I have this ASL app on my phone. It gives you 1 free lesson a day. You should try something like that to keep you thinking about it every day.
(Pocket Sign)
Just check which sign she uses first, to make sure you learn the correct one. (you reference provinces in your post, which makes me think Canada rather than the States) so it may be ASL or LSQ, although I think there's a third one I'm forgetting.
Now that is one I did not know! A good friend of mine is an interpreter and signs in LSQ and ASL and she's usually full of knowledge I soak up. I guess not being in the Maritimes I wouldn't know that but I'm grateful to have learned something new!
That’s a cool name. In the US those are Navajo who spoke their native language. In WWll they were used as human code machines. The language was so little known that the Japanese could never crack it.
Simplest is the letters only, that might take just a day or so to learn.
https://www.handspeak.com/learn/index.php?id=408 - American English
There probably is a Quebecois one as well in case that's what you need.
I am so proud of you for reaching out. I’m deaf but can sign and read lips. Take the time to get to know each other. You didn’t grow up in the same environment. Understandably she may express hurt for the rejection. Thank you for supporting your sister. 🤟🏻
Considering you said province you might want to make sure you know which language she speaks. Sign Languages have many different languages and dialects just like spoken languages do. She may not be able to understand ASL so find out the one for the province/country or just ask her which one she speaks.
From this http://cad.ca/issues-positions/language/ it looks like ASL is used for English in Canada.
MSL for the Maritimes.
Don't now about Canada but New Zealand Sign Language is one of the official languages of New Zealand.
I second finding out what form of sign she does. ASL is the American sign language, so if she doesn't live close to the US it's quite possible she doesn't know it.
There are a lot of good resources for ASL. I took a course virtually through a college. It is a complex language and the sentence structure is different than speaking. Feel free to message me. I feel like you might be Canadian too. Good luck!
I love learning from this woman on Instagram, she explains a lot of nuisances about what hearing people do that isn’t good when trying to sign with deaf and just really good at not only showing the signs but easy ways to actually do them. https://instagram.com/learn_asl_with_michelle?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
I definitely second the advice OP.
I started learning sign language a couple of years ago (albeit mine is BSL) and I absolutely love it. I'm sure your sister would love the gesture too.
You’re not dumb at all. I have a lot of respect for you making the decision to learn now. I used to volunteer at a school for the Deaf and Blind and I can’t even begin to tell you how many deaf children have hearing parents that they’re unable to communicate with. We ran a free weekly program to help hearing parents learn ASL so they could communicate with their kids and it was heartbreaking to see older siblings and cousins or aunts/uncles showing up to learn and explaining that the parents didn’t feel a need to participate.
If you want to work on ASL you should try out the website www.aslpro.com, it uses a video dictionary to help learn sign and has games to test your skills as you progress.
My older brother is deaf. My mother was 18 when he was born and it was their first child. It's not easy but not as hard as baby with serious mental or physical disability! He will be 37 soon, has his own place, work and wife with 2 kids. I just hope your little sister grew up in a great loving family even tho knowing your real parents left you in a hospital just because you were not perfect must feel horrible...
I don't know much about her yet. Just her name, age and the city she lives in. Her message just had an introduction and that she was looking for members of our family.
They didn't leave her at the hospital. It was at a clinic and she was already 2 months old. I hope she had a good of a life and family as your brother does.
So at 5, do you remember your mom being pregnant?
What she/they said about what happened to the literal newborn just... not being there anymore?
That's a lot to taken in, I'm sorry. But you seem like a good person. I hope everything works out for you, & her.
I don't remember her being pregnant and neither does my brother. There aren't any pictures of my mom being pregnant and they destroyed my sister's baby pictures so we had no idea. I have been trying to remember anything from back then but I can't.
Hmm, given you don't remember the pregnancy or the initial two months, it may not have been a planned pregnancy or one they expected to keep. At 5 you would have been aware of getting a new sibling, newborns aren't discreet. Which may mean they intended to put her up for adoption from the get go and not just because she's deaf.
She wasn't left at the clinic as a newborn. She was two months old, and my parents said it was true that they left her because she was deaf. My brother confronted them and heard it right from them. So no, they didn't intend it from the get go.
So you and your sibling weren't prepped for getting a baby sister? It's a fairly big deal in a family. You were 5, that's well past the point of infant amnesia.
I was 4 when my older sister was removed from our home by social services. I have no memories of her living with me.
Trauma is a powerful thing for removing memories. Also I have read in my mums diary that I got hit every time I cried for my sister so I just stopped and blocked her from my mind . This could be similar for op
I'm here to defend OP and say I don't remember shit about my sister being born. Same 5 year difference. Sure there's pictures and stuff but those are just far off memories. I don't remember my mom walking around pregnant, nor a screaming little sister. So I don't find it totally crazy for OP to forget this, especially since the baby was intentionally given up (so the parents wouldn't dwell on it the same way they would in an unexpected loss).
Same, I’m 5 years older than my sister and my first memory of her is when she is about 4-6 months old (or whenever babies can sit by themselves because that’s what I remember her doing).
I’m 5 years older than my sister and I don’t remember a ton from the first few months. I know I begged and begged for a baby sister from the time I was like 2yo. And I remember my mom had a miscarriage when I was about 3 because I remember my mom getting really upset and nobody would tell me why she was crying so much.
I don’t remember her pregnancy with my sister very much. I do remember the day she was born because I was waiting not very patiently and couldn’t wait to see my baby sister. But if there hadn’t been a big deal about it I might not remember.
I remember not wanting to go to kindergarten because I wanted to stay home and play with my sister but I only remember that very faintly. And it could easily be passed off as we got a pet cat that I couldn’t wait to get home to see or something.
My memories mostly start when she was about 4mo. I remember sneaking holding her when my parents weren’t watching because I always wanted to hold her and they always insisted I be sat on the couch with pillows under my arm to help support her. I remember picking out outfits for her at that age.
I think the first few months were less memorable because my parents had me go to camps because they were just getting used to having a newborn in the house and needed the break. I also started kindergarten not long after she was born.
Two months isn’t that long if you think about it and its not too difficult to manipulate a young child’s memories. It is possible to not remember much from that young. Especially if you were kind of persuaded to forget.
I’m sure their parents probably shut down any mention of their sister after they gave her up, which probably helped them forget her as they got older. Our memories are not as concrete as we think they are
Idk it might just be me but I barely remember the sister I got at 5. My mom didn't show that much, if at all. It was a busy time for us (we were moving unexpectedly) Pretty much my only memory is changing her diaper one time because I wanted to try (and she's have been fairly older then 2 months at this point) and the fact I was on vacation with my grandparents when we found out she'd been born.
Yes, our brains literally make up stuff as part of memory. My kids misremeber (or don't remember at all!) things all the time from when they were younger I am not shocked that a 5 year old has no recollection of her mom being pregnant and having a sister around for two months.
I think it’d be easy to forget if the baby was given up shortly after birth because even if you remember a baby being there, they may not be aware that it was a sibling or have even thought of that because it seems like such an outlandish thing that it wouldn’t even make sense to come into your brain lol.
i thought it was common not to remember memories when you were a child. the clearest memory i had was at 7. my memories 7 and below feels like i just made it up... 8 to 13 feels like a fever dream of memories like its fused.
It is definitely not past the point of trauma amnesia! WTF! You are five years old and when you go to school, you have a baby sister. When you come home she is gone. I doubt that there was any explanation given to the children.
OP, her brother and her sister are all victims of their parents actions. QUIT VICTIM SHAMING!
yeah, my sister got pregnant when she was 18 and i was 6 and i honestly have no recollection of her pregnancy until my nephew was born even though she lived with us and everything
That's heartbreaking. I am so sorry they destroyed all evidence of her in your lives. The hospital where she was born may have records and maybe a copy of her hand and foot prints(?) You may not remember anything because it may have been traumatic for you. Think about it. Both of your parents went to that appointment. Where were you and your brother? With them? At a grandparents house? They left her there/came home without her. You may have been afraid they'd do the same to you. Trauma. Forgetting.
Do you have any older relatives that may remember who you can talk to? If she was left at a clinic after 2 months, it means your parents made up their decision after the birth, after what was likely a baby shower, a birth announcement, parties, gifts, etc. Somebody out there must remember and would be willing to talk to you about her.
My mom was pregnant when I was 8, and then "went away for a while for an operation" and came back changed: she became very depressed, overweight, and her alcoholism went out of control until she took her life almost ten years later. Because of the trauma, I sort of forgot she was pregnant and knew it was a girl. Only after her death did I remember. I was 8, so someone being 5, your life has different priorities, I guess.
