Adopted Daughter Left Us for Her Rich Birth Parents & Then Showed Up at My Husband's Funeral With...

Adopted daughter left us for her rich birth parents and then showed up at my husband's funeral with a lawyer, demanding inheritance after eight years of no contact. Hello, Reddit. I recently lost my husband, and our ex-adoptive daughter showed up at the funeral to throw a tantrum.

So, I said and did some things that I'm going to talk about in a while. But before that, let me give you guys some context about our family so you can make a judgment. I, 47F, and my husband, 47M, had been together since we were in high school.

We got married when I was 21, and at 25, we decided to start trying for a baby. Unfortunately, as it turned out, both of us were struggling with infertility issues, and after almost two years of trying, we decided to adopt. We could have tried IVF, but we decided to adopt on purpose because we wanted to do something good for the world.

We decided to adopt through the foster care system because we knew that there are many abandoned kids who could do so much better in life if they had the right kind of care and attention. That's how we first met Elena, our daughter. She was four years old when we started fostering her since she had ended up in the foster care system because her biological parents were addicts, and she did not have any other family members willing to take her in.

At five years of age, she was legally adopted by us after one year of fostering her, since her birth parents decided to give up their rights because they didn't think that they would ever be up to the task of raising a daughter, and believed that she would be better off with us. We had a closed adoption, which meant that they wouldn't have any contact with Elena after she was adopted by us, and they honored that agreement until she turned 18. I still find it hard to talk about, but when she turned 18, they decided to reach out to her and asked her to come stay with them because they had finally cleaned up their act and really wanted her to give them a chance.

Even though my husband and I had been her parents for most of her life, she decided to abandon us so she could stay with her biological parents. All of this had happened behind our back, and by the time she had made the decision to leave us, it was too late for us to fix it. Besides, I had kind of figured out exactly why she wanted to be with her biological parents and not us—it was because they were loaded and we were not.

There's just no other way to say it. I guess they had genuinely turned their lives around and had gone from being addicts who couldn't even afford rent to a really influential business family. From what I know, Elena also had two biological siblings: a brother who was six years younger than her and a sister who was eight years younger.

It's great that they had turned their lives around, but it did not prove to be so great for us because Elena decided to choose them over us, and it really broke our hearts. I don't think either of us was ever able to move on from that—neither my husband nor I. We just made our peace with it, but that's just because we had no other option.

Elena was 18 when she left, a legal adult, so we couldn't try to bring her back. So we just had to let her go. But then, the more we thought about it, the less surprising it seemed because right from when she was really young, Elena had always been quite materialistic.

It wasn't really a thing when she was too young, but by the time she hit middle school, we could see that she liked the good things in life. We didn't have a problem with it; my husband and I, luckily, have never struggled with money and have had a comfortable life. But as she grew older, her demands grew more outrageous, and we had to start trying to discipline her because her expectations were really unrealistic.

We were comfortable, yes, but we were not the kind of family who could just take time off from work whenever we wanted to just go on vacation. We were not the kind of parents who could afford long trips to exotic locations or the kind of parents who could give her an exorbitant amount of pocket money so she could blow it all on clubs and parties. By the time she was 16, we were already having a lot of trouble dealing with her and were at our wit's end trying to keep her under control, because we didn't want her to become irresponsible and careless.

But that's the way she was going, and then the situation got worse when, around her 18th birthday, she was contacted by her parents. They decided to write her an email telling her everything about themselves. A few years after she had been given up for adoption, they decided to clean up their act because it was a wake-up call for them—the fact that they literally had to give up their baby because they couldn't take care of her.

Their families had cut them off, so their friends and a couple of well-wishers arranged for them to start again. It was really difficult for them in the beginning because they were not exactly ideal candidates for any job, but they managed to turn it around. By the time they were pregnant with their second child, both of them had stable jobs and a decent income, and around the time that their third child was on the way, they had.

. . started their own business dealing in kitchen supplies.

With time, they just kept growing, and finally, 14 years after they had given her up for adoption, they decided to reach out to her on her 18th birthday to tell her that they wanted her back in their lives and give their family a shot again. They had thought about it a lot and were not sure if it would be the right move to make because they didn't want to disrupt her life as it was. They also had to think about the fact that theirs was a closed adoption, and they were legally not allowed to get in touch with her without her consent unless she tried to seek them out and reach out to them first.

However, they couldn't wait for that to happen, so they had to pull a lot of strings to find out more about Elena just so they could speak to her. The sad part was that instead of telling us about the email, Elena decided to start meeting them behind our backs and began to build a relationship with her biological parents without us knowing. That’s how she was able to find out how rich they were.

