Closed adoptions in the 21st century?
April 27, 2010 7:53 AM Subscribe
What happened that caused the "closed" adoption to fall out of fashion, and what resources are still available to a couple who wishes to adopt a newborn without adopting a relationship with the baby's biological mother?
Background: I am the product of a closed adoption. Just like you, my mother is my mother, and my father is my father. Probably unlike you, someone decided to give me to my parents, and when they did, they did all of us an almost miracle-level favor. That is the story, there are no further details available -- and honestly, I'm very happy to have grown up having it that way.
My wife and I are now considering adopting a newborn, and from what we've seen so far, most current newborn adoptions are "open", where the birth mother meets and vets the potential adoptive parents, and in many cases maintains some sort of relationship with the child and adoptive parents post-adoption.
We don't think that we want that relationship, and this seems to be closing a lot of doors for us. Are we just looking in the wrong places? Are we wrong (or misguided) about our preference for a closed vs. open adoption? Can the hive mind offer answers, guidance, or a better referral?
Background: I am the product of a closed adoption. Just like you, my mother is my mother, and my father is my father. Probably unlike you, someone decided to give me to my parents, and when they did, they did all of us an almost miracle-level favor. That is the story, there are no further details available -- and honestly, I'm very happy to have grown up having it that way.
My wife and I are now considering adopting a newborn, and from what we've seen so far, most current newborn adoptions are "open", where the birth mother meets and vets the potential adoptive parents, and in many cases maintains some sort of relationship with the child and adoptive parents post-adoption.
We don't think that we want that relationship, and this seems to be closing a lot of doors for us. Are we just looking in the wrong places? Are we wrong (or misguided) about our preference for a closed vs. open adoption? Can the hive mind offer answers, guidance, or a better referral?
I don't have any experience in the adoption field but I'd say your choice is your choice. Pretending to want a relationship with a child's bio parent(s) is going to be hard for everyone, especially the child. Maybe look for an option where the child can contact bio parents when child is 18 to give the child the choice later on. Good luck.
posted by ShadePlant at 8:06 AM on April 27, 2010
posted by ShadePlant at 8:06 AM on April 27, 2010
According to my family law textbook, the move towards open adoption was driven, at least partially, by two things. First, many adopted children wanted to know their biological parents, and many believe or believed that those kids had a right to that knowledge. Second, after the legalization of abortion, some states either found or believed that permitting open adoption would, by giving potential mothers more control over the adoption process, induce those mothers to put the children up for adoption rather than abort.
Foreign adoptions remain largely closed.
posted by ecab at 8:21 AM on April 27, 2010 [3 favorites]
Foreign adoptions remain largely closed.
posted by ecab at 8:21 AM on April 27, 2010 [3 favorites]
I have an (domestically) adopted son, so here's my two cents ...
There's two different issues in here: do the adopting parents know anything about the birth mother/parents, and is there a relationship between the birth mother and the adoptive parents after the child is born.
In the international case, you will know a little bit about the birth parents (or sometimes nothing) and contact with the birth mother is rare; I've heard of cases where the adoptive parents sent letters or pictures occasionally, but that's about it.
But if you want a newborn, you'll probably be adopting domestically. In this case, things are different. Typically, the birth mother chooses the parents in this case, although there are always exceptions - sometimes the birth mother isn't available, capable or interested in going through the placement process, and so it's handled by an agency. As the adoptive parents, you prepare a "dear birthmother" letter (really a brochure about yourselves) and the agency or professional you hire works on pairing you with a birth mother. This can have lots of different details, depending on your timeline and the amount of money you're willing to spend.
But it sounds like you're really concerned about the relationship post-birth. This is something that's negotiated between the birth mother and adoptive parents ahead of time; often, a contract is drawn up. You can mandate the level of interaction you're comfortable with: letters only, one phone call a year, photos at birthdays, one visit a month, or whatever. The agency can help negotiate this process.
In my experience, which mostly comes from talking to other adoptive parents, most birth moms "fade away" - they are initially interested and want to keep in touch (which makes a lot of sense - they just carried this baby for nine months) but then break off contact - their lives move on, or it's too painful to keep in contact.
As for why this is the case, the current opinion seems to be that it's good for the adoptive child to be able to ask questions of his/her birth mom if he chooses, rather than having it be a big mystery. It also arguably lessens the stigma/secretive aspect of adoption.
posted by chbrooks at 8:27 AM on April 27, 2010
There's two different issues in here: do the adopting parents know anything about the birth mother/parents, and is there a relationship between the birth mother and the adoptive parents after the child is born.
In the international case, you will know a little bit about the birth parents (or sometimes nothing) and contact with the birth mother is rare; I've heard of cases where the adoptive parents sent letters or pictures occasionally, but that's about it.
But if you want a newborn, you'll probably be adopting domestically. In this case, things are different. Typically, the birth mother chooses the parents in this case, although there are always exceptions - sometimes the birth mother isn't available, capable or interested in going through the placement process, and so it's handled by an agency. As the adoptive parents, you prepare a "dear birthmother" letter (really a brochure about yourselves) and the agency or professional you hire works on pairing you with a birth mother. This can have lots of different details, depending on your timeline and the amount of money you're willing to spend.
But it sounds like you're really concerned about the relationship post-birth. This is something that's negotiated between the birth mother and adoptive parents ahead of time; often, a contract is drawn up. You can mandate the level of interaction you're comfortable with: letters only, one phone call a year, photos at birthdays, one visit a month, or whatever. The agency can help negotiate this process.
In my experience, which mostly comes from talking to other adoptive parents, most birth moms "fade away" - they are initially interested and want to keep in touch (which makes a lot of sense - they just carried this baby for nine months) but then break off contact - their lives move on, or it's too painful to keep in contact.