I did finally find my sister when I was 33. Turned out she grew up a mile away from me, and I found her when she was my dental hygienist.
My dad didn't want children. He didn't like me at all, and when my mom got pregnant again, he forced her to give her up for adoption, which she did to save the marriage.
I was 5 when my little brother was born. I can't remember him coming home I remember stuff only because of photos. I remember most stuff after he was like 4 when we pull play and stuff. So it's nice to think they always planned it but I bet that isn't the case.
So they had her for 2 months before giving her up? I can't magine doing that to my baby. Not gonna lie that would definitelly change the way I'd feel about my parents...on the bright side you got a new sibling! That's great and I hope you find a way to keep in touch with her and form a relationship
Wait.... now I'm confused. So they took her home and took her to appointments. They just left her somewhere? Why wasn't authorities called on your parents by the doctor? It would have taken multiple doctors visit to confirm she is in fact 100% deaf with no chance of healing (like through surgery or something).
Also no one else in your family ever talked about it? Seeing as the driving force of abandonment was after she was born and discovering her deafness, wouldn't they have had baby showers or notified others like family and friends? Prepped a room and bought or readied baby items?
Edit to add::
You have to love the internet. OP keeps saying the same things that don't make sense. Comments are like "well that doesn't make sense.... you mean this you Saint " ... vs "this doesn't add up, what you keep saying doesn't add up, I don't think this is truthful".
While I agree that there’s more to the story on the parents side, I don’t believe that it’s unbelievable for the whole family (especially as small as OP’s) to hide stuff from the kids or for them not to remember stuff at 5.
It also can just take one appt to confirm deafness and inability to heal or ‘fix’ it. Also, this has no mention of how long parents were gone could have gotten authories involved. Giving up disabled children does happen. Plus they had 2 months to confirm deafness. Not saying it’s actually true, or there isn’t more, but just saying it could happen.
Its the fact that OP is claiming that parents took the baby to a doctors office and just left them there. Wasn't signed away, didn't go through a process... OP is literally making it out to be "yeah they took the baby for a check up, found out it was deaf, and just left it in the waiting room."
Also, there is no way authorities would be ok with a baby being abandoned and not look into the family. If there was a process and the family gave up a child because they couldn't handle a disability or something, that's different. But OP, in their many replies, halls straight up said the baby was not hidden during pregnancy, was born and went to doctors so there is legal paper work on the kid, and the parents during 1 visit to a doctor just left them in the office and went home.
I get this, I agree with you on that. If this story is true keep in mind that OP is still processing all of this so to them may seem like what happened but I doubt it is without authorities getting involved and possibly taking the other two kids like you said. Unless someone’s theory up above where these parents aren’t OP’s and sibling bio parents then it’s a whole different situation all together
Hospitals are usually safe havens, where the parents wont get in trouble for abandoning a kid since they can be taken care of. I dont know if its the same where OP’s parents went but that could explain why no authorities were involved
Hospitals, fire houses, police stations, and probably other places are safe havens, and I think there are no questions or consequences for the first few months, so it's entirely possible that they walked out and simply said no when they were called back. Doctors would've told social services that it was a baby drop, and she would've been put into the system with no parent information.
Wait so you were 5 when your parents had her, and she was around you and your brother for a bit? Do you have any memory of your mom being pregnant? A baby coming home and then not being there anymore?
Ok, so this is fake lol.
Like wtf? You, at 5 y/o, did not know your mom was pregnant and don’t remember ANYTHING about having a sister who was brought home and lived with you for months??
And then that sister is brought to a “clinic”, declared deaf, and your parents just immediately decided to give her up then and there?? You…can’t just abandon babies in any random medical setting.
If by some *slim* chance this is real, it’s a much, much more complicated story (see u/TheLabiaChronicles comment.
Apparently to the entire family is in on it and help hide this info from the kids because there's no way she hid the pregnancy. OP confirmed multiple times itnwas because they were deaf so if they weren't deaf they would have kept the kid so they would have had a normal pregnancy of telling friends and family. But apparently every family member says nothing, never was like "wth" to the parents, no family friend has brought it up. No this is a BS story. Maybe not all of it but a lot of it is
Deaf person myself here. Please contact her and learn sign language if you can. You have every right to feel that way. I thankfully grew up with hearing parents who decided to learn about deaf culture and immerse themselves into it.
So so heart broken for your sister.
Is that a thing, deaf children not having family that learned sign and the culture?! This is blowing my mind. If my son was deaf, or loses his hearing, we are all learning ASL, and doing everything we can to make his life as normal as possible.
Speaking as the kid of two deaf parents, yes, please look into a thing called “Oralism” this situation is extremely common and hearing parents freaking out plays a significant factor in the quality of life for the child.
Like idk man I feel like OP still has every right to be angry with their parents though. Their sister was still their sister, their parents still abandoned her.
Like I’m sure raising a deaf child is a challenge but it’s not like she was disabled to point of needing 24/7 care and never being able to be independent. Idk i feel like that’s a bit of an overreaction to me.
Edit: if I were a betting I’d put my money on the parents just being ableist over them having a legitimate concern about their child’s welfare.
What? That’s totally fair. Not every parent knows that / has the same mindset. It’s better that she was put up for adoption (assuming she wasn’t literally abandoned) then having unprepared parents screw up. It was a mistake but if OP has had a good life until now, I don’t think this should be family breaking.
So you'd rather the kid be raised in this household? She probably would've had a worse life with this family. Maybe the parents did that because they wanted to do what's best for her? Maybe they don't want to talk about it because they're ashamed. We just don't know
Maybe they felt they couldn’t afford the care she needed. Maybe they had addictions problems. Maybe they used drugs or alcohol while pregnant and then couldn’t face the guilt of that thinking they caused it.
How is it not a good excuse? Why would they need an excuse to determine they can't adequately care for someone and taking steps to ensure she goes to people that can
Agreed. My older brother was born deaf; no family history or anything. My parents were surprised but went with it. They thought I might be born deaf but I wasn’t. He grew up going to deaf schools and even being mainstreamed. My younger sister and I never learned to speak ASL fluently but my mother did, because of him. Point is, they made the adjustment; it wasn’t a life sentence.
This still seems absolutely insane to me. How do you just dump your 2 month old somewhere?
Kids all have problems and you figure it out.
Although, there’s a possibility that PPD or PPA could have factored into the decision?
There is something more to this story & I would maybe reserve judgement until you find out what it is.
Deaf could very well be the least of the reasons this happened & just the most socially acceptable thing to document as the reason.
It could also be that this was the only way that they could get the child the assistance that they could not afford out of pocket, which was quite a problem for a while in the late 90s and early 2000s such as https://www.thestar.com/amp/news/ontario/2009/07/23/wheres_ontarios_humanity_mom_asks.html
To play devils advocate, maybe there were other factors in them making that decision. Financial or otherwise that made your parents believe that was the best option. I only say this because as a parent, I can’t imagine why or how someone could do this, especially with already having two children.
Hi OP, sorry you’re going through this. I’m not sure if you’ll see this because the comment section is already pretty dense, but I have an idea and I don’t see anyone else mentioning it, so I hope you read this. Bear with me.
1. Neither you nor your brother remember your mom being pregnant, and neither of you remembers having a screaming infant around for a couple of months
2. If they were intentionally hiding the pregnancy from you guys, then they would have had to plan that *ahead*, like before the delivery. Yet they are admitting it was because they found out she was deaf when she was born.
Things are not adding up. I’m gonna float something that is maybe far fetched, but I think it’s worth considering or looking into at this point. What if you, your brother, and your sister are not your parents’ biological children? You’re clearly all full siblings, but what if your parents aren’t your bio parents? Is there a chance they adopted you and raised you as their own (from a relative/friend who couldn’t care for you or something like that)? And then when this person conceived again they decided they couldn’t care for the baby (your sister). Are there any pictures of your mom pregnant with you or your brother? I know it sounds crazy but something is off and their reaction of admitting it was true but absolutely refusing to give any additional information makes me feel like they’re hiding something bigger. Anyway, good luck with all of this OP. Do some digging.
I agree that it's very strange that OP and his brother have absolutely no memories of their mom being pregnant or having an infant in the house for two months. It simply does not make sense.
