Adoption questions

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Almeria

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I’ve mentioned on a couple posts that my husband and I have been seriously considering adoption. We’re looking at sibling groups, which would include older children. I have a couple questions:

We’re Catholic, and we want to raise our kids Catholic (obviously). How does that work with adoption? I would think it would be pretty straightforward enough with adopted infants and toddlers, but once you start to get into the school years and teenagers, it’s not like you can just get them baptised and raise them Catholic. We obviously can’t make it a condition of adoption (i.e., “we’ll give you love, a home, and a college education if you convert to Catholicism”), and I wouldn’t want to do that, anyway. What do you do with the older children, who might have had a different faith? Should we expect some resistance from the county due to our faith?

Second, and this is a more trivial question, what happens with last names? They’d be part of our family no matter what their last name was, but do we ask the children to change their last name to ours? Is it just done automatically when papers are signed? Do you give them the choice?

Finally, does anyone here have experience with sibling group adoptions? I’m leaning towards 3-6 children in the first adoption (we want 12 kids or more–biological or adopted), and right now I’m being called more to girls than boys (of course, if a group of 8 boys catches our hearts, we’re there in an instant. it’s whatever God wants). What’s it like to go from just my husband and I to a full, lively family?
 
I commend you for looking into adoption and for considering sibling groups who are often difficult to place.

I have two adopted children, both received as infants, so my situation is much different than yours. While we were going through the adoption process, we also chose the option of siblings or twins, but God had some other children in mind for us! So, we did explore many of the same questions.

The basic answer to raising them Catholic and keeping their last names really varies depending on the birth family. If the children are young, they may not mind having their names changed. If some are school-aged this might be more difficult for them. As far as faith is concerned, you need to make it clear to whatever adoption counselor you are working with that it is your intention to raise any adopted children in the Catholic faith. Some birth families may have no objections; others might.

What if there were 3 Jewish siblings up for adoption? Would you consider that? Would you raise them with their Jewish traditions and your Catholic traditions? These are all questions you and your husband need to consider.

But, basically, it all depends on the children, their family and what the family’s needs and intentions are (if parents or relatives are even involved).

As far as going from 2 - 6 in one day – Wow! I can’t imagine it but know of people who have done this. Think of those who have septuplets! At least they shouldn’t all be in diapers, or going through the terrible twos, or be hormonal all at the same time! While the adjustment time may be difficult for all of you, I’m sure the children Our Lord has picked for you will be most grateful to have a loving home.

My thoughts and prayers are with you during this exciting and sometimes anxious time of your lives! God bless you both!
 
Hi there,

Well, first off, older sibling groups may have major issues. You would need to have some education provided by the county about what kinds of situations the kids come from and how to deal with those things.

You will be given a form with a plethora of conditions or ethnic types of children that you have to say yes, no, or would consider. It is a process in and of itself. One has to make concrete decisions about how much they handle.

Dr. Ray whose show airs through Catholic Answers may be a big help.

We have adopted infants twice previously. We had thought we would take a young child this time.

We are called Resource parents by our county/state folks. That means that we are going to take a child who isn’t legally free for adoption, but probably will be. That translates to a foster-to-adopt kind situation.

To be foster parents, we had to go through a fair amount of training. The training included the many ways people have found to abuse babies and children. :eek: It isn’t for the faint of heart. It was difficult for me and I see myself as pretty tough. Just a warning to maybe preserve your soul should you think that such training would wound you.

We are approved and waiting for 1 or 2 children, ages newborn to three years. (My husband did say that they should call if there is a 4 year old. :whistle: )

Anyway, I hope my info is helpful. PM me if you wish to converse in a less public place.
 
Well, the opinions of the birth family will really depend on whether it’s a closed or open adoption, right? I’ve been researching adoption a lot lately (forums.adoption.com is a great resource for all sorts of questions) and open adoption seems to be very much in fashion now and many adoption advocates have started frowning upon the traditional closed adoption, but I’d say go with what you’re comfortable with.

There are all sorts of adoption options available. You can go the foster-adopt route, adopt waiting children through a private or state agency, hire a lawyer to do a private adoption (that’s where you’re most likely to have an open adoption), international adoption, etc.

I, for instance, have been thinking about international adoption, particularly from Eastern Europe. For awhile I was wavering between converting to either Catholicism or Orthodoxy. I was thinking that if I adopted kids from Russia, say, it might be better if I became Orthodox, but I’ve pretty much figured to go with the Catholic Church, and if I wind up with Orthodox kids, I can take them to services there too.

