Comments on: Confused: keep the baby, or adoption?

By: A B

A B — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 00:07:19 +0000

Selfish? It is entirely natural to want to raise your son, and it certainly seems like you’re in a position to do so, with or without his father.
Too often adoption is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. You are eighteen, and that may seem young to parent, but it is also young enough that you have much opportunity ahead of you to make a really wonderful life for yourself and your son, regardless of his father’s decision to stay involved — particularly as you have support from your families. If he is the love of your life, he will not make you choose between him and your child. If he does, there will be another man (even if it doesn’t seem like it now). There will never be another opportunity to parent this precious little boy.
I am an adoptive parent and I don’t believe I could parent my child knowing that her/his mother could have: I needed to know that it could not have been another way, and in this case, it really seems clear that it can be and that your heart says it should be.

By: Justice

Justice — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 09:05:18 +0000

I was pregnant by my first love, many years ago. I put my baby up for adoption. My boyfriend was too immature to handle fatherhood. Our relationship could not withstand the grief and loss of our baby either. I got over him several years later, but losing your baby is not something you “get over” no matter what anyone tells you.

This decision is for a lifetime. Listen to your heart. Listen to your baby’s heart.

A man who is worth that kind of sacrifice wouldn’t ask it of you. My boyfriend truly regretted our choice of adoption in just a few short months. But it was too late. The love of your life is going to love this baby boy!

As others have said, this is a temporary financial situation that is going to keep changing. The bond of your child is real. You’ll get through it with love in your heart.

By: happy adoptee

happy adoptee — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 02:12:20 +0000

This is your life and your decision. It would be better to be able to keep your child but that is not always an option. You have to consider if you would be able to take care of a child at this point…some are capable at 18 and some are not capable even at 28. I was adopted and it’s been the best thing in my life. I’m happy, healthy, and well-adjusted. I do not blame or hate my birthmom. I know she loved me and gave me a chance at a great life with people who love me. There will be many women who are bitter and sorry about relinquishing a child or those unhappy adoptees who will tell you it’s the worst thing in the world to do to a child but that is simply not true. There are more birthmothers and adoptees who are at peace with adoption. Like I said, it is your decision, don’t let anyone talk you into doing it but it is ultimately YOUR decision. Listen to your heart

By: Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Sun, 31 May 2009 01:39:31 +0000

I’m glad to see others telling you to keep your baby. Thank goodness there are intelligent people here giving you good advice instead of the usual adoption is wunnerful propaganda.

Adoption ruins peoples lives. Period.

If you abandon your baby, he/she could grow up to hate you. Can you live with that?

Mothers who truly love their child(ren) don’t abandon them. It is the ultimate dice roll in life.

Keep your baby! Good luck.

By: withoutatribe

withoutatribe — Fri, 29 May 2009 09:50:44 +0000

keep your baby!! keep your baby!! keep your baby!! Do you see my name, thats because i’m an adoptee, and I don’t feel accepted or loved by anyone from the abandonment and rejection I feel from the “loving decision” my mom made by “giving me up for adoption.”

Adoption hurts.

You’re not just giving your baby away, you’re giving a part of you away, and any more children you have, you’re giving their sibling away, your parents grandchild away. You will forever have a hole in your heart from it, you don’t heal from the loss of a child.

Everything changes after birth, if this guy isn’t stepping up to the plate and supporting you in what you want to do NOW, i hate to break it to you, then he’s not a good guy!!! Don’t ruin you and your childs life by choosing adoption just to keep some loser in your life.

read “journey of the adopted self” by betty jean lifton and touch into what adoptees feel like. Educate yourself on the REAL issues adopted people from all kinds of adoptions face, its not pretty. I’m not trying to scare you, but nobody told my mother this when she was pregnant with me and both of us wish she would have…she would have kept me.

