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Missouri Adoption Heart Gallery coming to St. Joseph
by Sylvia Anderson
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Donald J. is a 10-year-old boy who loves cats, dogs, semi-trucks, going to church and watching Sponge Bob Square Pants on TV. He’s much like other boys his age, except for one thing: Donald dreams of having a family. “Someone to love me and I get to stay there forever,” he told the Missouri Department of Social Services. Just looking at his sweet face with those puppy dog brown eyes — well, it’s enough to break your heart.
That’s kind of the idea behind the Missouri Adoption Heart Gallery tour that will be coming to the Buchanan County Courthouse in St. Joseph July 21 and 22. Sponsored by the Adoption Exchange and the children’s division of the DSS, they hope to find homes for the 238 children depicted in the 185 photos on the tour. The tour will travel to 16 cities across the state to be on display in 22 venues.
“This is the third year,” says Sara Anderson, DSS spokesperson. “In the first two years, we had more than 100 kids who were placed with potential adoptive families. It’s something that’s working.”
And something that’s needed, considering there are 1,800 children needing homes in Missouri. Many of the children featured in the gallery were selected because they are harder to place, Ms. Anderson says. It’s usually because they are older or have siblings, like Emily Mathis. She was adopted when she was 11 years old, along with her brother, Billy, after being in foster care for two years. Emily was not sure she would ever have parents. “Nobody wanted to take on a kid that was older,” Emily says. “I’m not good enough for a family … you think that a lot.”
Foster parents took care of her physical needs, she says, but not the emotional ones. It’s different now with her adopted parents. They tell her every day how they love her, and she knows they will always be there for her. “It’s really helped me change my life,” she says.
One of the keys to the success of the Missouri Adoption Heart Gallery has been the quality of the photos. They were taken and donated by professional photographers across the state. “The thing about these pictures is that they are not just kids sitting there,” Ms. Anderson says. “These photographers are able to capture the spirit of these kids and that’s what is speaking to people.”
So you’ll see the sparkling eyes and bright smile of 10-year-old Angela S. and learn how she loves to sing, dance and ride her bike; or the freckles on 8-year-old John P. and read how he enjoys fishing, camping and playing with Lincoln Logs. Then, if the photos tug at your heart strongly enough, you may consider what it would be like to love one of these children as your own.
For more information, visit Heart Gallery
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I’ve been subscribing to The Daily Groove, a mindful parenting newsletter from Scott Noelle, for quite a while now. This reminder came at such a great time for me (Thanks Scott!) because it came a few hours before Shawna & I did some paint by numbers and it helped me to bite my tongue when I felt she wasn’t doing it “right”.
Go With the Flow… Even If It’s ‘Wrong’
Sometimes we think we’re doing our kids a favor when we tell them the “right” way to do something. No, dear… Do it this way.” We think we’re just saving them the hassle of reinventing the wheel, or reiventing something from being “wasted,” or saving time. But our corrections also send unintended, unspoken messages, like…
* The end result is more important than the process.
* Efficiency is more important than joy.
* There is no value in making mistakes.
* Better to go with a “sure thing” than to take risks.
In other words, frequently correcting children undermines their (and our) creativity!
So next time you see your child doing something the “wrong” way, ask yourself if it’s really so bad that
you can’t go along with it. See if you can relax and enjoy witnessing his or her process of discovery.
Children who are allowed to find their own way learn that they *can* find their own way.
I just read yesterday that The McCains adopted one of their children (a daughter) from Bangladesh and that was the first I had heard of it. Of course as a parent through adoption I found it interesting (not that it would sway my vote-just cool as a fellow adoptive parent).
I think this interview may be a few months old but here’s part of it. He talks about what led up to them adopting her and also transracial adoption. There’s a picture that follows, which may be a few years…I believe she’s a teenager now.
Dadmag: Your youngest daughter Bridget is adopted. Why did you decide to adopt Bridget?
