[KALLM]

We are having difficulty coping with a bad situation in our adoption. We adopted a baby seven months ago. We expected the legal part to be complete within six months. The paternal grandmother filed a suit for custody a month after placement. The BMom doesn't want her to be in the baby's life. After five days of court and one mediation meeting we are still in the nightmare. The courts granted her visitation until we get to another hearing about custody. We have tried to build a rapport with her, but she is unwilling. She feels the BMom abandon her baby and that bioligical family belongs together. By the way, the BDad is dead. He died a month after the birth. He was physically abusive to the BMom and the baby. That is where the whole mess got started. Now his mom feels she should have the baby. It's hard not to hate her. When we try to find something positive, she does something that shows she wants the baby and nothing else. We cannot believe we are having to go to court when the BMom has told the judge she wants the baby to be with us.

[JessTK]

Wow! The exact same thing happened to us! I know how you feel, It is such a horrible experience to go through. Ours worked out that our son stayed with us, they found that it was not in his best interests to live with grandma, and after a very long strained relationship with grandma we were able to work it out and now she is just a great grandmother to our son. Mediation was part of it, but I think she really had to come to terms with her loss. Like you we had a hard time finding "positive" things about her, but really trying to understand her grief (as much as you can anyways) really helped, not that we didn't get angry at times about the situation. When there was visitation we were emotional wrecks while he was with her and she often, probably without knowing what she was doing, undermined us. It was an awful, difficult road to walk. My only advice is keep loving your baby, don't hold back. I hope everything works out for your baby. Keep us posted.........