The question of names is a big one. Some older kids want a new name, to break with the past and to wipe the slate of the past clean. A lot of people keep a child’s old surname as a middle name. In the case of an international adoption you might Anglicize a child’s given name, turning “Ekaterina,” say, into “Katherine.”

At the same time, I think some common sense needs to be used. If your last name is “Rabinowitz,” leaving your kid’s first name as “Toshiro” is just setting him up for teasing.
 
Bless all of you adoptive Moms & Dads!

Almeria: I don’t know how far down the adoption path you’ve gotten so far, but there is a wealth of information available online. The North American Council on Adoptable Children has a trustworthy website:
www.nacac.org
and the US Dept. of Health & Human Services has a national photolisting website at:
www.adoptuskids.org

Regarding the original questions of baptism, name change & sibling groups:
Naturally, during your Home Study / Family Profile process, you will want to be open about the role faith plays in your lives and your wish to share the blessings of faith with your future children. Should you adopt an older child who, for some reason, is opposed to receiving the sacraments, that then becomes an opportunity for good catechesis on your part & your parish’s part, as well. Older children have more (name removed by moderator)ut into the adoption matching, as well.

The importance (to the child) of his or her last name will likely depend on his/her age. For some kids, it may be an ongoing topic of discussion right up until the adoption day. For the little ones, you will likely make the decision for them.

Sibling groups: Hopefully, you are in a state that has a good network of support for adoptive families. Siblings groups can present unique challenges, but if you are well-matched and supported, you all will experience the rewards, as well. Make sure that you thoroughly take advantage of the visitation & monitoring process when the time comes. Gather as much information, attend as many workshops or groups and ask for as much help as you feel you need! No one has all the answers, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t ask EVERY question that you have! Good luck & God bless!
 
If it matters, we are in an open relationship with our son’s birth mom. In fact she had for Satruday all day and overnight then until 5:00 PM on Sunday. She was helping us out during an odd time when we both work on a weekend.

Yep, she knows where we live in case we don’t come and get him. 😃

Our relationship with Heather is very good. We are also close to her mom and dad. We have become like family with each other. It is helpful to both sides of the child.

Our son’s birth father has chosen to not be open with us. We have no animosity towards and represent him in a positive way to our son.

I can say that while there are times when I go out of my way for the birth mom, there are times she does the same for me. We are friends beyond our son and that helps.

I don’t know how easy it will be for us to ever trust the birth family of our next placements. Since these people won’t be ending their parental rights voluntarily.

Open adoption is meant to be a help for the child and the rest of us. For the child, he will get to see who he looks like. We can get plenty of information about the personality and medical make up of the birth parent, too.

Mostly, our son is loved by more people and that is never a bad thing.
 
StephanieC, we’re hopefully moving to Texas in a few months. Hopefully they have a good support network there. We would be at the University of Dallas, so I’m anticipating a good amount of support there from other parents. I’ve looked through serveral photolistings sites, and have found several sibling groups in Texas that seem to be a good fit for us. While I hope for their sakes they’ve been placed already, we’ll probably be looking into adopting them once we get settled in.

While I’m open to open adoption, I have the feeling that most of our adoptions will be with children whose parents had their right terminated. I’m very open to adopting a pregnant girl–and the child, of course–and provide them with love and support. I guess you can’t get much close to the child’s mother in that case, huh? 🙂
 
I am so happy for you and your husband and will keep you in my prayers! My husband and I have adopted 2 older children a girl at 10 and a boy at 12. They are now both 13 (months apart). We introduced both children to our faith and invited them to find out more about our faith. Both children were baptised and received 1st communion after their adoptions were finalized. I’m not sure how the adoption\foster parent rules in Texas are but in Louisiana, we promise to respect the religion of the children we care for, while in foster care. My daughter really had no “religion” but was anxious find and understand God. She had been in and out of foster homes and she kept asking people if they were “saved!” She still asks “why God loves her so much?” Our son was very involved in the non-denominational church of his previous foster family. When he came to live with us, we still attended his church for awhile (gradually we backed off) and also attended Mass. His faith helped him alot to focus and understand God and family. He also taught our family alot about how focused non-demoninational churches are on apoligetics.

As far as names, our daughter kept her first name, used her birth surname as her middle name, and took our last name.( It was Evette Jane Doe now its Evette Doe Smith). Our son, after learning there was no way we would allow him to change his name to Sponge Bob Square Pants Curole (no really):bigyikes: , decided to keep his first name and take my husband’s middle and last name.