McCain: Well it was primarily my wife’s Cindy’s idea. She was in Bangladesh and she and some of the medical personnel visited Mother Theresa’s orphanage to try and help the children there. There were two little baby girls there. One had a heart problem the other a severe cleft palate. Cindy was very concerned about their ability to survive and their need for medical treatment, so she decided to bring them here for medical treatment. She fell in love with both of them. We decided to adopt Bridget. Two close friends of ours, adopted Mickey, the other child.
Dadmag: During your campaign for the Republican Presidential nomination Bridget became something of an issue in South Carolina didn’t she?
McCain: Yeah. There were some pretty vile and hurtful things said during the South Carolina primary. It’s a really nasty side of politics. We tried to ignore it and I think we shielded her from it. It’s just unfortunate that that sort of thing still exists As you know she’s Bengali, and very dark skinned. A lot of phone calls were made by people who said we should be very ashamed about her, about the color of her skin. Thousands and thousands of calls from people to voters saying “You know the McCains have a black baby” I believe that there is a special place in hell for people like those.
Dadmag: That must have made you pretty angry?
McCain: Yes, except that you have to consider the kind of people who do it. Getting angry doesn’t serve any useful purpose. But the calls increased my zeal for winning. (laughs)
Dadmag: There are an awful lot of African American children who could be adopted, but there are those who object, including African American organizations which have a policy against interracial adoption.
McCain: I see that barrier more and more breaking down. I think we are making great progress. We just need to make a lot more progress.
Dadmag: You had to go through an extraordinary process to adopt Bridget. A very intrusive process by the bureaucrats. They came to your home and rifled through your drawers. According to what I’ve read, adoption agency officials even asked about your sex life.
McCain: They were very intrusive. Unfortunately it is a disincentive to some parents because it’s so much easier to go overseas. And that leaves us, in this country, with thousands of children who want parents and thousands of parents who want children. One of the goals I’ve had for a long time is to try to encourage a much less convoluted process in order for parents to adopt a child.
Dadmag: Is this necessary or is it just the bureaucracy gone a little mad?
McCain: A little of both. They want to make sure that those who want to adopt are fit to do so. I think sometimes bureaucrats stretch it out for fear of getting in trouble or getting something wrong. And I also think that there are state laws, probably the result of some bad things having taken place, that are legislative overreactions. I just wish that every state would review their laws concerning the process of adoption, to expedite it but at the same time protect the child.
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My daughters (who we adopted through foster care) took my husband to Wendy’s for a Fathers Day frosty last year and they intend to take him again this year. The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is such a great organization and is one that everyone in the adoption community should support!
TREAT DAD TO A FATHER’S DAY FROSTY AND HELP CHANGE THE LIVES OF CHILDREN IN FOSTER CARE
DUBLIN, OHIO (May 27, 2008) – Forgo the colorful Father’s Day tie, treat dad to Frosty and help a wonderful group of children in the process.
That’s what Wendy’s second annual Father’s Day Frosty Weekend is all about – giving people another way to support the cause of foster care adoption and help the more than 129,000 U.S. children who are waiting for the love of forever families.
During Father’s Day Weekend, June 14 and 15,Wendy’s will donate 50 cents from the sale of every Frosty product, including new Frosty Shakes, at participating restaurants, to the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
The goal is to raise more than $1.3 million to support the work of the non-profit Foundation and its signature program: Wendy’s Wonderful Kids (WWK). This program is filling a critical need by funding and supporting full-time adoption recruiters at local agencies throughout the U.S., the District of Columbia and Canada to march parents with waiting foster care children.
Since 2004, WWK has grown from seven adoption recruiters to 109 across the U.S. and two provinces in Canada.
“The Wendy’s system is very proud to be involved with this special event that helps support our Founder’s most passionate cause – finding a permanent and loving home for every child,” said Wendy’s Chief Executive Officer and President Kerrii Anderson, who serves on the board of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
“Our first year was a resounding success and raised $1 million for the Foundation. We’ve set our 2008 goal at $1.3 million, and we hope families will find this an enjoyable way to celebrate Father’s Day while making a difference in the lives of others.”
To date, 3,500 children in foster care have been served by the growing WWK program. Of these children, more than half have been matched with prospective parents. Most important, 524 children have had their adoptions finalized and now are experiencing the joys of having adoptive families.
