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Respecting Your Child’s Privacy

Last week I was at a meeting of a group of parents who’ve adopted from Korea. The discussion turned to privacy issues. Many adoptive parents are so excited about our children. We love to share their stories. We are eager to correct stereotypes about adoption. (When you’ve seen babies three to a cradle in a baby home, you feel like buttonholing people on the street and asking them if they’ve ever thought of adopting!) People ask us about adoption. We are eager to give them information, to reassure them, but also to be honest so that an adopting couple will … Continue reading →

Protecting Your Child’s Identity

I was surprised to learn that not everyone who adopts from the state is notified about ways to protect their child’s identity. If your child is at any risk of harm by either birth parent at all, you might think about these steps. Consider changing your child’s name if it is in their best interest. I know there are potentially negative consequences in doing so, but please weigh the risk. Though last names are typically changed at adoption, you may want to at least think about changing the middle if you plan to leave the first name. Upon the finalization … Continue reading →

Naming, Claiming, and Letting Go

Naming our children is a very personal decision for all of us. My own parents preferred to think of new names, rather than naming their children after family. However, my husband and I gave our first child (our birth son) one name related to my family heritage and another after a recently deceased relative of my husband’s. We planned a girl’s name at that time also—a first name I had always thought was beautiful, and a middle name which was Charles’ mother’s, grandmother’s and sister’s middle name. When we adopted, many of the Asian language names sounded strange to our … Continue reading →

Making Contact: Finding My Child’s Adopted Siblings

After three years of playing amateur private investigator, I finally found the rest of my son’s birth siblings’ adoptive families. I desperately wanted more information on my son’s family medical background than I was given by our state. I wanted to know if the other families got more information on my son’s birth parents character as well. Here is the story on how we made contact. For easier reference and safety purposes, I will refer to my son’s birth siblings by their maternal birth order rather than their names. My son is the 6th child of 8 by his birthmother. … Continue reading →

Adopted Children Need New Social Security Numbers

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If you are about to adopt or have recently adopted, you may need to add one more thing to your “to do” list. After a child is adopted, his name is changed according to your wishes. Obviously, parents want their adopted child to have the family name. But you should not stop there. If it was a closed adoption, you need to also change the child’s social security number. If the number is not changed, the birth parent can find your child by tracing the number. We do not want our birth mother to find us at some future date … Continue reading →

Defining Family

What is it that defines your family? Is your family defined by the people you’ve grown up with? Are they the one’s who’ve been there for you when you’ve needed them? I have chosen three main definitions of family to focus on: genetics, law and special relationship. When looking at family dynamics in adoption, we should know that people use any combination of these to base their perspective, some putting more priority on one over the other. Genetics: Being united by genes is one way people define family. Some people call this blood relation, or biologically related, and some call … Continue reading →

Resources for Keeping Tabs on Birth Parents

As a mom who’s adopted child number 6 of 7 and worked very hard to make sure the adoptive parents of all these kids have contact, I have needed to be able to keep tabs on our son’s birth mother. This goes for our younger son’s birth mother as well. It might come across as a bit of an obsession of mine. It grieves my heart at the possibility of a child being born and none of us ever knowing of their existence. Not all birth mothers who’ve lost their children to the state have criminal records, but many of … Continue reading →