agonyaunt | (no subject)

Dear Prudence,

I have a 10-year-old son whom I gave up for adoption when I was 17. I wasn’t the best person nor could I take care of him financially. My older brother stepped in and adopted him at 3 months old and has been raising him as his own ever since.

Well, I’m a changed person now and I have a completely different life. I absolutely love the Lord and want to do right by him. I’ve now had a relationship with my son for almost three years and I’m getting to spend more time with him and have him more. The problem I have is when I visit my son at his house, I’ve noticed he’s very spoiled and disobedient. I feel like a lot of it has to do with the fact that he’s the baby of the family and his mom lets him get away with a lot. Lately, when I take my other kids over, my son is mean to his younger siblings. How do I approach his mom about his behavior without her getting mad or me ruining the good relationship we all now have. I really want my son to treat his siblings better and to grow up and be a good god-fearing man.

—A Little Advice

Dear Little,

You can bring up your concerns, but I want you to be very careful and very specific. The conversation with your son’s mom should be about how his treatment of your other kids affects them (so provide a couple of recent examples), and whether there’s anything the two of you can do to help all the kids get along and make sure the little ones are physically and emotionally safe. And that’s it. While I understand that you gave birth to him and feel invested in his upbringing—it’s not as if we’re talking about a random friend’s kid here—you have to respect that your brother has taken on that responsibility and gets the accompanying privilege of parenting in the way that makes sense to him. And yes, even if his approach seems flawed to you. If you decide that after he’s done all the hard work, you’re going to step in with a critique, it won’t go well. Trust me.

To stay in your lane and preserve the relationship, keep your criticism of your son’s upbringing to yourself. Remind yourself that your brother is doing his best. And as far as your desire for your son to be god-fearing, your best approach is to be a loving, joyful, kind, supportive person who brightens his life. Be a walking advertisement for the benefits of your faith, and he may one day want to emulate you and believe what you believe. If he comes to know you as someone who complains about how he’s spoiled and disobedient and gets away with too much, you’ll quickly lose any closeness you have with him and ruin your chance to be a positive influence.

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Here's an alternative explanation of what LW is seeing: When you come into a child's house as a visitor, you see only a snippet of behavior that's influenced by having a visitor in the home.

Maybe the kid is just acting out because it's weird that his biomom has become a Jesus freak and he's not sure how to handle his siblings who, after all, don't live with him.

If this boy is really being mean to his younger siblings, LW should speak to the other adult in charge of the kids or to her brother - this is not something that should go through the SIL unless they have a really close relationship. Otherwise, let it drop, LW.

This will end well.

When I first read this I was like "he is being mean to younger siblings because he's angry that she kept THEM and didn't keep HIM"

emotions aren't always rational, and don't always take into account things like

"when she gave me up, she had no money, and when she kept them, she had a steady job"

I went to church Sunday, so I'm allowed to say that if "I absolutely love the Lord" is the only justification you have for wanting to do right by your family, you're probably still not the best person, just a more sanctimonious one.

I’ve noticed a big difference in attitude between Christians who describe themselves as “God-loving” versus “God-fearing”, and the fact that she uses the latter to describe her aspirations for her son tracks with what you said.

Why is she talking to the mom and not her brother, in the first instance?

Or both of them, right? There was so much going on in this letter, but I still wish the columnist had brought that up!

She's replaced one addiction with a different one.

With a possible side of, “Oh, now she wants to pop up in my life as if none of this ever happened, and pleading Jesus makes it all better?”

Kid is also the youngest in his own family; maybe he's just imitating how HIS older siblings treat HIM. Or maybe his younger siblings are annoying! We don't know how old or how numerous the her younger kids are, and she's only 27 at this point; how many ten-year-old boys are equipped to deal with toddlers getting all up in their business? (She also doesn't say what's triggering big brother "being mean" to younger siblings; maybe he's "spoiled and disobedient" because he doesn't want little kids smashing his Legos or messing with his tablet.)

My older brother stepped in and adopted him at 3 months old and has been raising him as his own ever since

Does this mean "with the same level of love and care as though he were his own son", or does it mean "we haven't told him who his bio parents are?"... because that would change my advice significantly.

Edited 2024-05-01 08:15 (UTC)

Yeah, I wasn't sure from the letter whether the kid knows that LW is his biological mother.

Yep, exactly. Plus it'd be v understandable if the kid is jealous on some level - she kept THEM but not me!