The success of WWK is due to the ongoing partnership between the Foundation, the Wendy’s system of 6,500 Company and franchise operated restaurants and local adoption partners. The Foundation grants funds to qualified adoption organizations, and holds the agencies accountable for achieving agreed-upon results. The Wendy’s system raises funds to pay the costs of the local WWK programs.
“We’re very proud of how far the program has come in such a short time. But even with all that’s been achieved, there are still thousands of children in foster care still waiting to be adopted. The average age of a waiting child in the U.S. is nearly nine years old, and they spend an average of five years in the foster care system. Imagine telling a young child they must wait five years to find a permanent family,” said Rita Soronen, executive director of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
“We believe Wendy’s Wonderful Kids is the solution, and that the program will become even stronger with the support of Wendy’s customers during Father’s Day weekend.”
Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption
The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is a non-profit 501(c)3 public charity dedicated to dramatically increasing the adoptions of the more than 150,000 children in North America’s foster care systems ready to be adopted. Created by Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas who was adopted as a child, the Foundation leads programs such as Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, which puts adoption recruiters in all 50 states and Canada to find permanent, loving families for children in the foster care system, and Adoption-Friendly Workplace, which encourages employers to offer adoption benefits to their employees. The Foundation also works with adoption advocates and officials to streamline the adoption process and make adoption more affordable for families. As the only Foundation dedicated exclusively to foster care adoption, it is driven by its founder’s simple value: Do what’s best for the child. To learn more about the Foundation’s work, please visit http://www.davethomasfoundation.org/
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A couple of times a week, I like to make a cup of tea and catch up on some of my favorite adoption blogs. Here’s a few of the posts that caught my eye.
Lori, a valued member of our adoption forums, blogged about what Adoption Utopia would look like to you. Based on my personal experience with adoption (as an adoptive parent and a sister to an adoptee), my reply was:
My adoption utopia would be that after being abused by their biological parents, children are not victimized again by the foster care system. My children spent four years in foster care before we adopted them and that should be unacceptable to everyone in the adoption community. I would love to see children freed for adoption within six months of being placed in foster care.
Tracy posted the link to a review she did of Adoption House Adoption Agency at a website that allows people to review adoption agencies. It looks like a useful resource for anyone seeking an agency to work with. For those of you that used an agency, (we adopted through our state’s foster care system), take a few minutes and post a review…either positive or negative. It could really make a difference in someone’s decision.
Marcie blogged about the recent recommendations from the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute on transracial adoptions. It’s a topic I blogged about also…(just not as nice as Marcie did-lol)
This last one is from several months back, but I found this great blog when the author left a really nice comment on our post on transracial adoption. She’s an adult adoptee who reflects back on the day she was adopted. The comments that she received are quite heartwarming as well.
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(Dublin, OH – May 1, 2008) It’s the list that prompted policy change. After the first Best Adoption-Friendly Workplaces in America list debuted in 2007, more than 50 organizations nationwide established or enhanced their adoption benefits for 2008. As a result, employers who made the top 100 list released today by the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption offered more robust adoption benefits packages this year to make it. Wendy’s International, Inc. ranked #1 and was among those who expanded benefits in response to the 2007 rankings. (Editor’s note: The foundation is not an affiliate of Wendy’s International, Inc.)
The benefits package that has Wendy’s topping the list offers employees up to $23,300 in financial reimbursement and six weeks of paid leave per adoption. In 2007, the company provided $7,000 and the same amount of paid leave.
“Supporting adoption and helping find permanent, loving homes for foster children was the vision of our founder Dave Thomas,” said Kerrii Anderson, chief executive officer and president of Wendy’s International, Inc. “There is no finer cause than the support of families who are trying to adopt children, and we’re proud that Wendy’s has been recognized for our efforts. Many of our employees have adopted children, and we hope to empower more employees in the future with meaningful benefits and support.”
Michelle has worked for Wendy’s for eight years. She and her husband adopted two teen sisters from foster care in 2006. Michelle said if more companies offered adoption benefits, more people would consider adopting. “The expense of adopting children can be determining factor for many people,” she explained. “If more businesses offer financial assistance, more forever families will be formed. Employers can change the life of a child by simply offering adoption benefits.”
