Emotions of Adoption
What Will My Child Think of My Adoption Decision?
Are Children Adopted and Loved?
Women who choose adoption for their babies want to know that their child will be adopted and loved. Choosing adoption is about giving the child the chance to grow up in a wonderful home full of opportunity. Growing up happily adopted is often a prospective birth parents’ greatest hope for their child.
Many prospective birth parents worry that a child will not be adopted and loved. What if their new parents don’t like them? What if they have siblings who the parents like more?
These fears are common and totally understandable. Our hope is to show you why they’re not true.
When a family adopts a baby, they go on a long, challenging journey. It’s not easy to adopt. After learning more about what it takes to adopt, we hope you’ll be convinced of how committed any adoptive parents are to making sure your child grows up happily adopted.
What It Takes to Adopt
Hopeful adoptive parents embark on a challenging journey when they begin the adoption process. This isn’t something that people do half-heartedly. Anyone trying to adopt is fully committed to making sure that your child is adopted and loved.
Here are a few aspects of the adoption journey that show just how difficult it can be for adoptive parents and how committed they are to the process.
Struggles with Infertility
Every adoption journey begins differently. Some parents feeling a sense of calling to adopt. However, many adoptive families start their journey with a painful struggle with infertility.
Infertility can be devastating, but it’s often invisible to those on the outside. While the grief caused by infertility may not be as obvious as other medical diagnoses, it is a grief that hits hard and lasts a long time. For families who decide to adopt, that grief can create even more intense passion to fulfill their dreams of becoming parents. They cannot wait to hold a child who will be adopted and loved.
Commitment to a Challenging Process
Adoption isn’t easy. The adoptive parents have to find the right agency and meet rigorous screening requirements. They have to allow a social worker to conduct an invasive home study. Basically, they put their whole life under a microscope to prove that they are ready to provide a safe, loving home for a child.
What it feels like to be adopted can be different in every situation, but the process is designed to make sure any family you choose for your baby is a good one.
Major Financial Obligations
Adoption is always free to prospective birth parents, but it costs an average of $30,000–$50,000 for the adoptive family. Yes, that’s a lot. And it should show just how committed these families are to making sure that being adopted will be a great thing for your child.
Patience for a Long Wait
Being adopted doesn’t happen overnight. Many families wait months for an adoption opportunity, and others wait years. When you choose an adoptive family for your baby, they get a call that they’ve been patiently waiting for. It’s often one of the best calls of their life.
What It Feels Like to Be Adopted
As you can see, hopeful adoptive parents commit their whole lives to this journey. Through grief, frustration, serious financial obligations and more, they dedicate everything to adoption.
Do you know what all that commitment and effort does? It makes the end of the journey even more rewarding. Will your child be adopted and loved? Yes. Immensely.
Family is more than biology. Family is love, care and commitment. When adoptive parents are placed with your baby, they are eager to provide those things.
What it feels like to be adopted is different for every child. There can be struggles — there’s no doubt about that. But, those struggles will exist within a safe and loving home. No one can promise that growing up happily adopted is easy. Still, you can be sure that being adopted and loved will be a part of your child’s life.
Common Questions from Prospective Birth Mothers
We hope that you feel a bit more hopeful that your child will grow up adopted and loved now that you know what it takes to adopt.
Most prospective birth mothers still have more questions about what it feels like to be adopted, and we want to try to answer a few of those.
What emotions do kids “given up” for adoption feel?
All of them. It’s important to remember that every adoption journey is unique. What it feels like to be adopted will depend on so many factors. Also, you should keep in mind that a child who is not adopted doesn’t live a life of complete bliss. Life can be hard. Growing up can be confusing. A child who is adopted and loved will feel joy and sadness, hope and frustration, excitement and anger.
A good life is not the absence of hardship, but the presence of meaning in everything. A child who is adopted and loved may not always feel great, but they will be in an environment where they can grow, thrive and find fulfillment.
Do children like being given up for adoption?
It all depends on the child and the situation. Many adoptees recognize the courageous and loving sacrifice their birth parents made when they created an adoption plan. They feel thankful for this, even though they are also oftentimes sad that this is the way it had to be. Other adoptees have more negative feelings around adoption. Both outcomes are possible.
You’ll be able to help your child have a positive understanding of adoption through open adoption communication. By staying in contact and maintaining a relationship, you can tell your child how much you love them, and how happy you are to see them growing up in their great adoptive family.
If I give my child up for adoption, will he have a good life?
Life doesn’t come with guarantees. We’d love to make a promise here, but we can’t. However, that’s not reason to lose hope. As we’ve shown, an adoptive family is out there for your child, waiting patiently to provide all of the love they have. Whether or not your child has a good life is out of your control, but you can choose a family that will make them adopted and loved.
Speak with a Professional
Are you interested in learning more about adoption or starting your own adoption process? The next best thing to do is speak with an agency. Contact us today to be connected with an adoption agency. This connection is always free, and you are never obligated to choose adoption.
Ready to get started? Contact an adoption agency now to get free information.