Rape/Incest & Adopted Child: Doubting the Story

For the past several days, I have been discussing how to handle talking with an adopted child who was conceived through rape or incest. Several readers have contacted me with questions that I did not cover in this series, and I am working my way through answering those questions.

One reader asked the following question:

How [do you] deal with the fact that we can’t know with absolute certainty the “true” story of what happened to our daughter’s birth mother? . . . We are pretty sure the story she told us is accurate, but we do have a slight tidbit of doubt. How do we deal with this part of the issue? We don’t want to tell our daughter that her birth mother was raped only to have her birth mother tell her a different story down the line . . . but we also don’t want to give our daughter the impression we don’t believe her birth mom as we think that rape victims should be believed and don’t want to send our daughter the wrong message.

I believe you need to share the history that you were told because that is all of the information that you have. If your child’s birthmother later reveals that, for whatever reason, she lied about the rape, then you can honestly tell your child that you passed along the information that you were given when you adopted her. You can honestly say that you never lied to her, and you would never have shared this information if you had known it was not true.

You raise an important point about not wanting to send your daughter the wrong message about either her birthmother or about rape victims in general. The vast majority of women do not lie about being raped. Yes, there are exceptions to this rule, and those who lie make things so much harder for those of us who tell the truth.

I have been raped, so I know how hard it is to push through the shame and tell my story to others. Being raped is a tremendously painful experience, both physically and emotionally, and the experience is even harder when you fear that other people will not believe that this happened to you. Even though you are the victim, you feel an enormous amount of shame, and you believe that other people will reject you.

Because of this, it is so important that you send the message that you will always believe your child because you want her to come to you if she is ever raped. If you tell her that her birthmother may or may not have been raped, your daughter could apply this doubt to her own situation. If she is ever raped, she could think that you are not safe to approach because if you did not fully believe her birthmother, then your might not believe her, either. Even in the best of circumstances, it is extremely hard for a child to share this information with her parents. You do not want to erect any potential barriers if they can be avoided.

Related Topics:

• Adopted Child Conceived by Rape/Incest Series
• Rape/Incest & Adopted Child: Reasons to Tell
• Rape/Incest & Adopted Child: Issues to Consider if you Tell

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