December 10, 2015

Adoption News Roundup

Happy Friday, friends! We hope you’ve had a wonderful week, and are gearing up for one of the last few weekends before the holidays. Here’s a roundup of the links and reads that have really made an impact on us this week.

What a beautiful compilation of positive adoption thoughts, from Canada Adopts! They polled their community during National Adoption Month, to get their answers to certain questions about adoption. It really speaks to the power of adoption and the miraculous ways in which this process changes people’s lives and creates so many definitions of family.

This adoptive mama shares the questions she’s often asked, and what she REALLY wants to say.

We love Adoption.com’s Birth Mother Voices video series. Not only is it a great way to connect with the perspective of birth mothers, but it allows us to actually see them engaging with one another — so often birth mothers don’t get this type of placement in the adoption conversation. Their final topic in the series is: “What if your adoption doesn’t work out how you imagined?” A hard question, but one that deserves to be discussed.

How have you tried to keep your child’s heritage alive post-adoption?

Have you adopted more than child? Do your children have different levels of contact with their birth mothers? How do you explain that to the child who maybe doesn’t hear from their birth mother as often as their sibling? Adoptive Families tackles this difficult topic.

What sort of hurdles might you face with your adopted child during the holidays?  “Children who spent many years with their birth family and many years in foster care may have happy or sad memories of birth families and old traditions left behind. Internationally adopted children are likely to feel disconnected from their cultural roots, and may have many questions about their birth culture. Those children from open adoptions can experience stress and conflicting feelings about their birth parents and adopted parents. And finally, children who know little or nothing about their birth parents may spend more time reflecting on the birth families they have no memories of. Be observant during this time. Take notice of mood swings, subtle expressions and body language.”

Always a great refresher, especially as we’re looking at the end of the year…what do we need to know about the adoption tax credit?