How to start openness in foster adoption?

I adopted sisters who were our foster placements first. We are in an open adoption with the bioparents and a grandmother. We used to live in the same town as the birthmother, but have since moved out of state. She does have our address as does her mother (the grandmother). The grandmother sends birthday/Christmas/Easter cards and a small package for the girls twice a year. I send her an update with pictures two or three times a year. Nothing formal was set up, as far as how many times a year...it's just kind of fallen into what feels right for everyone. The birthmother and I talk on the phone every few months...she is parenting a full-bio sister and two half-sisters to my girls. I like to keep in touch, especially for the girls' sake. I have also set up a seperate email account just for the birthfamily to use. This is the only way the birthfather has to contact me currently. He knows I moved, but as far as I know, he doesn't know where. Perhaps, someday, I will set up a P.O. Box for him to use...for now though, I am just willing to do the email. I guess, for you, there is no right or wrong answer....I will say, though, it is better to start out small and gradually increase contact, versus starting out too big and then trying to cut back.

Actually, only certain types of mail are required to have a return address. It's things like Priority Mail, Registered Mail, etc that have to have one. Regular private mail under a certain number of ounces (I think it's 12 ounces) doesn't have to have one - you just have to be OK with not getting your mail back even if the mail isn't deliverable. That's probably the hard one. Without a return address you'd NEVER know if they received it or not. Or if they moved, died, refused the mail, or anything. So because of that, people tend to figure out a return address to use. A PO Box, or an out of state friend/relative. But I figured you'd appreciate knowing that you *can* send a regular letter without a return address.

We use a PO Box and we send all things certified. But, we are also in a binding open adoption, so its a bit different than your situation.

We went into foster/adopt knowing that we wanted as much contact as we could muster for the sake of the children. We just knew that we would have to be careful about addresses etc. because we didn't want trouble. Our children all came from the same neighboring county. We shop at the same malls and go to the same clinics. Privacy to some extent became an issue. For us we decided to start a MySpace page and post pictures of the children and blog about our daily life. We keep it upbeat and don't get into the major stuff like the children's diagnois of FASD etc. I post about 2 times per week about daily life and try to get the photos uploaded about every other week. For us this works great because we don't have to worry about a paper trail leading back to us. The account online is set up with a google email address and fake name. It is also set to be viewed only by our friends. The bio family knows that they can print pictures but that they can't post them on the web or their MySpace account otherwise I will shut it down. We have even used this to communicate when we have questions concerning the children's health. Well that is how it is done at our house. May not be something that you are interested in but it works well for us. And keep in mind that you can access the site from any library so even if they don't have a computer they can still check in whenever they want.

Not sure if you are through the county or through a private agency....but our agency lets us send things to them and they forward on to the family, or vice versa. Our address is never provided to them. Just a thought if your agency will allow you to do that.

No such luck there - we're through the county. I'm thinking about setting up a PO Box or using my mom's. I like the idea of using Myspace or Facebook, but I only have a name and address to start with. Maybe we'll be able to try that out with them in the future. Thanks for the ideas!

I use my work address - but I own my own business (and the building), so I'm not overstepping any work boundaries by doing so. If I couldn't do that, I would probably get a PO Box. Our HHS office said that they offer their services as 'middle man' and will forward mail to and from birthparents and adoptive parents. That might be something to look in to. (sorry, just read your last post, and you have looked in to it!) I have considered doing an online blog or myspace type page - but I have heard of situations where birthfamily has copied those pictures and put them onto their own pages, making false claims about the children still being with them etc... It might be farfetched and unlikely, but I decided it was a risk I didn't want to take. It's very difficult to get things off of the internet, once they're out there.

We made it very clear from the start that if this happened we would terminate our account and they would loose the privilege of pictures and learning about the children. I like the idea behind the web accounts because the bio parents/family members don't have to wait 6 months for an update.