As for why this is the case, the current opinion seems to be that it's good for the adoptive child to be able to ask questions of his/her birth mom if he chooses, rather than having it be a big mystery. It also arguably lessens the stigma/secretive aspect of adoption.
posted by chbrooks at 8:27 AM on April 27, 2010
Adopted kids may also need or want to know background info on their biological relatives for health-related reasons.
There are at least three concerned parties in an adoption: the biological parent(s), the adoptive parents, and the adoptee. Laws try to balance all parties' rights to information.
posted by dfriedman at 8:37 AM on April 27, 2010
There are at least three concerned parties in an adoption: the biological parent(s), the adoptive parents, and the adoptee. Laws try to balance all parties' rights to information.
posted by dfriedman at 8:37 AM on April 27, 2010
My sister is adopted.
When I was young, my parents decided to begin fostering the children of men and women who were in need of drug and alcohol dependency treatment. All said, we probably served as foster-family to about two dozen kids of various ages. There were already four of us, and we were young and bratty and didn't really like the attention it siphoned off of us, and so we put down our collective feet and said, "No more foster kids."
My parents bargained with us for one more foster child, and we agreed to a weekend stay for a little girl who needed a place to stay for a while. That's when Angela came to live with us, and it became pretty obvious immediately that this was going to be a permanent placement rather than a temporary arrangement. Her mother was a serious alcoholic, and in no shape to take care of her. The adoption was made final in October a couple years later. We celebrated my sister's "Special Day" with donuts, dressed in our Sunday finest, having tromped down to the courthouse as a family for this big event. I don't remember Angela's biological mother being there, either in court or at the party.
Through the years, my parents were very open with Angela about the fact that she was adopted and that families come in all shapes and sizes. Her mother lived in our town, falling apart from alcoholism, but had no direct relationship with Angela. There was a tangential relationship, surely. But nothing overt or heavy. I'm not sure that Betty would have noticed if there was no relationship at all. At one point, Betty's brother located her, and came to town to meet Angela. He was a well-adjusted guy from Seattle. And he knew a lot of the family history that Betty didn't know. His mother, Angela's grandmother, was alive and well(?) and living on a Native American reservation somewhere out west. David didn't remain a permanent fixture in Angela's life, but knowing him helped our family and Angela fill in her past. It turns out, her grandmother had offered Betty and David both for adoption also. When Angela was very young, Betty died and I was distraught that my parents didn't tell her when it happened. (They told her when she was older and able to understand it better. And she accepted it with the same detachment one might demonstrate upon being told of the death of a childhood friend's grandparent. Sad, but hardly shaken.)
Angela had a lot of developmental problems. Fetal alcohol syndrome, possibly. She had memory problems, but simply rated as very low-intelligence. Her performance on standardized tests indicated this, and because her grades corresponded with her standardized test performance, she wasn't eligible for any serious specialized education. There was a several-year slog to get her to graduation, and ultimately in order to get her a high school diploma, my parents had to enroll her in a private school that was exempt from administering Texas' high-stakes graduation test. She never would have passed it.
After high school, Angela disappeared. She just left home and moved in with her boyfriend, to the dismay of everyone else in our family. We live in a small town, so it wasn't hard to keep track of her and my mother also managed to get into her email address and torture herself by reading about my sister's exploits with drugs and alcohol and babies who have no business having babies. She and her boyfriend got pregnant, and she returned home when she realized that she and he had few good options. My parents worked to get them settled, and she got pregnant again. A few months after her second child was born, she disappeared again, leaving the children with her now-husband. That time, she left town and went to live with her new boyfriend and a prostitute friend on a meth ranch in Arizona.
Now, all of this is really really really uninteresting to you, except that my family would have been ill-prepared to deal with any number of these problems had we not known anything about Angela's origin. Knowing that the women in Angela's family had a tendency to leave uncared-for children in their wake, her abrupt disappearance became merely another loop in a well-established cycle. When she upped the ante, from alcohol to weed to meth, a long history of family chemical dependency was helpful to know. And when she demonstrated short and long term memory problems and an inability to grok some of the simplest academic subjects, her family history of substance abuse was important to understand where and why that might be. Because my parents knew Angela's well-adjusted Uncle David, they had ready access to Angela's family medical history in case anything ever went wrong.
I'm sure closed adoptions offer a degree of finality that is comforting. And I'm not so negative about the adoption experience as to declare it a wholesale bad experience. (And you, being adopted, might have a thing or two to say about that!) But I would caution you that parenting and family is hard no matter what hand you get dealt - whether biologically or through adoption. And being as prepared as possible can make all the difference. The terms really are up to you, and I am confident that you can find a legal solution that meets your parenting needs, your family structure desires, and that also safeguards the rights of your child to understand who they are and where they came from.
The epilogue is that eventually my sister showed up again. The boyfriend and the prostitute were both arrested in Arizona, and she blew back into town with her tail between her legs, but with the good sense not to just arrive on my parent's doorstep. She recognized that what she had done was wrong and dangerous. And she has been slowly working to support the two children that she abandoned. Her soon-to-be-ex-husband seems to have found a nice woman to date and doesn't appear to be in any danger of taking my sister back.
posted by greekphilosophy at 8:46 AM on April 27, 2010 [20 favorites]
When I was young, my parents decided to begin fostering the children of men and women who were in need of drug and alcohol dependency treatment. All said, we probably served as foster-family to about two dozen kids of various ages. There were already four of us, and we were young and bratty and didn't really like the attention it siphoned off of us, and so we put down our collective feet and said, "No more foster kids."