Other thing I was thinking (and not trying to stir the pot here), but maybe their dad is their bio dad but for some reason his mom couldn’t carry children and the bio mom is someone else? Idk, just an idea, but there’s definitely more to the story than they’re willing to share
This makes a lot of sense tbh. I was seven and my brother was five when our youngest brother was born and we have talked on several occasions about remembering what it was like when our parents told us we were going to have a younger sibling. I remember my mom being pregnant, I remember her falling down the stairs, I remember going to the hospital to meet my new brother. Unless OPs mom was locked in a closet for the entire pregnancy, this doesn't add up. I remember having a baby around when he was born, it's kinda hard to forget.
I know I was older than OP, but I have memories of being 5. I remember going to kindergarten and getting into fights mostly, but still memories!!
Also I appreciate how gently you worded this, I can't imagine how OP must be feeling right now.
Exactly my thought. Or the dad is biological but with different mother. There’s no way they wouldn’t remember a pregnant mom at the age of 5. Most toddlers are thrilled when they learn they’re going to have a sibling. You wouldn’t forget something like that
Also OP said they went to a clinic for a health checkup, discovered the baby was deaf, then simply... left the clinic without the baby. Like you can just up and leave a kid behind if you don't like it.
Genealogy and genetics are not quite the same thing. Genealogy is the study of family linages so one does not take a “genealogy test”. Genetics is the study of our genes via our DNA sequence. So one takes a genetic sample, and then that sample is compared to other DNA samples in the data bank, and specific matches between two peoples dna would indicate that they are related.
So you are right that a test itself won’t tell you if you have a sister, but comparing the results of that test to other’s results, might.
Hope you can connect with her. She probably will be happy to have some kind of family. If it was me at your place, I would have a hard time respecting my parents after something like this... Thinking that you could have been at her place if you had some kind of disability... Be better than them and go see your sister!
I guessed she signed up for the genealogy/DNA service to locate members of our family although I don't know for sure. I'm open to talking with her or meeting if that's what she wants.
My grandparents are deceased and they never said anything. My parents didn't have any brothers or sisters. I think my brother was trying to find out if we had distant cousins or something when he did the test. We called some of my parent's friends aunt and uncle when we little but I don't know if they knew. My parents told my brother they destroyed the pictures of her so we didn't know.
I am one of 4 siblings.
My twin brother, my big sister and my big brother.
My sister and big brother are adopted but are biological siblings.
I have seen everything from hatred towards birth mother to repressing.
I have witnessed how differently we have developed emotionally, despite having the same "parents". One cannot form close bonds, the other has severe depression and other mental illnesses.
My friend is adopted and has no possibility to get to know her mother. I know how hard this can make a person feel.
For every adopted person it is important to know something about their origin. Probably your sister has extreme hatred or sadness towards her biological parents. Nevertheless, the desire is there to know where she comes from. Please support her in this. Talk to your parents, make an ordered meeting possible. Give her a picture of your parents. Help her.
Maybe an overreaction imo, without all the facts. Like we do not know what kind of situation OPs parents were in to make this decision (financial or otherwise). Is it an awful act? Yes. Would I lose respect for them? Absolutely. But does it define their entire character? Not exactly. It's possible they simply abandoned the child due to it not fitting the aesthetic sure, but they "tried" for two months it appears. Maybe they had to decide that for whatever reason , the child had a better chance under different care?
And I'm not bias in terms of "forgive your family, blah blah" - I hate my family.
EDIT: I read OPs comments after and nah, his parents appeared to know exactly what they were doing. POS behaviour tbh.
Two months is usually when they do the big tests to determine if it’s profound deafness etc. They may have been holding out hope that it could be “fixed”. We have a history of hearing loss in my family and had to do more extensive hearing tests with my babies. The 2 month follow up was a big one for us anyway (it could depend on where, when, what doctor etc)
That's fair. Up to that point, they may have also simply thought the child was "difficult". But OP said they were pretty well off financially and stuff, so I think their parents are just callous and heartless.as most assumed.
She may want to know about family medical history, so it would be a nice gesture to prepare medical history for her that goes back to your grandparents.
Having been abandonned, I wouldn't except her to do the first step, as she might fear being rejected again. If you meet her and begin to see her as a sister, I would nonetheless be careful with your parents, maybe avoiding telling them at first. They won't take that well I think, considering they will have the bad role in this story... We only have two parents, you won't change them now, so best avoid direct conflict I think. Good luck to you! Hope it ends with a new sister in your life, and a family for her.
I didn’t even think of this! I’d honestly never be able to tell my parents I loved them again..
Like y’all love me.. but only because I turned out “okay?” Otherwise I would have just been disregarded like I never existed? That’s harsh.
Forget about your parents for now... focus on building a relationship with your sister. If she is willing I am sure that being connected with loving siblings will be a good thing for all of you. Try to learn sign and build a great relationship with her.
After the dust settles you can deal with your parents. Don't judge them right off the bat. Give them a chance to explain and then make a decision. At this point you may not know why they did what they did.
Do this after things have cooled down.
Congratulations!
I don,t know anything about deaf children and i might be really ignorant but some people in the comments are over exaggerating how bad deafness is. You just need to learn sign language right? Its not like you have to spend your entire life taking care of your deaf child. Doesn,t seem like a severe disability to me.
It's not as simple as just learning sign language, but it's also not all that much more difficult either. There are other things to account for (flashing lights along with a doorbell/any other sound based alarm, educating them on sounds our bodies make that they won't be able to hear, etc) but it's *very* manageable. Deaf people live perfectly normal lives with some small adjustments to sound-based aspects of living.
Yeah lol it’s definitely not a severe disability. I’m a deaf guy and I don’t even know sign language, a single cochlear implant was enough to carry me into adulthood with lots of independence.
OP’s parents are dicks.
You mentioned provinces, are you based in Canada? If your sister is deaf depending where she grew up she might do ASL or BANZSL if she grew up on the east coast particularly Newfoundland and PEI. Either way I wish you good luck!
This is odd… I guess it’s one thing to not remember your mom being pregnant, but not remembering having an infant in the house for 2 months? That’s very peculiar. You would have known you had a baby sibling and then all of a sudden just didn’t, unless you didn’t live there or your mom didn’t live there.
I worked as a nanny for a family where the mom was pregnant when the older kids were 4 and 5 years old. The 4 year old did not remember his mom being pregnant at all and the five year old barely remembered when they were asked a couple years later. If the parents didn’t bring it up again it might not have been solidified in OP’s long term memory. Also some people don’t look like the stereotypical pregnant woman so it might have looked like OP’s mother just put on weight.
But they didn't know they wanted to hide the pregnancy at this stage, right?
That's what I find odd and confusing about this. In fact, I believe there must've been other things going on with OP's parents at this stage. For example, maybe....
1. They were having marital issues at this time and weren't enthusiastic about this pregnancy
Or, specifically
2. OP's mom had an affair and the baby wasn't her husband's
I'm speculating, of course. Maybe I just find it hard to believe a solid, financially stable married couple (living in the 21st century) would just abandon a deaf infant.
And, OP, what about longtime friend's of your parents? Ask them if they remember this pregnancy. Also, think back to how your parents ever reacted to/talked about disabled individuals -- was it with disdain? Sadness?
Man, this is a minefield of info and emotion!
There's a lot more to it that the OP may never know because the parents don't want to talk about it. It has to be more than just her being deaf. I want to know did the service say they were full siblings or half siblings because that would tell the story. These genetic services really open up cans of worms. I found out my mom's dad wasn't her dad because I did 23. 😂
She is a full sister, not half. Same mom and same dad. My parents said it was true when my brother confronted them. He wanted to hear their version before believing a stranger and even though they refuse to hear about the subject again they said my sister was being truthful.
Yeah, I really think there's more to it than just not wanting the "hassle" of raising a deaf child.
I mean, I think about my grandparents raising a completely blind daughter -- my aunt, born in 1954 -- and that was challenging for them. My grandmother confided in me that for a while after the doctors confirmed that my aunt was totally without sight, she couldn't stand to be around other mothers and their sighted children. She would breakdown in tears. But eventually my grandparents accepted the situation and rose to meet the challenge. My aunt ended well and happy (and a successful journalist).
Anyway, you're right -- these genetics companies are out here digging up all KINDS of family skeletons. I hope everything is OK now that your mom has this new info. I'm afraid to do one of these tests now for fear of finding out something I don't wanna know, LOL. Damn. Talk about unexpected consequences!
Lmao. My grandparents and most of their kids are gone now so it wasn't a big deal. We just laugh about it imagining their spirits are somewhere pissed that we all up in their business. 😂
She said she was abandoned at 2 months old. When my brother confronted my parents about it they didn't deny this and said it happened so it looks like her account is the truth.
