100% for the biological parents - The Face on the Milk Carton (1995) Discussion

[–] dancequeen407 17 years ago

Neither set of parents was wrong. they were just two parents fighting for their daughter.

But the biological parents didn't go about it the right way. Their attitude was, "She's our daughter, she has to come lvie with us." That was the wrong way to go.
They should have let her stay with the other parents and slowly got to know her instead of dropping this huge bombshell on her. ALl they did by forcing her to live with them was push her away. She was a teenager. She wanted what she knew; she didn't want to live with perfect strangers. She had been raised by a different set of parents; how could they expect her to adapt to a new envirnment with a new family?
No one was really thinking about what was best for JAnie; they were thinking about what THEY needed.

And the Jessmons weren't blind. They had already lost one daughter. WHy should they lose the only other daughter they had? The other family at least had other kids to fill the void with.

And the mom especially isn't blind--remember, she was the one who called the number on the milk carton, saying that she didn't want anyone else to know the pain of losing a child?

And maybe Janie couldn't look at the situatiuon as having 2 sets of parents. Put yourself in her position. She's being forced to live with people she doesn't know instead of the ones she's known for most of her life. Don't you think that it would be kinda hard to love the people who took you away from the only home you've ever known?

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[–] suganspice70 17 years ago

And the Jessmons weren't blind. They had already lost one daughter. WHy should they lose the only other daughter they had? The other family at least had other kids to fill the void with
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How can you say that loosing one child is compensated for coz u have other kids?

I have two sons, if I lost one...I would say- ahh never mind, i got the other one.

This is reinforced by the film....they had two children, but not for a moment did the mother not think, love and frantically search for the child that was stolen from her. Didnt the son say- she would ran to children on the street to make sure it wasnt her child?

The biological parents had to endure years and years of pain and grief.....who is compensating that? They lost their daugher, taken from them and they didnt know what happened to her....that must be unimaginable pain that i cannot even bare to think about.

How can you say they didnt go about it the right way.......years of grief and pain, how else would u deal with it? if your child was taken away...

I would do what they did and make sure she stayed with the family that she belongs with, the family whom she was taken from who have suffered worse than anyone could possibly understand

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[–] dancequeen407 17 years ago

I'm not saying that having two other kids is compensation for losing one. I have never had children, so I have no idea how much pain those parents had to endure. But the Jessmons lost a daughter too. Hannah. And then they lost Janie. At least the other parents had their other kids to keep them going. The Jessmons had to suffer lonliness for years after Hannah left, and then they had to re-live that again when the law forced Janie to go and live with her biological parents. I never said the biological mother didn't feel pain just because she had two other kids--that's like if one of your parents died and thinking, "Oh, I don't have to miss my mom since my dad is still alive." Who would say that? And who would say that they didn't have to miss one child just because they had two others?

And yes, the biological parents had to endure years of pain not having their child and not knowing what happened to her. But didn't the Jessmons suffer that same pain? They didn't know where their daughter was or if she was even alive for years.

I don't think they handled it the right way because they weren't thinking that they would get back a teenage girl who had already been raised by another set of parents--they thought that they would get back the four-year old girl that was taken from them. It didn't occur to them that maybe she didn't want to go and live in an envirnment that she knew nothing about. How would you feel if someone took you from the only life you knew and made you live in a completley forign envirnment and then expect you to be okay with it?

Really, they were only thinking about THEIR pain. They were so absorbed with grief that they didn't think about what was best for Janie. And then they expected her to change her name? Can you really justify that?

What they should have done was let Janie stay with her other parents and see her as visiatations. Janie could stay with them for maybe a few days at a time, and then she could stay with them more and more and form a relationship with them in her own time. By forcing her to live with them, and change her name, they only pushed her away so much to where they didn't have a relationship at all with her.

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[–] denise1234 13 years ago

dancequeen407^

I do agree with you that this was handled incorrectly.

Not many people, whether they are teenagers or adults, would want to be taken from the environment that they have known (and from the movie, Janie had been raised in a loving home) and plopped into an entirely different one, to have to change their name, to have to suddenly call what are virtual strangers at that point, names that are terms of endearment (such as 'Mom' or 'Dad'), to have to go to a totally different school in a totally different neighborhood and to have to leave behind, so to speak, the closeknit group of friends that, in this case Janie, had grown up with. Talk about suddenly being stripped of all familiar and close relationships, familiar locations, and known support systems, and all in one fell swoop!

