Of course whenever a family begins the adoption process, they consider many things involved, and make decisions according to what they understand to be appropriate for their family. One of those considerations is the level of contact or openness they will choose to have with the birthfamily of their future child. While there is no right or wrong, every family makes a uniquely personal decision, openness as an option is often sadly downplayed, as a way to ease the fears adopting couples may have.

Some families may not know much about open adoption, and because of this they have fears about the prospect. Adoptive parents often worry that contact with birthfamily will impair the bonding process. Others may feel that openness and ongoing contact may confuse the child. Parents also might be concerned that a biological family member will try to reclaim the child, or attempt to co-parent with them in some way. With better information about the possibilities of openness, and the limited likely hood that any of these concerns will become a reality, some of these fears for adopting parents may be lessened.

Other adoptive parents may feel that openness it is not an option for them because of past experiences, or because of their personal beliefs about raising children in general. Education is still a key element here. It would be unfortunate to match a placing mother who desires contact and would be a positive for the right family, with a family who does not desire open adoption and would not consider keeping in contact.

Unfortunately this seems to happen all too often, mainly because agencies do not educate enough. They do not always encourage families to match with placing parents who share the same goals for contact with the child, and often tell adopting parents that they only need consider the level of openness that they initially feel comfortable with. Encouraging adopting couples to fully learn about and throughly consider openness, may actually scare some potential parents away, and adoption agencies do not want to do that.

Even though many adoptive parents I have met, did not want contact at the time of placement, as they watch their child grow and develop, many do later express a desire to reach out to birthparents in some more substantial way. One has to wonder how many of those families might have been more interested in openness at the beginning of the adoption, if they had just received more information about how they may feel once they settled into the role of parents.

While there are many reasons why adoptive parents might not consider an open adoption, it seems most likely that fears about the unknowns involved with openness, and truly needing more information about contact and adoption related complexities is the core of most situations.

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