Facebook

justjinny · March 2014

I'm just wondering if anyone would be willing to share their "rules" for Facebook & social media.

I'm a pretty private person and don't share much online, so it's hard for me to understand my friend's and family member's need to put everything out there on Facebook. How do you handle managing your family/friends online if they post about your kids/adoption related stuff?

Our agency recently gave us the ok to take/share photos, so I told my family they could post on Facebook now if they wanted. Seriously within an hour there were like 100 photos of LO across everyone's profiles and a ton of comments/likes from people I don't know. I was unprepared for seeing that many photos put up online, most of which I took and many that didn't even include the people in them who were posting. It seemed odd that people would post photos they weren't in, make up entire albums of photos they didn't take, and also not tag me on photos of my kid... What's your opinion on people posting photos of your kid? Do you ask your family to tag you or limit the photos they share?

What I was really unprepared for were some of the inappropriate comments people made. Mostly it was just poor word choices like "he's all your's now!" or "he looks like he fits right in". I REALLY don't want any of his birth family to come across my page and see questionable comments like this. I don't want to perpetuate poor word choices but I also don't want to have to constantly monitor this and be a nag about using correct adoption language. I was thinking of posting a link to something that explained correct word choice, but don't know if it's too much. Do you just let it slide? Do you have any good links to share that might be helpful for family?

Sometimes I think life was easier without the internet!

Dr.Loretta · March 2014

I'm probably not much help, because my family's attitude isn't like that at all. My mom makes a point of only sharing pictures we send her of her grandkids, very rarely, and never identifies the grandkids by name (only by first initial, if that). The pictures are innocuous, so I don't mind if people comment, and no one I know would dream of commenting about DD in an adoption-related manner.

MIL is a Luddite, so she's not even on FB, LOL.

If I were you, I'd have a talk with your parents/family about it, and see what they have to say. They may just be really excited to share pictures of their new relative, and it may die down with time. They may not realize that this is bothering you, and having a conversation may clear the air.

MileHighMaam · March 2014

My family is pretty good about not sharing information that isn't theirs to share. When we all first started using FB I was in the process of transferring jobs and told all of my friends and family that knew not to say anything on my blog or on FB until they saw that I had said something. This set a precedent for future major events. They know that if I post something to FB it is fine for them to comment or say something but not before. I chose to share my feelings about our adoption process via my blog instead of via FB.

lorifromwi · March 2014

Where I live there are very, very specific rules on posting on FB. While we are allowed to post pictures of LO, we are not allowed to have any mention of their foster status. If a SW would see something of that nature posted, we could lose the kiddos. This policy was mentioned in our first (of eight) homestudies...so I'm assuming they take it very seriously. It's worth some follow-up questions to your agency just to be sure you're meeting their expectations.

CarolinaGirl2014 · March 2014

No experience in where you are, but I can say as a birthmom that if I ran across pictures with comments like that on FB it would be painful. Maybe you could simply use that as your avenue to talk with your family- maybe suggest they limit pictures they post if it bothers you and recommend they also share a link about positive language? In my experience, adoption is so foreign to most people they mean no harm but something like that would never cross their minds on their own. Social media is such a hard thing to navigate- good luck!

Also, could you share your links for positive adoption language? I've often wondered if I'm using incorrect terminology but when I googled it I came up with stuff that was really insulting to birth families and not at all what I've seen here- kind of had me seeing red at the level of insensitivity and that old thought process that birth family is no longer relevant or matters.

MileHighMaam · March 2014

This is what I found for positive adoption language and actually this was part of the basis for my blog post yesterday. https://www.adoptivefamilies.com/pdf/PositiveLanguage.pdf it doesn't seem insulting to birth families but if any is I would be interested in hearing that.

justjinny · March 2014

I actually do think my family's been pretty good so far, since they did wait until I told them it was ok to post anything about the adoption. They had 4+ months of excitement stored up, so I can understand the massive picture dump that went on. My sister incorrectly posted that "everything was final", and when I sent her an email about it she went right away and changed her post. So I don't in any way think my family is out of line, I'm just trying to figure out what others are doing to keep some control over what's out online forever!

The people who made comments I didn't like were all more distant relatives/friends who haven't been very connected to the process. Thanks for sharing the link to the Adoptive Families language - it seems very close to what our agency has shared with us, so I would also be interested in hearing what birthparents and adoptees think of it.

