opinions from LDS hoping to adopt

Hi,This place is sort of slow..I'll try to answer what our experiences have been and what we as adoptive parents hope for. I hope this is what you are looking for I apologize if it is long, we've been at this for a long time. These past 3 weeks we have said "no" to 3 potential adoption situations through our county foster/adopt agency. The ultimate reason for our saying 'no' is not because we are looking for the perfect situation, it has ultimatly been because after much thought and prayer we did not feel the children were meant for us, it was agongizingly hard to say "no". We specifically feel there is a baby meant for our home, he/she is coming to us a different way. I want the baby who's Spirit I have felt and know wants to come to our home, this is so hard and truthfully is all on faith. After talking with many LDS adoptive and birth parents all have said that this is a spiritual decision. We feel we will adopt a biracial or AA infant...its hard to explain, especially to SW's who are not LDS. I know we sound picky. BUt we are actually open to just about any situation. What we do is pray and ask if this is the right baby for our family. At first we were stricly foster parents hopeing one day to adopt and were accepting all situations. We were blessed to have a little guy come in our life for 8 months and helped rebuild his bond with his mom as she got her life on track. OUr goal as foster parents is different then adoptive parents, somewhere along the way things changed. We felt as if the experience with our foster baby prepared us for the baby meant for our home. WE always wanted to adopt but we knew the road may be long. I imagine everyone is different, this is our feelings on things. We want and open adoption relationship with our birth mother and her son/daughter. This is one of the factors that has made it hard for us to consider foster/adopt as open adoptions are rare. With respect to the birth mother's feelings we would like to be as open as is comfortable and is healthy for all involved. Personally we feel this is best for everyone. We would love to know everything and anything, no matter how silly or unimportant a birth parent might think it is. Everything from how she is feeling, her favorite movie, life dreams/goals, health background...basically anything and everything she feels comfortable sharing. We would like to know about extended family and how she feels about her life after choosing adoption, how her family feels, is she getting the support and love she needs? How are her extended family, the birth father, his family...anything that she would like to share we would like to know. Having seen the bond, that amazing bond our foster son had with his mother after not see her for months of seperation as an infant I personally feel that tie should not be broken. I feel that Heavenly Father has his hand in all of this, especially in supporting birth mother's who make such a loving sacrifice. I Love our foster son's mom, we've sort of adopted her into our family and its been hard but beautiful at the same time. we are so different yet come together in this common bond of her son. Its clearly not the same situation but I try to imagine many of the same dynamics. We have become close friends. It is a mutual relationship of sharing and give and take. We both want what is best for her son, it makes our relationship easy. I apologize for typoes. I'm tired and i"m writing through my tears. What you are doing is very brave and impossible for me to understand. I wish you the best for you and for your baby. Find the right family, the family that you can share your thoughts feelings and life story with. LDS perpective on adoption, it seems to me, is different then the world's perspective. L

i have 3 adopted children and we are waiting for our 4th adopted child to be born. there are lots of things i like knowing about my childrens birthparents. most of it is not written on a paper, but found out through conversations. I like to know what their interests are, whether its sewing or football. i found out my sons bdad played the guitar and liked doing carpentry. favorites, like food, colors, music, movies, books, etc. we talk about feelings, why she is placing and not parenting. why she liked us and chose us to be the parents of her baby. there is so much to share and yes, we, the adoptive parents care deeply for our birthfamilies and think about them everyday. we grieve their loss of a child while we celebrate the new child in our lives. its a strange combination. sadness and happiness all at once. good luck in your journey and i pray you will make the right decision for you and know if you choose to place, Heavenly Father will lead you to the right placement. {{HUGS}}

I as an adoptive parent would want to know everything. I believe that the more that you tell us the more information they will have to share with the child as he or she gets older. I for one would be grateful for information about the you and the child's father. I also would want to know about interests, aspirations, and dreams. I would want to know the child to know you as much as they know us! I hope this helps! Gdaisy

