While several other bloggers are addressing this topic right now, I know each of our situations (like all adoptions) are unique and I will be sharing some of my own family experiences with this series.

Back in my series on the Independent adoption of our first daughter I talked about our meeting her birthfamily, and her placement with us. The adoption that resulted has been an open one with Danika’s birth grand-parents and three older half siblings.... more

Continued from Part One...

So down the road as my children grow, our open adoption arrangements may change and issues might evolve. How is it going to be when my children are older and begin to understand some of the differences in the contact they have with their own birthfamilies as compared to their siblings? What kind of challenges will this present for the whole family?

Right now I can only imagine how things... more

My co-blogger Coley just raised an interesting topic in her last post about adopted siblings with different birthparents, and how the relationships and contact level can vary. Having three children in open adoptions, all with different birthfamilies I wanted to address this from my own experience as well (and ok I was scratching my bottom brain trying to narrow in on a topic today).

It can be very challenging when you have more... more

Often times when there is more than one adopted child in a family, there will be different and varying degrees of involvement from each adopted child’s birth family. One child may see his or her birthmother through out the year while another may only receive letters from his or her birthmother every so often. I know that it has to be tough on the child that is receiving less contact.

As birthmoms, I guess we could relate by thinking of it as the same feelings that we may have when our friends who are also birthmoms are having more openness in their adoptions... more

I want to tell you about L and W.

They adopted a newborn A, several years ago from a young mother M who had many harsh issues in her life. There was a long history of mental illness, drug use, abuse, violence, prostitution, homelessness and inevitably incarceration.

L and W held high hopes for M, they wanted her to recover and be an active part of her child A’s life. They wanted a very open adoption. In the early years they stayed in close contact with M’s family. They sent information through them to M about A, all... more

An interesting theory has come up lately that every adoption could and should be an open one.

Ideally that would be great, but honestly how realistic is it?

I have no doubt that most birthparents care about their children, many have a lot to offer even though they are not parenting them. Open adoption can be a wonderful and positive thing for a child and I encourage everyone to consider if it is possible for them. If it is possible for them. I am also all too aware that there are some birthparents who just cannot... more

Do you feel like your open adoption is not going as well as it once was? Does it feel like the adoptive parents might be pulling away? Or has your child’s birthmom become a little distant lately? Does it feel like the open adoption relationship you have worked so hard to establish and maintain is slowly falling apart?

Ok, first of all, don’t panic. It’s probably really not as bad as you think. Our over active minds tend to make things seem worse than they actually are. So before you freak out, take a breath and let’s evaluate the situation.

Now,... more

Part 1 Part 2

I was in charge of a large Birthmother’s Day Event in May of last year. Two of the local news stations showed up. One station did a quickie minute and a half blurb about the event, but the other station did a longer, more touching story with a lot of footage of me talking to the reporter and sharing my adoption story with him, as well as some shots of Lani and I at the podium, other girls from the event, etc. That... more

Continued from part 1

It may sound odd that my descent into the closet started with church. But it did! I had given up on going to an organized church. Noah’s special needs and epilepsy would make Sunday School workers at church very nervous, so eventually I just stopped trying. My parents had started going to a new church and my Dad was helping to start a special needs ministry for children at the church. This was my opportunity to get back into church again and I knew I wanted Noah to be a... more

Other bloggers have recently talked about their process of coming out of the closet. At first, I don't think I was ever "in the closet" much but there have been times I stepped in and other times I want to run back in!

I was never too secretive about adoption in the beginning. Because of my work and my closeness with the people I worked with at the time, most of them knew about the adoption and even knew S and A since they were lunch time regulars at the restaurant I worked at. When people asked about the baby after he was born, I’d usually respond with... more