agonyaunt | (no subject)

Dear Annie: My mother gave up my half-sister at birth. I became close to my sister and her family beginning in my 30s when she found me. I'm almost 60 now. Her family was not fond of my mother, and my sister wanted to distance herself to follow her adoptive parents' wishes.

Unfortunately, my sister passed away at a young age from cancer, as did her beloved father the year before. I helped plan my sister's funeral with my brother-in-law. My brother-in-law and my sister's brother, also adopted, mentioned their displeasure with my mother for some things she did and said at the hospital. I thought pushing the idea of finding birth parents at the hospital was very insensitive at the time as well. They were offended by her (she often lacks a filter).

I asked my mother to be cautious at the funeral so as not to offend them because they were in quite a sensitive state after the loss of their sister and wife. They also don't have the same view of adoption as my mother does. My sister and her brother had recently lost both their parents, and her wishes were always to help her brother get through this loss.

My mother said how dare I mention it, that I'm a know-it-all and to have a nice life. I told her I was sorry to hurt her feelings but wanted things to be comfortable for the husband, brother and rest of the family who didn't all know about my sister's birth family.

My mother has not talked to me in eight months, nor has she shown interest in any holidays or my kids' events. I think she should've understood the sticky situation at the services and come for a visit afterward, but there's been no contact. Am I wrong? -- Torn but Thinking I Did the Right Thing

Dear Torn: You did the right thing. In a sensitive situation, you acted as any good sibling would, trying to bring peace to those who were grieving and honoring your late sister. I am surprised your mother responded as she did, whether that be out of grief, anger, resentment or some other emotion.

It sounds like you've tried to smooth things over with her since the service with no reciprocation. Until she is willing to come around and acknowledge that her reaction was not appropriate, there's not much more you can do besides keep the lines of communication open for if/when she is ready to reconnect.

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LW is almost 60, which means they're too old to have a fantasy image of their mom.

The woman does not lack a filter, she's just mean, and she doesn't like it when other people push back on it.

There's no nice way to say this, but if several months later this woman still won't talk to LW, good riddance.

"I told her I was sorry to hurt her feelings but wanted things to be comfortable for the husband, brother and rest of the family who didn't all know about my sister's birth family."

I may be misreading this, but is anyone else wondering if she asked her mother to pretend that she wasn't her sister's birth parent at the funeral?

(Because, if that's the case, I have more sympathy for the mother, who had just lost her daughter.)

Otherwise, the mother is out of line, and the advice is acceptable.

Well, it's certainly a possibility. But if LW has known her half-sister's family for some twenty-five years, and the family gets along fine with her but not with her mother, it sounds as though a bunch of the extended family might know perfectly well that LW exists, but have the vague impression that the mother is dead or somehow out of the picture. To me there's a long distance between saying "Please don't announce loudly that you're Half-Sister's "real mother," and go around talking about how everyone should find their birth parents, especially if their adoptive parents died on them" and saying "Please pretend you're not Half-Sister's mother in any sense." But you can see how a request to do the former might sound like the latter to someone like LW's mother.

I don't think that she should hog the spotlight or make a bunch of insensitive comments, but I do wonder how "don't have the same view of adoption" and "wanted things to be comfortable for the husband, brother and rest of the family who didn't all know about my sister's birth family" would have played out, in terms of what she was being asked to do.

(The birth mother can be a jerk with no filter AND have a legitimate grievance, if this were the case.)

"I thought pushing the idea of finding birth parents at the hospital was very insensitive at the time as well."

So it seems like the mother was pushy to the other adopted siblings about finding their birth parents, which they were not interested in doing, and thought that it was not the time or place to bring it up. Sounds like they are worried she's going to do the same sort of thing at the funeral.

I would really really really like a sentence or two explaining what "don't have the same view of adoption" means, because I can read this as "birth mother was an asshole who wanted to be the center of attention", but I can also read it as "adoptive family thinks birth mother gave up right to grief when she gave up her child, so treats her like shit when she wants to mourn with them".

Also, if the extended family doesn't know about sister's birth family, how are they explaining LW's close involvement in the funeral preparations? Are they lying and saying "oh, she's just a longtime friend of the family"??

Yes, all of this. I couldn't tell nearly enough about what was going on there to make any sense of the overall dynamic, especially with the remark about Sister's adoptive family being "not fond" of their bio-mother--- so there's some kind of relationship there, prior to Sister's passing, apparently, and not exactly a great one. Though LW's mother telling them they're a "know-it-all" and "to have a nice life" definitely does not paint the mother in the most sympathetic of lights. I'm calling "field too large/not enough information" for me at least to weigh in beyond that.