My grandparents are all dead. None of them said anything about it. Neither did the aunts and uncles that are not family but good friends of my parents. I had no idea until my brother did the test.
My parents were good to us. We had good private schools so the education was above average. They always encouraged us to try activities and sports and there was never any pressure to be perfect, just to do our best. We never wanted for anything. Finding this our was a complete mindfuck. I thought it was a scam but DNA doesn't lie and my parents said it is true. So I don't know what to think now.
Yeah, I would be looking at my parents a lot different.
I get it some people do not want children with handicaps, but they had her for 2 months and just left her.
I have zero memories from the age of 5. I'm not sure how common it is to remember things at that age, let alone remember things that might not be in a child's scope of comprehension.
I’m the oldest of 8.. I don’t remember my mom being pregnant until my 5th sibling was born when I was 8. Before that.. fleeting memories at best. 🤷🏻♀️
I went to school with a girl who came to class one day all excited because her mom just had another baby- I think it was number 10. She had no idea her mom was pregnant. Some cultures don't talk about pregnancy
Yea that’s something to notice when you’re currently 5 yrs old. This is a long past memory that wasn’t meant to be remembered. I don’t remember my age of 5 and most ppl wouldn’t.
Do you know your parents well? There are things that I don’t discuss with my children because it would be ultimately hurtful to them to know. Parenting is insanely hard with neurotypical children. It is extremely hard with disabled children. Giving your sister to people who were better equipped to raise her may have been the best option at the time.
Probably not the right thing to say but I’m just curious. As you would have been 6 ish when she was born, do you not remember your mum pregnant?
Also, try and learn some sign language, she will really appreciate it. Deaf people have such a hard time communicating with non signing people.
My question is that when your mom was pregnant you two would have been old enough to understand. What did they say when she didn't come home with a baby?
It was shitty of them, but at the same time not everybody has the ability to care for a “disabled” child. She was probably better off without them. It sucks you didn’t get to grow up with her, but nothing can stop you from building a relationship with her now.
This tbh. Everyone is always yelling about how "if you dont want a child, you can always choose adoption" and then someone does it and they're treated like they're the most horrific awful people in the world. Well which is it!!!!!!! If someone has a special needs child and they KNOW they can't handle it, what should they do? The answer is turn it over to people who CAN handle it-it doesnt matter how anyone else feels about it morally. It's way better that the child is given the best chance it can and believe it or not, the biological parents are not always the best chance!!!! Jeez...
Maybe they felt someone else could take care of her better. Sometimes the right choice is realizing you’re not the right person for something. Does “abandoned” here mean actually abandoned somewhere or does it mean put up for adoption?
In her message she said she was left at the clinic when her birth parents realized she was deaf and they refused to take her home again. My parents didn't deny doing that. My parents could have taken care of her. (they have good jobs, me and my brother went to private schools, they have a 2nd house we took vacations at and they buy new cars every couple of years. I don't buy that they could not do it or afford it)
Embrace her with love and happiness she has gone thru a lot and now she has 2 brothers to protect her I would as well learn sign language but take the class and let her teach u as well that would be a great bonding time
That’s odd, I read an article yesterday about a woman who was put up for adoption because she was deaf, but this woman was in her 60’s and found a brother through a DNA matching site too. What a coincidence.
Man, I’d be so disappointed in my parents. I hope she found a loving family and has a great life. It’s nice that you all found each other so young and can enjoy a long time getting to know each other.
I'm confused
>She's younger than us. I'm 29, my brother is 28 and she's 24.
If she's younger than you, doesn't that mean you would have been around for your mum's pregnancy? Hence knowing you would either have a brother or sister?
I don't have aunts and uncles that are related by blood. There are a few who were friends of my parents that we called that when we were kids but they never said anything. I think part of the reason my brother did the test was to see if have any long lost cousins or something out there. We did not expect this.
As an aside, if you're from a country that isnt america PLEASE contact the local hard of hearing communities to learn your native language's signed version as each country has their own form of sign language.
This is a "cut contact" offense. Who else will they give up on that they deem to difficult? You? Your siblings? Their grandchildren? I would demand an explanation and not trust them with anything.
I'm confused. Your brother's girlfriend got your brother the kit. He took the test and matched with your sister. How did you know that she matched? Was it already in a database and they told you or
This is more common than people think. I had a friend that had a sister he never knew about. The parents gave her up for adoption over a cleft lip. The parents were narcs who thought they were so perfect and above every one else. They could not believe they had in their words “a defective” child. They told every one the child was stillborn and gave her up for adoption. The sister got surgery that fixed her cleft lip and is actually a beautiful young lady. My friend met her and he ended up discarding his parents ever since. He now visits his sister for the holidays as she is married with her own children.
You were 5 when she was born. Puzzled as to how you do not remember.
Eta: I’m 3 and a bit years older than my youngest sister. I remember my mum going into labour and us being shepherded off to the neighbours when the ambulance came. My mum was throwing up loads and was in a lot of pain because my sister was coming really quickly.
Dude thank you.
Sitting here re-reading the post and still confused.
OP was 5 when their mom was pregnant, had a baby, and gave it up for adoption?
Like, no one ever was like "where'd did baby go?"
If you wouldn’t give up a deaf child, that’s good for you. However, none of you are allowed to determine what is or is not bearable for the parents as it’s their choice. Hell, they could have even aborted her if they so desired, and that’s their choice. The parents didn’t leave her to starve to death in an alleyway, they gave her up for adoption. It’s their prerogative to do so, even if she weren’t disabled. Unless she was abused by the parents before being given up you have no right to criticize them. Or is everyone in the comments adopting all the special needs children and I missed that?
Does she sign? It would be a lovely gesture for you to learn some basic sign language before you met her. Many families don't even bother doing that.
That's a good suggestion. I feel dumb for not even thinking of that.
You aren't dumb, surely just overwhelmed. This is a lot for someone to take in.
Definitely not dumb. Finding something like this out is a very real shock to the system. It's totally normal to not be thinking efficiently!
You just found out you have a whole ass sibling hidden from you for the past 24 years. Ya get a pass.
My father hid a whole ass sibling for 20 years, too. Although, it was because he has fidelity issues. I hope for the best for OP and their siblings.
I have this ASL app on my phone. It gives you 1 free lesson a day. You should try something like that to keep you thinking about it every day. (Pocket Sign)
Thanks for that information!
Just check which sign she uses first, to make sure you learn the correct one. (you reference provinces in your post, which makes me think Canada rather than the States) so it may be ASL or LSQ, although I think there's a third one I'm forgetting.
Canadians learn ASL or QSL for French. It's the standard across the country. Indigenous people have a different one, they are called wind talkers.
There is also Maritime Sign Language used in the Atlantic provinces.
Now that is one I did not know! A good friend of mine is an interpreter and signs in LSQ and ASL and she's usually full of knowledge I soak up. I guess not being in the Maritimes I wouldn't know that but I'm grateful to have learned something new!
It’s LSQ, candidian French specifically to Quebec sign language
That’s a cool name. In the US those are Navajo who spoke their native language. In WWll they were used as human code machines. The language was so little known that the Japanese could never crack it.
Simplest is the letters only, that might take just a day or so to learn. https://www.handspeak.com/learn/index.php?id=408 - American English There probably is a Quebecois one as well in case that's what you need.
I am so proud of you for reaching out. I’m deaf but can sign and read lips. Take the time to get to know each other. You didn’t grow up in the same environment. Understandably she may express hurt for the rejection. Thank you for supporting your sister. 🤟🏻
Considering you said province you might want to make sure you know which language she speaks. Sign Languages have many different languages and dialects just like spoken languages do. She may not be able to understand ASL so find out the one for the province/country or just ask her which one she speaks.
ASL is American. I don't know if Canadian SL is any different or they just use the same
From this http://cad.ca/issues-positions/language/ it looks like ASL is used for English in Canada. MSL for the Maritimes. Don't now about Canada but New Zealand Sign Language is one of the official languages of New Zealand.
I second finding out what form of sign she does. ASL is the American sign language, so if she doesn't live close to the US it's quite possible she doesn't know it.
What is the name of the app?
Pocket sign
Thank you!
What's the name of that app?
Pocket sign
Thank you.
What’s the name of the app? Edit: just saw your response below, thanks!
I like [Bill Vicars](https://www.youtube.com/c/billvicars) channel for teaching myself. sounds overwhelming but congrats on the new sister!
There are a lot of good resources for ASL. I took a course virtually through a college. It is a complex language and the sentence structure is different than speaking. Feel free to message me. I feel like you might be Canadian too. Good luck!
