NYT Motherlode blogger Anita Tedaldi returns adopted son, sparks controversy


A post on New York Times blog Motherlode has divided readers with a controversial post about a failed adoption.

Anita Tedaldi, mother to five girls and wife to a deployed soldier, adopted a South American boy who’d been abandoned by the side of a road. His age remains unknown, and ostensibly due to the rough circumstances of his formative first few months, the boy failed to develop a familial bond with Tedaldi or her daughters. (Her husband was deployed at the time.) So Tedaldi “returned” her adopted son after eighteen months of being his mother.

Tedaldi’s story blew up on the internet today after an interview with Today‘s Matt Lauer, sparking an equal outpouring of strong criticism and non-judgmental support. She told Lauer:

“I loved him and I cared deeply for him,” Tedaldi told TODAY’s Matt Lauer Thursday in New York. “I tried to do the same exact thing I did with my biological children, but over time it became clear that our family maybe wasn’t a good match for him, that we were unable to meet some of his needs.”

The original post is heart-wrenching, a candid look into a situation most parents will be lucky never to face. And the outcome is a foregone conclusion – you know going in it isn’t a happy ending and that Tedaldi ultimately relinquishes the boy to whom she does not feel a true parental bond. No follow up information is given on D’s fate- whether he was able to bond with his third mother, or if his failed adoption affected his development further.

You can read Tedaldi’s original post here, and watch the Today show clip below:

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