In the four months after her birthday, she decided that she was going to move in with them and try to become a part of their family. I still remember it as clearly as if it was yesterday—the day that she decided to tell me and my husband that she had made up her mind that she was going to go back to her birth family and give them a chance. I distinctly remember how shocked we were when she made us read that email she had been sent by them on her birthday, because we had never seen this coming, and she had completely chosen to ignore our shock and disappointment.

She told us that she had been spending a lot of time with them while she had been telling us that she was going out with her friends, and she had realized that they were a better fit for her than we were. There was a reason that she had been originally born into their family and not ours, so now she would like to fix that. She told us never to contact her again because she wanted to give this a real shot, and she wouldn't be able to if we kept trying to get in touch with her.

She wanted to completely move on from her past and start a new life with her actual parents, and within the next couple of days, she had packed up her things and was gone. We didn't think about any legal recourse because it was pointless, even though we could have done something about the fact that Elena's whereabouts had been revealed to her birth parents without consent. The bottom line was that she was gone now, and we couldn't do anything about it.

It was not until later on that we stalked her on social media, spoke to a couple of her old friends, and then we found out that her birth family was extremely rich, and that’s why she was with them. Right now, she was living the life that we had denied her in the name of discipline. She was partying every weekend, going off on trips with her close friends, and just doing every irresponsible thing that we didn't think was good for her.

That was when we realized that we had pretty much just wasted 14 years of our life raising Elena and trying to do our best as parents when in reality, she was more interested in having money than us. It was really hurtful, but it was the truth, so we eventually had to come to terms with it. Almost eight years have passed since then, and it was really hard for us, but we managed to make our peace with it and move on with our lives.

That doesn't mean that we didn't miss her anymore all of a sudden, but we just knew that she didn't want us in her life, and after what she had done, I think it was for the best that we stopped wishing for her to come back as well because things could never be fixed after this. Then, three years ago, my husband was diagnosed with liver cancer. I tried my best to help him survive, but unfortunately, after a while, the treatment stopped proving to be effective, and about a week ago, we lost him.

Everyone knew him and knew that he had been suffering, and I find it unlikely that Elena had absolutely no idea because she was in touch with a couple of friends from school, and they definitely knew about my husband's disease since their parents and sometimes even her old friends had reached out to me to offer condolences and support. So I knew that Elena must have found out but didn't bother to contact us, which was quite disappointing. Thankfully, I didn't have enough time to worry about it at the time anyway.

A couple of days after he passed away, we organized his funeral, and finally, Elena showed up after eight long years. Sadly enough, it was not for the purpose that you guys think. She was only here to demand her share of the inheritance and not to pay her last respects.

I was surprised that she had even shown up, but my husband had thought about it. He had even planned for this particular scenario and had left her a letter. I will get to the contents of the letter in a while, but before that, I need to tell you guys exactly how she showed up at the funeral so you know how inappropriate and outrageous it was.

She was wearing all black and stuff. That was not the problem; the problem was. .

. That she had brought along a lawyer with her to fight with me at the funeral because she thought that I was going to keep my husband's money and property for myself. When she came to talk to me and offered her condolences, I told her that I would speak to her later because I knew that she was building up to something.

But she told me that she had to discuss it with me right then. When I tried to explain to her that I was busy, she started throwing a tantrum, saying that she knew this was a tactic to distract her from the fact that there was going to be an inheritance, and the least that I could do for her at this point was to at least include her in whatever my husband had left behind. She was being really loud and annoying, so I decided to hand her that letter right then and there because that's what it had been left for.

Now, coming to the contents of the letter, my husband had had the foresight to know that Elena would probably try to pull something like this off. So, in the letter that he had left, he had made it very, very clear that in his will, he had left every single penny to me, and all his property was going to be left to me as well. He hadn't mentioned any names, but he had said that anybody who had not been involved in his life in the past couple of years, after he fell sick, had no right to demand anything at all, and he owed them absolutely nothing.

She made her lawyer read that as well, and he did not look happy. Since, in addition to his will, this letter in his own handwriting also reinforced everything that had been decided in his official will, I was pretty satisfied with their immediate reaction. You see, eight years had passed since Elena had left us to be with her family, and a lot had changed in those years.

My husband and I had taken over a branch of his uncle's business when he decided to expand and start something in our city as well. So we were handling that, and it was quite profitable. We had made a lot of money; granted, we had spent quite a lot on his treatment as well, but even then, we were left with quite a lot.

Our lifestyle had improved significantly in the past couple of years, and we had been living well. I guess Elena is like a bloodhound at this point; she can just sniff out who has money and come to them to be her share. That's what she did with her biological parents, and now she intended on doing that with us.

Any lawyer worth his salt probably would have known that in Elena's situation, she had no right to be demanding anything from us, especially since she was 26 and had had absolutely no contact with us for the past eight years. I don't even know what that guy was thinking coming along with her, but I knew that that letter had dashed all her hopes of getting anything out of us. After reading the letter a couple of times, she immediately started sobbing.