Hi there,Obvoiusly, everyone is different, but I think that most people who are actively looking for an open adoption (as opposed to "willing to accept" open) want to know as much as you would like to share (and probably more, but are too shy to ask). We have three kids, two adopted, and have open adoptions w/ both families. My son has 5 brothers. We got to know them pretty well after he was born and now he loves for me to tell him how he sleeps on his tummy like a little frog, just like two of his brothers. And when he says to me "hey mamma" in the morning, he sounds JUST like his other brother did when he shouted it at his mom as she was walking down the aisle at her wedding.... stuff like that is important for kids to know. It isn't just stuff like "she had brown hair". They want to know if YOU because you will become family. My daughter is only 3 months old and her family doesn't live in this country. The other day I was talking to her grandmother (my daughter's mothers, mother) and the baby was making her happy sound. It is kind of a low growly sound. Grandma said "T used to do that when she was a baby and I had forgotten all about it". Stuff like that is wonderful. MY big regret is taht we don't know anything about either father besides a name. So......I hope that helps. Whatever you choose for your baby will be a conclusion you can only reach through lots of prayer and study and research. If you choose to place and want to be a part of his/her life, make that clear to the family. You will find a family that matches what your needs are. I think that many people are afraid of open adoption. If you remember that the relationship needs to be worked on, just like all relationships do, you are likely to find that it can be rewarding for everyone, but most of all the child. Also...remember that we are nervous about all this too. We walk a fine line between being interested in your welfare w/ out trying to be coercive. We want to be involved but don't want to step on your toes. We want to be sensitive to your pain and grief (w/ my daughter we were so careful about showing how ecstatic we really were that she worried there was something wrong...). We are not sure what topics are ok to ask about and what things aren't. It is a very strange kind of intimate stranger type of relationship. We want to know the things that make you who you are and the things that are important to you. Again, good luck and I wish you peace with whatever you decide.....

First of all, thank you for considering adoption. When we adopted our DS 3 1/2 years ago, there were many things about our birthparents that could have scared us off. (Mostly because it was a legal risk adoption, but there were other factors too). But we made a spiritual connection right away and received the confirmation that this was our son. I am glad we know what we do, the good and the bad, because I feel like it will help me raise him better. We certainly aren't perfect and neither was our birthmom, but we love her and respect her tremendously regardless. So I wouldn't be afraid to share everything and anything. If there are things that are too hard for you to talk about, have your cw share it. I don't know if this is what you were looking for, but there is my two cents. Best wishes to you!

We adopted our son 10 1/2 months ago and we wanted to know absolutely EVERYTHING and ANYTHING his bio parents wanted to tell us! We wanted to know medical history, how bparents met, their likes and dislikes, hobbies, etc. At first...it was casual and we took our relationship slowly, but as this last year has gone on...we have become more open and are very close with our son's first family!! We e-mail weekly...sometimes more if M (Tyce's birth mom) and I are feeling chatty! We e-mail pics a couple times a month and send "actual" pictures a couple times a month also! We get together every couple months or so. My point is that as time has gone on, we feel very comfortable asking each other questions. For example, our son developed Eczema and I was able to hop online and shoot M an e-mail, finding out that both bio dad's family and her family had it! Things like that! Can you tell I am an open adoption fan? Good luck and don't worry! If it is right...you will all be able to talk as friends and ask each other questions freely!:love:

Hello,I think sharing as much information as you feel comfortable with, about your situation, is good. We don't know much about our son's birthparents. Both of them have such unique historys. What we do know, we are very glad to know. (We have semi-open adoptions with our 2 boys, guardianship of our daughter)Remember that YOU are a daughter of God. Also the child you carry is a child of God. We each have our own unique place here in this world. Our path, and how we arrive to our earthly 'home' is also unique. Not one is alike. Sometimes the road is rough, and unchartered...but as you face these trials... the knowledge, strength, understanding and growth you will recieve will amaze you.Thoughts & Prayers,Stephanie

