Discussion of Adoption: Part Five, "I don't need two moms"

Sheri was talking to her adopted niece at Charity's wedding.  She is in an open relative adoption.  As such she has a birth mom and her adopted mother, with whom she has lived since she was newborn.  Her birth mother is a Facebook friend. Sometimes her birth mother will provide motherly advice.  The niece's comment with regards to this was, "I don't need two moms."  The sense I get from m neice, is that sometimes things can be overwhelming.
I learned early on in doing foster care and adoption work that their are three parents in a child's life--the birth parent, legal parent and the love parent.  Each of these parents is important.  Normally they are vested in the same person, however in an adoption they are not.

The birth parent is the person that gives life to the child.  They leave a lasting impression on the child, as he is loved in the womb, and as her traits, habits and wants are passed through her genes to the baby. 

The legal parent is the person or couple who are making legal decisions for the child.  In an adoption, the court relinquishes this, and gives this to the adoptive family.  The legal parent determines where the person lives, and signs consent for medical treatment.  They hold the right to confidentiality, and have the right to view records with regards to the child. 

The love parent, is the day-to-day parent.  It does not imply that he birth parent does not love the child, but the love-parent is the parent that is there, for the child to turn to.  The parent is who changes the dirty bum, wipes the snotty nose, cleans up the vomit and pee.  This is the parent to calms the child after a night mare, who misses sleep feeding or comforting a child who doesn't sleep through the night.  The birth parent gets to play toesey games, muss the hair, and get snuggles.  This is the role that loses sleep, but gets all the rewards.  This is the teaching parent.  That teaches the child how to dress, his colors and his abc's.

And so the child is influenced by each of these three parental roles.  He will always carry the looks of the birth parents, and many of their traits and likes.  However this will also be influenced and molded by the love parent. 

The dilemma I face now, is how much involvement the birth parent family should have iwth our Tony.  The adoption is not open, but still we have contact.  There will come a time when Tony will be able to conceptualize those three parental roles.  When he will realize that he did not come out of my wife's tummy, but the tummy of his birth mother.  I think when we gets to that point, it would naturally follow that he would like to meet his birth parent.  That, at least is what I'm thinking.

I am thinking that at some point we will want Tony to get with his birth family, so he can understand more of his physical features, and his personality.  My dilemma is when that should be.  I don't have all the answers.