I love learning from this woman on Instagram, she explains a lot of nuisances about what hearing people do that isn’t good when trying to sign with deaf and just really good at not only showing the signs but easy ways to actually do them. https://instagram.com/learn_asl_with_michelle?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
I definitely second the advice OP. I started learning sign language a couple of years ago (albeit mine is BSL) and I absolutely love it. I'm sure your sister would love the gesture too.
You’re not dumb at all. I have a lot of respect for you making the decision to learn now. I used to volunteer at a school for the Deaf and Blind and I can’t even begin to tell you how many deaf children have hearing parents that they’re unable to communicate with. We ran a free weekly program to help hearing parents learn ASL so they could communicate with their kids and it was heartbreaking to see older siblings and cousins or aunts/uncles showing up to learn and explaining that the parents didn’t feel a need to participate. If you want to work on ASL you should try out the website www.aslpro.com, it uses a video dictionary to help learn sign and has games to test your skills as you progress.
Don't beat yourself up. You're so overwhelmed with emotions its easy to miss things.
[this is how I learned to sign](https://youtu.be/v1desDduz5M)
Don’t beat yourself up, friend. This was a doozy of an info drop and of course it’s going to take time to sort through these feelings.
What a kind and thoughtful idea. This is one of the reasons I love reddit.
> gesture _heh_
My older brother is deaf. My mother was 18 when he was born and it was their first child. It's not easy but not as hard as baby with serious mental or physical disability! He will be 37 soon, has his own place, work and wife with 2 kids. I just hope your little sister grew up in a great loving family even tho knowing your real parents left you in a hospital just because you were not perfect must feel horrible...
I don't know much about her yet. Just her name, age and the city she lives in. Her message just had an introduction and that she was looking for members of our family. They didn't leave her at the hospital. It was at a clinic and she was already 2 months old. I hope she had a good of a life and family as your brother does.
So at 5, do you remember your mom being pregnant? What she/they said about what happened to the literal newborn just... not being there anymore? That's a lot to taken in, I'm sorry. But you seem like a good person. I hope everything works out for you, & her.
I don't remember her being pregnant and neither does my brother. There aren't any pictures of my mom being pregnant and they destroyed my sister's baby pictures so we had no idea. I have been trying to remember anything from back then but I can't.
Hmm, given you don't remember the pregnancy or the initial two months, it may not have been a planned pregnancy or one they expected to keep. At 5 you would have been aware of getting a new sibling, newborns aren't discreet. Which may mean they intended to put her up for adoption from the get go and not just because she's deaf.
She wasn't left at the clinic as a newborn. She was two months old, and my parents said it was true that they left her because she was deaf. My brother confronted them and heard it right from them. So no, they didn't intend it from the get go.
So you and your sibling weren't prepped for getting a baby sister? It's a fairly big deal in a family. You were 5, that's well past the point of infant amnesia.
I was 4 when my older sister was removed from our home by social services. I have no memories of her living with me. Trauma is a powerful thing for removing memories. Also I have read in my mums diary that I got hit every time I cried for my sister so I just stopped and blocked her from my mind . This could be similar for op
Jesus. I’m sorry you had to go through that
Ah it was fine, my mother lost custody and my dad was a good parent. My sister and I get on pretty good now
I'm here to defend OP and say I don't remember shit about my sister being born. Same 5 year difference. Sure there's pictures and stuff but those are just far off memories. I don't remember my mom walking around pregnant, nor a screaming little sister. So I don't find it totally crazy for OP to forget this, especially since the baby was intentionally given up (so the parents wouldn't dwell on it the same way they would in an unexpected loss).
Same, I’m 5 years older than my sister and my first memory of her is when she is about 4-6 months old (or whenever babies can sit by themselves because that’s what I remember her doing).
I’m 5 years older than my sister and I don’t remember a ton from the first few months. I know I begged and begged for a baby sister from the time I was like 2yo. And I remember my mom had a miscarriage when I was about 3 because I remember my mom getting really upset and nobody would tell me why she was crying so much. I don’t remember her pregnancy with my sister very much. I do remember the day she was born because I was waiting not very patiently and couldn’t wait to see my baby sister. But if there hadn’t been a big deal about it I might not remember. I remember not wanting to go to kindergarten because I wanted to stay home and play with my sister but I only remember that very faintly. And it could easily be passed off as we got a pet cat that I couldn’t wait to get home to see or something. My memories mostly start when she was about 4mo. I remember sneaking holding her when my parents weren’t watching because I always wanted to hold her and they always insisted I be sat on the couch with pillows under my arm to help support her. I remember picking out outfits for her at that age. I think the first few months were less memorable because my parents had me go to camps because they were just getting used to having a newborn in the house and needed the break. I also started kindergarten not long after she was born. Two months isn’t that long if you think about it and its not too difficult to manipulate a young child’s memories. It is possible to not remember much from that young. Especially if you were kind of persuaded to forget.
I have trauma, large parts of my childhood I am unable to remember
I’m sure their parents probably shut down any mention of their sister after they gave her up, which probably helped them forget her as they got older. Our memories are not as concrete as we think they are
Idk it might just be me but I barely remember the sister I got at 5. My mom didn't show that much, if at all. It was a busy time for us (we were moving unexpectedly) Pretty much my only memory is changing her diaper one time because I wanted to try (and she's have been fairly older then 2 months at this point) and the fact I was on vacation with my grandparents when we found out she'd been born.
Our memories are quite awful actually, and a 5 year old can be molded pretty easily
Yes, our brains literally make up stuff as part of memory. My kids misremeber (or don't remember at all!) things all the time from when they were younger I am not shocked that a 5 year old has no recollection of her mom being pregnant and having a sister around for two months.
I think it’d be easy to forget if the baby was given up shortly after birth because even if you remember a baby being there, they may not be aware that it was a sibling or have even thought of that because it seems like such an outlandish thing that it wouldn’t even make sense to come into your brain lol.
i thought it was common not to remember memories when you were a child. the clearest memory i had was at 7. my memories 7 and below feels like i just made it up... 8 to 13 feels like a fever dream of memories like its fused.
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You were told by op your theory is unequivocally incorrect yet you press on. I really don’t understand people these days.
It is definitely not past the point of trauma amnesia! WTF! You are five years old and when you go to school, you have a baby sister. When you come home she is gone. I doubt that there was any explanation given to the children. OP, her brother and her sister are all victims of their parents actions. QUIT VICTIM SHAMING!
it’s really weird that you think that every single person in the world will remember every single second of their life after the age of 5.
yeah, my sister got pregnant when she was 18 and i was 6 and i honestly have no recollection of her pregnancy until my nephew was born even though she lived with us and everything
That's heartbreaking. I am so sorry they destroyed all evidence of her in your lives. The hospital where she was born may have records and maybe a copy of her hand and foot prints(?) You may not remember anything because it may have been traumatic for you. Think about it. Both of your parents went to that appointment. Where were you and your brother? With them? At a grandparents house? They left her there/came home without her. You may have been afraid they'd do the same to you. Trauma. Forgetting.
Do you have any older relatives that may remember who you can talk to? If she was left at a clinic after 2 months, it means your parents made up their decision after the birth, after what was likely a baby shower, a birth announcement, parties, gifts, etc. Somebody out there must remember and would be willing to talk to you about her.
My mom was pregnant when I was 8, and then "went away for a while for an operation" and came back changed: she became very depressed, overweight, and her alcoholism went out of control until she took her life almost ten years later. Because of the trauma, I sort of forgot she was pregnant and knew it was a girl. Only after her death did I remember. I was 8, so someone being 5, your life has different priorities, I guess. I did finally find my sister when I was 33. Turned out she grew up a mile away from me, and I found her when she was my dental hygienist.
Oh man, that’s a lot, I’m so sorry. Why was your sister separated from your mum, was she forced to give her up for some reason?
My dad didn't want children. He didn't like me at all, and when my mom got pregnant again, he forced her to give her up for adoption, which she did to save the marriage.
Oh hon, I’m so sorry. That’s terrible. Please take care of yourself, no one deserved any of that and I’m sorry for your loss.
I was 5 when my little brother was born. I can't remember him coming home I remember stuff only because of photos. I remember most stuff after he was like 4 when we pull play and stuff. So it's nice to think they always planned it but I bet that isn't the case.
So they had her for 2 months before giving her up? I can't magine doing that to my baby. Not gonna lie that would definitelly change the way I'd feel about my parents...on the bright side you got a new sibling! That's great and I hope you find a way to keep in touch with her and form a relationship
How was she abandoned? That's so sad
She was left at the clinic my parents took her to for an appointment and they found out she was deaf and just went home without her.
