“We took you into our family out of the goodness of our hearts and we don’t deserve to be treated this way”
Background: I am adopted. My mom has said this to me several times throughout my life when I disappointed her in some way. I recently told some friends that she said this to me and they flipped. They said it was very hurtful and manipulative. I honestly never looked at it that way. I mean, they did take me in right? I should be good to them as a daughter right?
Man, I need therapy.
I think it’s a hurtful statement to make to ANY child (the biological child version of this is, “We gave you life, etc.”).
Your Mom went to the same Momming school as my Mom. My Mom can be a hurtful, moaning bitch. Take your own conclusions…
That shit of “we’re your parents, we deserve your respect / you to spend your whole life twisting yourself into pretzels trying to make us happy / to be able to decide how you’re going to live / etc” is pulled both by biological and adoptive parents. I’m refraining from using appropriately descriptive language as this is not the Pit.
I gotta say (as someone who is also adopted) that this is actually shocking to me…
Trust me, I have certainly not been perfect, but I can not CONCIEVE of my parents saying this----Actually the fact that i was adopted has never come up unless the conversation was to do with adoption in general.
I dont know why your mother would feel the need to remind you of your adoption, but it seems like she is the one with issues, not you.
Take care, and I hope you are doing well----Matthew
It’s just like “I carried you around for nine months, we raised you, we sent you to school, and this is how you treat us?” Maybe not nice, but certainly true.
As a mom the problem I see is that it puts all the burden for civility and respect on you. If you were a 10-year-old orphan in the Great Depression, who got shipped to the midwest to work on a farm, then yeah, “goodness of their hearts”.
But in most adoptions there are reciprocal benefits for both the parents and the child, as much as with parents who gave birth to their children.
Kids don’t have a debt to repay to their parents.
After reading this, I just invited my mom and dad out to lunch later today…
Thanks for reminding me just how lucky I am, and how much I love them!!!
Matthew
It is certainly not a nice thing to say, but I think it is one thing if it is in response to the son/daughter getting hooked on heroin or being thrown in jail, and another thing if it is in response to dating the wrong guy/girl, getting a C in math, or the like.
What Zsofia says - it’s stupid, but no more stupid than “I was in labor with you for forty seven hours, and now you forget to take out the trash”. The first part of the sentence has nothing to do with the second.
Adopter rather than adoptee, but I would never/have never said anything like this to my kids. Mostly because it wasn’t “out of the goodness of my heart”, any more than having kids the old-fashioned way.
Sorry you had to get this. Parents, even adoptive ones, say stupid shit sometimes.
Regards,
Shodan
I can actually see that being said in jest – as long as the child is mature and secure enough to get it. It’s just that absurd.
But otherwise, yeah, it’s emotional manipulation.
I’m the adoptive father of a 5 year old boy.
I would NEVER say anything like that, no matter how angry he made me.
Quite apart from the fact that would be a cruel, mean thing to say, it simply isn’t TRUE! I wasn’t doing HIM a favor when I brought him home. I’d wanted children my whole life. Bringing him home was a dream fulfilled, for me. I owe HIM far more than he’ll ever owe me.
Agree with this completely. I’m adopted, by the way.
I think its nasty - it implies adopting you was a grudging act of charity rather than something that your mother very much desired. I would compare it more to “Well I didn’t have an abortion and this is how you treat me…” it seems to imply that your existence was an error, or an accident best not repeated. Just plain mean.
As someone who surrendered a child to adoption as a teenager, I found those words to be very wounding in nature and by design.
It breaks my heart to think any parent would ever say such a thing to an adopted child.
My understanding is that all adopted children have a certain amount of feeling they ‘owe’ their adopters. Part and parcel of recognizing your own parents, on some level, ‘abandoned’ you. No matter how sensitive or evolved the household, all adoptees carry this inside them to some degree.
To verbalize it and use it to guilt your child is hideously misguided in my opinion.
Another adoptive parent checking in. That is a hugely fucking bitchy thing to say. I would NEVER say anything to my child to imply that adopting her was a burden or she somehow ‘owes’ us something for shouldering said burden. Sorry; you have every right to tell your mom that she is way out of line.
I’m not adopted but it seems different than the “I carried you around for nine months” speech. Like, the latter could be done for comic effect (kind of like the Bill Cosby, “I brought you into this world, I can take you out”). But the former just seems colder to me. It just suggests to me that you see this person not as your child but as a burden. Like something that a relative would say if they were forced to take on the burden of a foster/orphaned child.
I totally read that as, “You ungrateful little bitch!” As if they should have left you in the orphanage or something. That’s just me.
What a nasty selfish thing to say.
Having/adopting and raising kids should be a selfless act. You may reap rewards from it but you sure as hell don’t deserve them.
More of that “it’s all about me me me” mentality. You’re a troubled kid who’s acting out? Who cares about you. Look what it’s doing to me me me.
Yeah it’s wounding but I can’t really say why. I didn’t so much have to hear that but I heard “You were our duty, that’s why we adopted you.” Which arguably could be said to be even worse.
Huge act of charity, that’s what it feels like. Doesn’t make you feel part of the family.
Well, it’s probably retaliation for some assholish emotional manipulation on the part of the kid - it isn’t the right way to parent, but it’s not like we all parent the right way all the time. I’m sure it’s just frustration coming out.