The Best Adoption-Friendly Workplaces in America list includes the top 100 organizations that provide exceptional support to employees who adopt. Rankings are based on the amount of financial assistance and paid leave provided. The foundation compiled the results from survey data collected from 919 U.S. employers. Several survey partners helped extend the survey’s scope even further by asking their subscribers/members to participate: Employee Benefit News, a SourceMedia publication that is the leading source of information for benefits decision makers; the National Restaurant Association; and the Ohio Chamber of Commerce.
In addition to ranking the top 100, the foundation also recognized the top 10 by size, the leaders of each industry, and companies who support the cause of adoption and adoptive families in other ways. Wendy’s also ranked #1 among large businesses and in the food, beverage, and restaurant industry. Go to www.AdoptionFriendlyWorkplace.org to view each of the lists.
Rita Soronen, the foundation’s executive director, said 157 additional employers participated in this year’s survey, and 26 of them are honored on the Top 100 list. “For years we’ve known employers care about helping employees and their families, but this year we learned they also care about being competitive,” she explained. “We found companies genuinely want to help families formed through adoption, but they also know it’s important to maintain a competitive benefits package. Further, we saw the list actually prompted some employers to enhance their adoptions benefits packages.”
National Trends
Adoption benefits are voluntary, employer-provided and include some combination of financial assistance, paid leave and unpaid leave. According to the foundation’s 2008 survey results, the average adoption-friendly employer has had a policy in place for eight years, offers up to $5,000 in financial assistance and five weeks of paid leave. The foundation, now celebrating its 16th anniversary, has seen a significant increase in the number of employers offering adoption benefits over the years, which mirrors an annual survey conducted by Hewitt Associates LLC, a global outsourcing and consulting company providing human capital management services. Of the 1,000 major U.S. employers surveyed, Hewitt reports a steady increase of companies offering financial adoption benefits, from 12 percent in 1990 to 47 percent in 2007.
Soronen noted another new trend among employers. “Now we’re seeing support for relative adoptions,” she said. “When a child is adopted by a grandparent or other relative, it is usually an emergency situation in which the employee can benefit greatly from financial help and paid leave.”
National Misperceptions
A national survey commissioned by the foundation and released in November 2007 by Harris Interactive reveals that the majority of those considering adoption are considering foster care adoption. In fact, 48 million Americans have considered adoption from foster care, yet the majority has misperceptions about the process and the children who are eligible for adoption. These misperceptions include the following:
· 67 percent of people considering foster care adoption are unnecessarily concerned that biological parents can return to claim the children. Once the court finalizes the legal termination of parental rights, the parents can never return to claim the child.
· 46 percent mistakenly believe foster care adoption is prohibitively expensive, when in reality there is very little cost to adopt from foster care, and there is financial support available for all adoptions.
· 45 percent believe children in foster care have entered the system because of juvenile delinquency, when in reality, the vast majority entered the system through no fault of their own, as victims of neglect, abandonment and/or abuse.
· 48 percent believe a single parent raising an adopted child can definitely provide a healthy and loving environment. However, 32 percent of children adopted from foster care in 2005 were adopted by single parents or unmarried couples.
· 37 percent believe a person over 55 can definitely provide a healthy and loving environment for a child, when in reality 23 percent of adopted children live with an adoptive parent 55 years or older.
“Misperceptions about foster care adoption create barriers that keep wonderful children from loving adoptive parents,” Soronen said. “We need to inform potential adoptive parents about the need, the affordability and the finality of foster care adoption so we can make strides toward connecting more waiting children in foster care with forever families.”
Survey Methodology
The Best Adoption-Friendly Workplaces in America list was compiled using data collected from 919 U.S. employers. The foundation mailed survey invitations to 40,000 business leaders, surveyed human resource professionals at conferences and collected data from the online survey on the foundation’s Web site.
