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25th Apr 2024

‘My wife put our baby up for adoption because she’s not a good fit for the family’

Joseph Loftus

Everybody knows that having children isn’t easy.

It’s a mammoth lifelong task.

Say a partial goodbye to your social life, your hobbies, your sleeping routine – at least for a while.

But it’s also regarded as one of the greatest gifts in the world, the gift of parenthood. Bringing a person into the world and preparing them for life. Watching them learn, develop, and grow into, who you can only hope, will be a good person.

There are lots of good parents and lots of bad parents, but one recent story has gone viral, after a father explained that his wife put their daughter up for adoption as she didn’t fit in with the family, reports the Mirror.

The father explained on Reddit: “I go to work later than her [my wife] Catherine, so I take morning duty, but she gets home earlier than I do so she takes evening duty. During the day, Elizabeth stays with my mother-in-law.”

The father then began to explain how he noticed his wife barely recognises their daughter. He said: “Catherine really doesn’t have anything to do with her. Even if she is crying, unless it’s for a real reason (like being hungry or wet), Catherine doesn’t do anything to soothe her.

“I know that babies sometimes cry for no reason and that picking Elizabeth up every time she cries could reinforce the crying, shouldn’t she at least pick her up and soothe her a bit? Plus, even when she’s not crying, Catherine doesn’t interact with her.”

After struggling to bond with their daughter and looking to have their old life back the couple decided to place their daughter up for adoption.

He said: “I will be consulting a lawyer this week, but prefer to go in with some idea of what to expect. My wife and I wish to place our three-month-old daughter up for adoption. Are there any laws that could impact this process? Could members of our family file against our decision to adopt out? How long can we expect the entire process to take?”

He added: “Our daughter was going up for adoption; this was non-negotiable. My mother-in-law, having assisted in her care, could take custody if she so wished.

“My sister-in-law would be a permissible alternate. Otherwise, we would pursue outside arrangements. As many predicted, my mother-in-law opted to assume custody herself and we started that process after Thanksgiving.”

Naturally most in the comments reacted very strongly to the couple’s decision to give up their baby after not getting on with her.

One person wrote: “Now this is an odd situation. Would it be better for a pair of parents who are willing to send off their three-month-old child for whatever sociopathic reason to continue to raise said child, or should they go through with the adoption, preventing the child from being raised by a bunch of weirdos?”

Another commented: “I don’t understand why everyone is so mad. They’re s****y parents and realize that. The kid is probably better off being put up for adoption.”

A third said: “Therapy has not been tried by either parent. Therapy needs to be tried.”

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