Long Lost Family

[Ann from Sussex]

A new series started last night. Anyone else watching?
Once again I have been struck and made incredibly sad by people who say they were never made to feel part of their adoptive family. In this case, a brother and sister adopted by two different families who both grew up feeling the same way. Why adopt in the first place if you aren't going to treat the child as your own....or maybe they would have been like that with their own? And then, a couple in their 50s looking to adopt a 16 month and a 2 month old? That seems to me such a strange thing to have considered doing.

[Olde Crone]

Yes, I saw it and felt the same as you. I was also struck by the casually wicked lies. That man being told he was an only child. How dare they. What purpose did that lie serve?

The more I hear about adoption, the more I wonder who made the rules and why. To allow someone to adopt two babies and then send one back reminds me of buying dresses from catalogues, not being given a precious gift. I knew a woman who was adopted to be a playmate for the existing child. She was treated like a servant, reminded that she was a "child of sin" on a regular basis and just generally put down all the time.

OC

[Ann from Sussex]

With both reunited families in this episode, I was left wondering how much contact they will really have in the long-term. The bit of text updating at the end gave the impression that neither of them have rushed to join forces as families.

If I had been reunited with my long lost birth mother and she had given me a beautiful bangle I would have put it on straight away, not put it back in the box and just told her, "I will wear it". I felt so sad for the 16 year old that mother had been and the way her parents treated her. She is only a couple of years younger than me so I know exactly what the attitude to unmarried mothers was at the time we were teenagers. I am absolutely sure my parents wouldn't have behaved the way hers did. They would have been cross and horrified but they wouldn't have sent me away to bear all that trauma alone.

[Olde Crone]

I agree, I didn't think the relationship between mother and daughter was going to go far when they said at the end she was planning to introduce her birth mother to her children "later in the year". Her children must be adults so why the delay and why the planning?

My work colleague gave up a baby for adoption. The girl later traced her and flew excitedly into her life, inviting her to her wedding. The adoptive parents said if she came, they wouldn't attend, so the daughter said sorreee and flew excitedly out of her life again. My colleague was devastated and said "I've lost her twice".

I can understand what motivates both sides to reunite but I don't think they think it through. As one disappointed birth mother said of their reunion, "I gave away a tiny baby and got back a 50 year old man".

OC

[Ann from Sussex]

A relative of mine brought up her husband's little girls whose mother had abandoned him and them for someone else when the children were under 5.
Those girls are grown up now. Some years ago they were contacted by Long Lost Family because their mother wanted to trace them in spite of never sending so much as a birthday or Christmas card to any of them since she left. It transpired she was now alone in the world. They declined the invitation on the grounds that she hadn't wanted them when they needed her and that they regarded their stepmother was their real mother.

[Olde Crone]

On a local website, I became interested in a man's quest to find his mother - he had been born in the same hospital as my daughter, the day before she was born and I realised I must have known her - only 8 beds on maternity.

To cut a long story short, I discovered that she hadn't just abandoned him, she had gone on to abandon another two sets of children. Someone on here traced her current address. I debated whether to tell him I knew where she was, but as he never asked, I didn't tell him - he was (quite rightly) very bitter towards her as he had been passed around the family like an unwanted puppy. I'm still not sure if I've done the right thing though.

I try not to judge, but it's hard not to. All I can think of as an excuse is that she had personality problems making her unsuited to a conventional life. I could wish she had embraced contraception though!

OC

[Phoenix]

The story I heard of my great uncle was that his wife turned up on his parents' doorstep, saying I can't cope, and dumping Mabel and her two little brothers with the inlaws.

Great uncle remarried, and they had two girls.... whose births I failed to find.

Well, I didn't find the girls because they were both given Princess as a first name! I don't think even Dad knew that there were another THREE boys because they, like Mabel and her brothers, were left behind: one in England, one in Wales, and one (we think) in Scotland.

And I didn't find my great uncle's second marriage because it was bigamous and took place in Scotland.

The boy left in Wales appears to have had no children. Nobody knows what became of the one dumped in Scotland. The one left behind in England had an unhappy home life and ran away as soon as he was able. He used a similar television programme to make contact with his family, but by this stage both of his blood sisters were dead.

So, I had basically heard the story from the great uncle's side, with no idea that there could be quite a different narrative, of a man who had abandoned a wife and six of his eight surviving children.

[Olde Crone]

I worked with a girl many years ago who had been brought up in care. She knew she had ten siblings and remembered her dad hit her mum a lot and her mum had just left one day, not even taking her coat. It was only many years later that I wondered if she really had left, or.........

OC