[me1600]

it seems like U.S. domestic is a nightmare. lots of failed adoptions etc. Your thoughts? we are thinking of international as well any thoughts on best Countries we are fine with transracial and certain disabilities.

[carmen90]

I don't think there is such a thing as 'better'. They are very different and have pros and cons (which are different for different families). So you have to pick the best fit for your family. The best fit for your family won't be the best fit for another one

For me, that was foster care not international (there is no private adoption in my country). Foster care was a better fit for me because I wanted older children but was scared of a language barrier, I didn't feel equipped to adopt transracially, I didn't have a lot of money, I was very aware how many children were waiting in care with no hope of a family and finally (most importantly), I had a strong gut feeling that FC was right and that my child would be there.

There are many families who do experience failed adoptions through private arragements, as well as through foster care. There are also many families who have experienced failed adoptions internationally as well. No group is immune to the heartbreak of disruption, no group is immune to failed adoption. However there are thousands of familes who do finalise domestic adoptions every year - I think the number is about 50,000 FC adoptions and around 20,000 private adoptions every year. International adoption isn't as common. But it might be just right for you

I would ask yourself what you really want and what you envisage your future family to be like. You could make a list of your own pros and cons for each route. Do you get any gut feeling either way?

If you do think international is the right route, picking a country can still be difficult. Some people just know exactly which country is the right one, others make a list and decide on that. It's very important that you have a positive image of your chosen country, because you will be the one who tells your child all about the country they were born in. It's important that your child knows about at least some positive aspects of life where they came from, even though of course some things will be difficult to talk about, and sometimes life wasn't very good there at all. You need to decide how much money you are willing to spend (Russia is very expensive, other countries aren't). You need an age range - don't expect a child younger than about a year, and over 18 months is far more likely. You need a list of exactly which disabilities you could take on - some countries like Ukraine only have serious disabilites in younger children. Some countries are only open to parents of a certain religion, some have a weight limit, some have restrictions on age and children already living in the home.

If you expand a bit more on what you are looking for, we could advise which countries might be a good fit. You can look on the state department website for international adoption here Adoptions Home | Intercountry Adoption and look at information for certain countries (although when I looked at information for my own country, the information was 6 years out of date and therefore incorrect, so do double check anything you read there). Talk to current families in the process or just finished, to know exactly what's happening at the moment.

[carmen90]

Edit - I found your other post

"Hi:
here is our story:
we are 48 and 46
we have a small child by frozen embryos that I gave birth to.
We have been married nearly three years.

we are interested in adoption or foster to adopt.

however for the sake of our baby son, I think I would like someone younger than he.

Here are my questions:
what is the best route for adoption: private attorney?
what is the best route for foster to adopt?
we are open to: children under five
we are open to foreign adoption
we are open to children with physical disabilities but not emotional.
we are open to transracial adoption.
we would love a baby, toddler or small child.

what is your experience, advice and opinion? Thank you!"



My anser is that there's no guaruntee in adoption that a child won't have emotional issues. Mild emotional issues are very common, and you should go into IA expecting them. Remember your child will be taken away from everything they know, and that's an enormous shock to the system. Expect some difficulty bonding and expect grieving. Hard to go through emotionally (you can't cure the grieving with love, time eases the wound and not much else. Bonding requires lots of consistency and nurture over months). Also expect institutional delays in children from orphanages - these delays include social delays. Foster care adoptions also carry the same likelihood of emotional difficulties. Exposure to drugs and alcohol in utero can cause long term issues (although sometimes the child is fine). These emotional isses often don't show up till school age or older

Nearly 3 years is long enough married for some countries but not all of them. You need to check carefully.

Foster adopt carried the inherent risk that you will lose the child - you are acting as a foster parents who support reunifying the child with their parents. You need to be comfortable with that if you choose that route. Straight adoption would only really be a route if you wanted a school age child.

