Pregnant women have three legal options: parenting, abortion, and adoption. At Legacy, you discuss what you feel are the risks and benefits of each option. However, in order to evaluate the pros and cons, you must actually understand what each option entails. There are many misconceptions regarding adoption. While it would seem that the popularity of movies and TV shows, like Juno and Glee, featuring adoption storylines would dispel some adoption myths, we find that many clients aren’t sure what adoption involves.
Adoption may not be the best choice for you and your child, but it’s important to understand. For instance, did you know?
Today, nearly all birthparents hand-pick the adoptive family.
Most adoption agencies won’t even facilitate a closed adoption—one in which neither party has information regarding the other. There are many reasons for this, including access to the birthparents’ medical history. When birthparents meet with an adoption professional, they discuss what they want for their child’s parents and view profiles. They then typically interview couples. This is very different from adoptions sixty years ago, which could involve a mother relinquishing her child to people she had and would never meet.
The following are adoption websites featuring online profiles of adoptive families:
Wyoming Children’s Society
http://www.wyomingcs.org/find-a-family/
Bethany Christian Services
https://waitingfamilies.bethany.org/
Catholic Charities of Wyoming
http://www.awyomingadoptionoption.com/Waiting_Families.html
Birthparents determine the desired level of contact.
Up front, you discuss your contact options with an adoption professional. Do you want to see the family around holidays and birthdays? Then you may prefer a local couple. Would you like to send cards and pictures directly, or would you prefer to pass on information through an agency or attorney to protect your privacy? Many birthparents are Facebook friends with their adoptive family and view themselves as part of the family. The point is that you are in control.
Contact can be emotional…but also reassuring—watch one birthmom’s experience:
The expectant mother decides what her time at the hospital looks like.
Some birthmothers want time alone with their newborn. Others may want the adoptive couple to cut the cord. You can arrange a photographer and create a birth plan that includes honoring the birth with footprints, locks of hair, etc. You have time to research what others have done and what makes sense for you during and after delivery.
____________________________________________________________________________
Today, adoption is a customized process that birthparents initiate as they develop an adoption plan. Adoption professionals should make you feel as if you are in control and support you in making a plan with what fits you best. Exploring adoption doesn’t commit you to that option!
Legacy is not an adoption agency. We connect a birthmother with adoption attorneys or licensed agency representatives to address her legal and practical concerns regarding the adoption process. Additionally, we have volunteers who would love to share their real-life adoption experience and welcome your questions about what it was like for them. We are here for you: during pregnancy, after birth, and beyond…no matter your choice.