My parents bargained with us for one more foster child, and we agreed to a weekend stay for a little girl who needed a place to stay for a while. That's when Angela came to live with us, and it became pretty obvious immediately that this was going to be a permanent placement rather than a temporary arrangement. Her mother was a serious alcoholic, and in no shape to take care of her. The adoption was made final in October a couple years later. We celebrated my sister's "Special Day" with donuts, dressed in our Sunday finest, having tromped down to the courthouse as a family for this big event. I don't remember Angela's biological mother being there, either in court or at the party.
Through the years, my parents were very open with Angela about the fact that she was adopted and that families come in all shapes and sizes. Her mother lived in our town, falling apart from alcoholism, but had no direct relationship with Angela. There was a tangential relationship, surely. But nothing overt or heavy. I'm not sure that Betty would have noticed if there was no relationship at all. At one point, Betty's brother located her, and came to town to meet Angela. He was a well-adjusted guy from Seattle. And he knew a lot of the family history that Betty didn't know. His mother, Angela's grandmother, was alive and well(?) and living on a Native American reservation somewhere out west. David didn't remain a permanent fixture in Angela's life, but knowing him helped our family and Angela fill in her past. It turns out, her grandmother had offered Betty and David both for adoption also. When Angela was very young, Betty died and I was distraught that my parents didn't tell her when it happened. (They told her when she was older and able to understand it better. And she accepted it with the same detachment one might demonstrate upon being told of the death of a childhood friend's grandparent. Sad, but hardly shaken.)
Angela had a lot of developmental problems. Fetal alcohol syndrome, possibly. She had memory problems, but simply rated as very low-intelligence. Her performance on standardized tests indicated this, and because her grades corresponded with her standardized test performance, she wasn't eligible for any serious specialized education. There was a several-year slog to get her to graduation, and ultimately in order to get her a high school diploma, my parents had to enroll her in a private school that was exempt from administering Texas' high-stakes graduation test. She never would have passed it.
After high school, Angela disappeared. She just left home and moved in with her boyfriend, to the dismay of everyone else in our family. We live in a small town, so it wasn't hard to keep track of her and my mother also managed to get into her email address and torture herself by reading about my sister's exploits with drugs and alcohol and babies who have no business having babies. She and her boyfriend got pregnant, and she returned home when she realized that she and he had few good options. My parents worked to get them settled, and she got pregnant again. A few months after her second child was born, she disappeared again, leaving the children with her now-husband. That time, she left town and went to live with her new boyfriend and a prostitute friend on a meth ranch in Arizona.
Now, all of this is really really really uninteresting to you, except that my family would have been ill-prepared to deal with any number of these problems had we not known anything about Angela's origin. Knowing that the women in Angela's family had a tendency to leave uncared-for children in their wake, her abrupt disappearance became merely another loop in a well-established cycle. When she upped the ante, from alcohol to weed to meth, a long history of family chemical dependency was helpful to know. And when she demonstrated short and long term memory problems and an inability to grok some of the simplest academic subjects, her family history of substance abuse was important to understand where and why that might be. Because my parents knew Angela's well-adjusted Uncle David, they had ready access to Angela's family medical history in case anything ever went wrong.
I'm sure closed adoptions offer a degree of finality that is comforting. And I'm not so negative about the adoption experience as to declare it a wholesale bad experience. (And you, being adopted, might have a thing or two to say about that!) But I would caution you that parenting and family is hard no matter what hand you get dealt - whether biologically or through adoption. And being as prepared as possible can make all the difference. The terms really are up to you, and I am confident that you can find a legal solution that meets your parenting needs, your family structure desires, and that also safeguards the rights of your child to understand who they are and where they came from.
The epilogue is that eventually my sister showed up again. The boyfriend and the prostitute were both arrested in Arizona, and she blew back into town with her tail between her legs, but with the good sense not to just arrive on my parent's doorstep. She recognized that what she had done was wrong and dangerous. And she has been slowly working to support the two children that she abandoned. Her soon-to-be-ex-husband seems to have found a nice woman to date and doesn't appear to be in any danger of taking my sister back.
posted by greekphilosophy at 8:46 AM on April 27, 2010 [20 favorites]
It really depends. Some adoption agencies really push open adoptions; ours left it up to the birthmother and the adoptive family. Our adoption is "open" in the sense that we know who our daughter's birthparents are; we sent the birthmother letters and pictures four times in the first year, and now every year. I very much did not want a fully open adoption of the kind some people I know have, where they talk on the phone with the birthmother and there are visits. I had heard too many stories of open adoptions gone bad (I've also heard stories of great open adoptions. Still, I didn't want to take the risk, though I'd have considered a more open adoption with a birthmother who wanted that.). We adopted across state lines, which made the possibility of visits pretty small, though with a different birthmother we might have been willing to travel at some point for a visit under agency supervision.
One thing is that, when you're offered a "match" with a birthmother who likes the looks of you, you can say OK, negotiate, or turn it down. So if a birthmother asked for a degree of openness you weren't comfortable with, you're not required to agree to that.
Some families I know have done letter exchanges with the possibility of opening the adoption further down the line if things go well.
On the other hand, many families I know who started with adoptions that were open to some degree have lost touch with the birthfamily because they just disappeared with no forwarding address. I think there are a fair number of adoptions (this is just anecdotal) that are never as open as the two families expected them to be.
I guess the short version of this is, "it really depends." There really are all kinds of degrees of openness. I agree that there is a stronger philosophical bent toward open adoption but it seems pretty variable in practice.