I too want to know everything...I hate being "the aparent" because it limits me on my friendship. Like I could give advice if I were simply a friend, but as an aparent that comes across as condescending and patronizing....I hate that even tho stuff comes from my heart, being the aparent makes it more suspicious in my motives....I consider an adoption to be very much like an arranged marriage... INTIMATE STANGERS describes it very well. I don't think there is anything I could find out that would make me wish I hadn't known...KNOWLEDGE is power....and not knowing stuff makes you feel powerless... I wish I knew all the stuff that my dd did as a baby, and if it was like her bmom...I wish I knew how her bmom feels about stuff, life etc. I wish we were closer and I wish that being close didn't cause so much pain for her.We have an open adoption as well, I consider it a swinging door in the wall. She is welcome at any time. I wish I could be her sister....I wish she didn't think we're better off than her....We're just regular people struggling to keep our life together just as she is. I wish me giving her a hand with things in her life wouldn't be seen as pity or charity but merely family helping family.

First of all I want to say that I really respect your courage in considering adoption and doing things like this (asking questions) to be better informed. I agree with the ANYTHING and EVERYTHING! We want our daughter to see all the ways she takes after her birth parents as well as all the ways she takes after us. The more your child's a-parents know about you, the more they can pass on to your child. We adopted our daughter in what was supposed to be a semi-open adoption, but through some of Heavenly Father's miracles, it became very open, and we're so glad it did. Our feeling is that the more information we have about the birth parents and her family, the more open we can be with them. Since we brought our daughter home, we have become more open with her birth mother than her birth father, simply because her birth mother has been more open with us. It has really been a situation where things "clicked" with us right off. My daughter's birth mother and I can talk for hours, and she fits right into our family. There have been several experiences on both sides of the adoption that confirmed to us that the placement was right. This was essential, since as much as I love my daughter, I could not have recieved her from her birth mother if I hadn't known it was what Heavenly Father wanted. If you want an open adoption, make sure that's known up front and choose a family who wants that as well. In my opinion, open adoptions are better for everyone involved because it takes away the "fear" many people feel of the unknown. Our main hope in adopting is to find build our eternal family through adoption situations that can benefit everyone involved. I hope you find peace in whatever decision you make for you and your baby.

Hi. Having adopted twice, I'll just say, remember that the adoptive parents are just as nervous as you are. We wanted to know what our birthparents were comfortable sharing with us. With our second adoption, we told our son's birthmom that we were pretty open and that she could ask us anything and we would answer honestly. We all liked that approach and we told her that if we asked anything that she didn't want to tell us, then all she had to do was not answer the question. With any situation, you need to feel comfortable with the contact you have. Ask what you need to know and expect the same from them. A relationship can't develop without honesty. In our quest for our third and final child, we are keeping this attitude. We are open and honest people and would hope that our children's birthparents would feel comfortable enough with us to ask. We loved ANY information that we were given and after our face-to-face meetings, I came home and wrote everything I could remember down so that I could share it with our children. We have a deep love and respect for our children's birthparents and know that they love and respect us. If you follow your heart, you will find the right family for your child and receive witness to that fact. The adoptive family will also receive spiritual promptings that "this" child is meant to be in their home. With both of our children, we KNEW that they were meant to be in our home and their birthparents received that same witness. I pray that you find the "right" family for you and your child. Hugs! Heidi

Does the Lds church do open adoptions? I was reading some where that lds soical services only does semi open or closed and was wondering if thats true?

YES!! LDS family services DO have open adoptions! In the past they did put stipulations on the openness, etc. of adoptions but thankfully, they have changed their policies completely! We adopted our son one year ago and from day one, our relationship with his birthfamily was entriely ours to do with what we wanted...we chose a fully open adoption and enjoy it very much!! Just wanted to make sure you got the correct information!! Good luck!