Routes for private adoption are also dependent on your situation. States have different requirements about how you must go about it. You can adopt in a different state if the mother gives birth there - you follow the relinquishment laws of the state where the child is born. The best laws are those which allow the mother the time to make a full decision about adoption. IMO laws which do not allow papers to be signed for at least 72 hours post-birth are the best ones - it makes it more likely the mother can make a fully informed decision, gives you the peace of mind that your adoption was ethical, and gives that same reassurance to the adoptee. The adoptees who have serious issues later, often had unethical adoptions where their bith mothers did not have enough time to make the best decision or was coerced.

However, private adoption of an infant is the route where the child is likely to be the most healthy (emotionally speaking). Time being neglected or in insitiutions or in care make emotional issues more likely. Private adoption also of course makes it the most likely you would have a baby. International adoptions usually do not involve babies

[stllc116]

One is not better or worse, they are just different. For me I had a strong connection to the country I adopted from which was part of my decision. One advantage for me was I felt more comfortable with the way the wait was done. I was on a waiting list for a referral so I could track my progress. I could plan a trip for work or a vacation because I could tell I wasn't going to get a referral in the next month or two. In domestic adoption it seems you could wait a few weeks or a few years with occasionally very short notice.
I also was worried about the mother deciding not to place her child after I was emotionally attached. While international adoptions can run into problems the chance of that happening between meeting her (getting attached) and bringing her home were rare. I also wasn't comfortable with the idea of marketing myself and in a sense competing with other waiting families.

But some advantages of domestic adoption are that newborns are available, no foreign travel, no foreign language, no foreign governments, more known history of child and his or her heritage.....

Some people will tell you cost, but really both domestic and international vary it is hard to say which is cheaper. It depends on the individual situation.

[ippichic]

me1600: I agree with the others that each couple has to make the choice that makes the most sense to their family. I can give you the reasons why we decided on international adoption from Russia, and your motivations may be very different.

We chose Russia because:
1. I am divorced twice and that doesn't matter to Russia. Domestically, it would probably have been a negative point in my profile and prolonged my wait.
2. I am 43, my DH is 33 and Russia doesn't care about my "advanced" age or the age difference between us. This may have been another negative point in a domestic profile.
3. I did not like the idea of an "open adoption" since I think it's tough enough having a toddler or teenager playing two parents against each other, let alone three. Domestic adoption agencies will tell you that most birth moms want an open adoption in the US, albeit, there are varying degrees of "openness".
4. The cost of a domestic adoption is not set in stone, adoptive parents must be flexible with covering medically necessary costs involved with the birth mother's pregnancy, so it could be equal to or even exceed the set fees in an international adoption (caveat is that the travel costs for int'l adoption can fluctuate as well, but medical costs can skyrocket quickly). My international adoption fees are all disclosed up front, except travel costs.
5. Russia has a relatively short average wait time and relatively young children available for adoption, and we wanted a child as young as possible, as quickly as possible, whereas in domestic adoption, you have no clue when a birth mother is going to choose your profile from the hundreds of other adoptive parents waiting to be chosen. It could be days, or weeks, or it could be years.
6. There is very little likelihood that a birth mother or her family is going to try to appeal the adoption after I leave the country with my newly adopted child. Domestically, there are birth moms who can change their minds once the child is born, or during a 30 day finalization period or family members who spend years appealing custody. I know it's certainly not the majority, but it can happen.

I hope this helps you see how we reasoned it out. Good luck with your decision!

By the way, I'm certainly not trying to fire up any disputes about one or the other being a better choice, only describing what we decided based on internet research and speaking to other adoptive parents, and some assumptions and conclusions that we drew. I hope I have expressed my decision without offending any readers.

[Oldmama]

Agree! There is no one "best" answer for any one family. We all have our own experiences/things we can and can not tolerate etc....

