Blog Post #4: Open Adoption

In the past, when thinking about adoption, I was always somewhat confused and unsure about open adoptions. I thought that it would be slightly awkward for all involved and would make the situation more difficult for the biological parent(s) and more confusing for the child. Since taking this class, doing the readings and listening to speakers though, I am starting to understand that the majority of that is untrue.

Pertman discusses in his book how biological mothers struggle with giving their child up, even those most confident and assured of their decision. They all usually experience some guilt and second guess their decision as well as their self-worth. This decision is not an easy one to make and “the insecurities of biological parents, particularly mothers, often run deepest of all – especially when their sense of loss isn't alleviated by contact with, or even information about, the children they carried” (144). Having an open adoption allows the biological parent(s) to maintain confidence that they made the right decision and often allows them to have a relationship with their child. It may seem confusing to someone outside the situation but for those involved it becomes their normal.

Mishon talked as well about the wellbeing of the biological mother. A question that came up was about who the client was at Catholic Charities. For them, the biological mother is the primary client and what she wants is priority. It is true that the adoptive couples are also their clients but they are more secondary. And overall the child’s best interests are taken into account. I really liked how she explained it. It gives the biological mother the control in the situation which helps her make the best decision for her and for her child.  After listening to Mishon talk about what all Catholic Charities does and I was surprised initially by the low number of closed adoptions they do and that the vast majority of them were open or semi-open adoptions. The range of open adoptions was also something I had not known about previously; I had always believed that if it was open then it was completely open.

I had always thought that closed adoptions were the norm but after listening to her explain how open adoptions work it definitely made more sense to me why they are becoming more and more common. Like Pertman discussed, the insecurity of biological parents is something that would be incredibly difficult to deal with and having some kind of connection with your child can make a huge difference in a biological parent’s confidence in their decision to allow their child to be adopted. The extent to which the adoption is open is up to the biological parent but the adoptive parents agree to a completely open adoption before the process even begins, allowing for flexibility in the relationship between the child and biological parents. There are boundaries of course and although I had previously thought that having the biological parent in the child’s life would complicate things (they may want to have a say in how the child is raised for example) I now see that those boundaries are pretty clear from the start. The biological parent is able to see that their child is getting the best life possible and they are provided with the opportunity for a relationship when they are ready. It does not force a relationship and at the same time it doesn’t prevent a relationship.

Lindsey E.