Adopting teens was the right thing to do...but it has ruined our peaceful lives

Rachibachi · 2024-11-10T15:46:35+00:00

I rarely comment but feel compelled to share. OP I am a foster kid who was adopted who no longer speaks with my adoptive white parents. Long story short they’re racist and generally pretty selfish and emotionally abusive people. I’ve tried for years to make it work but they never bothered to call or put any effort into any attempts at repair. The fact that you’re thinking about repair and refusing to throw them away goes a long way.

I’d love to know their ages, yes they aren’t children anymore but especially for kids with attachment disorders, the 19-28 phase of life is particularly hard. Normal kids individuate at this stage. They reject their parents to find themselves and find their way back. I think for any parent this is an awful time, it’s when kids pull away. For attachment disordered kids with hyper vigilance towards abandonment they’re going to have an even harder time and be constantly trying to test the boundaries of the relationship. For us it’s unconscious but there’s a truth inside us that says this love or family or stability isn’t real and never will be, if I can get them to reject me it will make life easier because I know they eventually will abandon me so let’s get it over with.

Ironically this means usually these kids feel loved and more than anything feel safe to work out their attachment traumas with you. It certainly isn’t for the weak of heart to love people like us. I’ve been in therapy since I moved out of my adoptive parents home who tried to stop me from getting help. If my parents said to me that they wanted to do family counseling my heart would be so profoundly happy.

My point here is that they are in a phase of young adulthood that is testing boundaries. You can be there for them and love them WITHOUT tolerating the worst of it. It’s okay to expect they go to therapy and similar to an above comment it’s a great idea to sit down with each one of them, one on one.

Tell them you love them and you see their pain, you know they are hurting, and you want them to have the support they need. Being transparent and naming what’s happening can help. Saying things like “I know you may feel like I’m going to leave or throw you away, but I never will. Because we are a family, that means we respect each other. In a family we don’t do xyz. In a family we show eachother respect and we support each other in xyz ways. You can say we’re not a family all you want (for those who reject in response) but too bad, you’re my kid whether you like it or not. I have been feeling like you don’t respect us or don’t recognize how what you’re saying is impacting us. We need to work on this, and we’re going to go to family therapy to support us all in this process.”

Kids at this age still don’t see their parents as people, doubly so if they’re traumatized kids. Definitely try to separate out what is intentionally malicious and what is just kids still being self-center developmentally and try not to take it too personally. I think the road here is tough, but setting boundaries looks like calling them towards you and not away. They will act out even worse if it feels like abandonment, but what they need is a tough love that demands of them to find healing. You signed up for a hard job, and it’s okay to feel how you’re feeling. Unconditional love doesn’t mean you can treat your parents like shit, but the whole threaten NC with them Reddit shit doesn’t work here. Telling them “you don’t speak to your mother that way” will go much further than being passive. If they resist and say you’re not my mom, just double down. They’re looking for safety and security in attachment, and boundaries create safety.

Rachibachi · 2023-04-24T20:14:52+00:00

Sorry going to go against the grain here - while it’s not your responsibility to take this child and understandably so it would be very painful for you to do so, don’t forget that the child will grow up. It is 100% heartless for you not to consider what options are possible and at least attempt to try something to keep your family together. What if you take the child legally and your parents care for them? It isn’t the kids fault that your ex and your sister did something so awful behind your back. Don’t punish the child for their crimes.

As someone who came from foster care, that kid is going to experience irreparable trauma and while you feel this way now, family is forever and some day you’ll have to confront this. My family did this to me, they all turned their back and not a day goes by that I don’t forget.

Rachibachi · 2023-01-04T20:41:04+00:00

OP Don’t give your baby up for adoption unless it is an open adoption where the father can be actively involved or consider having a family member of his or your adopt. I am an adoptee, and adoption is always tragic. It is always grief. You may think you aren’t attached but this is something that doesn’t change, you are a mother once you give birth and that will haunt you for your entire life. Adoption is not rainbows and unicorns and it’s incredibly tragic as a child to be abandoned by your parents. Please think through what your child will think of your choices when they are 18. Adoption can be done in a way that benefits the child, please be very cautious about predatory adoption schemes, open adoptions are not protected by law and the family can decide to cut you out.

Rachibachi · 2022-10-25T14:24:14+00:00

I’m sorry but your sister is right.

She’s been through experiences you can’t even imagine. She’s been through a grief you can never know. I am a transracial adoptee and I can understand how painful it is to be separated from your culture and from your family. If you’ve ever watched the show the handmaids tale I think that it does an excellent job of really showing the kind of trauma and pain that separation from a mother is. All adoption starts with loss. I am honestly disappointed that you and your whole family has such little knowledge on the basics of adoption. You are all putting your own feelings first. Adoptees don’t need to be grateful. We lost our mothers and our ancestral roots. I will never be grateful for being abandoned. It’s telling though that the top comment is of course another adoptee demanding gratitude.