I really don't want LO's birthmom to be hurt by anything that was just left off-hand on my page. Maybe I could just bring it up next time we're together and explain that some family/friends don't yet get it? We're not Facebook friends, so who knows if she's even looked me up?

I'd be curious to know if anyone stays connected to their birth/adoptive families through Facebook and how that works for them.

Dr.Loretta · March 2014

We don't stay connected through FB. I have FB stalked DD's birth family, but they don't post much. We started e-mailing last year, and we set up a blog for them from the start, so connecting through FB isn't a priority.

[Deleted User] · March 2014

The user and all related content has been deleted.

plus12012 · March 2014

My In-Laws constantly post pics. of DD. I've just decided to be happy that they have fully embraced her into the family. Adoption was a completely new concept to them.

hansa11 · March 2014

We post pictures of our (bio) kids on Facebook and friends and family are good about either asking us if they can post pictures (like if my kid happens to be posing with their kid in a picture) and/or tagging us in pictures. We don't have a problem with that when the pictures are appropriate. Facebook is the easiest way for us to share what's going on in our lives.

We're adopting internationally, so the issues are a little different since I'm not worried about birth family members being hurt by a comment they see. As for inappropriate/stupid comments, I plan on deleting those. I've done it for non-adoption-related comments.

hey_its_jenn · March 2014

I have been thinking about this ever since your post and I think I want to set up a private-ish blog to post pictures and share the links with family, friends and the Bfamily. Perhaps a Tumblr. I'm not sure. But something to limit the pictures posted on FB.

CarolinaGirl2014 · March 2014

@milehighmaam thanks for sharing! I've seen that but wasn't sure if there was anything out there more extensive, not that it's really needed. Sometimes when I have a rough day little things offend me, like the notion that I can't call A's mom her adoptive mom. But I realize that list is for the general public and not the birthmom, and while no one would ever fault me (I hope) for calling her mom her adoptive mom when I need to I'd surely hope no one else would call her anything but her mom.

@justjinny love that you're being considerate. Personally, that would mean a lot to me that A's mom thought to warn me about that. As PP's said, you could always delete any comment you don't like since your family is respectiful.

maryoosa · March 2014

Ah. Social Media. I love to hate it. And I can't live without it. I start to get twitchy without my computer or phone for more than like 2 hours. So--- we shared really vague things before our son was born- mainly sharing that we were matched with an EM and we hoped that we'd be able to bring her child home as our son but that wasn't a guarantee. After he was born, we didn't post any pictures until TPR was signed. Then, we didn't post any other pics in public forums until the revocation period ended 30 days later. Now, we post pictures but we've luckily not had any offensive comments. Also, although we are very close to his birth family, we are not friends with any of them on facebook- even though we text and see each other regularly. I'm fairly sure that his birth parent posts pictures of him on FB and that's fine. He's her flesh and blood afterall. And we post pics of him too. We would never post pics of him with his birth fam without their permission. And we ask that anyone who posts a picture of him tag us in it so we know it's posted

justjinny · March 2014

Thanks for sharing. It seems like the photos & posts with my LO have really died down, so I'm guessing it was just all the pent up energy that caused the initial Facebook dump! I don't really have a problem with a few pictures posted here and there, and I am definitely taking advice on deleting any uncomfortable comments here on out.

I ended up not bringing up the whole Facebook subject at our last meeting with BM. It felt forced to bring it up, and I like that we both can go about our own business on Facebook right now. BM posted a bunch of really cute photos from our visit last week, which I am cool with and like to see the comments her friends and family leave.

We've been mostly just sharing photos up until this point through Google Docs with both our family and BM. It's worked well to keep two separate folders to share so we're not sending photos with BM to our family or vice versa. We can also put up short video clips which people like. I think we'll keep with using this primarily.

erinmc1 · March 2014

My MIL shares my photos and albums that I post of J willy nilly. And my FIL is not such a huge fan of mine, so he isn't even my friend, but has photos of my son that I took, and had posted on my page, on his page (I'm assuming he snagged them from my MIL), which I can't even see (I only know this because my husband IS his friend). Social media is very murky water. And yes, it does bother me somewhat that there are people posting that I don't know, and potentially sharing photos of him beyond my scope of knowledge.

On the other hand, like a PP said, I'm really glad that they've fully embraced J as their grandson, and are so proud of him, and they never mention the adoption aspect in any form.

My parents are totally anti-facebook and don't see any reason they should ever get it, so on their end it's a non-issue.

Want a personalized experience?

Facebook

Re: Facebook

Choose Another Board

Search Boards