Survey rankings are based first on the maximum amount of financial reimbursement per adoption, which includes any additional support for special-needs adoption, and second on the maximum number of weeks of paid leave per adoption. Employers who offer both are ranked higher than those providing only monetary support. Employers who have identical ranking criteria are listed alphabetically.
The foundation offers free toolkits and technical assistance for employers who wish to create a policy and for employees who wish to propose one. The toolkit includes a sample proposal, policy, reimbursement form, frequently asked questions, news release and tax summary. Thirty-three of the survey participants established new adoption benefit policies in 2008, and 26 used the foundation’s free resources. Go to www.AdoptionFriendlyWorkplace.org to order the toolkit.
About the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption
This non-profit 501(c)3 public charity is dedicated to dramatically increasing the adoptions of the more than 140,000 children in North America’s foster care systems ready and waiting to be adopted. Created by Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas, who was adopted as a child, the foundation spearheads programs such as Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, which puts adoption recruiters in all 50 states and Canada to find permanent, loving families for children in the foster care system, and Adoption-Friendly Workplace, which encourages employers to offer adoption benefits to their employees.
The foundation also works with adoption advocates and officials to streamline the adoption process and make adoption more affordable for families. As the only organization dedicated exclusively to foster care adoption, the foundation is driven by Dave’s simple value: Do what’s best for the child.
To learn more about the foundation’s work, go to Dave Thomas Foundadtion.
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Author of Logan’s Journey, Kathy Heath reads her endearing book on open adoption. A valuable tool for parents and educators, Logan’s Journey can help children understand that families are created in many different ways.
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This has circulated among adoption groups for a while and I just found it as I was cleaning up our old adoption forums on ezboard (we moved to our own server in January).
Transracially Adopted Children’s Bill of Rights
Every child is entitled to love and full membership in his or her family.
Every child is entitled to have his or her heritage and culture embraced and valued.
Every child is entitled to parents who value individuality and enjoy complexity.
Every child is entitled to parents who understand that this is a race conscious society.
Every child is entitled to parents who know their child will experience life in ways differently from theirs.
Every child is entitled to parents who are not seeking to “save” a child or to make the world a better place by adopting.
Every child is entitled to parents who know belonging to a family is not based on physical matching.
Every child is entitled to parents who have significant relationships with people of other races.
Every child is entitled to parents who know transracial adoption changes the family structure forever.
Every child is entitled to be accepted by his or her extended family members.
Every child is entitled to parents who know that if they are white they experience the benefits of racism because the country’s system is organized that way.
Every child is entitled to parents who know they cannot be the sole transmitter of the child’s culture when it is not their own.
Every child is entitled to grow up with items in their home environment created for and by people of their own race or ethnicity.
Every child is entitled to have places available to make friends with people of his or her race or ethnicity.
Every child is entitled to have opportunities in his or her environment to participate in positive experiences with his or her birth culture.
Every child is entitled to opportunities to build racial pride within his or her own home, school, and neighborhood.
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1. “Want to adopt? You’re on your own.”
Adoption may seem an altruistic endeavor, but it’s also a big business and a loosely regulated one. “Nobody’s watching for cheaters,” says Adam Pertman, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute and author of Adoption Nation.
Adoption has always been a local, not federal, issue, and statutes governing it vary from state to state. Few states, Pertman says, go far enough in monitoring and enforcing standards that would prevent adoption agencies from pressuring pregnant women and lying to adoptive parents. So buyer beware.
How can you start the process with confidence? Avoid searching the Web blindly; the Internet is replete with agencies that lack a physical location a major red flag. Instead, check out the National Adoption Directory, a database funded by the Department of Health and Human Services that lists licensed agencies by state. You can research an agency’s history of complaints by contacting the licensing specialist also listed on the site in the state where your adoption will take place. Finally, the directory can point you to support groups that offer independent references for an agency.
2. “We have no idea how long this will take.”
When prospective parents ask how long an adoption will take, agencies often quote an average of one to two years. But the process can take months longer.
First, a social worker conducts a home study to gauge your ability to become an adoptive parent. It includes essays, counseling, home visits and FBI clearance. Agencies typically don’t include time for the home study in their estimates, so be sure to factor in the four months it often takes.