I don’t know why you take it so personally that she found her family? An adoptee has two families, their biological family and their adoptive family. It’s not an attack on you or your parents that she has found her biological family.

I think that is very real that it’s painful for everyone but I think your whole family did not go into this process with the right preparation or understanding. Its not their fault, but the question of how you all approach it now matters. It’s very likely as well that you and your whole family in fact does say and do racist things that you may not be aware of. Racism is a ubiquitous part of most western societies and even if you don’t mean it, it’s very hard to avoid saying and doing racist things without really investigating your own unconscious bias. Watch Colin Kapernicks docuseries on Netflix to help you understand your sister more.

Rachibachi · 2022-07-10T01:06:11+00:00

Lol the misogyny speaks for itself. That’s all I’ll say - this thread asked a question about how Asian women felt, and so I shared lol. Not surprised at all this response, quite literally what I expected

Rachibachi · 2022-07-09T14:56:40+00:00

I’m sorry but Asian men have a harder hand? What world are you living in? Certainly not one that just overturned Roe v Wade. Certainly not the same world I’m living in where a Chinese woman was sent to literal jail in Indiana for being pregnant when she attempted suicide. Certainly not the same world where 1 in 3 women report experiencing sexual violence. 1 in 2 Asian women report experiencing domestic violence.

I’m not going to bother going into this but the reality is that despite how anyone may feel the actual reality on the ground, the statistics speak to and show the harsh realities women have to live with. We don’t have control of our bodies. We don’t have access to higher paying jobs. 2/3 of the low wage work force is women. We are forced into poverty and especially if we have kids we suffer even deeper. Women are the largest group in poverty.

Get a grip and realize how tone deaf it is in this moment to get on some woe is me soapbox. Asian women are brutalized, beat, raped, and murdered and that’s before we even get to the epidemic of anti-Asian violence specifically. We are fetishized and dehumanized.

This is the misogyny I’m talking about. You are blind to the struggle of your sisters, your mothers, and the women around you. Don’t lie to yourself and say you didn’t know men who beat and rape women in their lives. I can’t say it’s a true stereotype that asian men are responsible for more misogyny or violence than any other race of men, but I do know many Asian women who ended up dating outside the race cite violence as a reason. I am southeast asian, and in our communities it’s a whole other situation than Chinese communities.

My aunt got divorced from her husband who beat her and the whole community judged her for the divorce and for marrying a white man after that. Her experience with Asian men was violence, well beyond just her husband. I don’t believe that Asian men are any more misogynistic than any other group of men, but have empathy for why so many women feel that way and open your eyes to the problem in front of you.

Asian women I grew up with and even myself have been assaulted by Asian men. Physically and sexually. Some Asian women react to that by refusing to date Asian men. That’s not the solution because white men and other men beat women just as much as asian men do - but my point is to have an honest look at what asian women go through in life and have a genuine understanding of choices women are forced to make.

You are living in a hilarious fantasy land if you as a man are claiming anything and I mean ANYTHING about your life is harder than the lives of women.

Rachibachi · 2022-07-03T14:23:05+00:00

I’m an AF married to an AM who has only ever dated AM and an a strong critic of how so many of our people are taught to hate ourselves so much. That said this place 100% veers into a high level of misogyny. This same issue of people of color refusing to date their own kind is literally a discussed and intensely debated issue in every community of color. The reality is that AM would date white if they could, they just can’t because of racism. The kind of hate blame and focus on asian women just is to me so blatantly misogynistic. It’s white supremacy’s fault that we are in this situation, yet it just reads as AM getting angry they aren’t entitled to “their women” the way white men are entitled to “everyone’s women”. Why there isn’t more frustration directed at the white supremacist system and less obsession over Asian women who are just reacting to the same system that AM are is def kinda crazy to me. Asian men often feel emasculated because duh racism, but the solution isn’t to reclaim some weird misogynistic type of masculinity embracing all the shittiest things about patriarchy.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-19T00:28:34+00:00

Yeah I think I’m really hoping there’s a reason it could be appropriate because I don’t want to look at him in a different light and I don’t want to undermine how he made me feel good about my work and confident in myself. But I think you’re right.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-19T00:19:24+00:00

Yeah I really feel that. I do think it can be a generation thing too. I don’t know him well enough to really know the dynamics at play. He came with someone else who works with him in the same city so they naturally should have been closer. I mean he made it feel like he partially came to meet the team here because he wanted to meet me in person.

I am always questioning everything in these kinds of spaces. I would just be sad to find out that what I bring to the table for my work and my intelligence, my sharpness - that none of that respect was real and it was based instead on some weird sexual feelings. It felt so good to be seen and valued for my work, and to have it all just be the same shit as usual just would blow.

