LEVEL OF TRANSPARENCY THE PROS
AND CONS FOR EACH
|
Pros of Each Type of
Traditional Adoption and/or egg/sperm donation-for the Involved Parties (experts believe
is similar to embryo adoption)
| |
Confidential Adoptions |
E-Mail |
Mediated (transparent through 3rd party) |
Transparent/Open Adoptions |
| No contact
between birth and adoptive families. No identifying
information is provided. Only non-identifying
information (e.g., height, hair color, medical history,
etc.) is provided through a third party (e.g., agency or
attorney). |
E.A. is the first to pioneer the e-mail option.
Each party secures their own e-mail address and upon match
parties maintain contact via email (a hotmail or other
private account could be used) |
Non-identifying contact is made (via cards, letters,
pictures) through a third party (e.g., agency or attorney). |
Direct
interaction between birth and adoptive families. Identities
are known. |
Donor/
Birth Parents |
- Provides real choice for birth parents when compared
to open adoption.
- Privacy.
- Some feel this provides a sense of closure and ability
to move on with life.
|
- Allows each to share highlights, milestones, photos,
or emergencies.
|
- Allows for some information transfer between birth and
adoptive parents (and perhaps the child).
- Some privacy.
|
- Increased ability to deal with grief and loss.
- Comfort in knowing child's well-being.
- Sense of control over decision-making in placement.
- Potential for more fully defined role in child's life.
- Potential to develop a healthy relationship with the
child as he or she grows.
- Less pain and guilt about the decision.
- May make the decision to place for adoption easier
(compared to a contested termination of parental rights
trial).
|
|
Adoptive Parents |
- No need to physically share the child with birth
parents.
- No danger of birth parent interference or
co-parenting.
|
- Greater sense of control over relationship.
- Enhanced ability to answer child's questions about his
or her history
|
- Greater sense of control over process.
- Roles may be more clearly defined than in either
confidential or open options.
- Increased sense of entitlement compared to
confidential adoptions.
- Enhanced ability to answer child's questions about his
or her history.
|
- Increased sense of having the "right" to parent and
increased ability for confident parenting.
- Potential for authentic relationship with the birth
family.
- More understanding of children's history.
- Increased empathy for birth parents.
- Less fear of birth parents reclaiming child because
they know the parent and their wishes.
- Delight of being "chosen" as a parent.
|
|
Adopted Persons |
- Protection from unstable or emotionally disturbed
birth parents.
|
|
Only true when
relationship is "shared" with the adopted child |
|
|
- Genetic and birth history known.
- Birthparents are "real" not "fantasy."
- Positive adjustment is promoted in adoptee.
|
- Direct access to birth parents and history.
- Need to search is eliminated.
- Identity questions are answered (Who do I look like?
Why was I placed?).
- Eases feelings of abandonment.
- Lessening of fantasies: birth parents are "real."
- Increased circle of supportive adults.
- Increased attachment to adoptive family (especially if
the birth parents support the placement).
- Preservation of connections (e.g., with siblings,
relatives).
- Lessens loyalty conflicts (according to recent
research).
- Exposure to racial and ethnic heritage.
- Ability for evolving, dynamic, and developmentally
appropriate account of the adoption.
|
Child Welfare
Information Gateway Updated on December 7, 2007
with E-Mail Option-Transparency and Donor terms pioneered by E.A. added July 20, 2008
and Oct 31 2009
|
Cons of Each Type
of Traditional Adoption for the Involved Parties
| |
Anonymous/Confidential
Adoptions |
Liaison
(transparent through 3rd party) |
Transparent/Open Adoptions |
| No contact between birth and
adoptive families. No identifying information is provided.
Only nonidentifying information (e.g., height, hair color,
medical history, etc.) is provided through a third party (e.g.,
agency or attorney). |
Nonidentifying contact is made
(via cards, letters, pictures) through a third party (e.g.,
agency or attorney). |
Direct interaction between birth
and adoptive families. Identities are known. |
Donor/
Birth Parents |
- Less grief resolution due to lack of information about the
child's well-being.
- May encourage denial of fact that child was born and
placed with another family.
|
- Loss of potential for direct relationship with adoptive
family (and/or child).
- Increased grief in the initial years, less later.
- Loss of contact if intermediary changes or leaves (i.e.,
staff turnover, policy changes, or agency closings).
- Birth mother may feel obligated to place child due to the
emotional or financial support given by the prospective
adoptive parents.
|
- Full responsibility for setting relationship limits and
boundaries.
- Potential abuse of trust (fewer safeguards).
- Potential disappointment if adoptive family cannot meet
all expectations or needs.
- Birth mother may feel obligated to place child due to the
emotional or financial support given by the prospective
adoptive parents.
|
|
Adoptive Parents |
- Allows for denial of "adopted family" or fertility status.
- Increased fear, less empathy for birth parents.
- No access to additional medical information about birth
family.
- Less control: agency controls information.
|
- Loss of the full relationship with the birth parents.
- Lack of ability to have questions answered immediately.
- Potentially troubling cards, letters, or pictures.
|
- Full responsibility for setting relationship limits and
boundaries.
- Potential pressure: accept openness or no child.
- Potential difficulty with emotionally disturbed birth
parents.
- Potential for supporting both child and birth parents
(emotionally).
|
|
Adopted Persons |
- Possible adolescent identity confusion (unable to compare
physical and emotional traits to their birth families).
- Limited access to information that others take for
granted.
