You might think I am absolutely against adoption. I am not, under all circumstances. If you have a mother that decides to place her child even though she has full support to raise her child then adoption is fine. There is no coercion, it is an adult making a decision. If a child is in foster care and their is no chance of reunification then adoption is okay. After all it is about a child needing parents not about parents needing a child. If a child is orphaned and has no living relatives that can raise him then adoption is okay.
But PAP matching is absolutely unacceptable. There is one thing to choose the parents and meet them and tell them you are looking into adoption but totally different for them to come to the appointment and ultrasound and be there at the birth. That puts too much pressure on the mother. How does she decide against the adoption last minute if the PAP are there? How does she hurt them and tell them that especially if they have become "friends"? How does the mother even get time alone with her child with the PAP coming in and out of the room with their friends and family?
I have seen and know of several very acceptable adoptions. I have a friend who does foster care to adopt. She has had several kids in her care who were in need of long term care. Some of the kids were able to be placed back with their parents. Yes it was hard on my friend after caring for these kids for 6 months or longer but it is about what is best for the child. She started fostering a newborn. This newborn was born with drugs in her system, the mom was homeless, and the mom walked out of the hospital without her daughter with no forwarding information. In this case was adopting the child OK? Absolutely, because it is about the needs of the child, not the needs of the PAP.
Next is my husbands grandmother she had 3 kids of her own and was a foster parent in the '60's. She had no intent on ever adopting. At one point she had a baby at 6 months old and when he was 2 and a half he was still with her. There was no hope of reunification with the mother or father of this child. They had raised him and they were the only parents he knew so they adopted him when he was around 3 years old. Did they know his natural parents names. Absolutely, they even offered to help him look for his natural parents when he was 13. He wasn't ready, he didn't want to look for them at that point. They never covered up any facts for him, yes he did have an ABC but they never lied to him about who his parents were and they were even in support of him finding his natural parents when he was barely a teenager. Why would they do that? Why when they had raised him? Because adoption is about the child and not the parents. This couple even in the 1970's realized that.
How do we get around ABC? How about having guardianship instead of adoption until we fix the laws. That works in families all of the time. Even in my family this has happened. My sister had her son when she was 16. By the time my nephew was 3 my sister had divorced her husband (my nephews step dad). She had lived with my parents but for her own reasons decided she couldn't parent her son. So my parents took over the parenting of their grandson. They did not adopt him. He still has his OBC, he still can see his mom and his dad. He has not lost his culture, his people, his family, he knows where he fits in. He can asks questions and know the stories of HIS ancestors.
One of my friends has a sister who could no longer parent her 3 kids due to mental problems. At the time the kids were about ages 5, 3, and newborn. Now they could have adopted out the baby after all he was marketable on the adoption market but he did have breathing problems. The other 2 kids were autistic. So you have my friend who had no children of her own all of the sudden become a parent to 2 autistic preschoolers and one baby that they had to give breathing treatments to every few hours around the clock. Did I also tell you that she was only living in a 1 bedroom apartment? Yes the easy decision was to adopt them out to someone who was better prepared to parent them. But my friend understood that these 3 kids, her niece and nephews, would lose alot more than they would gain through adoption. They would not only lose their parents but their siblings also. Now these kids are 16, 14, and 11. They do not call their aunt anything but Nina, they call their uncle Unc, and their grandparents they call papa and grandma. It is very simple. They haven't seen their mother in years but they know who she is they have seen pictures of her. They know where they get there looks from. They know where they get their personality from. They know where they fit into the family. They are told about all of their mom's good qualities, they are told stories of her growing up and how she loves them but she is too sick to take care of them. My friend has guardianship of these kids only. They lost nothing but just gained an aunt, uncle, and grandparent that put their needs aside to take care and raise these 3 children.
No comments:
Post a Comment