And I don't mean the quiet kind of weeping while looking down at the floor; she literally started howling and threw herself onto me to give me a hug so she could cry on my shoulder. She started apologizing really loudly about everything that she had put us through in the past, saying that she had been ungrateful and that she had learned her lesson. But now all she wanted was to be there with me.

She kept telling me how sorry she was that she hadn't visited in the past eight years and hadn't even bothered to speak to her father, even after finding out that he was sick. She just kept apologizing for everything, but at that point, it was too little and much too late. Besides, I was disgusted by the fact that she had gone from throwing a tantrum for the sake of the inheritance to pretending to be sad about my husband's demise within a couple of seconds, as soon as she found out that we didn't want anything to do with her anymore.

I felt like it was all an act that she was putting up so she could mourn with me and show me how sorry she was, so I would cut her some slack and take her back. I didn't know exactly what was going on in her life, but I knew that she was in some sort of trouble because otherwise, I didn't think she would come back here, especially not with the purpose to demand her share of the inheritance, given that her biological parents were pretty well off. I had realized all these things while she had been reading together, so when she had been crying on my shoulder, I was so disgusted that I threw her off within a couple of seconds, and she was shocked that I had shoved her.

I then told her to stay away as loudly as I could because at that point, I really didn't care about my volume. I was so upset; I told her that I did not want her in my house anymore and that she was making a mockery out of my husband's funeral with her antics. I told her that this was not the place or the time for her to be putting up a show and that I wanted her to leave.

She made the mistake of trying to tell me that she was here as family, so I literally laughed out loud and told her that families are usually formed by either relation of blood or by relations of love. And she had never been related to us by blood, but in the beginning, we had at least loved each other like a family does. However, eight years ago, when she left to stay with her biological family and abandoned us because we were not as well off as them, she cleared that misconception for us as well.

So, no, she was not our family at all, and I wanted her to go away. After I yelled at her, she finally left, and people started trying to comfort me because I was obviously very upset. For the rest of the day, I just got the funeral over with, and then I was too emotionally and physically exhausted to think anything else, so I just crashed.

Then, when I woke up the next morning, I saw that I had several messages from an unrecognized phone number. I’m assuming it was Elena. How she had been able to find my contact, I don't know.

But anyway, I was right about her going through a tough spot. Apparently, after living with her biological family for four years, things started changing. They had been quite supportive of her lifestyle in the beginning, but after that, they started getting annoyed with her for spending way too much money.

She, like a fool, refused to change her ways, and even though she did get a job to keep them from complaining about how she was depending on them too much, she didn't really take it seriously and blew all her money on maintaining her extravagant lifestyle. So, basically, it was her irresponsible and callous attitude that led to her falling out with her biological family as well. About four years ago, they finally told her that they couldn't support her anymore because it was clear that she was planning on mooching off of them for the rest of her life.

They didn't think that it was fair because even though she had come back to spend time with them and build a relationship with them, she was so busy trying to show off for the world that she had barely spent any actual time with them. So they wanted her to move out, get her own place, and start living separately. They were open to her having a relationship with them, but it had to be for more than just the sake of money since they had started to feel like she was using them, which they were right about.

She had a huge fight with them and moved out but didn't contact them again purely because of her overinflated ego. They didn't try to get back in touch with her either, and she knew that she couldn't come back to us after everything that had happened. She was too embarrassed and ashamed.

So for the past four years, she had been trying to make it on her own, but it had been pretty difficult for her because the job market was tough, and she hadn't even been to college. Even when she found out about my husband's sickness, she had intended on reaching out to us, but then again, it was the fear of rejection that had stopped her. For not getting back in touch with us, she was really sorry and said that she genuinely meant her apology for everything that she had put us through.

But she was also very disheartened by the fact that I had told her that she was not our family on the day of the funeral. She told me that the lawyer that she had come with was actually one of her friends, and he had suggested that he come along with her so he could at least try to reason with me before they tried to contest the will because she was sure that she wouldn't have received anything after everything that had happened. However, now after she had spoken to me and been there for her dad's funeral, she didn't want any part of the inheritance anymore; she just wanted me to forgive her and take back what I said about her not being my family.

She also told me that the only reason she had even come by to demand part of the inheritance was that she actually wanted to put that money to good use and go to college so she could get a degree and do something better with her life, instead of the disappointing jobs that she had to stick to right now simply because she didn't have any other option. But I really don't feel like forgiving her right now, and yet I feel like I would be a pretty bad person if I didn't. I've been holding out on making a decision for the past week, and now I feel like it's time to make up my mind instead of going back and forth about this inside my own head constantly.

So what if I refused to take back what I had said to my adoptive daughter, that she was not my family? **Update One:** Hello, Reddit. First of all, I would like to thank everybody who took time out of their day to comment on my post, give me advice, share their judgment, and offer all the condolences.