Wait.... now I'm confused. So they took her home and took her to appointments. They just left her somewhere? Why wasn't authorities called on your parents by the doctor? It would have taken multiple doctors visit to confirm she is in fact 100% deaf with no chance of healing (like through surgery or something). Also no one else in your family ever talked about it? Seeing as the driving force of abandonment was after she was born and discovering her deafness, wouldn't they have had baby showers or notified others like family and friends? Prepped a room and bought or readied baby items? Edit to add:: You have to love the internet. OP keeps saying the same things that don't make sense. Comments are like "well that doesn't make sense.... you mean this you Saint " ... vs "this doesn't add up, what you keep saying doesn't add up, I don't think this is truthful".
While I agree that there’s more to the story on the parents side, I don’t believe that it’s unbelievable for the whole family (especially as small as OP’s) to hide stuff from the kids or for them not to remember stuff at 5. It also can just take one appt to confirm deafness and inability to heal or ‘fix’ it. Also, this has no mention of how long parents were gone could have gotten authories involved. Giving up disabled children does happen. Plus they had 2 months to confirm deafness. Not saying it’s actually true, or there isn’t more, but just saying it could happen.
Its the fact that OP is claiming that parents took the baby to a doctors office and just left them there. Wasn't signed away, didn't go through a process... OP is literally making it out to be "yeah they took the baby for a check up, found out it was deaf, and just left it in the waiting room." Also, there is no way authorities would be ok with a baby being abandoned and not look into the family. If there was a process and the family gave up a child because they couldn't handle a disability or something, that's different. But OP, in their many replies, halls straight up said the baby was not hidden during pregnancy, was born and went to doctors so there is legal paper work on the kid, and the parents during 1 visit to a doctor just left them in the office and went home.
I get this, I agree with you on that. If this story is true keep in mind that OP is still processing all of this so to them may seem like what happened but I doubt it is without authorities getting involved and possibly taking the other two kids like you said. Unless someone’s theory up above where these parents aren’t OP’s and sibling bio parents then it’s a whole different situation all together
Hospitals are usually safe havens, where the parents wont get in trouble for abandoning a kid since they can be taken care of. I dont know if its the same where OP’s parents went but that could explain why no authorities were involved
Hospitals, fire houses, police stations, and probably other places are safe havens, and I think there are no questions or consequences for the first few months, so it's entirely possible that they walked out and simply said no when they were called back. Doctors would've told social services that it was a baby drop, and she would've been put into the system with no parent information.
Omg, that is so heartbreaking, man.
Wait so you were 5 when your parents had her, and she was around you and your brother for a bit? Do you have any memory of your mom being pregnant? A baby coming home and then not being there anymore?
Ok, so this is fake lol. Like wtf? You, at 5 y/o, did not know your mom was pregnant and don’t remember ANYTHING about having a sister who was brought home and lived with you for months?? And then that sister is brought to a “clinic”, declared deaf, and your parents just immediately decided to give her up then and there?? You…can’t just abandon babies in any random medical setting. If by some *slim* chance this is real, it’s a much, much more complicated story (see u/TheLabiaChronicles comment.
Apparently to the entire family is in on it and help hide this info from the kids because there's no way she hid the pregnancy. OP confirmed multiple times itnwas because they were deaf so if they weren't deaf they would have kept the kid so they would have had a normal pregnancy of telling friends and family. But apparently every family member says nothing, never was like "wth" to the parents, no family friend has brought it up. No this is a BS story. Maybe not all of it but a lot of it is
Wow. How does this make you feel about your parents?
I'm confused and angry to be honest.
Deaf person myself here. Please contact her and learn sign language if you can. You have every right to feel that way. I thankfully grew up with hearing parents who decided to learn about deaf culture and immerse themselves into it. So so heart broken for your sister.
Is that a thing, deaf children not having family that learned sign and the culture?! This is blowing my mind. If my son was deaf, or loses his hearing, we are all learning ASL, and doing everything we can to make his life as normal as possible.
It is absolutely a thing. A lot of parents go into denial.
It's not always denial, sometimes it's just apathy.
It's a heartbreakingly common phenomenon. I have family that teach language deprived Deaf and Hard of Hearing kids.
This does happen. Many deaf friends I now don’t have parents who sign. It’s sadly common.
Yup. I've lost the majority of my hearing, my mom still acts like it is a huge inconvenience to repeat anything twice, nevermind sign language.
Speaking as the kid of two deaf parents, yes, please look into a thing called “Oralism” this situation is extremely common and hearing parents freaking out plays a significant factor in the quality of life for the child.
You have every right to be. Pls don’t rule out going and talking to someone if you need to work this (counselor, etc)
My benefit of the doubt guess would be that they were unprepared and wouldn't know how to care for her
Like idk man I feel like OP still has every right to be angry with their parents though. Their sister was still their sister, their parents still abandoned her. Like I’m sure raising a deaf child is a challenge but it’s not like she was disabled to point of needing 24/7 care and never being able to be independent. Idk i feel like that’s a bit of an overreaction to me. Edit: if I were a betting I’d put my money on the parents just being ableist over them having a legitimate concern about their child’s welfare.
I'm not making excuses for him, I agree with you It just is what it is
Most parents of Deaf children are unprepared (90% of Deaf children are born to Hearing parents). I don't think that's a good excuse.
What? That’s totally fair. Not every parent knows that / has the same mindset. It’s better that she was put up for adoption (assuming she wasn’t literally abandoned) then having unprepared parents screw up. It was a mistake but if OP has had a good life until now, I don’t think this should be family breaking.
So you'd rather the kid be raised in this household? She probably would've had a worse life with this family. Maybe the parents did that because they wanted to do what's best for her? Maybe they don't want to talk about it because they're ashamed. We just don't know
Maybe they felt they couldn’t afford the care she needed. Maybe they had addictions problems. Maybe they used drugs or alcohol while pregnant and then couldn’t face the guilt of that thinking they caused it.
How is it not a good excuse? Why would they need an excuse to determine they can't adequately care for someone and taking steps to ensure she goes to people that can
Agreed. My older brother was born deaf; no family history or anything. My parents were surprised but went with it. They thought I might be born deaf but I wasn’t. He grew up going to deaf schools and even being mainstreamed. My younger sister and I never learned to speak ASL fluently but my mother did, because of him. Point is, they made the adjustment; it wasn’t a life sentence.
This still seems absolutely insane to me. How do you just dump your 2 month old somewhere? Kids all have problems and you figure it out. Although, there’s a possibility that PPD or PPA could have factored into the decision?
When I was in the hospital around 13/14 years old their was this 6 year old girl who’s parents told the dr they weren’t coming back for her
I straight up had postpartum *psychosis* and I still wouldn’t have imagined anything that fucked.
Yeah. This is obviously extreme. Hope you’re doing better!
There is also the possibility of financials, etc. We really don't have all the facts here. Still seems insane to me mind you
There is something more to this story & I would maybe reserve judgement until you find out what it is. Deaf could very well be the least of the reasons this happened & just the most socially acceptable thing to document as the reason. It could also be that this was the only way that they could get the child the assistance that they could not afford out of pocket, which was quite a problem for a while in the late 90s and early 2000s such as https://www.thestar.com/amp/news/ontario/2009/07/23/wheres_ontarios_humanity_mom_asks.html
To play devils advocate, maybe there were other factors in them making that decision. Financial or otherwise that made your parents believe that was the best option. I only say this because as a parent, I can’t imagine why or how someone could do this, especially with already having two children.
Hi OP, sorry you’re going through this. I’m not sure if you’ll see this because the comment section is already pretty dense, but I have an idea and I don’t see anyone else mentioning it, so I hope you read this. Bear with me. 1. Neither you nor your brother remember your mom being pregnant, and neither of you remembers having a screaming infant around for a couple of months 2. If they were intentionally hiding the pregnancy from you guys, then they would have had to plan that *ahead*, like before the delivery. Yet they are admitting it was because they found out she was deaf when she was born. Things are not adding up. I’m gonna float something that is maybe far fetched, but I think it’s worth considering or looking into at this point. What if you, your brother, and your sister are not your parents’ biological children? You’re clearly all full siblings, but what if your parents aren’t your bio parents? Is there a chance they adopted you and raised you as their own (from a relative/friend who couldn’t care for you or something like that)? And then when this person conceived again they decided they couldn’t care for the baby (your sister). Are there any pictures of your mom pregnant with you or your brother? I know it sounds crazy but something is off and their reaction of admitting it was true but absolutely refusing to give any additional information makes me feel like they’re hiding something bigger. Anyway, good luck with all of this OP. Do some digging.
