How to Connect with Birth Mom with Mental Illness? - Weekend Wisdom

Question: I've been listening to your podcast for a few years! Our 10-year-old kinship adopted daughter has lived with us since she was 2 months old. For a variety of reasons, there hasn't been any in-person visits or phone calls with her birth mom (my sister). Communication has been limited to holiday/birthday cards and gifts.  My sister has schizophrenia and bipolar disorders. Because she has been stable on her medications and her behaviors are typically within a somewhat 'predictable' range, we're thinking it's time to begin an in-person relationship.  We're planning on writing a letter to my sister to tell her our thoughts on all of this and establish some ground rules and boundaries. After she has some time to digest that letter, my wife and I plan to meet with her in person (without our daughter) to firm up plans, expectations, etc.  My questions are:

• What are some generally good boundaries to set up? 
• How can we help prepare my sister for potentially tough questions from our daughter? (My sister is in denial that anything is wrong with her.) 
• How can we prepare our daughter for all of this? 
• How can we do this in a way that doesn't feel like we're wagging our finger at my sister and being 'above her'?  

Resources:

• Working with Birth Parents for the Child's Best Interest (Resource page)
• Evaluating Risk Factors in Adoption (Resource page)
• Finding an Adoption-Competent Therapist (Resource page)

Transcript

Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.

