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My daughter asked me in 2008 to let her step mother adopt her so i did. Not without a lot of prayer of course. Well, i never received paperwork afterwords stating that she had been adopted. this was all done in texas, ft. worth and i did sign papers. i am still on her legal birth certificate and i am wondering if i was supposed to ever get papers letting me know that the adoption went through? any help would be greatly appreciated. She is 17 now and well this is what she wanted and i couldn't take care of her when she was younger due to some medical problems.
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The papers you signed were likely "termination of parental rights" papers. Once they became irrevocable (usually a few days after signing them) you no longer have any legal rights to the child or to information about the child - which means you would not have recieved any information about an adoption after you signed those papers.
When a child is adopted, the old birth certificate is sealed and a new one issued with the new, legal, parents' names on it. HOwever, in some areas it can take over a year for the request to change the certificate to go through all the proper channels.
But the birth certificate should have been changed, if indeed an adoption did happen after you signed termination of parental rights paperwork. But you'd have to request a brand new copy from the state in order to know about it, and since you are no longer legally related to her, they would probably deny you a copy of her birth certificate. If SHE requested a copy, it would be the one that is legally in force at the time she requsted it.
Hope that helps!
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The papers I signed were adoption papers. I am a legal secretary in Alabama and I took them to the attorney that handles adoptions and everything to do with family and they were adoption papers and still nothing saying she was adopted from the courts? I do know that we get copies of everything to do with court even if it is adoption.
You will not get anything saything the adoption went through because you signed over your rights. Therefore you dont have rights to learn about the adoption.
Because the child was a minor at the time of adoption the files are sealed.
Try ordering a Birth Certificate or a Social Security Card, if the adoption went through you will not be able to obtain any of these because they are only distributed to the "legal" parent, the parent listed on the Birth Certifcate.
To learn more about your rights Stepparent-adoption.org offers a great resource.
mommyas20
My daughter asked me in 2008 to let her step mother adopt her so i did. Not without a lot of prayer of course. Well, i never received paperwork afterwords stating that she had been adopted. this was all done in texas, ft. worth and i did sign papers. i am still on her legal birth certificate and i am wondering if i was supposed to ever get papers letting me know that the adoption went through? any help would be greatly appreciated. She is 17 now and well this is what she wanted and i couldn't take care of her when she was younger due to some medical problems.