February 17, 2014

Adoption News Round-Up

Take a look at some of the stories happening around the adoption world right now:

These five siblings were reunited fifty years after being adopted at infancy. United after their mother’s death, they’ve become part of each other’s lives in what is an incredibly heartwarming story.

Russia has done it again, this time banning all same-sex adoptions from foreign countries, as well as banning adoptions for single people who are from countries where same-sex adoption is legal. Same-sex marriage is illegal in Russia, so adoptions from same-sex couples in their home country are banned as well.

But in better news, Idaho joins the legion of states who are allowing same-sex adoption, by ruling that same-sex couples have the same right to adopt as anyone else!

An adoptive mother who successfully adopted a little girl in an international adoption from South Korea shares five things she’s learned about adoption.

A birth mother who placed her daughter for adoption 24 years prior is committed to telling her story to help others who’ve been in her same position. “With no one to turn to, she realised there were many others dealing with the hardship of adoption who needed somewhere to turn. Next week the Riverina Adoption Support Group will meet for the first time as a group welcoming all community members affected by adoption – whether it be birth parents, adoptive parents, adoptees, siblings or extended families.” Although she was forced to give up her child against her will, we are so happy to know that at 64, she is finally on the path to finding some peace for herself. That that path includes helping others makes it all the more heartening.

Bekka Ross Russell, an adoptive mother of two, shares the stories of her adoption as well as information about about an organization she started, The Small Things, which partners with the orphanage that her children were adopted from to help raise and provide resources to give the children living there adequate care. Many of these children, like Bekka’s son, who could barely walk due to rickets caused by malnutrition, are desperately in need of the kindness of others. For more information about The Small Things, visit their website.