Neither set of parents was 'right' or 'wrong' in their feelings about 'their' daughter. I AM a parent, so I guess I have some credibility when speaking about a parent/child bond. The fact that Hannah was dead sealed the deal that there was no one left 'to blame' for the original circumstance. All that was left was dealing with the remnants of the wreckage and moving forward with it all. There was plenty of anger and hurt to go around, but no legitimate target at that point.

I don't understand why a counselor was not brought into this, to help Janie/Jennie acclimate to all the new information, new circumstances, and to help her to better understand and cope with her rather unique situation. Both sets of parents (and the sibs) could have been helped by some good counseling, too.

Poor Janie/Jennie. She is like taffy being pulled between the grief of her nurture-parents regarding their 'real' daughter and then the ‘loss’ of Janie; the grief of her bio-parents, who, as loving parents would, never fully recovered from losing their daughter so many years prior, not knowing if she were alive or dead, and then having to deal with the fact that she had all these attachments to her nurture-parents and another life, and did not even know her bio-family anymore; AND the grief of her bio-sibs, from resenting how her disappearance affected their parents and their childhoods to the misplaced guilt the brother felt for incorrectly thinking that he was to blame for Jennie being abducted, that he at first projected in anger against Jennie/Janie.

Jennie/Janie had her own issues to deal with, in addition to what I listed above. She had her own misplaced guilt for having 'gone with' Hannah, although she was only 3 years old at the time and so was certainly not to blame, and also having to deal with the fact that the family she grew up with was not what she had thought they were, in relation to her.

It would have been totally reasonable and more appropriate, IMHO, for both sets of parents to share visitation -- the bio-parents could have started with a weekend visitation sort of plan so that Janie did not have to have her daily, school life and whatnot disrupted. And, they should not have forced the name change because that was just insensitive. Also, I think that they should have talked more with the other two children because the brother was, at least initially, SO hostile to Janie and the sister obviously had some issues, too, regarding Janie. Everything was just too fast for everyone and some time, flexiblity, and good guidance from a counselor certainly could have helped everyone along in this strange transition.

A very interesting story and dynamics, all the way around.

denise1234

"I can't stand a naked light bulb, any more than..a rude remark or a vulgar action" Blanche DuBois

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[–] EdenParadise 14 years ago

My biological gave me up when I was 9 months old. I am almost 18 now, and we have since gotten in touch. She certainly knows what it's like to lose a child, but she doesn't want to take me away from my parents. She knows it would hurt everyone, and knows that it would be a very selfish thing to do. I think that if Janie's biological parents had kept her from her real parents, then the biological parents are the selfish ones. A visit now and then is all they can be promised, if Janie is willing.

I think "Captain Planet" is something that should be mandatory to watch nowadays.

Team Jacob!

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[–] branenj001 13 years ago

This is one of those things where if you don't have kids, you really shouldn't comment/judge on it because if you haven't experienced that bond, there is no way in hell you know what the parents on both sides were going through. No one should judge the child in this situation either because that is a gigantic thing to just suddenly have to deal with. You can't for sure say how you would have reacted yourself.

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[–] SunflowerJones88 13 years ago

I don't think you need to have kids to know what it's like to lose someone. No matter who it is that you lose, the feeling of loss is the same, whether you lose a child, a sibling, or a parent. Even if you didn't have kids, I think you can imagine what that loss might be like for a parent.

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[–] cosmic_quest 13 years ago

It's a very difficult situation which is only going to lead to pain for one family or the other but I think the film dealt with it well. Janie is not selfish in the slightest. She was a sixteen-year-old who has suddenly found herself being forced into a family who she sees as strangers. What teenager would happily go along with that? As an adult, she probably would come to see that she is almost lucky to have two loving families but not at sixteen, when she's being forced away from the only parents that she knows and loves.

Yes, the Jessmons knew what it was like to lose a child but they loved Janie and are only human. They are hardly going to say, 'here, take her from us'. They acted like any normal couple would.