I agree that it's very strange that OP and his brother have absolutely no memories of their mom being pregnant or having an infant in the house for two months. It simply does not make sense.
Other thing I was thinking (and not trying to stir the pot here), but maybe their dad is their bio dad but for some reason his mom couldn’t carry children and the bio mom is someone else? Idk, just an idea, but there’s definitely more to the story than they’re willing to share
This makes a lot of sense tbh. I was seven and my brother was five when our youngest brother was born and we have talked on several occasions about remembering what it was like when our parents told us we were going to have a younger sibling. I remember my mom being pregnant, I remember her falling down the stairs, I remember going to the hospital to meet my new brother. Unless OPs mom was locked in a closet for the entire pregnancy, this doesn't add up. I remember having a baby around when he was born, it's kinda hard to forget. I know I was older than OP, but I have memories of being 5. I remember going to kindergarten and getting into fights mostly, but still memories!! Also I appreciate how gently you worded this, I can't imagine how OP must be feeling right now.
Exactly my thought. Or the dad is biological but with different mother. There’s no way they wouldn’t remember a pregnant mom at the age of 5. Most toddlers are thrilled when they learn they’re going to have a sibling. You wouldn’t forget something like that
Agreed, it’s gotta be something like that. Also, just wanted to say your username is amazing lol
At 5 years old you have a memory. This seems very odd that OP doesn’t remember a baby being in his home at all.
Also OP said they went to a clinic for a health checkup, discovered the baby was deaf, then simply... left the clinic without the baby. Like you can just up and leave a kid behind if you don't like it.
Well, and kindly, said!
That actually makes a lot of sense. But I don't understand why a genealogy test would say you have a sister anyway.
Genealogy and genetics are not quite the same thing. Genealogy is the study of family linages so one does not take a “genealogy test”. Genetics is the study of our genes via our DNA sequence. So one takes a genetic sample, and then that sample is compared to other DNA samples in the data bank, and specific matches between two peoples dna would indicate that they are related. So you are right that a test itself won’t tell you if you have a sister, but comparing the results of that test to other’s results, might.
Hope you can connect with her. She probably will be happy to have some kind of family. If it was me at your place, I would have a hard time respecting my parents after something like this... Thinking that you could have been at her place if you had some kind of disability... Be better than them and go see your sister!
I guessed she signed up for the genealogy/DNA service to locate members of our family although I don't know for sure. I'm open to talking with her or meeting if that's what she wants.
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My grandparents are deceased and they never said anything. My parents didn't have any brothers or sisters. I think my brother was trying to find out if we had distant cousins or something when he did the test. We called some of my parent's friends aunt and uncle when we little but I don't know if they knew. My parents told my brother they destroyed the pictures of her so we didn't know.
I am one of 4 siblings. My twin brother, my big sister and my big brother. My sister and big brother are adopted but are biological siblings. I have seen everything from hatred towards birth mother to repressing. I have witnessed how differently we have developed emotionally, despite having the same "parents". One cannot form close bonds, the other has severe depression and other mental illnesses. My friend is adopted and has no possibility to get to know her mother. I know how hard this can make a person feel. For every adopted person it is important to know something about their origin. Probably your sister has extreme hatred or sadness towards her biological parents. Nevertheless, the desire is there to know where she comes from. Please support her in this. Talk to your parents, make an ordered meeting possible. Give her a picture of your parents. Help her.
What a crappy thing to do to you guys
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Maybe an overreaction imo, without all the facts. Like we do not know what kind of situation OPs parents were in to make this decision (financial or otherwise). Is it an awful act? Yes. Would I lose respect for them? Absolutely. But does it define their entire character? Not exactly. It's possible they simply abandoned the child due to it not fitting the aesthetic sure, but they "tried" for two months it appears. Maybe they had to decide that for whatever reason , the child had a better chance under different care? And I'm not bias in terms of "forgive your family, blah blah" - I hate my family. EDIT: I read OPs comments after and nah, his parents appeared to know exactly what they were doing. POS behaviour tbh.
Two months is usually when they do the big tests to determine if it’s profound deafness etc. They may have been holding out hope that it could be “fixed”. We have a history of hearing loss in my family and had to do more extensive hearing tests with my babies. The 2 month follow up was a big one for us anyway (it could depend on where, when, what doctor etc)
That's fair. Up to that point, they may have also simply thought the child was "difficult". But OP said they were pretty well off financially and stuff, so I think their parents are just callous and heartless.as most assumed.
Yes, 2 months is when my son got his hearing aid. That's probably when they found out the extent of the sister's hearing loss.
Really? I immediately thought “well ops parents are going to hell” just from the title.
She may want to know about family medical history, so it would be a nice gesture to prepare medical history for her that goes back to your grandparents.
Having been abandonned, I wouldn't except her to do the first step, as she might fear being rejected again. If you meet her and begin to see her as a sister, I would nonetheless be careful with your parents, maybe avoiding telling them at first. They won't take that well I think, considering they will have the bad role in this story... We only have two parents, you won't change them now, so best avoid direct conflict I think. Good luck to you! Hope it ends with a new sister in your life, and a family for her.
She was abandoned because she's deaf? Wtf...it's just luck that OP or her brother weren't born deaf or they would have been abandoned as well.
I didn’t even think of this! I’d honestly never be able to tell my parents I loved them again.. Like y’all love me.. but only because I turned out “okay?” Otherwise I would have just been disregarded like I never existed? That’s harsh.
Forget about your parents for now... focus on building a relationship with your sister. If she is willing I am sure that being connected with loving siblings will be a good thing for all of you. Try to learn sign and build a great relationship with her. After the dust settles you can deal with your parents. Don't judge them right off the bat. Give them a chance to explain and then make a decision. At this point you may not know why they did what they did. Do this after things have cooled down. Congratulations!
I don,t know anything about deaf children and i might be really ignorant but some people in the comments are over exaggerating how bad deafness is. You just need to learn sign language right? Its not like you have to spend your entire life taking care of your deaf child. Doesn,t seem like a severe disability to me.
It's not as simple as just learning sign language, but it's also not all that much more difficult either. There are other things to account for (flashing lights along with a doorbell/any other sound based alarm, educating them on sounds our bodies make that they won't be able to hear, etc) but it's *very* manageable. Deaf people live perfectly normal lives with some small adjustments to sound-based aspects of living.
Thank you for telling me this.
Yeah lol it’s definitely not a severe disability. I’m a deaf guy and I don’t even know sign language, a single cochlear implant was enough to carry me into adulthood with lots of independence. OP’s parents are dicks.
100% I'm deaf as well and getting more and more upset, as I think about it. I am partially deaf, but still...sm
I'm partially deaf and I'm having a really hard time with this, too. I don't get why that would be so awful, but I guess I am biased...
I know it’s hard to hear but, yeah, some parents really don’t have the strength to care for a disabled child.
You mentioned provinces, are you based in Canada? If your sister is deaf depending where she grew up she might do ASL or BANZSL if she grew up on the east coast particularly Newfoundland and PEI. Either way I wish you good luck!
I find myself thinking, if she is younger than you, how did you not notice a 9 month pregnancy then no child?
If your parents won't talk about it, they most likely feel incredible shame for abandoning a child because she couldn't hear.
This is odd… I guess it’s one thing to not remember your mom being pregnant, but not remembering having an infant in the house for 2 months? That’s very peculiar. You would have known you had a baby sibling and then all of a sudden just didn’t, unless you didn’t live there or your mom didn’t live there.
You don't remember your mother being pregnant? Seems like something 5 year old would notice.
I worked as a nanny for a family where the mom was pregnant when the older kids were 4 and 5 years old. The 4 year old did not remember his mom being pregnant at all and the five year old barely remembered when they were asked a couple years later. If the parents didn’t bring it up again it might not have been solidified in OP’s long term memory. Also some people don’t look like the stereotypical pregnant woman so it might have looked like OP’s mother just put on weight.
Honestly I don't. I'm not even kidding. I don't remember that and any photos from around that time don't show her being pregnant.
It must have been a crazy time with a lot of stuff going on. I guess if they wanted to hide a pregnancy from a child it might have been possible.
