Abigail Lee
Foster Parent Recruiter
HopeTree Family Services
One way to support those touched by adoption is to be conscious of the language we use when talking about adoption. Never let children (or adults) use “you’re adopted” as an insult. Speak positively about adoption as a way to join a family, just as birth and marriage are ways to join a family. Here are some additional suggestions for the words we use when talking about adoption:
Abigail Lee
Foster Parent Recruiter
HopeTree Family Services
It’s National Adoption Month. Adoption is both beautiful and complex. During this month, we celebrate families who are formed by adoption, raise awareness about adoption and the need for more adoptive families, and honor the grief and loss experienced by birth families who have chosen or had the choice made for them that their child would be adopted by another family. There are many myths and stereotypes surrounding adoption and we’d like to take some time to share with you some truths about adoption.
Myth: Adoption is for couples who are not able to have children biologically.
Fact: According to the U.S. Census, about half of all families who have at least one adopted child also have biological children. There are many reasons families choose to adopt: some parents choose to adopt after an infertility diagnosis, some choose to adopt because they have a prior relationship to the child, some choose to adopt because they know there are children who need adoptive families and they want to be that family. It’s not very polite to ask a family why they chose to adopt or to assume that you know the reasons. However, if you know an adoptive family it is helpful to express your support for their decision to adopt and share how happy you are to get to know all the wonderful children who are in their family!
Myth: All people who were adopted were adopted as babies.
Fact: There are three major types of adoption: 1) Parental placement adoption. In this type of adoption, a birth parent makes a decision to place their child in an adoptive family. This type of adoption makes up 15% of adoptions in the United States each year and children adopted through parental placement are typically babies. 2) International adoption. This is adoption of a child from another county. This type of adoption makes up 26% of adoptions in the United States and children adopted internationally can be in any age range. 3) Adoption from foster care. This type of adoption makes up 59% of adoptions each year in the United States and children adopted from foster care range in age from 0-18 years old, with the average age being 8-years-old. [1]
[1] Information found on the adoption network website: https://adoptionnetwork.com/adoption-myths-facts/domestic-us-statistics/
Myth: There is a really long waiting list for parents who want to adopt.
Fact: The wait time for an adoption depends on the type adoption (see the three major types described above). Typically adoption from foster care is a shorter wait time than parental placement or international adoption. There are over 100,000 children in foster care in the United States waiting for adoptive families. For people wishing to adopt from foster care, there are many agencies who can provide training and support to parents so they will have the skills to parent the children who need adoptive families. This training and home study process usually does take a few months, with the exact timing depending on the adoption agency. Families wishing to adopt should ask specific questions about timelines to the adoption agency they’re working with. In some cases, these timelines can be sped up for families wishing to adopt a child who are already waiting for a placement.
Myth: One must be rich to adopt a child.
Fact: Children are expensive. This is true of children who join a family through birth and children who join a family through adoption. All families with children make financial sacrifices for their children. But one does not need to be rich to adopt a child. There are many factors that determine the fees associated with adoption and, in some cases, there are grants and programs to help families who wish to adopt and who can’t afford certain fees. If you are interested in adopting a child and you would like information about fees to determine if you can afford adoption, you can contact your local adoption agency for information. It is never appropriate to ask an adoptive family how much their adoption costs – just as you would not ask someone how much their hospital stay cost when they gave birth. This information is private.
Myth: People who are adopted are supposed to forget their past and join their adopted family with a “clean slate.”
Fact: People who are adopted share love and loyalty with two families, their birth family and their adopted family. Connection to birth family and adoption story is important to an adoptees development and sense of identity. When they are not able to maintain contact with their birth family, it’s important that they know as much as possible about their family of origin and adoption story. In many cases, a person who is adopted can maintain a relationship with their birth family. Sometimes this is in the form of cards or letters or sometimes visits or phone calls. This does not take away from the love and loyalty they feel for their adopted family. In adoption, it’s best when all family members, birth and adopted, love and support each other.
Myth: Adoption is rare.
Fact:
One out of every 25 families in the United States with children have at least one adopted child. And 6 out of 10 Americans have personal experience with adoption, which means that either they or someone they have a close relationship with was adopted, has adopted a child, or placed a child for adoption. [2] Let’s work together to normalize adoption in the way we talk about it. It is more prevalent in our society than we may realize.