The most useful resource for me when I was early in the learning-about-adoption process were the discussion boards at ForeverParents. They're closed boards, and people are brutally honest about their experiences. There are lots of people (mostly women) there who are willing to answer any questions you have, talk about their own experiences, and so on. I haven't been to the boards in awhile, so YMMV, but when I was there, the breadth and depth of experience was amazing and I felt like I understood things much better than I did from, say, reading books.
posted by not that girl at 8:56 AM on April 27, 2010
One thing is that, when you're offered a "match" with a birthmother who likes the looks of you, you can say OK, negotiate, or turn it down. So if a birthmother asked for a degree of openness you weren't comfortable with, you're not required to agree to that.
Some families I know have done letter exchanges with the possibility of opening the adoption further down the line if things go well.
On the other hand, many families I know who started with adoptions that were open to some degree have lost touch with the birthfamily because they just disappeared with no forwarding address. I think there are a fair number of adoptions (this is just anecdotal) that are never as open as the two families expected them to be.
I guess the short version of this is, "it really depends." There really are all kinds of degrees of openness. I agree that there is a stronger philosophical bent toward open adoption but it seems pretty variable in practice.
The most useful resource for me when I was early in the learning-about-adoption process were the discussion boards at ForeverParents. They're closed boards, and people are brutally honest about their experiences. There are lots of people (mostly women) there who are willing to answer any questions you have, talk about their own experiences, and so on. I haven't been to the boards in awhile, so YMMV, but when I was there, the breadth and depth of experience was amazing and I felt like I understood things much better than I did from, say, reading books.
posted by not that girl at 8:56 AM on April 27, 2010
One other aspect of past "closed" adoptions is that beyond not having contact with the bio parents, there was often no access to records about the adoption, both for the adoptee and the bio parents. So, even those adoptees that wished to learn more about their birth parents as adults were greatly hindered or even flat out unable to do so.
I think the best thing to do is to really flesh out what you mean by "closed." Do you mean you never want your child to be able to find out about his or her bio family, even as an adult? That's something that you may no longer be able to do, legally, and even if you could, it's not something that you'd likely have much control over once the child is an adult. You may be okay not knowing about your birth relatives, but you can't guarantee your kid would feel the same way.
If, however, you mean that you'd be willing to be interviewed by the birth mother via an agency and have indirect contact with her throughout the process itself, but cut off contact once the child is adopted, you'll probably have an easier time finding an agency. Though totally "open" adoptions may be more typical, I'm sure there are birth parents who do not wish to have continued contact.
posted by catwoman429 at 8:59 AM on April 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
I think the best thing to do is to really flesh out what you mean by "closed." Do you mean you never want your child to be able to find out about his or her bio family, even as an adult? That's something that you may no longer be able to do, legally, and even if you could, it's not something that you'd likely have much control over once the child is an adult. You may be okay not knowing about your birth relatives, but you can't guarantee your kid would feel the same way.
If, however, you mean that you'd be willing to be interviewed by the birth mother via an agency and have indirect contact with her throughout the process itself, but cut off contact once the child is adopted, you'll probably have an easier time finding an agency. Though totally "open" adoptions may be more typical, I'm sure there are birth parents who do not wish to have continued contact.
posted by catwoman429 at 8:59 AM on April 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
I'm an adoptee from a closed adoption. You do realize that in the end, nothing is closed as your child becomes an adult. I asked my parents for my information. I hired an investigator. I found my birth mom. It was my right and I was pissed to no end that my parent thought it was their right to deny me the knowledge of who I am and fill my world with lies they wanted to portray.
So note, you can control only so much. Sometimes a child doesn't care. Sometimes they do. But know this, we always find out that we are adopted. And if it happens later in life, the more pissed we get that we were lied to. I always had a feeling. I found out during a bitter argument when I was 20.
I 100% understand your feelings about not wanting a relationship with a birth mom. I'm not saying me and my birth mom are all hunky dory. I've met her once. I talked with her on the phone 2ce. It's ended. I talk to my 1/2 brother more (found that out during adoption discovery too). It was my choice not to persue a relationship.
Oh and closed adoptions suck--I know nothing about my genetic history. Am I an increased chance for any cancer? Will I pass something on to my children? Who knows?
Not. Fair. Get as much medical history as you can.
posted by stormpooper at 9:06 AM on April 27, 2010 [8 favorites]
So note, you can control only so much. Sometimes a child doesn't care. Sometimes they do. But know this, we always find out that we are adopted. And if it happens later in life, the more pissed we get that we were lied to. I always had a feeling. I found out during a bitter argument when I was 20.
I 100% understand your feelings about not wanting a relationship with a birth mom. I'm not saying me and my birth mom are all hunky dory. I've met her once. I talked with her on the phone 2ce. It's ended. I talk to my 1/2 brother more (found that out during adoption discovery too). It was my choice not to persue a relationship.
Oh and closed adoptions suck--I know nothing about my genetic history. Am I an increased chance for any cancer? Will I pass something on to my children? Who knows?
Not. Fair. Get as much medical history as you can.
posted by stormpooper at 9:06 AM on April 27, 2010 [8 favorites]
I have a good friend who surrendered a child for adoption when she was 17. Her son's adoption is "open" in the sense that his family sends her photos of the child and a letter once a year, and, when he turns 18, he will have the option to access her contact information if he wants to. She has an indirect way to contact them in case of emergency, but cannot contact them directly. This is an agreement that they negotiated (via an agency, she's never met the parents) when the boy was born.
Having those photos and letters has been a psychological godsend for my friend. With them, she can continue to assure herself that she made the correct decision. Also, when she was diagnosed with crohn's disease a few years after the adoption, she was able to to get that information to the family, which may be important to the child later on.