Next, you must wait for a child or birth mother to be identified, then go through the legal steps mostly paperwork to finalize the adoption. International adoptions, in which the children often come from orphanages, can get slowed down by the country of origin’s political problems or red tape. In domestic infant adoptions, the adoption agency compiles a profile describing each family and the environment it can provide a child. The birth mother picks the adoptive parent based on these profiles, and she can be swayed by a seemingly unimportant detail, such as prospective parents’ native state or a pet’s name. To avoid disappointment during your adoption, ask what the average wait time is for people who have yet to be picked by a birth mother.
3. “Speed now can mean heartache later.”
Although domestic adoptions are very rarely contested in court, experts estimate that about half of birth moms decide to keep the child at some point between the initial verbal commitment to adoption and the official termination of legal rights after the birth.
If an agency promises brisker-than-average results, take it as a warning that it may not be adequately investigating who else in the birth mother’s family is involved. Ask if the agency has ruled out the possibility of any biological relatives trying to claim the child. Maureen Flatley Hogan, a Boston-based adoption lobbyist, notes recent cases in which the child’s paternal grandparents challenged an adoption. You’ll also want to ask what steps were taken to include the father in the process. Beware if the agency tells you the birth mom doesn’t know who the father is. It could leave the door open for a potential father to make a claim later.
Sometimes a birth mother contacts an agency within days of her delivery. In those cases, relinquishment shouldn’t happen until she’s out of the hospital and has received eight to 12 hours of counseling with a social worker from an agency with extensive adoption experience. Otherwise she may regret her decision.
4. “You make a lot of money? Oops, our fee just went up.”
Using an agency for an adoption usually costs between $15,000 and $30,000, according to Pertman. Your out-of-pocket costs can include a home study, the process of identifying a child, placement fees and postplacement visits by a social worker. For international adoptions, they may also include the cost of visas, document translation and a contribution to the orphanage. The precise fee you’ll pay for each service varies from one agency to the next. To comparison-shop, ask agencies for an itemized list of charges, and consider dropping any firm that won’t cooperate.
Be wary of any agency that asks for your financial information before providing an itemized list of charges. A home study, required for all adoptions, usually runs between $1,000 and $3,000, but lobbyist Hogan recently came across an agency that was charging consumers 10 percent of their annual income. Other agencies have inflated charges when consumers are eligible for the adoption tax credit. If your 2003 income is below $192,390, you can claim all or a portion of the $10,130 credit. “If the agency knows a family will be eligible, they may increase the cost of the adoption because, after all, the family will get it back in their taxes,” Hogan says.
5. “Our quoted fee is only a fraction of what you’ll spend.”
Besides checking the breakdown of an agency’s fees, you’ll need to ask about extra costs that often aren’t listed at all. In an international adoption, many parents find that once they arrive in the particular country, they are asked to pay bribes to grease the wheels with government officials. For domestic infant adoptions, agencies may not tell you about your responsibility for the birth mother’s living and medical expenses, which can run several thousand dollars, until later in the game. “It is especially disturbing when a mom’s fees are charged ‘retroactively’ for periods of time when the couple didn’t even know she existed,” Hogan says.
If you’re paying a birth mother’s living expenses, ask to write the check directly to the provider, such as the birth mother’s electric company, instead of having the agency give her your money. You’ll also want to see proof of the birth mother’s medical expenses; to preserve her privacy, the agency should be able to delete the birth mother’s identifying information. According to Pertman, some agencies have charged adoptive parents for the full price of health care even though the birth mother was already covered through Medicaid or a state-subsidized program.
6. “We’ll apply more pressure than a car salesman.”
Preadoptive parents are understandably hesitant to question the kinds of activities that would in other circumstances send them running. Every adoption agency understands this insecurity; the worst firms exploit it with pressure tactics more commonly seen in an automobile dealership. There’s even the adoption world’s version of the bait and switch you arrive in a foreign country to find a child who is much older than the one you thought you were adopting or has serious medical problems. Another tactic in international adoptions: ratcheting up the pressure after the parents have received the medical history and a photo of the child and must decide if they want to adopt him. Some agencies will call the couple on a Friday and give them the weekend to decide. Or they’re told that other families or agencies are considering the child, and whoever decides first gets him. Of course, it would be irresponsible to allow a child to languish in an orphanage while a couple takes six months to decide. The best agencies balance these factors by giving the prospective parents about a week to turn down the referral or to make a tentative verbal commitment with the caveat that they can ask for additional information.