[2] Information found on the adoption network website: https://adoptionnetwork.com/adoption-myths-facts/domestic-us-statistics/
Abigail Lee
Foster Parent Recruiter
HopeTree Family Services
The concept of adoption has been around for as long as humans have existed. In fact, we have many biblical examples of children who were taken in and raised by someone other than their birth parents: Exodus 2 tells the story of Moses being cared for by Pharaoh’s daughter. In 2 Samuel 9, Mephibosheth was taken in by David. In 2 Kings 11, Jehosheba took in and raised Joash. Job 31 tells us that Job cared for many orphans. In the story of Esther, we learn that Esther was raised by her cousin, Mordecai.
Adoption was also a practice in the early Christian church dating back to the very first century. In ancient Rome, Christians were known for bringing home and raising infants who had been left by the sea on rocks or in garbage heaps. In the ancient Roman culture, this was a practice called “exposure” in which infants were left exposed to the elements when their birth parents were not able to take care of them. The Christians of the first century regularly took in children left to exposure and raised them as their own children, effectively adopting them into their family.
In the 1890s, HopeTree was founded originally as the Virginia Baptist Orphanage with the goal of providing a home for children whose birth family could not care for them and, when possible, placing children in adoptive families. As culture and child welfare has changed over the years, HopeTree’s adoption program has also changed. In the mid-1900s, HopeTree had a large infant adoption program. At that time, it was common for women who were not married and became pregnant to make an adoption plan for their baby because there was a cultural stigma associated with single parenting. In these cases, HopeTree, then known as the Virginia Baptist Children’s Home and Family Services, would match newborn babies with families who were looking to grow their family through adoption. It was common practice at that time for adoption files to be “sealed” and for there to be very little or no exchange of information between the birth family and the adoptive family. Over the years, as we in child welfare have learned more about child development and heard from adoptees themselves, we learned that knowing one’s adoption story is an important part of an adoptee’s development. Research shows that infants form attachments even in the womb and in the first hours of life. The separation of an infant from their birth parent is an emotional loss experienced by the infant even when the child is too young to remember the loss. People who are adopted can sometimes feel like they are “missing a piece” of themselves if they don’t know their full adoption story and the reason their birth parents were not able to raise them. This is why today HopeTree provides a service called Adoption Disclosure. This service is available to all adult adoptees who were adopted through our agency at any time in the past. Through our adoption disclosure program, we provide the adoptee with his or her redacted case file, meaning we take out the birth family’s identifying information. When requested, we also conduct a search for the adopted person’s birth family to find updated medical information and to connect the adoptee with his or her birth family if both parties agree to a reunion. For many adoptees, learning their story, their current family medical history, and information from their birth family plays an important role in developing their own sense of identity.
Adoption now looks very different than it did in the past. HopeTree no longer operates an infant adoption program. Many parents who experience unplanned pregnancies choose to raise their children instead of making adoption plans. Now, however, HopeTree facilitates many adoptions through our foster care program. When a child first enters foster care the main goal is always that the child would return home to their birth family. Foster families work closely with birth families to support this goal. We have learned that children do best when all the adults in their life can work cooperatively together. Children often have close attachments and love for their birth families and they also build attachments and form loving relationships with their foster families. Just like parents can love more than one child, children can love more than one set of parents and children do best when all of those parents work together! If a child is not able to return to their birth family or live with a relative, then that child will sometimes become available for adoption. If the foster family wishes to adopt the child, HopeTree helps facilitate the adoption process. When a child is adopted that means that the child is legally the child of their adoptive parents, just as if they were born to them, but it doesn’t mean that they have to severe their connection with their birth family. In fact, we encourage adoptive families to keep in contact with a child’s birth family whenever it possible and in the best interest of the child. This contact might be in the form of exchanging cards and pictures on a regular basis or even having regular phone calls or visits. Being adopted into a new family does not erase the love and attachment an adopted person might feel for their birth family and many have a desire to maintain contact with their first parents. Children do best when all the adults in their life work to maintain these connections in a healthy and supportive way.
National Adoption Month is a time to recognize and support all those who are touched by adoption – the parents who welcome a child into their family through adoption, the birth parents of people who are adopted, some of whom chose adoption for their child and some of whom did not have a choice, and the people who are adopted who share their love and loyalty between their two families.
