Hippity Hoppity Easter - A Time for New Life and Meeting Birthmothers!

We just completed our training on an introduction to the perspective of the birth mothers with whom our agency works. What an incredible group of women! The agency does quite a thorough job of making sure that we, as adoptive parents, are who they want to place babies with. If we didn't seem like a good fit, they'd have no problem recommending other agencies a couple might be better suited to go through to adopt. They do not, however, turn away a birth mother looking for guidance on placing her baby for adoption. They welcome and are supportive of all. While each one brings her own story to the agency, we've picked up on a few commonalities.

1. They all love their babies very, very much!

2. No one gets pregnant in order to place their baby for adoption. It is a decision that these women arrive at after much consideration and contemplation about the best life for their child.

3. They are predominantly grateful for the adoptive parents to raise their child in a home that is loving and can provide a stability they do not feel that they have in their own lives.

4. They are often interested in keeping informed about the child initially and then the path that connection takes later on varies greatly.

We have been open to "open" adoption from the beginning. We don't know exactly how our personal situation will define "open", but we do know that we want our kids to have all the answers they need to understand their own multidimensional backgrounds. Our hope is that we can experience a connection with the birth family and keep them involved enough that the kids know they are loved by many people.

It's not joint custody we're after, they will be our kids and we'll have the tasks of diapers, discipline, bedtime stories and curfews. It's knowledge of another set of their roots. It's more love. Every child deserves to know in their heart that they are loved without a doubt and we are confident that we can share with our kids the many loving reasons their birth mother relinquished her rights to parent them. They will likely have questions about why they were "given up", but they will be reassured that love was at the core of her decision.

The birth mother will have a say in how open she wants the relationship to be. So will we. We believe that our story will play out the way it is meant to. We think we'll be matched with a woman who understands all of our roles in helping the children feel complete in their understanding of who they are and where they're from. We're excited to meet her!