Giving birth to a child then handing him over to someone else to raise, never seeing him again, can be a devastating experience for a woman. In large part, the "new openness" of the adoption process recognizes that there are more parties involved than just the child.
posted by anastasiav at 9:20 AM on April 27, 2010 [7 favorites]
Having those photos and letters has been a psychological godsend for my friend. With them, she can continue to assure herself that she made the correct decision. Also, when she was diagnosed with crohn's disease a few years after the adoption, she was able to to get that information to the family, which may be important to the child later on.
Giving birth to a child then handing him over to someone else to raise, never seeing him again, can be a devastating experience for a woman. In large part, the "new openness" of the adoption process recognizes that there are more parties involved than just the child.
posted by anastasiav at 9:20 AM on April 27, 2010 [7 favorites]
Stormpooper, that sounds really painful.
I will say that (while I obviously don't know every adoptive family in the world) I think it is pretty much just not done anymore to hide the fact of adoption from adopted kids, for precisely the kind of reasons stormpooper describes--that feeling of having been lied to.
posted by not that girl at 9:21 AM on April 27, 2010
I will say that (while I obviously don't know every adoptive family in the world) I think it is pretty much just not done anymore to hide the fact of adoption from adopted kids, for precisely the kind of reasons stormpooper describes--that feeling of having been lied to.
posted by not that girl at 9:21 AM on April 27, 2010
But know this, we always find out that we are adopted. And if it happens later in life, the more pissed we get that we were lied to
Not always. My husband was told he was adopted when he was 33, he had no earthly idea. And he wasn't angry about it at all.
posted by pinky at 9:31 AM on April 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
Not always. My husband was told he was adopted when he was 33, he had no earthly idea. And he wasn't angry about it at all.
posted by pinky at 9:31 AM on April 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
If you are interested in learning about the darker side of closed abortions historically, The Girls Who Went Away is a really excellent read. Today, pregnant women considering adoption have a good deal more control and power over the process. Access to abortion is probably also a factor - it makes sense that a women who chooses to carry a pregnancy to term (not an easy task) might desire at least some degree of contact with the child.
I also think that attitudes have shifted considerably in terms of recognizing an adopted child's personal history and birth parents, even in the case of international adoptions. Mimi Smartypants, for example, has blogged about how important it is to her to raise her Chinese-adopted daughter in away that recognizes her daughter's birth parents:
I will always remember and honor the fact that Nora had eight months of a life before we met her; that she has a birthmother and birthfather and most likely birth siblings, although we will never meet them. I feel really uncomfortable around some families who have internationally adopted—although the attitude is never articulated, some of them act as if their child sprang full-blown out of the adoption dossier, and his or her history is just a charming anecdote to tell on “Gotcha Day.” It bothered me when we were deep in the application process and people would say perfectly well-meaning things like “your daughter is waiting for you in China,” even though I knew they meant it in a spiritual, metaphorical way. We were waiting for her. She was sitting in the Social Welfare Institute minding her own business, getting her diaper changed, looking forward to the next bottle. Maybe I am just relentlessly practical and have no sense of cheesy Hallmark-card-quality poetry, but let's be realistic here.
It is a fine balance, and one we will be constantly adjusting throughout our lives. On the one hand, we are Nora's parents and she is our daughter, unquestionably. On the other hand, I would never want to dismiss, in even the most subtle way, her life before us.
posted by susanvance at 9:46 AM on April 27, 2010 [5 favorites]
I also think that attitudes have shifted considerably in terms of recognizing an adopted child's personal history and birth parents, even in the case of international adoptions. Mimi Smartypants, for example, has blogged about how important it is to her to raise her Chinese-adopted daughter in away that recognizes her daughter's birth parents:
I will always remember and honor the fact that Nora had eight months of a life before we met her; that she has a birthmother and birthfather and most likely birth siblings, although we will never meet them. I feel really uncomfortable around some families who have internationally adopted—although the attitude is never articulated, some of them act as if their child sprang full-blown out of the adoption dossier, and his or her history is just a charming anecdote to tell on “Gotcha Day.” It bothered me when we were deep in the application process and people would say perfectly well-meaning things like “your daughter is waiting for you in China,” even though I knew they meant it in a spiritual, metaphorical way. We were waiting for her. She was sitting in the Social Welfare Institute minding her own business, getting her diaper changed, looking forward to the next bottle. Maybe I am just relentlessly practical and have no sense of cheesy Hallmark-card-quality poetry, but let's be realistic here.
It is a fine balance, and one we will be constantly adjusting throughout our lives. On the one hand, we are Nora's parents and she is our daughter, unquestionably. On the other hand, I would never want to dismiss, in even the most subtle way, her life before us.
posted by susanvance at 9:46 AM on April 27, 2010 [5 favorites]
My wife and I are working with an agency to adopt a child. The situation is much like not that girl describes, except that our agency actually sends us information about the birthmother and her situation before our "life book" is shown to her, so we can choose whether or not we want to be considered.
The agency asks us to commit to sending some photos and a letter to them (the agency, not the birthmother) every so often (twice a year for 18 years, I think), and some birthmothers want more contact than that. As we choose whether or not we want to be considered, the birthmother's requests for contact have been a factor once or twice.
As I understand the process (my wife has much more detailed knowledge), we need not meet the birthmother, though many birthmothers do want to meet at some point between selection and birth. Our agency moderates that meeting, so it's neutral ground and all that stuff. Having the agency as an intermediary can offer the best of both worlds -- the ability to make contact if there's a good reason, but no obligation to make the contact without that reason. You can't know how interested your young one will be in the birth family situation.
We're in Texas, working with a private agency. They're expensive, but they provide lots of counseling for the birthmothers and they also understand that adoptive parents have the movie-of-the-week fear that a birthmother may show up on their doorstep if things are too open.
