Is anyone here an adoptee that reunited with birth siblings as adults?

[Ottakee]

If you want to private message me instead of post here that is fine as well

 

My 2 girls, now 19 and 20 came to us at 7 months old 7 months later at 2 days old. They were adopted through foster care.  They were number 7 & 8 of the birth mom.  We knew all along that they had 6 older siblings but searches were hard as they were all older and had been adopted in other states before my girls were even born.....therefore they never knew about them.

 

In February we located the sister just older than my girls and they met in April.  That has been a good thing.

 

Last week we found information on 4 of the remaining 5 siblings.  We are still searching for the oldest that was adopted in Iowa.  We wrote letters to 3 of the 4 we found information on (the other one is deceased).  We have pictures of the siblings and they certainly look like they are the siblings.  We also have their facebook pages.

 

If you were reunited with your siblings as adults, what was good/bad about how it was done?  How would you have LIKED it to have been handled?  My 20 year old (who has some special needs but has been wanting to find her siblings for years) is planning another reunion, looking at plane tickets, planning where to visit with them, etc.  They all live with in 30-45 minutes of each other and in fact we were only about 1 mile from 2 of them when we were there in April.....but didn't know it.

 

If it was up to her she would be messaging them on facebook, etc. but I told her to wait and see if they respond to our letters first.

 

To complicate matters, out of the 3 siblings we found, 2 have special needs.  My 2 also have special needs as does the sister we met in April.  Most likely they have some form of the same genetic disorder that my girls have.  

 

Any other input?

[Spryte]

My DH is an adoptee who reunited with 4 birth siblings and birthparents in his 40s. I'm not the adoptee, but was a big part of the process (well, on his side, we did a lot of talking during the process, so maybe it's more fair to say I watched the process closely with a deep emotional investment). If you want to pm me, feel free. If you think it applies - obviously the ages are different.

 

FWIW, I highly recommend waiting for them to respond to your letters. DH's reunion process took years. There was a lot of adjustment time, and some people were not ready to rush in. Pushing with too much contact at some points in the process would have caused them to shut down. It was a tightrope.

[Scarlett]

Not quite the same but I have a half sister that I met for the first time when she was 11 and I was 15. It took us 28 more years to really be able to be in each other's lives even though we bonded at 11/15 and thought about each other often. Our roadblock was our dad...who abandoned me and raised her.....he did all he could to keep us apart.

 

I know all situations are different but generally no one should come between siblings.

[Ottakee]

Thanks to both of you for sharing. It is hard for my daughter to wait for them to respond but I do feel it is best.

[Carrie12345]

Not quite the same but I have a half sister that I met for the first time when she was 11 and I was 15. It took us 28 more years to really be able to be in each other's lives even though we bonded at 11/15 and thought about each other often. Our roadblock was our dad...who abandoned me and raised her.....he did all he could to keep us apart.

 

I know all situations are different but generally no one should come between siblings.

 

I'm also in a half-sibling situation, and definitely want to be clear that I recognize it's a much different situation.  That said...

 

I hadn't seen him since he was 4 and I was 21.  We friended each other on FB when he was a teenager, but didn't communicate much.  We met up for lunch with another sister and most of my kids earlier this year, and it was nice.  We still don't really communicate, even though there are no longer any adults "in the way".  It's a little bit disappointing to me, but it's easy for me to understand that we've lived and continue to live very different lives.  I love him.  He's on my Powerball win disbursement plan!  But I don't think we're going to get any closer than this.

 

I would want my hypothetical children to be aware of the possibility of little to no ongoing connection.  And then hope that's not the case.

[DawnM]

PMing you.  Not wiling to share publicly just yet.

[Denisemomof4]

I would also encourage waiting for the response and not pushing. I have a friend who is going through this right now. She has been trying to reunite for years. The birth family took a LONG time, multiple years, before they were even willing to consider communication on any level, many more years before they met in person. There is a lot of emotional pain involved and everyone needs to go at their own pace.

[Ottakee]

Just an update

...

 

We heard from an older sister yesterday. She didn't know my girls existed but was very happy to hear from them. Right now we are just sending emails pictures but the girls hope to meet in the future.

 

Thanks to all who responded here and by private message.

[rose]

I have an older full sister that is 6 years older than me that my parents gave up for adoption when they were 18. I never knew about her until I was 18. We met that year. The reunion between her and my family didn't go so well. If you're interested in my thoughts PM me.