Welcome to Weekend Wisdom by Creating a Family. This is our podcast where we answer
your questions, which means, of course, that we need your questions so you can send
them to us at info @creatingafamily .org. Again,
that's info @creatingafamily .org. All right, we're going to jump right into today's
question. It is from Brad and it's a long one. I've been listening to your cash
for a few years now. Our 10 -year -old kinship adopted daughter has lived with us
since she was two months old. For a variety of reasons, there hasn't been any in
-person visits or phone calls with her birth mom, who is my sister. Communications
had been limited to holiday and birthday cards, as well as gifts. My sister has
schizophrenia and bipolar disorders. Because she has been stable on her medication and
her behaviors are typically within a somewhat predictable range, we're thinking it's
time to begin an in -person relationship. We're planning on first writing a letter to
my sister to tell her our thoughts on all of this and to establish some ground
rules and boundaries. After she's had some time to digest that letter, my wife and
I are planning on meeting with her in person without our daughter to firm up plans,
expectations, etc. My questions are, What are some generally good boundaries to set
up? How can we help prepare my sister for potentially tough questions from our
daughter? My sister is in denial that anything is wrong with her. How can we
prepare our daughter for all of this? How can we do this in a way that doesn't
feel like we are wagging our finger at my sister or being above her? Another
dynamic we're working through is my wife has not seen my sister since our daughter's
fourth birthday. We had a short period of visits during that time, and on that day,
things went very poorly and the police had to be involved and they arrested my
sister. Our daughter does not have any memory of this. I see my sister somewhat
regularly as she lives with my dad about 20 minutes away. My wife has wanted
nothing to do with her for the last six years. Any thoughts on how to help the
relationship between my wife and sister would be very welcome as well. My wife and
I are going to counseling and that's a lot of the reason we're finally moving in
this direction with my sister. Thank you so much.
There's a lot to this question, Brad. First, I'm really happy that you and your
wife are in counseling to help you to navigate all this. And as I often say, keep
in mind that I am not a mental health professional, but I can share my thoughts. I
think it helps for you and your wife to be centered on why you're taking this step
to establish these in -person relationships with your sister and your daughter's birth
mom. You know, it might be tempting to think that you're doing this for your sister
or for family harmony. But in the end, you are doing this for your daughter.
Chances are overwhelmingly good that your daughter will someday have some type of
relationship with her birth mom. I mean, after all, she lives only 20 minutes away
from her mom. I can only imagine how strained family events are already. And as
your daughter ages, she's going to become more aware of this. Plus, we know that
many, many adoptees wonder about their birth parents. The fact that they don't ask
questions is not indicative that they don't think about the people who gave birth to
them. Very often, they want answers as to who they are and where they come from
and why aren't they living with their birth parents. And they often want some type
of relationship. And this relationship with her birth mom is going to be complicated
because of her mom's mental health issues. So one very good reason to establish a
relationship now is to provide a role model for your daughter on how to manage a
relationship with someone who has schizophrenia and bipolar. She needs to learn how
to establish healthy boundaries and establish them with respect and how not to get
sucked into drama if that's an issue with her mom and other things such as that.
So knowing that your daughter is going to someday very likely be navigating a
relationship with her birth mom, your job as her parents is to prepare her for how
to handle this relationship. So one of the first things is your daughter needs to
understand schizophrenia and bipolar, how they can affect a person's behavior, discuss
that the person is still capable of loving her and loving her very dearly, but that
their behavior may be erratic. I don't know your sister situations, she would need
to adapt this discussion to fit the reality of what her capabilities are and how
the disease reflects in her. And you don't want to make your daughter afraid, but
you want to prepare her. And there are great children's books that explain mental
illness. The National Alliance on Mental Illness lists them on their website, or you
can call them and get information. You can go to the library to see what children's
books are available to explain mild illness. I would look for books specifically,
however, on schizophrenia and bipolar because a lot of the books I've seen really
focus on depression or anxiety. So I do think it would be more helpful if it was
more specific to bipolar or schizophrenia. You might get some suggestions from
organizations such as the Schizophrenia and Psychosis Action Alliance. If they don't
have it on their site, you may be able to call because other family members with
somebody with schizophrenia are also facing this issue. You also want your daughter
to know that you are there to help her and that she doesn't have to figure out
how to create a relationship on her own. One thing to prepare for in advance is
that your daughter, as she ages, is very likely going to worry that she's going to
develop schizophrenia or bipolar disease. So do some research in advance on the and
then the genetic connection of these illnesses, so that you can share that
information with her. And if she doesn't ask, she might want to, as she ages, gets
a little older, see if she's worrying about it. If she doesn't bring it up, you
bring it up. Creating a family covers this topic in several places, including our
shows on evaluating risk factors and adoption. Or you could also just Google some of
our, we have covered this topic a number of times. I would then ask your daughter
how she would like to proceed to start a relationship? What would she feel
comfortable with? Would she like to FaceTime with her birth mom first? Or would she
rather just send texts using your phone to begin with? You might suggest that she
draw her a picture of one of her favorite activities or something like that for you
to send her. And when it's time to meet in person, ask your daughter if she would
like to meet at a park first, The first time or the first couple of times or to
meet up at a coffee shop and then as things progress Ask her if she'd like to go
to grandpa's house to visit with them or does she want her birth mom to come to
your house? Assuming you're okay with any of those options You know get get
information for her how she wants to proceed and how fast she wants to proceed and
Depending on how things develop and how stable your sister is you may want to
develop a signal between you and your daughter to use if she feels overwhelmed and
she wants to end the visit sooner. So those are some general information up front.
Now to your specific questions. Your first, what are some generally good boundaries
to set up? So work through the boundaries with your daughter. She should be a part
of helping because they should be boundaries that make her feel safe and proceed at
the speed she's interested in. Some of the ones we want to include was how to
begin, Where to meet? How long to meet? Does the birth mom need to work through
you to set things up? Dropping by unannounced things like that and your sister needs
to understand that you're moving at a pace that is best for your daughter and That
you're following your daughter's lead And I realize that your sister may not believe
this and think that you're slowing things down But your focus should be on the
child. So your second question. How can when we prepare my sister for potentially
tough questions from our daughter, that your sister is in denial that anything's
wrong. You know, depending on the level of delusion your sister is under, you may
need to prepare your daughter that her birth mom won't be able to answer some of
these hard questions because of her mental illness. As things develop with the
relationship, ask your daughter what questions she has, and then brainstorm with her
about how to ask them and to increase the chances that she's gonna get an answer.
The other thing is bring some between you and your wife and your dad about are
there other people in the family that can answer these questions other than her
birth mom? And you know, that brings up another question I had. Where is your dad
in all of this? Could he be a support for your sister and perhaps help her set
realistic expectations? All right, your third question, how can we prepare our
daughter for all this? I think I've already addressed all of I think that was what
the whole first part what I was talking about for how can we do this in a way
that doesn't feel like we're wagging our finger at my sister and being above her. I
think explaining to your sister that you and she are on the same team with the
same goal, you both want what's best for your shared daughter and let her know that
you believe having a relationship with her mom is in the best interest of your
daughter and that you're going to do everything you can to facilitate this and that
you know that she's going to do that too. And also, and I don't know if this is
a part of it for you, but forgive her for her past behavior and accept that mental
illness is a huge burden and your sister is doing the best she can with the hand
she's been dealt. And your last question is how to improve your wife's relationship
with your sister. Well, in addition to what I just said about the burden of mental
illness with an emphasis on the word illness, also point out that blaming someone
with mental illness for their behavior is like blaming someone with cancer for being
tired. Perhaps more to the point, your wife needs to focus on the why. Why are you
reestablishing this relationship? She isn't improving relations with your sister for
you, or for your sister, or for your dad, or for herself, or for your marriage.
She needs to work with your sister because her daughter needs her guidance on how
to do this. Her daughter is going to have a lifelong relationship with this person,
and it's going to be complicated, and she needs her parents to leave the way. And
if that doesn't work, assure her that they don't have to be friends. They just need
to be polite. At the very least, she needs not to talk bad about your sister
because this woman is her daughter's mother. And depending on how your daughter and
your wife are handling this reunion, you might want to consider some family therapy
with a mental health provider who is adoption competent or just therapy for your
daughter to give her another safe adult to help her process this experience. And we
have resources on how to find a mental health professional who is adoption competent
on creating a family .org, click on adoption topics, then click on post adoption and
then click on therapy resources. Brad, I wish you the best of luck with this and I
hope this has helped. And for everyone else, I want you guys to remember that
creating a family has a criminal substance exposure workshop for parents who think or
know that their children were exposed prenatally to alcohol or drugs. You can get
more information at bit .ly /prenatal -exposure -training.
That's B -I -T dot L -Y slash prenatal dash exposure dash training.
Thanks for listening to this week's Week in Wisdom. If you like it, please tell a
friend to subscribe to the creating a family dot org podcast, and I will see you
next week.