Look for adoption consultants in your area to see what range of private agencies are available to you. It does seem that a truly closed adoption has gone the way of the dodo, but different agencies have different policies and ranges of openness they operate in. I think you can find something you'll be comfortable with.
posted by flexiblefine at 10:04 AM on April 27, 2010
The agency asks us to commit to sending some photos and a letter to them (the agency, not the birthmother) every so often (twice a year for 18 years, I think), and some birthmothers want more contact than that. As we choose whether or not we want to be considered, the birthmother's requests for contact have been a factor once or twice.
As I understand the process (my wife has much more detailed knowledge), we need not meet the birthmother, though many birthmothers do want to meet at some point between selection and birth. Our agency moderates that meeting, so it's neutral ground and all that stuff. Having the agency as an intermediary can offer the best of both worlds -- the ability to make contact if there's a good reason, but no obligation to make the contact without that reason. You can't know how interested your young one will be in the birth family situation.
We're in Texas, working with a private agency. They're expensive, but they provide lots of counseling for the birthmothers and they also understand that adoptive parents have the movie-of-the-week fear that a birthmother may show up on their doorstep if things are too open.
Look for adoption consultants in your area to see what range of private agencies are available to you. It does seem that a truly closed adoption has gone the way of the dodo, but different agencies have different policies and ranges of openness they operate in. I think you can find something you'll be comfortable with.
posted by flexiblefine at 10:04 AM on April 27, 2010
Whether or not a domestic adoption is "closed" is, generally up to the wishes of the birth mother. Most others choose open adoption. A small minority, though, still choose closed, for personal reasons.
The reason open domestic adoptions have become the norm is, largely, due to societal shifts in how our culture views adoption. In the old days, an unplanned pregnancy was looked upon as a shameful thing. A pregnant girl was hidden away (out-of-town relatives, catholic homes, etc) and the baby was put-up for adoption. Back then, too, the official adoption record was sealed by the court. The entire process was very opaque. The birth mother never met the adopting couple except in the most extremely rare of circumstances. In short, the whole process was built as a closed system.
Then, our society went through some changes. Unplanned pregnancy was, more or less, stripped of the shame. The adoption process changed, too. More and more, birth mothers expressed strong desires to make sure their baby was going to a good home. This was not open adoption, though. Truly open adoption took a little more time to appear. More changes had to occur. On the other end of the spectrum, there began a movement by adopted children to open the closed records so that they might be able to find their birth mothers. This pushed many states to provide processes where adoptees and birth mothers can find each other.
All this set in-motion the open adoption movement as we know it.
My wife works in an adoption agency. The agency encourages couples to embrace open adoption, where birth mother and couples meet face-to-face. Where letter and pictures are shared as the child grows up. Where the once secret past of an adoptees origins is now an open book. Overall, the move to open adoption has been an overwhelming success, for both the birth mothers and the new families.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:20 AM on April 27, 2010
The reason open domestic adoptions have become the norm is, largely, due to societal shifts in how our culture views adoption. In the old days, an unplanned pregnancy was looked upon as a shameful thing. A pregnant girl was hidden away (out-of-town relatives, catholic homes, etc) and the baby was put-up for adoption. Back then, too, the official adoption record was sealed by the court. The entire process was very opaque. The birth mother never met the adopting couple except in the most extremely rare of circumstances. In short, the whole process was built as a closed system.
Then, our society went through some changes. Unplanned pregnancy was, more or less, stripped of the shame. The adoption process changed, too. More and more, birth mothers expressed strong desires to make sure their baby was going to a good home. This was not open adoption, though. Truly open adoption took a little more time to appear. More changes had to occur. On the other end of the spectrum, there began a movement by adopted children to open the closed records so that they might be able to find their birth mothers. This pushed many states to provide processes where adoptees and birth mothers can find each other.
All this set in-motion the open adoption movement as we know it.
My wife works in an adoption agency. The agency encourages couples to embrace open adoption, where birth mother and couples meet face-to-face. Where letter and pictures are shared as the child grows up. Where the once secret past of an adoptees origins is now an open book. Overall, the move to open adoption has been an overwhelming success, for both the birth mothers and the new families.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:20 AM on April 27, 2010
It's possible to have an adoption arrangement where you know the identity and medical/genealogical background of the biological parents but don't have any or much of a relationship. Whatever you decide (or whatever the eventual birthmother decides), please do your child a favor and keep all the details for him/her to have if he/she is ever curious.
I'm an adult adoptee, and in the 21st century in the USA it's goddamned draconian to be legally barred by the state where I was born from ever having a copy of my original birth certificate. (The b.c. the state issued me says my adoptive mother gave birth to me at 8:17am in the hospital where I was actually born--when she hadn't even met me yet! And this is de rigeur in closed adoptions in 48 states from about the 1940s through the 1990s. Many states are still this way; the laws are being changed, but slowly.)
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 10:54 AM on April 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
I'm an adult adoptee, and in the 21st century in the USA it's goddamned draconian to be legally barred by the state where I was born from ever having a copy of my original birth certificate. (The b.c. the state issued me says my adoptive mother gave birth to me at 8:17am in the hospital where I was actually born--when she hadn't even met me yet! And this is de rigeur in closed adoptions in 48 states from about the 1940s through the 1990s. Many states are still this way; the laws are being changed, but slowly.)
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 10:54 AM on April 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
Pinky. I'm not pissed about being adopted. Things happen in people's life. She told me it was too late for an abortion. So there's THAT lovely sentiment.
