I have three siblings, but this is about my youngest (Ryan) who is 12. Ryan was born when my brother (Jake) was sick and we all thought he was going to die. Jake eventually got better. Jake has always hated Ryan for being conceived to replace him after his death. Recently I posted about my family dynamics in another subreddit and several people raised the possibility that Ryan wasn’t conceived as a replacement, but as a donor.
I confronted my parents, and they stonewalled me. I’ve done research, but I realize the only way to truly know the truth is to look at Jake’s medical records. I think Jake deserves the truth, but more importantly I think Ryan deserves it. Ryan has always been treated like an odd man out, an afterthought. He deserves to know why our parents had him even though they never wanted to still be raising a child at this age.
Jake is a legal adult and can request his relevant medical records. I know he won’t agree for Ryan’s sake. He hates Ryan. So how do I convince him to request the records?
29 comments
What did you expect to get from his medical records? if anything he could have only received stem cells which they would have taken from Ryan’s cord blood.
Wow. I have to say, just from this post, I think you are way out of line. Why do you need to know why he was conceived? Tons of us were accidents. Should we be upset about that?
All you are going to do with this mission is bring angst to your family. And, if there is already disfunction you are going to make it worse.
Your brothers and you are alive, sounds like even the one that was sick is healthy, so, STOP LIVING IN THE PAST, and start living in the future.
There is so much to learn, to do, to experience, to love.
I suggest to just stop. This sounds like something a delusional preteen would think up. Whatever is going on isn’t your responsibility to handle and all your going to do is cause harm.
I mean, its really messed up, and you’re not going to like this answer, but the horrible truth is this: Jake will only help you out if he believes the end result crushes and destroys Ryan. As a result, you can’t ask him, he might try to use it to hurt Ryan, not help him.
The fact is that he has an obsessive hatred of your brother that can only end via therapy and realizing he’s focusing his hate at his own parents onto Ryan, when it isn’t Ryans fault! He didn’t ask to exist! He didn’t show up one day in spirit form and demand your mom to make him immediately. Its like people hating affair babies: the hatred should be on the person unfaithful, not the baby that unintentionally exists because of it.
Jake is a POS, and your parents are even bigger POSes for disgracefully enabling him. You need to sit down with Ryan and tell him this isn’t going to change until Jake gets help and that he will have to be ready for it not changing for years, maybe ever. Then, you need to sit down with Jake and say what I said about Ryans existence not being Ryans fault and tell him he needs help. If he refuses to let go of his hate and go to therapy, you have to cut him off and go no contact. He is a mess and nothing in your family will change until he does.
I’m sorry if my honesty was too brutal, but its the truth. I feel beyond sick for Ryan, he deserves none if this. Make sure to strongly love him and nurture him so he knows he’s loved and he belongs.
I’m not entirely sure why people are bashing OP? (*now I know)
Yes, your parents messed everything up.
Jake doesn’t deserve the truth, nor should he ever find out, coz his hatred of Ryan will make him use the truth to hurt him. Do NOT talk to him about this.
It looks like Ryan already thinks he was only conceived to replace Jake. That knowledge, coupled with Jake’s treatment of him and your parents’ failure to protect him, will already be awful to live with.
If it’s actively upsetting him, he should know the truth. Ryan’s medical records would show it. Dont ask Jake, ask Ryan. Finding out he was a donor baby will also be awful to deal with, but at least it’ll be the truth. Therapy will help.
If he’s happy and is living his life without being affected by this, then just let it go. Don’t even go to anyone with your theory, just leave him alone. If it bothers you, you go to therapy.
***Edit: I went through OP’s post history. She’s the one who told Ryan he’s a replacement baby, even though she didn’t actually know that she just assumed it, and he was devastated by it. OP you are meddlesome and causing problems please just stop. Stop making things worse for Ryan.
I don’t think confirming this will achieve what you want it to. Jake will still hate Ryan. It’s not illegal to conceive a child to save another so what consequences do you foresee for your parents? It sounds like the person who will suffer the most from this misguided quest is the one person who has done nothing wrong: Ryan. If you insist on pushing this, you will extend the years he spends in therapy. What on earth can you possibly gain?
I think OP and “Jake” need therapy. Harboring this kind of resentment against a sibling for something they wouldn’t have had any sort of control over, then inventing a scenario where you can turn that spite towards the parents, possibly dragging the youngest against them.
They seriously need professional help before they damage their relationships even more.
Did Jake get a stem cell transplant from the umbilical blood?
Would it make more sense to focus on getting R help? Can he live with grandparents or other family? Can you? What about planning now for when you are 18 and leaving? In my mind, R needs a practical solution. What you are looking at isn’t that. What about school mental health resources? Doctors? Church or other social groups? Staging a family intervention? Other solutions? Have you already asked R what he wants by way of a way forward?
You seem to think that Ryan saved Jake’s life and if you can prove it, that should make Jake love Ryan instead of resent him. That is your fantasy and it won’t happen. Jake has severe trauma from almost dying as a child. Even if Ryan saved his life, that won’t change his trauma, only years of therapy will. At this point stay out of it. What if Ryan wasn’t a donor baby and was actually a replacement child? The truth could be worse for everyone. Ryan is only 12. All you can do is let Ryan know you love him and appreciate him and explain that Jake can’t help his feelings because he came so close to death. Ryan is old enough to understand that. Stop trying to be the family peacemaker because you are actually driving everyone apart.
