[mmksmom]

I'm the mom of twins M&R (18) and S (10) by birth, and K (16) by adoption. The back story: we adopted K as a newborn, having met once with her first mom before the adoption. At that time, L (K's first mom, who was 15) stated that she wanted a closed adoption, so she could "get on with her life." We respected her wishes, but told her we would be willing to have an open adoption if she decided she wanted more contact before or after K's birth. She did not. We took K home when she was three days old, and that was the last we heard from L... until last week!

We'd informed both L and the adoption agency that if L ever wanted to open the adoption, we would be more than willing to consider the possibility. We kept the agency updated with our contact information over the years, and last Friday, we received a letter from L via the agency. She wrote that she (encouraged by her parents) had tried very hard to forget about K, but as an adult with three children of her own, she couldn't stop thinking about the baby she had given up. She said she understood if we did not want to disrupt K's life at this time, but if direct contact wasn't possible, she would very much like to know that K is happy and healthy, and anything else we wanted to share.

We've been very open with K about her adoption and done our best to answer her questions over the years (although, of course, there were some we couldn't answer). She was always aware of the possibility that her first mom might contact us, and had always said she would like to know if we did hear from L, so we shared L's letter with her.

K took a few days to think it over, and has decided she's not ready to try to negotiate a relationship with her first mom "yet," so she doesn't want any direct contact, but she did say she would like us to correspond with L and "let her know I'm okay." She also said it would be all right if we shared pictures with her first mom.

I'm in the process of writing a letter and putting together pictures of K through the years, so here's my question: what kind of information should I include? Just the basics? The big things? The hundreds of little things there are to know? I don't want to overwhelm L, but I feel like if I had never even seen my sixteen-year-old daughter, I would have a million questions and would want to know as much as possible.

So... what should I say?

[dklevy]

Well, my first instinct was to scream out "everything"!

But realistically, I would start with an overview of her life and telling her about what type of person she is. If you are going to keep the communication open you don't have to fit it all in one letter. And it might be nice if your daughter shares some of the special memories with her herself when she is ready for direct contact. I would also mention that she can ask you anything and that you weren't sure what to say or what she wanted to know. I'm sure she'd welcome the invitation to ask away.

[billiearenaemery]

I would enclose some pictures as well. i would want to see with my own eyes how my son is.

[KittyMay]

I gave my bmom a picture from every year of my life in a photo album when I met her. I also included every year of my daughter's life. Some special pets and vacation photo's, copy of my winning science fair project and things that meant alot to me. Perhaps after it sinks in a bit your daughter might suggest some photo's along those lines. Good luck to you.