I was pissed that my adopted parents thought it was their right to hide it from me. Not cool.
posted by stormpooper at 11:50 AM on April 27, 2010
I was pissed that my adopted parents thought it was their right to hide it from me. Not cool.
posted by stormpooper at 11:50 AM on April 27, 2010
I am an adoptive parent of twins. We have a semi-open adoption agreement - my husband and I met their birth mother at the hospital after they were born, but she and their birth father chose not to have annual visits. Instead, they wanted only to get photos and letters twice a year. They provided us with photos, and medical and biographical information to share with the children as they get older. We adopted in Maryland, which mandates a legally binding contact agreement.
We worked with a non-profit agency, and as part of the placement process, we were asked to specify what level of 'openness' we were comfortable with. As with drug tolerances and medical issues, the more limitations you set, the less likely your profile would match up with incoming placements. Our children's birthparents initially said they wanted to meet us before they were born, and wanted annual visits (which we were open to), but then changed their minds. Even though our relationship with them is one-sided, I still think about them a lot. We include them in our nightly prayers with the kids, and I am working on 'lifebooks' for the kids that tell their stories. It is important for them to know that their birthparents choosing adoption for them isn't a bad thing, and that it doesn't mean they aren't loved.
posted by candyland at 12:13 PM on April 27, 2010
We worked with a non-profit agency, and as part of the placement process, we were asked to specify what level of 'openness' we were comfortable with. As with drug tolerances and medical issues, the more limitations you set, the less likely your profile would match up with incoming placements. Our children's birthparents initially said they wanted to meet us before they were born, and wanted annual visits (which we were open to), but then changed their minds. Even though our relationship with them is one-sided, I still think about them a lot. We include them in our nightly prayers with the kids, and I am working on 'lifebooks' for the kids that tell their stories. It is important for them to know that their birthparents choosing adoption for them isn't a bad thing, and that it doesn't mean they aren't loved.
posted by candyland at 12:13 PM on April 27, 2010
I didn't read all the responses (sorry) but I do agree with what chbrooks said: there are two separate issues here. You might not be able to get out of meeting the biological parent(s) of the baby, but you don't have to have any contact with them once the baby is born. Just be sure that there is a very iron-clad confidentiality agreement and see if you can limit how much personal info. is given to the bio. parents, just in case they decide to track you down one day.
In one way, you can see them wanting to meet you as a positive thing: they want to ensure that their baby goes to a good family, and it's nice for you to know where (who) this baby is coming from. As long as it's crystal clear that there is to be no communication after the birth, and this is explicit verbally and in your contracts, then it shouldn't be a problem (hopefully).
posted by 1000monkeys at 12:16 PM on April 27, 2010
In one way, you can see them wanting to meet you as a positive thing: they want to ensure that their baby goes to a good family, and it's nice for you to know where (who) this baby is coming from. As long as it's crystal clear that there is to be no communication after the birth, and this is explicit verbally and in your contracts, then it shouldn't be a problem (hopefully).
posted by 1000monkeys at 12:16 PM on April 27, 2010
The thinking in adoption now is that everyone is entitled to knowledge about themselves: we are the keepers of our (adopted) children's stories, but they are not our stories to keep.
If by closed adoption, you mean no relationship with the first family, fine. But if you intend not to give this information to your child later in life, please reconsider.
posted by bluedaisy at 2:44 PM on April 27, 2010
If by closed adoption, you mean no relationship with the first family, fine. But if you intend not to give this information to your child later in life, please reconsider.
posted by bluedaisy at 2:44 PM on April 27, 2010
I am a brother to four adopted siblings. Two were adopted internationally, two domestically. The international brother and sister adoptions were closed. Vietnam and Korea.
As an adult, I chose to adopt from China because I *wanted* a closed adoption. Thoroughly closed. I *hated*, really, objectively hated my domestically-adopted siblings fucked-up parents. Make no mistake, they were, and are, fucked up. Abusive, alcoholic, entitled, trash, assholes.
*Every single time* I've heard any discussion of my sibs contacting their birth parents, it was a con job, or ended before the con got going. The birth parents would pull some lame guilt thing, or "loan me some money" thing. Ugly. The non-adopted siblings were barely better.
I do not wish that for my child. I also really dislike domestic adoptions for a whole host of reasons. Therefore, the decision to go to China to adopt was far easier.
I respect my daughter's culture, I was a Chinese history & language major in college, which helps. I honor her mother for not killing my daughter, for making the effort to illegally carry her to term and (risking jail) abandon her at the child welfare center. It took guts, and I honor that. I'm happy that this honoring is the end of it.
From what my mother (who is now retired, but used to be a VP in a very very large international adoption agency) tells me, Open Adoption is the standard situation in domestic adoptions. I wouldn't do it. I couldn't, after seeing the pain my sibs went through trying to build bridges.
posted by Invoke at 2:50 PM on April 27, 2010
As an adult, I chose to adopt from China because I *wanted* a closed adoption. Thoroughly closed. I *hated*, really, objectively hated my domestically-adopted siblings fucked-up parents. Make no mistake, they were, and are, fucked up. Abusive, alcoholic, entitled, trash, assholes.
*Every single time* I've heard any discussion of my sibs contacting their birth parents, it was a con job, or ended before the con got going. The birth parents would pull some lame guilt thing, or "loan me some money" thing. Ugly. The non-adopted siblings were barely better.
I do not wish that for my child. I also really dislike domestic adoptions for a whole host of reasons. Therefore, the decision to go to China to adopt was far easier.
I respect my daughter's culture, I was a Chinese history & language major in college, which helps. I honor her mother for not killing my daughter, for making the effort to illegally carry her to term and (risking jail) abandon her at the child welfare center. It took guts, and I honor that. I'm happy that this honoring is the end of it.
