AITA for telling my SIL I don’t regret placing my son for adoption?

Fourteen years ago, I placed my newborn son for adoption because I knew I couldn’t give him a safe life. Now my sister-in-law, who’s deep in anti-adoption spaces, is angry that I refused to express regret for my decision in an interview for her college paper.

I’m 34F and had a baby boy when I was 20. I chose adoption, have never had contact with him or his adoptive family, and while I don’t hide it, I don’t often go into the details. My husband’s younger sister is 22 and became a mom at 17; she and her boyfriend almost chose adoption but decided to keep their baby. Since then she’s become very passionate about adoption, adoptee rights, and birth mother rights, and has fallen somewhat down the anti-adoption rabbit hole online. She’s now a college student who focuses her assignments on adoption and wants to be a social worker who helps people keep their kids so adoption “becomes a thing of the past.” I’m the only birth mother she knows well enough to interview, so when she asked, I agreed.

When she sat me down expecting a tragic, regret-filled story to fuel her anti-adoption paper, I told her the truth: I have zero regrets, I would make the same choice again, and keeping my son back then would have meant raising him in abuse, chaos, and neglect.

During the interview she asked why I gave “my own baby” up, what might have changed my mind, whether I regretted it, and even brought up studies about skin-to-skin contact—asking if I wished I’d held him after birth. I told her plainly that I have zero regrets about choosing adoption and that, if I had to decide again, I would make the same choice. I said that even though skin-to-skin has benefits, I deliberately refused to hold him because I knew myself: if I had held him, I would have kept him, and his life with me at 20 would not have been good.

"Had I held him at all I would have kept him, and the life I would’ve given him would have been full of trauma."

I explained that I went from one abusive household (my parents) to another (my ex), and at the time I was more focused on rebelling and “pissing my parents off” than building a stable life. My ex was everything they hated, and they were everything I hated, so I clung to him, even though the baby wasn’t his and he was never going to accept him. There were drugs, sex, random people in and out, and I admitted I would have stayed in that environment. No amount of free housing, childcare, or therapy would have changed who I was then, because I wasn’t going to take real advantage of any of it.

"I know 20-year-old me better than anyone else, and the only life I would have given him was one full of abuse and neglect."

I told her loving and wanting my son wasn’t the same as being willing to sacrifice for him, and that keeping him would have made me a monster in hindsight. She pushed back, insisting I couldn’t know whether more resources might have helped and that adoption doesn’t guarantee a better life either. I agreed adoption isn’t perfect, but said it still gave him more of a chance than staying with me ever could have, and that in my specific situation it really was the only responsible option.

🏠 The Aftermath

After the interview, my SIL was clearly upset. She told me that everything I’d said went against the point of her paper and that I’d made it sound like adoption is the only option. I reminded her that I never claimed it was the only option for everyone—just that, for me, it was the only safe option for my son.

She asked why I agreed to be interviewed if I wasn’t going to give her the kind of story she expected and complained that I’d made her assignment harder. I told her I wasn’t willing to lie about my own life to fit a narrative, and part of why I said yes was to try to open her mind to the reality that not every birth parent regrets their decision.

My husband backed me up and told her she was wrong to be mad at me for answering honestly when she came to me for my experience. Still, she’s annoyed and distant, and I’m left wondering whether I was wrong to participate at all knowing she wanted a specific, regret-heavy angle I was never going to give her.

"She wanted a source for her argument; I gave her the truth about my life, and that wasn’t the story she was hoping to write."

I don’t regret my decision or my answers, but it does hurt that being honest about the choice that protected my son has led to tension with someone who claims to advocate for birth mothers and their voices.

💭 Emotional Reflection

This isn’t a simple story about adoption being “good” or “bad.” It’s about one specific situation where a young woman knew she wasn’t willing or able to change, and chose adoption because keeping her baby would have meant exposing him to abuse, instability, and neglect. My SIL is focused on systems, resources, and all the very real ways adoption can harm people; I’m focused on who I actually was at 20 and what that would have meant for a defenseless child.

Could resources and support change some lives? Absolutely. But it’s also true that some people are not ready to use those resources, no matter how many are offered. For me, loving my son wasn’t enough to override my attachment to my abusive relationship or my desire to rebel. Acknowledging that doesn’t glorify adoption—it just acknowledges that, in my case, adoption was the least harmful option available to him at the time.

Reasonable people can debate policy and ideals while still respecting that not every birth mother feels the same way. My story doesn’t erase the pain others have experienced, and their pain doesn’t erase the peace I feel about my decision. The real conflict here is that my SIL wanted my story to serve her thesis, and I refused to reshape my reality to fit her agenda.

Here’s how the community might see it:

“She asked for your experience, not a scripted quote. You’re not obligated to regret saving your kid from a situation you know would’ve been abusive.”

“Adoption can be flawed as a system and still be the safest choice in some cases—your honesty doesn’t make you anti-child, it makes you self-aware.”

“If her advocacy can’t handle a birth mom who doesn’t regret her decision, maybe she needs to rethink how ‘pro-birth mother’ her stance really is.”

Reactions will likely split between people who focus on the harms of adoption and those who see your specific circumstances and agree that, sometimes, placing a child really is the most loving and responsible choice a parent can make.

🌱 Final Thoughts

Telling the truth about a painful, complicated decision is never easy—especially when someone clearly wants you to say something else. In this case, you chose honesty about who you were and what your son’s life would have been like, even knowing it would clash with your SIL’s beliefs.

Advocacy around adoption should have room for stories like yours, where the birth parent doesn’t regret placing a child and genuinely believes it spared them from harm. Silencing those stories doesn’t make the conversation more ethical; it just makes it less honest.

What do you think?
Was it wrong to agree to the interview knowing your answers wouldn’t fit her narrative, or was sharing your real experience exactly what needed to happen? Share your thoughts below 👇