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Old 12-07-2003, 12:08 PM
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Sharon Sharon is offline
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Do you have a lawyer yet? As far as I know, relatives do not have the legal right to prevent a mother from placing her child for adoption. That decision is entirely up to the mother and father of the child. I know this is the case with newborn adoption. In your case, since your child is older, I'm not sure; different rules may apply. The thing is, it will be very traumatic for a child the age of your son to be removed from all the family he has ever known and be placed with strangers, no matter how wonderful and caring. Unless none of your family members are fit to raise him, I can't see how this would be in your son's best interest (being given to strangers, when there are biorelatives who are willing to take him). And if in fact none of your relatives would be suitable guardians, this will probably come out in court. Even with relative adoption, I believe a home study is still required.
Perhaps you, your family, and the potential aparents can work out some sort of compromise; such as allowing the couple you've chosen to adopt the child, but still allowing family members to have contact and visitation. It truly isn't in a two-year-old's best interest to be cut off completely from all the family he's ever known, except in cases of abuse or mistreatment.
My advice would be to speak to a lawyer and find out exactly what the laws in your state are, regarding this situation. I don't know if your relatives have a case or not. If it turns out they don't, and you are free to go ahead with your adoption plan, I would strongly recommend an open adoption involving contact with all family members. They apparently care about your child, and he has bonded with them by now, and I think some sort of ongoing contact with his bio-relatives would be advisable, and would make the transition much smoother for him.
Best wishes, ~ Sharon
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