I liked this film (and the book) for the way the two sets of parents dealt with the situation like adults. The Shields' realised that it was too late to force Janie to live with them lest they lose her forever. She was old enough to make a choice of her own and they would deal with things from there. Far better than the real life 'Switched at Birth' case of Kim Mays where the biological parents were so selfish that they basically wreaked this girl's life.

"I always pretend to root for Gryffindors but, secretly, I love my Slytherin boys."~ Karen, W&G

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[–] jmichael3387 10 years ago

I would only agree with the original poster if the kid was very young and had only been separated a short time. But if the kid is 16 and has been separated since age 3....then it's RIDICULOUS to send the kid back to the original parents 100%. You need to have split custody and/or plenty of visitation. If my biological kid was separated from me like that, I wouldn't want to upset him/her by snatching them back 100%. I would want them to ease into any transition.

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[–] meerschweinchen_freunde 10 years ago

Sorry, but you cannot force your thirty year old child to live with you and have a relationship with you and their siblings because that person is legally an adult.

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[–] sxymommacitaprincess_227 9 years ago

Yea she should have been returned to her biological parents. It dont matter if the grandparents didnt steal her,she was still an abducted child. They had no legal claim to her. Her parents were the rightful ones with legal rights. She was THEIR CHILD. She should have been returned to her parents and just had visitation with the grandparents. Did they ever say why that skank hanna kidnapped her?

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[–] meerschweinchen_freunde 9 years ago

The girl is sixteen in the books and the movie and one thing that you have to remember about a sixteen year old is that they do have some limited legal rights in such situations. One thing that she could do is have herself legally emancipated from her biological parents and then she can live with the couple who raised her. The biological parents handled the situation very badly by forcing her to live with them and I would think that in such a situation the courts would hire a guardian ad litem for the girl.

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[–] pypsqweek 9 years ago

They have rights but not when they have been kidnapped. Remember, Janie was stolen. At first I didn't like her parents but later I realized like any parent you do want your child back no matter the age. The only thing I didnt agree with was the parents constantly calling her Jennie after she spent 90% of her life being called Janie. Nevertheless, the parents did do the right thing and realize that it was affecting Janie. So they allowed her to go back home to her parents.

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[–] meerschweinchen_freunde 9 years ago

You may want your child back no matter what age if the kid was taken from you but that doesn't mean the person even if they are a minor doesn't have any rights in the legal system. I recently re-read the book Whatever Happened to Janie after twenty years and the author did not know what she was writing about when it came to family law and the court system. In real life there would be a court hearing in the state in which she was residing and the court would take into account the girl's life even though she was kidnapped. She would not be forced to live with complete strangers even if they are her biological family. Especially if they're a teenager. The most unrealistic part in the book was that a psychologist was not brought in to help both families with a traumatic time.

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[–] se-harris 9 years ago

I'm halfway through this movie and completely lost! is this based on a true story? I don't get why the two families are "negotiating" for this girl. If a crime has been committed why didn't someone call the police?

WHO IS HANNA? Was there really a cult?

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[–] LaraCroftLegacy 9 years ago

Hannah is daughter of Miranda and Frank

Lara Croft Himiko! The First Sun Queen! This is Yamatai.

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[–] rosemei 8 years ago

Seriously, when Janie wanted to call the Jessmons' after she heard Hannah had died and bio-dad stopped her and was yapping about giving them time before they called and how she needed to consider their feelings I wish she had snapped back, "Did YOU think about their feelings when you used the threat of finding Hannah and having her arrested to blackmail them into giving me up?"

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[–] DarcyBrandon 8 years ago

That's not fair.

Janie's biological father didn't know that Hannah was dead at the time. All he knew was that Janie's adopted parents had kept their daughter and that Hannah was the one who kidnapped their child.

He was speaking out of anger because he lost his child for 13 years. Janie's adopted parents didn't even check who this child was that Hannah brought home. I think he had a lot of reasons to be upset. When he was talking to Janie after they learned of Hannah's death he had a point. He told her that as long as the Jessmon's had Janie, they were pretending that everything was alright. He just asked her to give them space.

He didn't say that Janie couldn't talk to the Jessmon's ever but to just try to get to know her biological family.

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