- Potential preoccupation with adoption issues.
|
- Similar to confidential adoptions, if information not
shared with the adoptee.
- Potential perception that it is unsafe to interact with
birth family directly.
|
- No clean break for assimilation into family, which some
feel is necessary.
- Potential feelings of rejection if contact stops.
- Difficulty explaining the relationship to peers.
- Potential for playing families against each other.
|
Transparency
Openness in Adoption
Factsheet for Families
| Author(s): Child
Welfare Information Gateway |
| Year Published: 2003 |
What is Open adoption?
Open, or fully disclosed, adoptions allow adoptive parents, and
often the adopted child, to interact directly with birth parents.
Family members interact in ways that feel most comfortable to them.
Communication may include letters, e-mails, telephone calls, or
visits. The frequency of contact is negotiated and can range from
every few years to several times a month or more. Contact often
changes as a child grows and has more questions about his or her
adoption or as families' needs change. It is important to note that
even in an open adoption, the legal relationship between a birth
parent and child is severed. The adoptive parents are the legal
parents of an adopted child.
The goals of open adoption are:
- To minimize the child's loss of relationships.
- To maintain and celebrate the adopted child's connections with
all the important people in his or her life.
- To allow the child to resolve losses with truth, rather than
the fantasy adopted children often create when no information or
contact with their birth family is available.
Is open adoption right for our family?
Open adoption is just one of several openness options available
to families, ranging from confidential, to semi-open (or mediated),
to fully open adoption. In semi-open or mediated adoptions, contact
between birth and adoptive families is made through a mediator
(e.g., an agency caseworker or attorney) rather than directly. In
confidential adoptions no contact takes place and no identifying
information is exchanged.
Making an open adoption work requires flexibility and a
commitment to ongoing relationships, despite their ups and downs.
While this type of adoption is not right for every family, open
adoption can work well if everyone wants it and if there is good
communication, flexibility, commitment to the process, respect for
all parties involved, and commitment to the child's needs above all.
There are many resources available to help you determine what
level of openness might be best for your family. The chart included
with this factsheet may help you consider some pros and cons of open
adoptions. You can also:
EXPLORE THE INTERNET. Several
Web sites provide research and issues to consider in open adoption:
READ. Several recent books
about open adoption may be helpful:
- Children of Open Adoption by
Patricia Martinez Dorner and Kathleen Silber (1997, Independent
Adoption Press). The topics in this book include the essential
"ingredients" for successful open adoption and communication tips
for talking about open adoption with children of all ages.
- How to Open an Adoption by Patricia
Martinez Dorner (1998, R-Squared Press). This book gives guidance
to adoptive parents, birth parents, and adoption professionals in
how to navigate more inclusive relationships.
- Lifegivers: Framing the Birth Parent Experience in
Open Adoption by James L. Gritter (2000, CWLA
Press). This book examines the ways birth parents are
marginalized. The author makes the point that adopted children are
best served when birth parents and adoptive parents work together
to ensure that birth parents remain in children's lives.
- The Open Adoption Experience by Lois
Ruskai Melina and Sharon Kaplan Roszia (1993, HarperPerennial).
This complete guide for adoptive and birth parents touches on
almost every aspect of open adoption.
- The Spirit of Open Adoption by Jim
Gritter (1997, CWLA Press). This book gives a realistic look at
the joys and pains of open adoption for birth parents, adoptees,
and adoptive parents.
- What is Open Adoption? by Brenda
Romanchik (1999, R-Squared Press). Written from the perspective of
a birth mother in an open adoption, this pocket guide provides
concise information and resources.
Abstracts of these books are available through the
Information Gateway Library Search.
TALK WITH A COUNSELOR OR THERAPIST WITH KNOWLEDGE AND
EXPERIENCE IN OPEN ADOPTION. Child Welfare Information
Gateway has a tip sheet on
selecting
and working with an adoption therapist who is informed about
issues of adoption. This factsheet describes the types of mental
health professionals available and provides guidelines for choosing
the best resource for your family.
TALK WITH OTHER PARENTS. The
National Foster Care &
Adoption Directory has lists of foster and adoptive parent
support groups in each State. Because each parent group will have
its own focus, you might want to ask how many families attending the
group are in open adoptions.
What questions should our family consider in open
adoption?
In open adoptions, families need to consider
when and how much to tell a child about his or her
birth family, and then if and how to involve him
or her in that relationship. An adoption professional can help you
address some of these issues. Some of the questions you may want to
consider include:
- At what age should a child be included in contact with his or
her birth family?
- What happens if one party decides to break off all contact?
- What will the birth parents' role be in the child's life?
- How will your child explain his or her relationship with birth
relatives to his or her peers?
- How will you handle other adopted siblings who have different
levels of openness in their adoptions?
Summary
No one level of openness in adoption is best for everyone, and
each adoption changes over time. Adoptees from all kinds of
adoptions, from confidential to fully open, can be emotionally
healthy. Using the resources listed on this Factsheet, as well as
the following tables, you can decide what level of openness is best
for your family.
Table of pros of each type of adoption for the involved parties
Table of cons of each type of adoption for the involved parties
1 "Cooperative adoption" or
"adoption with contact" refer to arrangements that allow some kind
of contact between adoptive families and members of the adopted
child's birth family after the adoption has been finalized. (back)
This material may be freely
reproduced and distributed. However, when doing so, please credit
Child Welfare Information Gateway.
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