From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaOpen adoption is a term generally used to describe a variety of arrangements allowing for ongoing contact between members of the '
adoption triad' (adoptive family, birth family, and adopted child). The level of openness in any relationship varies widely. Degrees of open arrangements span from mediated contact, which implies letters and photographs sent through a third party (so that the adoptive family can maintain privacy), to full disclosure of the adoptive family's personal information. In fully open adoptions, there is actual physical contact, through meetings and visits between the birth family and the adptive family. Sometimes an adoption agency may describe an adoption as 'open' when the birth-mother (and/or birth-father) may have a say or may make the actual decision on who is chosen to parent their child, though this is not the generally accepted definition.
An adoption where the adoptive and birth parents do not become aware of each others' identities and where only medical and historical information is given to the adoptive parents is known as a
closed adoption.
Although open adoptions are thought to be a relatively new phenomenon, in fact most adoptions in the
United States were open until the twentieth century. Until the 1930's, most adoptive parents and birth parents had contact at least during the adoption process.
[1] In many cases, adoption was seen as a social support: young children were adopted out not only to help their parents (by reducing the number of children they had to support) but also to help another family by providing an apprentice.
Adoptions became closed when social pressures mandated that families preserve the myth that they were formed biologically. One researcher has referred to these families, that made every attempt to match the child physically to their adoptive families, as 'as if' families.
[2][3]Openness became the norm when infants available for adoption became scarce, and birth parents had the ability to negotiate acceptable terms for their children, including the ability to participate in decisions about who they wanted to parent their child.
Proponents of open adoption maintain that such adoptions are better for the child and represent best practice. Increasingly, as children growing up in open adoptive homes are studied, adoption researchers are finding that this might be a preferable adoption arrangement.
[4] Civil rights advocates argue that openness is the right of all children, who are entitled to information about their history and heritage.
One important fact related to openness is that open adoptions are not legally enforceable agreements in many jurisdictions
[5]. The adoptive parents may terminate all contact with the birth parent(s) at any time and for any reason.
We are often asked if we are in an open adoption or closed. That is always a hard one to give a simple answer to. Mainly due to the fact that everyone has their own idea on what it means.
We willing share emails and pictures with our wonderful birth mother, and family. Each week Nat writes a special one to one email just to her. I write a family email to her, her dad and step mom, her mom and step dad. I have even written to the birth father per his request but have not herd back. We have received emails from all the rest. We are printing them out and saving them for Maggie to read when the time comes.
We have also given them the address to our blogs and encourage them to share that with anyone they wish. So yeah we are open. We still have some boundaries but they are small and not set in stone.
I truly believe that blogs are the most perfect way to share information and to let people get to know who we are and how we think.