From what my mother (who is now retired, but used to be a VP in a very very large international adoption agency) tells me, Open Adoption is the standard situation in domestic adoptions. I wouldn't do it. I couldn't, after seeing the pain my sibs went through trying to build bridges.
posted by Invoke at 2:50 PM on April 27, 2010
Oh, sorry to comment twice in a row. The "hiding the adoption" thing is totally morally wrong. Not that it was a possibility with my siblings, or with my daughter.
I'm convinced that half the reason people go to Russia to adopt is because they want a white baby they can pretend was born to them. Bleah. I'm aware this is completely politically incorrect to believe, yet I do.
posted by Invoke at 3:00 PM on April 27, 2010
I'm convinced that half the reason people go to Russia to adopt is because they want a white baby they can pretend was born to them. Bleah. I'm aware this is completely politically incorrect to believe, yet I do.
posted by Invoke at 3:00 PM on April 27, 2010
Open sounds like a binary: open or else closed. It's not. It's a spectrum from limited openness to extreme openness. The scenario you seem to be envisioning, of ongoing and personal involvement, is one that's fairly rare. (Personally, I think it'd be a net good if it were less rare. But birth parents often find that they need less, or are capable of doing less, than they originally envisioned.)
I talked to a lot of agencies and checked into several attorneys, all of them practicing open adoption differently. Some degree of openness is the norm, so zero tolerance for it does indeed limit your options. But at its most basic, that means only that there is some amount of information known to the one or both parties that in the past would have been known only to the court and/or agency. There are open adoptions in which everything the families know of each other is from a handful of pictures and perhaps a first name on a case file summary. Contact, if there is any, may be entirely via agency intermediary. I would encourage you to talk to some agencies that you otherwise find interesting, and find out what openness means to them because the variability and customizability of it may certainly surprise you.
It would be a very unusual situation when a birthmothers participates meanfully in any "vetting". Vetting is a separate process that is takes place before entering into selecting. Unless both sides have somehow found each other and reached agreement without the aid of an adoption professional (for instance, because they got introduced by someone who is a friend of both families), typically the vetting is done by a social worker or comparable professional. In open adoption, most of the information shared with a birthmother is limited to you've personally chosen to share with her. After you've been vetted and accepted by an open adoption program, your agency or lawyer likely would work with you to craft a "Dear Birthmother letter", which these days tends to be a full color glossy 2-4 page newsletter type affair in which you showcase family photos and speak semi-anonymously to pregnant women in your own words. Depending on agency, these might not even be shown to a birthmother until after you've heard all about her and you've green-lighted her
Openness agreements vary in their enforceability. In my state, California, it was emphasized that California courts don't recognize those agreements as binding. YMMV. Ask what your local situation is.
If you want newborn, domestic, and as close to the "closed" end of the spectrum as possible, look into whether fost-adopt could fit for you. There are many newborns in the system, and it's still where predisposition to keeping the parties apart runs very strong. It's very different from independent adoption; you may get a placement extremely fast yet need to be okay waiting 1-2 years for finalization to become possible vs. waiting years for a newborn to become available then finalizing within days or weeks.
I would encourage you to consider some form of open adoption, even if that starts out extremely minimal. It's hard to anticipate what these next decades will bring, and impossible to know how your child will feel about any of it. It is a gift to all to have left room to invite in greater openness when/if the time ever become right for it. Even if your child never exercises the right, it may be a comfort (to you, as well as to the child, and for the woman whose choices brought your family together) just to know the option exists should need ever arise for it.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 8:10 PM on April 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
I talked to a lot of agencies and checked into several attorneys, all of them practicing open adoption differently. Some degree of openness is the norm, so zero tolerance for it does indeed limit your options. But at its most basic, that means only that there is some amount of information known to the one or both parties that in the past would have been known only to the court and/or agency. There are open adoptions in which everything the families know of each other is from a handful of pictures and perhaps a first name on a case file summary. Contact, if there is any, may be entirely via agency intermediary. I would encourage you to talk to some agencies that you otherwise find interesting, and find out what openness means to them because the variability and customizability of it may certainly surprise you.
It would be a very unusual situation when a birthmothers participates meanfully in any "vetting". Vetting is a separate process that is takes place before entering into selecting. Unless both sides have somehow found each other and reached agreement without the aid of an adoption professional (for instance, because they got introduced by someone who is a friend of both families), typically the vetting is done by a social worker or comparable professional. In open adoption, most of the information shared with a birthmother is limited to you've personally chosen to share with her. After you've been vetted and accepted by an open adoption program, your agency or lawyer likely would work with you to craft a "Dear Birthmother letter", which these days tends to be a full color glossy 2-4 page newsletter type affair in which you showcase family photos and speak semi-anonymously to pregnant women in your own words. Depending on agency, these might not even be shown to a birthmother until after you've heard all about her and you've green-lighted her
Openness agreements vary in their enforceability. In my state, California, it was emphasized that California courts don't recognize those agreements as binding. YMMV. Ask what your local situation is.
If you want newborn, domestic, and as close to the "closed" end of the spectrum as possible, look into whether fost-adopt could fit for you. There are many newborns in the system, and it's still where predisposition to keeping the parties apart runs very strong. It's very different from independent adoption; you may get a placement extremely fast yet need to be okay waiting 1-2 years for finalization to become possible vs. waiting years for a newborn to become available then finalizing within days or weeks.
I would encourage you to consider some form of open adoption, even if that starts out extremely minimal. It's hard to anticipate what these next decades will bring, and impossible to know how your child will feel about any of it. It is a gift to all to have left room to invite in greater openness when/if the time ever become right for it. Even if your child never exercises the right, it may be a comfort (to you, as well as to the child, and for the woman whose choices brought your family together) just to know the option exists should need ever arise for it.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 8:10 PM on April 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by zeikka at 8:00 AM on April 27, 2010