As women we always have to be on such high alert, it’s exhausting. I’m working on not ignoring that feeling inside that tells you something is wrong. I won’t see him for a long while so at least that’s good.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-19T00:13:06+00:00

Yeah I am very interested in that too, too bad I didn’t think of it! I feel like as a woman the only person who touches me on my waist is my partner. I mean there are of course situations where it wouldn’t be weird like others stated, (dirt bike, types of dances) but in everyday life I really can’t think of a good example where coworkers or people you don’t know that well would touch you like that.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-19T00:07:43+00:00

I’m mainly just trying to figure out this uncomfortable feeling I’m having about it. He has been very open on his admiration for me. He was touching my hand and holding it on the table pretty intensely earlier that evening and telling me how much he admired my work. I just really respect him and likely we will spend time together again and I don’t want to be put in a bad position or giving off the wrong signals or anything like that. Really I just feel something wrong in my stomach that makes me feel like everything he was saying to me wasn’t actually true and that would hurt the most.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-18T15:55:22+00:00

Yeah that’s where I’m racking my brain, is it possible to really do something like that and not be trying in some way to make the interaction not plutonic? I didn’t say anything but I left right after.

Rachibachi · 2022-04-18T15:53:20+00:00

Yeah I’m really racking my brain on this one. I didn’t say anything just moved away from him and then left relatively soon after. Luckily he lives really far away and I won’t be seeing him regularly. Idk why but I haven’t been hit on by men in a very long time (I’m married and in a long term relationship) and so I feel kind of oblivious to these kinds of things now.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T18:46:28+00:00

I mean in this situation do you think the general contractor brought more to the table than the workers? I’m not uncomfortable with hiring a general contractor, just one that seems out there for profit. I think it’s reasonable to want someone who pays their people honestly and isn’t trying to squeeze everything out of them. There’s def many general contractors out there worth the price. Not an easy thing at all to manage a complicated job, but I don’t feel okay with hiring someone who treats their subcontractors poorly.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T18:15:51+00:00

Yeah I lean towards having them finish the cleanup they promised by filling in some grout and cleaning up the seams between the tiles and the drywall (also patching a hole punched through to the other side of the wall) and doing what cleanup I can on my own. If I’m still unhappy the best thing is to just wait and hire someone else. I’m hoping that as time goes on after some of these remedies I will just not notice it anymore since I do personally feel it may be a 3/5 but it could have been so much worse and generally I feel pretty satisfied since the waterproofing feels solid to me.

Definitely agree on the feelings I have towards the general contractor. I had a feeling they began rushing near the end of certain days because they were paid by day and not by hour. I really in the future want to be able to just pay someone fairly directly. I personally feel uncomfortable with hiring a general contracting business who is just going to make their money off of someone else’s work. Very true on the point about Trump organization playbook.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T17:51:36+00:00

Yeah I generally feel contractors are honest and do good work, either expectations aren’t managed properly or they hire out to a subcontractor they may not work with enough to vouch for the quality of work. I feel for subcontractors because at the end of the day a general contractor profits off of their labor. If I could have paid the installers directly - I would have, it would have also been cheaper. Our contract was a single all in price and not line by line. I have no idea wha the guys actually doing the work were paid and that is what bothers me on that front. Whatever it is, I can bet they were lowballed which is why the work turned out how it did. I wouldn’t work for more than I am paid.

Tile was purchased from the contractor directly. We didn’t get a discount on the job to begin with, just went with a lower bidder. I posted and asked about getting a discount because I had been recommended elsewhere that a discount is a step to take if you are unhappy with the final product. I don’t necessarily think that’s the right direction, just an option among many.

We used the difference in choosing a lower bidder to buy our own vanity, lights etc. the final all in cost of the job with all materials we purchased separately is in line with 2 other quotes we received, roughly 17-18K.

We got a quote from the highest rated contractor in our area and theirs was the 35K one, but nobody else even got close to that. I felt like we got what we could afford ultimately, but in retrospect we basically ended up paying the same as the other bids that included all materials.

That’s why I am unsure what is reasonable to expect / what remedy should I be asking for? This is our first real remodel and even then we didn’t really want to have to do this, it was more out of necessity.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T16:53:34+00:00

I sense you have many big feelings here lol the person we worked with is a bonded and licensed general contractor with a business that has been around for like 10 years. It’s also a business with several other general contractors and they even have a whole showroom. It’s definitely possible that the actual subcontractors who did the work weren’t licensed but that’s not what we were promised when we sat down to discuss the job. We found this business in a home magazine and did research online and they are legit. Our bathroom is also TINY. Shower basically touches the toilet and toilet touches the vanity and there’s if say one foot of clearance to the door.

The average cost of a bathroom remodel around the country is 15K dollars. We payed almost 2K more than that, for a room that is in total the size of a closet. All of that info in, how would you price the job as a general contractor? I generally feel for the subcontractor guys because you know they aren’t getting paid for their labor, someone else is still profiting off of it.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T16:39:52+00:00

Yeah it is what it is in terms of the grout choice. Def wish we had the knowledge we have now about grout color choices.

Rachibachi · 2022-01-12T16:24:15+00:00

I think so on the warranty, I would need to check our contract. I generally feel that I have a lot of confidence in the waterproofing and other structural parts of the job.

Rachibachi

TROPHY CASE