March 02, 2015

Adoption News Roundup

Here’s a look at some of the inspiring and informative news that’s caught our eye recently:

If you’re an adoptive parent, especially one in a transracial family, you’ve likely experienced unwelcome comments from strangers. This article examines something that we haven’t thought nearly enough about. What if your child, who is of a different ethnicity than you, doesn’t want to get stopped anymore and told how beautiful their eyes, hair, skin, etc. are? Furthermore, the article muses, would these children get those same comments if they were out and about with a family of their same ethnicity? Positive stereotyping…it can be just as harmful to your child as negative stereotyping, and it’s something to think about.

This incredible lawyer just recently completed his 1,000th adoption for a child in foster care. “He hasn’t pocketed a dime for any of them. Instead, he and his firm, Shook, Hardy & Bacon, put those state fees in a scholarship fund to help send those kids to college someday. So far, the fund has provided $625,000 to nearly 500 students.” What a story.

This woman couldn’t take people’s rude comments about her son’s birth mother anymore. So she set out to change minds and lives.

Have you heard of “baby boxes” for abandoned newborns? Indiana might be the first state ever to use them. Although these little incubators could save the lives of abandoned babies who might otherwise die, the program does have some critics. This article presents both sides well. What do you think?

This is just so heartwarming. This incredible young birth mother has been pumping her breast milk for almost three months after her baby was born, and sending it to the adoptive family. Not only that, but she plans to donate leftover milk to neonatal babies in need.

A chance encounter changed these boy’s lives forever.

Can you imagine teaching your three year old how to play? “When I first brought him home, he was lost in bewilderment as the older children — four of them, ages seven to 18 — romped around him. I realized immediately: He does not know how to play. The world of fun and make-believe was foreign to him. Though he’d spent the last three years in the nonstop company of other children, it was not about play. They were not having fun. They were surviving together.”