I know that my husband is in a better place now, and while I do miss him and think that if he had been here, I would have found it much easier to deal with this dilemma, I also think that I need to respect his wishes as well. It was pretty clear to me that he didn't want anything to do with Elena, and I really don't want anything to do with her either. I had become quite emotional since she had returned so suddenly, and on top of that, I was also coping with the loss of my husband, so I wasn't thinking straight.

I don't think Elena deserves to be forgiven. Even when she showed up on the day of the funeral, it was an intention to demand her inheritance; she didn't show up because she cared for her so-called family. With that in mind, I finally responded to her message and told her that I was not going to take anything back, and neither was I going to forgive her.

She had dug her grave, and now she needed to lie in it. There was nobody who could fix this for her because the situation that she had created was just that nasty. I wished her the best for the future, and then I told her never to speak to me or try to contact me again.

Then I blocked the number that she had texted me from. As for who had given her my contact info or my address since my husband and I had moved away a couple of years ago, I don't know who did any of that, but when I find out, they will definitely pay for it. **Update 2:** I just found out who it was who had told Elena where I live and what my contact info is, and surprisingly, it was my mother.

I didn't see that coming because she had known about how terrible things have been with us. However, she told me that Elena had said she wanted to come apologize to us, so she really had no idea that this is what she was going to do. She apologized to me wholeheartedly for giving my personal information to Elena without asking, and I forgive her because, honestly, she's getting up there, and I'm sure her intentions were not bad.

Had it been anybody else in her place, though, I'm not sure I would have had the same opinions. But my mother is in her 70s now, and I've already lost my husband; I don't want to get into a fight with her as well, especially when she was just a bit misguided, but didn't have any bad intentions, and she has apologized, so that's that. **Update 3:** Hello, Reddit.

Six days ago, I had blocked Elena's number after sending her that message, and I really didn't think that she would try to get back in touch with me again. But she showed up to my house once again today, and I refused to let her in. She just kept sobbing right outside my door and kept telling me that she was really sorry about everything, but she just needed to speak to me.

I really had to give her a chance to explain herself. It was incredibly hard for me to deal with that kind of thing because I'm still grieving, and I'm not in a very emotionally stable place right now. So, I kept telling her to leave, that I couldn't deal with this at the moment, and that I really needed some space.

But she refused to go and kept telling me that she really needed to talk to me. I would have called the cops under normal circumstances, but she was sobbing so hard that I couldn't find it in me to do it. It might sound strange, but even though she is a grown woman now, all I could hear was that little kid whom we had brought home who would cry at almost everything.

So, I ended up opening the door to let her in. It took a few minutes for her to compose herself, but once she did, she immediately started apologizing to me for everything once again. I had to cut her off and told her that the only reason I had brought her in was so she could stop crying, and I could tell her that this was not a place to process or accept her apology right now.

A lot has happened, and everything has changed, so accepting her back into my life is not going to be a piece of cake. She needed to realize that whatever had happened in the past eight years, I couldn't just forget it because she had apologized for it. So, she really needed to give me my space, especially when I was already dealing with something so big right now: the loss of my husband.

That man was the love of my life, and he's gone now. I need to cope with my emotions regarding that first, and only then can I even think about her. I explained that to her as politely as I could, and after a few minutes of silence, she told me that she understood and that she would be waiting for me to contact her.

She scribbled her contact info on a notepad and told me that she was going to leave me alone now, that she was still very sorry about everything, and that she was even sorry about behaving like that. Then she finally left. I don't know if I'm going to be using that contact info to get in touch with her anytime soon, but I'm glad that both of us got the closure that we kind of needed, so I really don't regret inviting her in so I could speak to her and get this out of the way.

**Update 4:** Hi, Reddit. Five months have passed since I lost my husband, and slowly but surely, I've been trying to get my life back to normal. Although, I'm not sure what normal means anymore because for me, a normal life always included my husband's comforting presence.

Now that he's not here, I'm just getting used to doing everything that I used to do before, just without him. It's nice that I have my work—his uncle's business—to handle here since he and I used to work together. I have to do it all on my own now, so at least it keeps me occupied the rest of the time.

Have I tried to fill it by keeping in touch with my family and friends? But most of the time, I just stick to television and books. It hasn't been easy, but I'm getting used to it now.

Now, the million-dollar question: Did I reach out to Elena, or did she reach out to me? Well, for better or for worse, I haven't reached out to her yet, and she has respected whatever I said to her during our last meeting and hasn't reached out to me either. So we are sticking to our no-contact agreement at the moment.

Maybe someday in the future we will be able to figure it out, and I'll be able to forgive her, but right now I'm not in the place to do that, and that's okay. I just want to focus on my own life.