Our personal decision was made due to the fact that many people we know in our community had foster to adopt experiences that did not go well. I saw the pain the PAP parents went through, along with their children and the children they were hoping to adopt. Couldn't do it. That said, thank God there are loving people that can provide safe, loving homes to children while their biological parents get the help they need. I admire their strength.

We decided Russian adoption because it works with our own family dynamics, including our age. We have friends who adopted children from Russia and it has went well for them. It just felt right and we want to give a home to a child who has no one fighting for them.....in any way.

Those are only the reasons for our decision.....but keep in mind there is no right or wrong. Just right and wrong for your own family.

[LoveBeingaMom]

I want to add in response to some of the statements about open and state adoption. We in the midst of an international adoptions so we are not anti-int'l at all. Just want you to have accurate information about the choices you are trying to decide between (in addition to what I pm'd you yesterday). We adopted twice domestically (not including our youngest who was a donated embryo).

1. Our first was through the state. Our state actually has a straight adoption route. We specifically did not want to foster as we are attys with experience representing kids as their guardian ad litems in the system and the system consistently screws them and we would not be able to handle the emotion of of sending them back to their um, "inadequate" at best bio families.

These are kids that were are in the foster system but free for adoption--TPR already in place. Our son was an infant, we brought him home from the NICU. No issues with his adoption. You should inquire if your state has such a type of adoption.

2. The other was through a domestic agency.
--Yes, most birth moms want some degree of openness but you set what level of openness you can handle and the agency will only submit you to birthmoms who want the same level. We agreed to visits at the agency once a month for the first year after TPR (which happened one week after birth) because the hormonal changes are terrible after pregnancy and we knew that visits would help her in that emotional period and soldify that she choos the right parents. We also agreed to monthly photos and updates on a password protected shutterfly site.

Our daughter's birth mom was respectful to us and I genuinely like her, we have made ourselves available for further visits but she has not taken us up on them. She is not a third parent, nor would she ever be. In addition there are very few states that do not include in their statutes the right of the adoptive parent to cease visits/contacts if they, the adoptive parents, deem it in their child's best interest. In fact, in most states (including ours) post TPR visitation and contact agreements are not legally enforceable--it is a moral obligation if you agree and then it is your parental duty to determine if/when they should cease.

However, I will say that some kind of contact with your child's bio family, even if it is simply photos to them and no visits gives your children a positive feeling that you respect and value their roots and cherish their birth mom for choosing you.

-- If you are not open to paying medical expenses, again, your agency will not submit your profile to birth moms who are in a situation that would require such payment. In our case, our birth mother chose us two hours after our daughter was born and was on state health insurance, so we paid nothing for medical. However, we were open as this was an expense we would have had if I were pregnant. Many birth moms are on medicare or other state health insurance.

--As for appealing the adoption--once TPR is filed, they CANNOT undo the adoption without a demonstration of fraud which is extremely rare. Most cases in which custody drags on involved instances in which the agency/lawyer or adoptive parents did not obtain termination of the birth fathers' rights properly--which if unknown is easily done by a due diligence search and notice by publication in the paper. If your agency/lawyer is reputable and experienced it is not a problem.

If bio mom and dad are 16 and decide on an adoption plan, their family (ie grandparents, etc) have no right to contest it.

3. Most birth moms who place their children for adoption are in their 20s. Teenagers tend to keep their kids and the highest rate of "mind-changing is in the teenage mom" usually because they were pressured by their family to place. Of course, there are teen moms who place willingly and teen moms who do a great job raising their kids. Just want to dispel the myth that most birh moms are crazy teen girls.

I can't tell you how many times I have been asked if my kids birth moms were teenagers. Both of them were in their mid-20s!

4. The cost of our state's adoption (no foster involved) adoption was absolutely free--they even paid our attorney.

5. The cost of our private agency adoption was half of the cost of our current international adoption and ALL of the domestic fees WERE known upfront. We were open to medical fees but we still would have come out under our current international adoption costs.

Hope that helps!

Susan