You don’t feel as though you’ve done enough to Ryan by telling him that he was born to replace Jake as a matter of fact even though the truth is you don’t know that?! Despite the certainty of your feelings/ opinions they are still just feelings/opinions and should not be relied on as facts.
You shouldn’t. Leave it alone. Whatever obsession you have, you should seek put a therapist to help you through it. You aren’t doing anybody any favors
How would finding out help Ryan? I honestly can’t see that it would. If he knew for sure he was just intended as a tissue donor or whatever it would be tougher on him than being able to think “maybe that’s not true”. It’ll give you more ammunition against your parents and Jake, but extra ammunition is not going to make them magically turn into better people. All it will do is escalate the conflict, make day to day life more stressful for Ryan, and make him feel less wanted.
What Ryan needs is to accept that his family are AHs but that he will be able to find much better people in life. Probably very hard at his age but hopefully he at least has you and some good friends.
What your parents and Jake need to do is lots of self reflection and trying to become better people (ha I doubt this will happen).
What you need to do is just be a good, supportive brother to Ryan without making his home life worse.
How was a 12 year old supposed to replace a person who is a legal adult now? I’m kind of hung up on that part.
This is a terrible plan that will make everything worse. But I don’t know, burn it down I guess. Jake might be keen to help you destroy what’s left of your family if you present it to him like that.
I think it might be worth seeing if you can have a heart go heart with Jake about all his feelings. He’s likely to rant or rave and talk about being replaced. That could then be your moment to pose the scenario of “what if our parents used him to get the stem cells from him”. Don’t actually ask him to do anything about it, he might be old enough to remember if he got that transplant and say so, or the thought might linger with him. Maybe he won’t do anything about it but at least it’s a shot at finding out the truth. I don’t think Ryan would be any worse off than he is now.
I take it someone read My Sisters Keeper and got a little too excited to try their own fictional writing.
Maybe the next time Jake starts bad mouthing Ryan in any way you might look at him and say “Hey did you ever think about the possibility that mom and dad had Ryan because they might have needed a donor for you because of your medical problems?” And just see what kind of reaction you get.
First, babies cannot be donors. To be a donor you have to be 18 years or older. Your parents wouldn’t be able to use bone marrow from a baby. They potentially could use the umbilical cord for stem cells but I doubt they did that 12 years ago. So I don’t think you’ll find anything in medical records.
Second, who is this going to help? Nobody.
Jake is an AH being angry at a baby. That’s his problem and he is an adult.
Ryan is going to be shattered if he was just born to potentially help Jake.
I honestly don’t see how the medical records would confirm what you’re looking for. It would just be regular hospital records. I don’t understand why this is something you feel the need to dig deeper into.
This post is fucked up.
Leave Ryan alone. This is horrible and selfish of you. He can make his own mind up when he’s an adult.
He’s 12 FFS.
Actually, he doesn’t deserve to know “why” they had him. That’s the parents own personal choice and reasoning. And who even cares the reason, what does that even change?
Your plans are an exercise in folly. Just stay out of it before you end up alienating everyone in your family.
So based on your last post, you’ve already spoken to Ryan about why Jake hates him and Ryan understood. Now if you manage to dig up some evidence that Ryan was meant to be a donor (which sounds unlikely for several reasons), how does that help Ryan? What additional clarity can you offer him? The facts are already pretty clear: Jake has some issues that he’s taken out on Ryan, and your parents are enabling this. It doesn’t matter WHY Ryan was conceived, he just WAS and that is the one thing Jake hates him for.
If you love Ryan which it seems like you do, protect him. Part of that protection means making him feel loved and valued. Giving him more reasons why people hate him doesn’t feel like age-appropriate information for a 12 year old. Please consider this may cause him more lasting damage than help him at his age.
Faaaaaaaaaaaake. Like seriously, this many people believe that?
This has nothing to do with Ryan. Poor babe was born, his only crime. If anyone needs to be called out it’s your parents, and also you.. for giving life to the idea that Ryan is at fault. You should be protecting all of your siblings. Especially Ryan. Do better, listen to others. I have nothing nice to say.
I don’t think you’ll be able to find out definitively even if you have the medical records anyway – like, if he did receive stem cells, they may not have come from Ryan yknow? Or if they did, the records won’t say if your parents deliberately conceived Ryan to be a donor, it could just be a situation where you parents took advantage of the new baby being a match with Jake. The only people that know for sure are your parents.
So I’d focus on Jake. I’d straight up talk to him, and say, “Jake, you seem to think our parents had Ryan to replace you, and you’ve hated him for it. Have you ever thought that maybe they had him to save you, by being a living donor or using his umbilical cord blood? He might be the reason you’re alive now. And yet you treat him like crap, even though he didn’t ask to be born. If you’re gonna be angry at someone shouldn’t it be our parents? They’re the ones that worked to have him.”
And your whole family needs therapy, poor Ryan most of all.
You don’t
this is none of your business, and if you keep at it – you’re likely going to end up causing a lot of hurt (well, more than you’ve done already)
leave it alone
If your parents all love you the same whats the issue. If they were scared about losing a child and this helped bring your parents some sort of peace at the time then all the power to them. Ryans alive and should just enjoy being a kid. Who cares why you were put into this world just make the best out of it now. Unless your parents are treating the siblings different i dont see what the problem is and i think digging to find some info that could just end up tearing people apart is going to be a fools errand.