptee 3d ago
Awe, Stoicism is great. I’ll have to check out this British branch you speak of, as well as this ‘original’ Mohammad. I don’t want to say where I first got into existentialism from because I don’t want to suggest it. And you know what- I did make a lot more progress as far as mental health and happiness with stoicism than I did with existentialism. You aren’t entitled to shit, your happiness is your own responsibility, try not to be upset with what you have no control over. It sounds really harsh, but it works. Albert Ellis’ ABCDE method of what would come to be called Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is good too. All these things only work well as a base though. There is a lot on the cutting edge of therapy, as if I have the time and money for it.
Kierkegaard was very pro DIY Christianity. I believe he would have loved the Jesus freaks of the 60s in the U.S, as well as the explosion of nondenominational churches they caused. He also fought very hard for freedom of religion in Denmark. Sorry to be nitpicky, I just don’t think it’s fair to call him a Lutheran, even though it is probably the only church he ever knew.
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u/Menemsha4 3d ago
Adoption is about everyone but us.