Adoption from the US

Hello! I work at a private agency and we have had some families pursue adopting from the US. As regulations and laws can be different in each Province, I would recommend talking to someone from your local Adoption office with the Government. While adopting from the US is legal here in Alberta, I would say it is definately not the first choice of the folks at Adoption and Permanency Services. Also, an adoption from the US is normally not finalized in Alberta so it can require that the family remain in the US until an adoption is finalized and then apply to Immigration Canada. Adoption & Permanency Servies would need to approve your home assessment and then would provide a "Letter of No Involvement" indicating that they have approved you to adopt but that after that point they have no involvement in your adoption. Hope this helps. Carrie

Yeah we are not sure if we are going to work with the province or a private agency with no real experience with the US but specialises in international (CAFAC).

We looked into it. I am an American married to a Canadian and what we discovered, at least from our research was the cost financially was more than we could handle. The overall cost we were quoted was more than going to China or Russia. I was sad because I thought it would be neat for our family to have at least one child born in the US (just like Mommy!). It was not meant to be. We were told that we might have to "live there" until finalized but if we could, it would be better for the expecting Mom to give birth here. But that is the same thing were told about the two possible placements we were considered for in Ontario. It seems that it is almost as hard to adopt out of province as it is to adopt out of country. We were told that if we had no preference to ethnicity (and we didn't) the timeframe was/could be exceptionally fast, but timing didn't play a large role in our decision. We chose domestic here in Canada, mostly because the financial commitment was known and since our finances were limited, and we wanted more than one child, this was a better opportunity for us. Sad but true that the financial aspect entered into our decision. We have been placed with two children in the last four years. I call them my little North Americans, as hopefully, unless the laws change (I have heard rumors of this) they are/will be allowed dual citizenship. Blessings of your journey...

EDITED TO REMOVE AGENCY DISCUSSION

Blessed - you are not the only ones that find adopting internationally prohibitively expensive :eek: - we knew that it was definately not something that we could explore and that lead us to choosing Government adoption. We could probably come up with the money for private adoption and might pursue that in the future, but international adoption is definately out for us. :coffee: Carrie