Families with different levels of contact offer glimpses into their relationships with birth parents during their first year home.
6 Questions Every Adopted Teen Wants Answered
In this excerpt from Beneath the Mask: Understanding Adopted Teens, we take a look at what goes on in the minds of teens, and offer advice for talking with them.
“From Our Hearts”: Letters to Our Child’s Birth Parents
Writing about the little things in letters to our daughter’s birth parents often tells a bigger, warmer story in the end.
Prenatal Drug Exposure — What Parents Need to Know
If there’s a possibility that the baby you are planning to adopt was exposed to drugs in utero, what should you be prepared for?
The Evolving Conversation
Should parents initiate talk about adoption or wait for their child’s questions? Sometimes you lead, say the authors, and sometimes you follow.
Visiting with Birth Parents
When we adopted our son three years ago, our relationship with his birth mother was semi-open (letters, phone calls). Since then it has grown more open, and we’re discussing a visit. Any advice?
Why Didn’t They Keep Me?
Answering kids’ questions about birth parents.
What if My Birth Mother Shows Up to Claim Me?
Reassure your child that you are his parent, forever and always.
The Birth Parent Perspective
A major study reveals that open adoption works well for everyone involved. Hear what families say is good about the process — and what could be better.
Answering Tough Questions
As your teen’s thinking becomes more sophisticated, she’ll want to know more about her adoption.
Adoptees on Open Adoption: “I Have All My Pieces”
Teen and young adult adoptees who grew up in fully open adoptions talk about their relationships with their birth parents and adoptive parents and the many benefits openness has brought them.
What Can We Learn from Our Kids’ DNA?
As genetic testing makes its way into the adoption world, our families discover its promise — and its limitations.
Understanding Open Adoption
Among experts who study it and families who practice it, open adoption varies widely. Here’s a look at open adoption today.
Your Earliest Adoption Conversations
Not sure when — or how — to bring up adoption with your toddler or preschooler? Here’s where to begin.
Telling the Tough Stuff
Here’s how to tell your child the difficult facts about his adoption in positive, age-appropriate ways…and how to keep the conversation going.
A Durable Relationship with Your Child’s Birth Parents
Over the years, an open adoption arrangement may need to evolve to accommodate the changing needs of everyone involved — above all, the child.
“Too Many Questions”
When you and your child look different, the world wants to know why.
Ask AF: Sharing Details We Found Online
“After my daughter’s birth family stopped corresponding, I looked them up online. Is it unethical to share this information with her, since I obtained it without their consent?”
Ask AF: Continuing Contact with the Birth Family?
Answers to your parenting questions.
Ask AF: When to Share Birth Family Information
How do we answer our young child’s questions about adoption, and her birth mother?