Frequently Asked Questions About Our Open Adoption

We recognize that open adoption is still relatively unusual in the United States, and many of our friends have questions about the process. We've created this list to answer some of those common questions.

Stereotypes

First, though, we'd like to ask a small favor. It shouldn't be necessary to do so, but unfortunately some people ask potentially hurtful questions without thinking about how the happy parents will feel. For various reasons, there is a media stereotype that the only babies available for adoption are undesirable. There have also been many hyped-up news stories about incredibly unusual situations in which birth parents went to court years after the placement, trying to get children back.

Both of these stereotypes are false, as explained below. But as adoptive parents, we run into them all the time. Sometimes, people who hold the stereotypes ask about them in a clumsy fashion. So please, do not ask us or any other adoptive parents any questions along the lines of "How do you know the baby will be healthy?" or "How can you be sure the birthmother won't take the baby back?" Both of these questions will be answered in detail below, along with some suggestions on how they can be asked in a polite fashion that Miss Manners would approve of. But the best thing you can do, by far, is to avoid even the vaguest hint of suggesting that the outcome of the adoption would be anything other than happy.

The Questions

Q: What is open adoption?
A: Open adoption is any adoption in which the birth and adoptive parents know at least a little bit about each others' identities. The amount of openness varies widely, and may be regulated from state to state. In California, it's entirely at the discretion of the people involved. It's quite common to have full disclosure of names and medical records, and to maintain some level of contact even after the adoption is completed.
If you're thinking about adoption yourself, either as a birthparent or as an adoptive parent, you might want to visit the home page of our agency, the Independent Adoption Center. The IAC specializes in open adoptions, and we happen to think that they are an excellent and caring agency.
Q: Will you continue to see the birthmother? How often?
A: In our case, the contact will probably not be direct. Our birthmother has indicated that she would like to keep in touch and see pictures of Alexandra's life, but that frequent visits would be emotionally too difficult for her.
Q: Will the baby know she is adopted?
A: Yes. If nothing else, when she gets old enough to read, she could visit this Web page. But we are matter-of-fact people, and we will treat this issue like any other. We will explain that "Theresa" loved her so much that she chose the best life for her daughter, even though it meant not being able to raise her herself.
Q: What is the birthmother like?
A: If you asked us to sit down and draw up a profile of the perfect birthmother, we would have described "Theresa". She is an amazing woman who is lively, outgoing, decisive, selfless, determined, intelligent, sensitive, beautiful, and insightful. When she smiles, the room lights up, and everyone she meets likes her right away. Even when under stress and pain, she was thinking first of her baby and of our concerns. If our daughter grows up to be even half as fantastic as her birthmother, we might pat ourselves on the back and claim to have been good parents, but the majority of the credit will go to "Theresa" for giving life to such a wonderful girl.
Q: Why did she give up her baby?
A: We don't know all of the reasons, and even if we did we wouldn't share them, because some of them are personal and private. However, we can tell you that "Theresa" was not in a position to give her child a solid and stable upbringing with the attention that a baby deserves, so she made the difficult and painful choice separate herself and to find a couple who were able to give her baby the love that she herself would have liked to have given.
Q: How do you know the birthmother wasn't a drug user?
A: Don't ask it. A variant of the "sick baby" question below, it is predicated on the assumption that birthmothers are often degenerates, which is far from the truth and most unfair to our wonderful and irreplaceable birthmother.
Q: How do you know the baby will be healthy?
A: We don't, any more than any expectant couple can be certain. Most children have health problems at some point in their life; Geoff had a heart murmur and Pat spent a year at home after contracting rheumatic fever.
The secret code behind this question is "Obviously, any woman who would give up her baby is disturbed and probably a drug addict. The only reason she'd consider adoption is so she won't get stuck with a sick child." Sorry to be blunt, but this is garbage. The truth is that most birthmothers give up their children after long and careful consideration, and do so because they want the child to have a better life than they can give them. As in our case, birthmothers tend to be young and healthy, and their babies are probably healthier than average.
If you absolutely must ask this question because you need to know for some valid (usually medical) reason, try something positive, such as "Oh, she looks so pink and robust. You must be pleased to have such a healthy baby." If the adoptive parents feel it appropriate, this will give them an opportunity to share relevant medical caveats with you. If not, they won't feel like you're hinting that they made a big mistake.
Q: How can you be sure the birthmother or birthfather won't take the baby back?
A: This is a complicated question, and the answer varies widely from state to state. In California, the law is quite clearcut: there is a relatively short period (rarely more than 90 days, and sometimes less than a week) during which the birth parents can change their mind and reclaim the baby, and after that there is no going back except in very unusual cases such as fraud on the part of the adoptive parents.
In an open adoption such as ours, before the waiting period is up, and in fact even before the birth, the birth parents and adoptive parents have a chance to meet each other and get a feeling for how certain they are about their decision. In our case, it was clear that our birthmother was a mature and thoughtful woman who had arrived at her difficult choice carefully and after much consideration. From the moment we first spoke to her, we didn't worry for even a second about this possibility.
If you must ask it, the best way to address this question is to make general requests for information: "How does the adoption process work? What sort of legal hoops do you have to jump through?" The adoptive parents will be happy to tell you all about it, and you will learn much more than if you were to clumsily suggest that they should be nervously watching their doorstep in fear of losing their precious baby.
Incidentally, the so-called postpartum reclaim rate varies widely, depending on the adoption agency and a number of other details. If you are considering adoption, this is a good thing to ask about. We've heard of reclaim rates of 25% and higher. Our agency had a rate of only 4% last year.
Q: What about all those cases we hear about in the news, where the birthmother or the birthfather goes to court years later?
A: Again, this is a complicated question. The short answer is that those cases were in other states where the laws do not protect the interests of the child so strongly, or they were in situations where the birthparents were cheated in some sense of the word. We don't have the time or space here to go into details about the law, but we can tell you that everybody involved in our adoption has had a chance to choose that option, and everybody fully understood their rights when they made their choice. We won't be lying awake nights worrying about this problem.
Q: So is it all final, then?
A: Yes. Shortly, after Xandie was born, the birthmother signed the "relinquishment," which gives up her right to take the baby back, and the courts later terminated the birthfather's rights. We then completed all the required contacts with social workers and a six-month waiting period. On April 30, 1999, we went to court to sign a few documents and became Alexandra's official parents.
Q: Why can't you have a baby of your own?
A: We do have a baby of our own, and we're extremely happy with her.
What you're really asking, of course, is "Why are you infertile, if indeed you are?" And you already know the answer: our medical difficulties (or lack thereof) are our own business.

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