[StarBishop]

Background into this question is this.............i have adopted my stepdaughter........Her birth mother died when she was 25 mos old and I entered the picture when she was 3 3/4 yrs old. My husband and her mother were married and after the funeral the contact between the mothers family was sparse --cards b-day gift x-mas gift ect but twindled more as time went by. One aunt came to visit when my daughter when she was a little over three but was upset by the fact that my husband had a live in girl friend (not me at athe time) and after that no one has ever visited again. My daughter is now 7 yrs old and my husband and I have been together since 2000 and married in late 2001. We moved to HI in Mid 2002. Mid 2001 was the last that any of them had spoke to her by phone and to my knowledge these phone contacts were sparse maybe 3x a year. The aunt has know wrote me stating that the want visitation to my daughter --- this is very disturbing to me since she has no recollection of these people. Do the aunts of the birth mother have any rights to visitation?? How about the grandmother??

[lucyjoy]

Aunts, no. Grandparent visitaion varies by state.

[DianeS]

Are you asking about legal rights to get court-ordered visitation? Then no, the only ones I've ever heard being successful with that were grandparents, and even that is rare.

But if you're asking about what's best for the child, I'd suggest that you consider letting her biological family visit. I firmly believe that a child can NOT have too many people loving them.

Your daughter meets people all the time who she doesn't know or doesn't remember, and it doesn't hurt her one bit. So having a biologically-related aunt who she doesn't remember come to visit won't hurt, either.

This is of course assuming that none of these people have ever done anything to hurt her in the past--no drug use, attempts to kidnap, speaking poorly of you, etc. But it doesn't sound like anything like that happened.

Children love to be loved. Having her re-meet her aunt isn't likely to be detrimental at all, as long as the aunt means it this time and doesn't disappear again in a few years. Good luck!

[rather not say1]

In Illinois, grand parents do not have any rights.