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This perfectly illustrates the point I was trying to get across on another thread yesterday. Here is a biological family raising a child together. Mom is fed up that Dad won't kick the dope and sees that his choice is potentially damaging to the child. She kicks him to the curb because his behavior is damaging to the good of the family. Chances are, Mom's choice in telling him to hit the bricks is commendable to people privy to her situation...she is putting the welfare of her child first.
Now...when an adoptive family is faced with the same situation because a member of their child's biological family is exhibiting damaging behavior which could be/is detrimental to the child, they are often not treated with the same understanding. If they talk of stopping contact, they are often told how unfair and hard-hearted they are being.
Why is this? Why is it okay to distance oneself from a parent in a bio family but not in an adoptive family? I just don't get it.
It's too easy to uphold one set of standards for a biological family and a whole separate set for an adoptive family. I see it often when reading the various forums and message boards, and I am really trying to understand. Maybe Dad had issues he was trying to work on...but does that mean it was Mom's place to rehab and counsel him? Especially when he didn't CHOOSE to get clean? I don't think so. And neither do I think it is the place of an adoptive parent to be expected to rehab and counsel the birth parent.
Don't even know if this makes good sense...
JMO.
~Deb
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