There’s the element of the Big Family Secret in here, too. And, sadly, I know all too well about the Big Family Secret.
I think it would be better for the child to accept bio-dad as a part of his life now, than for bio-dad to walk away until later. Young kids are very accepting, and if bio-dad is someone he grows up knowing, then it’s all just a part of his life as he knows it, and not some huge deal to be worked out in therapy later. It sounds like the adults are handling this perfectly well, and as long as it continues this way, then that’s great, especially for the child.
Not every situation has to be dysfunctional. There are lots of things that fit perfectly within the range of human experience. Kids are born to gay families; parents get divorced and re-married; kids are born to sober alcoholics; and God knows parents have a past. To paint each of these as a major crisis insults the intelligence and maturity of adults who can deal with it, and it can traumatize the kids involved by making a Big Deal out of Nothing. Why screw with the kid’s life any more?
Seemed pretty clear to me, yes - leave and never come back. After all, he’s just a “sperm donor” and having two dads would be “confusing” and detrimental to the child. She made NO mention of waiting until the child was an adult, or of an age to understand - she simply said, “Leave.”
But upon reaching adulthood, wouldn’t that still be an awful thing for the child to go through? And worse, they might never know that their biological father walked away willingly, thinking it was best for them.
Indeed, I’m equating this whole thing to a divorced/remarried situation. If the bio dad is seeing the kid regularly, with the mother and husband’s consent, how is it any different? Has “Dr.” Laura ever advocated a biological father remove himself completely from his child’s life when his ex-wife remarries?
Maybe, probably. I honestly don’t know. I wasn’t adopted, both parents are still alive and together, and I’m certainly no psychologist so I have absolutely no insight into this.
That’s probably the best way to look at it. The problem here is that there is no legal framework to regulate stuff, leading to the potential of a nasty court case. Maybe the best solution would be to have the three parents sit down and figure out what they should do - agreed upon visitation, etc., then agree on it and get a judge or someone to ok the contract. This is really just an ugly situation all around with so many nasty possibilities.
That said, while I have never personally listened to Dr. Laura’s show, I seriously can’t imagine ever calling into a radio show with a problem like this. Or any problem really. The whole thing gets a hearty “bah” from me.
Me three. Not to mention (well someone already did, I think) that it’s terribly presumptuous of dr laura (all lowercase on purpose, I too hate the dumb creature) to just arbitrarily decide that the three won’t behave like adults and make it work out.
She said that about someone who smoked marijuana because, “all dopers lie.”
Next caller wanted to get out of a sticky family wedding invitation. Her advice, “just say you have to be somewhere else at the time.”
Hey, it could have been worse. She could have suggested the mom divorce her husband and marry bio-dad.
That, however, is icky enough to leave plenty of room for ick, which is where her given solution is. Ick.
I was 10 when I found out my two oldest brothers were adopted. I spent the next four years thinking we had no relation. Then I found out that they had been adopted by my father, as they were my mom’s sons from her first marriage. Yes, this was also when I found out my dad was not my mom’s first husband.
I never met her first husband, but I would have liked to. I know my brothers only got to see him a few times.
Age 10-14 is not the age to find out that your parents have been keeping huge secrets from you (four years later, I found out that my aunt was gay by walking in on her and her girlfriend…). It should be a time for honesty and openness, because the kids that age are going through some pretty terrifying changes. I hate to sound like a total geek here, but there’s a programming/data entry solution that applies: correct as close to source as you can. Don’t wait until the product ships to start introducing patches. They should tell this kid now that he has two dads, and he can grow up knowing that he has not two, but three parents who want to help him grow.
There is some middle groud between having two daddies (and the crisis of authority that concerns astro and bio-dad bugging out completly.
My sister became pregnant at 15 and her daughter was adopted in an open adoption. This little girl does not have two mommies. She has one mom, the woman who adopted her. That is her mother. The little girl knows and loves my sister, and knows that my sister birthed her: it wasn’t anything she was ever sat down and “told”, it was simply always known and never that big of a deal. She never needed to have it explained who her “real” mom is–her real mom is obviously the woman who is raising her. She calls my sister by her first name, and when my sister saw her in her third grade school play, she eagerly introduced her to her friends and teachers as her birth-mom. But she isn’t at all confused about what that means or about who her “real” mom is. There’s never been any doubt about that.
Make no mistake, this relationship is hell on my sister. It eats her up inside. The only things that would eat her up worse were all the other choices she had. But it’s a great relationship for the little girl, and I have no doubt that she has benefitted tremendously from the fact that her bio-mom is still around and there is no mystery or secrecy.