Please, don’t give away your baby, to keep her/his father in your life. Everyone is telling you to keep him/her including me. To have family support in raising your child is HUGE. USE IT!!! IN the long run, you’ll be so happy that you kept your baby, he/she will love you like no person in the world could ever. When I look at my children they are the highlight of my life. There is NOTHING and i mean NOTHING that could EVER replace them. Nobody, no man, no amount of love from another human being could make me feel the happiness my children bring to me. When they run to you with open arms screaming “mama mama i love you” it will melt your heart, adoption, changes that. It ruins that. You don’t get that with adoption.

By: Joy M

Joy M — Tue, 26 May 2009 19:46:44 +0000

I had my baby at the same age, it was the best thing that ever happened to me, I also took him to uni. with me, and now he is all grown up means more than a best friend.

Keep your baby.

By: sunny

sunny — Mon, 25 May 2009 16:00:53 +0000

Please, sweetie, KEEP your baby. I am a 43 year old woman who was given up for adoption. I now have a relationship with my mother–but we lost the first 22 years of my life–and we’ll never have them back.
Do not worry about insurance. Go get help from Medicaid. It’s done all the time. This is a TEMPORARY issue. Promise me, you will never get over the loss of your child. Never. Everything in life pales in comparison. Your baby would rather dirt poor be with you than super rich with strangers/adoptive parents.
You will never regret keeping your child–he needs YOU–his mother!
Re: the father, if he comes around, fine, if he doesn’t, your child is still better off with YOU.

By: jade_frost82

jade_frost82 — Fri, 22 May 2009 05:22:14 +0000

I am a 25 year old adoptee, and let me tell you, the issues from adoption run deep, and hard to get over. Even when the adoptive parent situation is a good one, which mine wasn’t.

Please, please, please, think about this decision, and think hard. No one will ever be able to replace you as your childs mother, no one.
Particularly not strangers with no biological relations to you or your baby.
There are plenty of supports out there, plenty of ways you can get help for you and your baby.

Just think about it, it is your choice to make, but it sounds like giving up your baby would be one that you regret.

By: blondie

blondie — Tue, 19 May 2009 07:19:27 +0000

The loss of your child will be much greater and harder to live with, than the loss of a boyfriend - even the alleged love of your life.

Many birthmothers equate the pain to be similar to that of grief - I met my birthmother after 35 years and she is STILL dealing with the issues of giving me up for adoption. It’s hard to fathom how you will be feeling about this in the future, but relinquishing a child has never been an easy road to travel. It causes much pain, guilt and anguish. You have support, and I would personally use that. Your child is number one now. Not your boyfriend. If your boyfriend is going to give you ultimatums like that, you’re better off without him. He may be the love of your life now, but how loving is someone who would force such harsh choices upon you. And anyway, who needs to be given ultimatums at the most exciting time in their life - the birth of their first child?

You deserve better and you have options. Use them.

I wish you every happiness and much strength for the future. x

By: nomorefords

nomorefords — Sat, 16 May 2009 18:24:03 +0000

If you love your baby, and you want to keep him, do. No one will ever love him as much as you do, and if you relinquish him, you will rob him of the most important person in his life right now—you. If your boyfriend leaves you (and he may, but I doubt it) then it will hurt. It may hurt for a year, it may hurt for a few… But google around for birthmother blogs, and you will find dozens of women who relinquished their children who are hurting 10, 20, 30 years post-adoption. You have to do what is going to be best for you and for your son, and given the huge support network you have to make it as a single mom if that’s what keeping him means, adoption is not the best thing for either of you.

If you choose to go the adoption route, please, for your son, fight tooth and nail for an open adoption. Read blogs of adoptees and see what questions they have for their birthmothers, and answer those questions in a letter now, while you can. Leave family photos if they’ll let you. You wouldn’t believe how much time your son will spend thinking about you, wondering if he looks like you, wondering why you gave him up—for the rest of his life. And when the time comes… when he finds you… and when he asks you why you gave him away, and asks you if you didn’t have anyone in the whole world supporting you, and then wants to know why, still you relinquished your life with him to strangers… you better have a good answer.