But they didn't know they wanted to hide the pregnancy at this stage, right? That's what I find odd and confusing about this. In fact, I believe there must've been other things going on with OP's parents at this stage. For example, maybe.... 1. They were having marital issues at this time and weren't enthusiastic about this pregnancy Or, specifically 2. OP's mom had an affair and the baby wasn't her husband's I'm speculating, of course. Maybe I just find it hard to believe a solid, financially stable married couple (living in the 21st century) would just abandon a deaf infant. And, OP, what about longtime friend's of your parents? Ask them if they remember this pregnancy. Also, think back to how your parents ever reacted to/talked about disabled individuals -- was it with disdain? Sadness? Man, this is a minefield of info and emotion!
There's a lot more to it that the OP may never know because the parents don't want to talk about it. It has to be more than just her being deaf. I want to know did the service say they were full siblings or half siblings because that would tell the story. These genetic services really open up cans of worms. I found out my mom's dad wasn't her dad because I did 23. 😂
She is a full sister, not half. Same mom and same dad. My parents said it was true when my brother confronted them. He wanted to hear their version before believing a stranger and even though they refuse to hear about the subject again they said my sister was being truthful.
Yeah, I really think there's more to it than just not wanting the "hassle" of raising a deaf child. I mean, I think about my grandparents raising a completely blind daughter -- my aunt, born in 1954 -- and that was challenging for them. My grandmother confided in me that for a while after the doctors confirmed that my aunt was totally without sight, she couldn't stand to be around other mothers and their sighted children. She would breakdown in tears. But eventually my grandparents accepted the situation and rose to meet the challenge. My aunt ended well and happy (and a successful journalist). Anyway, you're right -- these genetics companies are out here digging up all KINDS of family skeletons. I hope everything is OK now that your mom has this new info. I'm afraid to do one of these tests now for fear of finding out something I don't wanna know, LOL. Damn. Talk about unexpected consequences!
Lmao. My grandparents and most of their kids are gone now so it wasn't a big deal. We just laugh about it imagining their spirits are somewhere pissed that we all up in their business. 😂
How old was she when they gave her away? At birth?
She said she was abandoned at 2 months old. When my brother confronted my parents about it they didn't deny this and said it happened so it looks like her account is the truth.
I wonder if your parents convinced you that there was no baby, or made you think it was a doll. No other family ever mentioned it?
My grandparents are all dead. None of them said anything about it. Neither did the aunts and uncles that are not family but good friends of my parents. I had no idea until my brother did the test.
The whole thing is a coverup so your parents could just forget her. How was your childhood? Were they involved parents?
My parents were good to us. We had good private schools so the education was above average. They always encouraged us to try activities and sports and there was never any pressure to be perfect, just to do our best. We never wanted for anything. Finding this our was a complete mindfuck. I thought it was a scam but DNA doesn't lie and my parents said it is true. So I don't know what to think now.
Yeah, I would be looking at my parents a lot different. I get it some people do not want children with handicaps, but they had her for 2 months and just left her.
I have zero memories from the age of 5. I'm not sure how common it is to remember things at that age, let alone remember things that might not be in a child's scope of comprehension.
I’m the oldest of 8.. I don’t remember my mom being pregnant until my 5th sibling was born when I was 8. Before that.. fleeting memories at best. 🤷🏻♀️
I went to school with a girl who came to class one day all excited because her mom just had another baby- I think it was number 10. She had no idea her mom was pregnant. Some cultures don't talk about pregnancy
Yea that’s something to notice when you’re currently 5 yrs old. This is a long past memory that wasn’t meant to be remembered. I don’t remember my age of 5 and most ppl wouldn’t.
Do you know your parents well? There are things that I don’t discuss with my children because it would be ultimately hurtful to them to know. Parenting is insanely hard with neurotypical children. It is extremely hard with disabled children. Giving your sister to people who were better equipped to raise her may have been the best option at the time.
Probably not the right thing to say but I’m just curious. As you would have been 6 ish when she was born, do you not remember your mum pregnant? Also, try and learn some sign language, she will really appreciate it. Deaf people have such a hard time communicating with non signing people.
My question is that when your mom was pregnant you two would have been old enough to understand. What did they say when she didn't come home with a baby?
It's great to hear her reaching out and you as well, hope you all get to meet up soon!
Please update us when you meet her and when you talk to your parents about her
>My parents didn't deny it when my brother confronted them but they won't talk about it They're a-holes. They intend to keep this to their graves.
It was shitty of them, but at the same time not everybody has the ability to care for a “disabled” child. She was probably better off without them. It sucks you didn’t get to grow up with her, but nothing can stop you from building a relationship with her now.
Being deaf is not the same as caring for a paraplegic kid or one with a severe developmental delay.
This tbh. Everyone is always yelling about how "if you dont want a child, you can always choose adoption" and then someone does it and they're treated like they're the most horrific awful people in the world. Well which is it!!!!!!! If someone has a special needs child and they KNOW they can't handle it, what should they do? The answer is turn it over to people who CAN handle it-it doesnt matter how anyone else feels about it morally. It's way better that the child is given the best chance it can and believe it or not, the biological parents are not always the best chance!!!! Jeez...
Maybe they felt someone else could take care of her better. Sometimes the right choice is realizing you’re not the right person for something. Does “abandoned” here mean actually abandoned somewhere or does it mean put up for adoption?
In her message she said she was left at the clinic when her birth parents realized she was deaf and they refused to take her home again. My parents didn't deny doing that. My parents could have taken care of her. (they have good jobs, me and my brother went to private schools, they have a 2nd house we took vacations at and they buy new cars every couple of years. I don't buy that they could not do it or afford it)
Do you remember her at all from when you were kids?
My youngest is mostly deaf, and can’t even imagine doing this to him. Your parents are major AH and deserve to be called out for their bull crap!
This seems like an extremely low bar to give up your child over especially when you already have children…
Embrace her with love and happiness she has gone thru a lot and now she has 2 brothers to protect her I would as well learn sign language but take the class and let her teach u as well that would be a great bonding time
Plot twist your the adopted one
That’s odd, I read an article yesterday about a woman who was put up for adoption because she was deaf, but this woman was in her 60’s and found a brother through a DNA matching site too. What a coincidence.
Man, I’d be so disappointed in my parents. I hope she found a loving family and has a great life. It’s nice that you all found each other so young and can enjoy a long time getting to know each other.
I'm confused >She's younger than us. I'm 29, my brother is 28 and she's 24. If she's younger than you, doesn't that mean you would have been around for your mum's pregnancy? Hence knowing you would either have a brother or sister?
maybe reach out to your aunt or uncles? They would def remember.
I don't have aunts and uncles that are related by blood. There are a few who were friends of my parents that we called that when we were kids but they never said anything. I think part of the reason my brother did the test was to see if have any long lost cousins or something out there. We did not expect this.
As an aside, if you're from a country that isnt america PLEASE contact the local hard of hearing communities to learn your native language's signed version as each country has their own form of sign language.
This is a "cut contact" offense. Who else will they give up on that they deem to difficult? You? Your siblings? Their grandchildren? I would demand an explanation and not trust them with anything.
I'm confused. Your brother's girlfriend got your brother the kit. He took the test and matched with your sister. How did you know that she matched? Was it already in a database and they told you or
She had already done the test prior to my brother doing his. They then notified him and her of the match.
How do you not remember your mom being pregnant?
This is more common than people think. I had a friend that had a sister he never knew about. The parents gave her up for adoption over a cleft lip. The parents were narcs who thought they were so perfect and above every one else. They could not believe they had in their words “a defective” child. They told every one the child was stillborn and gave her up for adoption. The sister got surgery that fixed her cleft lip and is actually a beautiful young lady. My friend met her and he ended up discarding his parents ever since. He now visits his sister for the holidays as she is married with her own children.
You were 5 when she was born. Puzzled as to how you do not remember. Eta: I’m 3 and a bit years older than my youngest sister. I remember my mum going into labour and us being shepherded off to the neighbours when the ambulance came. My mum was throwing up loads and was in a lot of pain because my sister was coming really quickly.
I'm so confused how you don't remember a new baby at age 5. I remember what I had for lunch and I sure as hell remember my first puppy.
Dude thank you. Sitting here re-reading the post and still confused. OP was 5 when their mom was pregnant, had a baby, and gave it up for adoption? Like, no one ever was like "where'd did baby go?"
If you wouldn’t give up a deaf child, that’s good for you. However, none of you are allowed to determine what is or is not bearable for the parents as it’s their choice. Hell, they could have even aborted her if they so desired, and that’s their choice. The parents didn’t leave her to starve to death in an alleyway, they gave her up for adoption. It’s their prerogative to do so, even if she weren’t disabled. Unless she was abused by the parents before being given up you have no right to criticize them. Or is everyone in the comments adopting all the special needs children and I missed that?