7. “The people we work with overseas are unreliable.”
When evaluating a U.S. agency that does international adoptions, ask about the people the agency works with overseas. Often called “agents” or “facilitators,” they act as liaisons between the agency and the orphanages. Many agencies have every intention of working with reputable facilitators, but in too many cases, the go-betweens have sketchy qualifications, as a Michigan family learned after adopting a child from Russia. In the course of a wrongful-adoption suit alleging that the agency failed to disclose the child’s multiple congenital anomalies, the parents discovered that the facilitator had no social-work training; he was a furniture refinisher and didn’t even speak Russian. Before committing to an agency, ask about its overseas liaisons. Are they trained child-welfare professionals? To what degree does the agency assume responsibility for the acts of employees and facilitators abroad? How are facilitators paid? Some receive salaries, which is a good sign, while others are paid for each successful find, which encourages unethical players who just want fast cash. Finally, ask your agency if it’s insured; if it isn’t, you’ll have little recourse in a potential lawsuit.
8. “Children adopted overseas have serious health risks.”
Many agencies would have you believe that children adopted overseas are healthy kids in need of nothing more than love. But many of these children arrive in the U.S. with problems that are as great as or greater than those faced by children in domestic foster care. Many children adopted overseas have spent time in institutions. As a result, there is a possibility of medical and developmental issues that should be explored before you bring a child home. For example, fetal alcohol syndrome is common among children adopted from Eastern Europe. Research has also shown that some institutionalized children have difficulty forming close relationships. The good news is that even the most severe problems can be tackled with early intervention. Some of the best agencies offer classes that cover these issues, but to learn more on your own, check out www.adoptionlearningpartners.org, which offers a comprehensive online education program entitled With Eyes Wide Open: A Preparation Guide to International Adoption for $25. Also, the list of adoption experts at www. adoptionresearch.org/research.html includes relevant articles and studies.
9. “Our medical information is incomplete.”
Once you know the potential for health problems, you’ll face another hurdle: getting specific medical information about your prospective child overseas. Record keeping in the birth country might have been slipshod, or the child may have been abandoned. Even in such cases, however, some helpful information is usually available if your agency bothers to get it. According to a survey conducted by the Adoption Institute, 15 percent of the 1,600 responding families adopting overseas reported that their agency withheld details or gave them inaccurate information about the child. At a minimum, the agency should have material on what the child looked like the day he was brought in how much he weighed, whether he was responsive and his current physical and mental health. Typically, the agency will give you a photo or videotape of the child and will hire a translator to provide a summary of his medical report. As soon as you receive the information, ask a pediatrician who specializes in international adoptees to review it. Find one on the directory at the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Web site. You should also request the original documentation so your pediatrician can compare it with the translation, checking for missing pages. Ann Arbor, Mich., pediatrician Jerri Jenista once saw two different medical reports from two different agencies about the same child. One agency failed to translate a critical sentence: “The mother was an alcoholic and murdered the child’s sibling.”
10. “You got your child . . . See ya!”
The best adoption agencies offer postadoption services that guide parents through a range of problems, from explaining adoption to the child to dealing with their own “postadoption depression,” surprisingly common among these parents. If a child develops a medical condition, parents should be able to call the agency to ask whether it runs in the birth parents’ families. One top adoption agency even arranges to have social workers meet with the child’s teachers to help them understand any problems. And many parents return to their agency when the child is old enough to consider getting in touch with the birth mother. Many agencies, however, end their services the day you bring your child home. To evaluate the level of service, ask the agency to give you names and phone numbers of three clients whose adoptions were completed at least three years ago. Ask those adoptive parents how the agency handled both postadoption services and the adoption process itself.
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The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is such a great organization and is one that everyone in the adoption community should support!