While they are not related, we have had contact with the siblings of both children. We were even considering adopting our daughter’s sister, however it did not work out. For Christmas break our daughter’s siblings older 2 brother’s (who were adopted) came to visit, along with her sister (who was in a group home), and brother who the bio-mom still has custody of. Our son has had contact with his brother who is adopted but we have had no contact with the 2 sisters who the mom still has. However, if any of these children come up for adoption the state knows to contact us.

I want to say that is very, very, very important to find out the dynamics of the sibling group that you adopt. Remember that for what ever reason these children are out of the parents home, they (the children) have already established a family hierarchy and you may have to deal with a 12yr old who will question who is mom them or you, or who is dad them or you. I’m not saying this to discourage you but to help be aware of the reality of the situation.

If I could give you 3 pieces of advice they would be:

1- You and your husband make sure to take time for each other alone, stand together on all decisions, and pray together as a couple.
2- Never forget to tell the kids you love them no matter what they do.
3-Insist that therapy is set up BEFORE the children come in the home, making sure the therapist will respect your parenting style.
Please e-mail me if you have any questions, I’d be happy to help any way I can.
God Bless
 
Dear Dawn,

I haven’t looked into Butler’s “Lives of the Saints” in awhile, but was’t there a hermetic saint named Sponge Bob Square Pants who lived in a pineapple under the sea off the coast of Asia Minor in the 6th century AD?
 
My wife and I were looking at adoption as an alternative to not being able to have children. As things worked out, she became pregnant before we got the chance to start classes, but I did become acquainted with a first-class organization: The Arrow Project.

arrow.org/

They are a Christian group (the worker in our area was a solid Catholic) that tries to help kids through fostering and adoption. It may no be for everyone but they do defray much of the costs through staff attorneys. The down side is that you must attend a battery of classes.
 
That Arrow Project sounds excellent. We’re more than willing to go through classes–we realize that suddenly having many children is a big step, and the classes are probably well suited to training us what to expect. I doubt mommies of quints get such training! I especially like that they are a Christian organization.
 
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Almeria:
I’ve mentioned on a couple posts that my husband and I have been seriously considering adoption. We’re looking at sibling groups, which would include older children. I have a couple questions:

We’re Catholic, and we want to raise our kids Catholic (obviously). How does that work with adoption? I would think it would be pretty straightforward enough with adopted infants and toddlers, but once you start to get into the school years and teenagers, it’s not like you can just get them baptised and raise them Catholic. We obviously can’t make it a condition of adoption (i.e., “we’ll give you love, a home, and a college education if you convert to Catholicism”), and I wouldn’t want to do that, anyway. What do you do with the older children, who might have had a different faith? Should we expect some resistance from the county due to our faith?

Second, and this is a more trivial question, what happens with last names? They’d be part of our family no matter what their last name was, but do we ask the children to change their last name to ours? Is it just done automatically when papers are signed? Do you give them the choice?

Finally, does anyone here have experience with sibling group adoptions? I’m leaning towards 3-6 children in the first adoption (we want 12 kids or more–biological or adopted), and right now I’m being called more to girls than boys (of course, if a group of 8 boys catches our hearts, we’re there in an instant. it’s whatever God wants). What’s it like to go from just my husband and I to a full, lively family?
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God bless you! This is a lovely ambition!

I want to put a bug in your ear about international adoption. The need is immense. I have a student who is from the former Soviet republic of Belarus – she and her brother were adopted after they were in the U.S. on a cultural exchange program; there are still siblings in an orphanage in Belarus. The poverty level in many nations is so serious, and the lack of health care and educational opportunities in the orphanages are so disappointing, my student’s mom said it’s the best thing they ever did. These are two delightful kids, too!

Now, once you adopt the kids they are yours. You can’t be discriminated against by the local government on account of your religion; it’s against the law.

I recommend with older kids that you simply tell them, “This is what we do,” when it comes to Mass attendance and family devotions. It’s not an option; they aren’t mature enough to know the difference between what’s good for them. You ought not to let them dictate what they will and will not eat at mealtimes; the state of their soul is far more important! Just be matter-of-fact and pleasant about it, it’s not something any kid gets a say-so about.

Okay, SHOULD get a say-so… :rolleyes:

Enroll the kids in CCD, and be prepared to do some hard-core catching up with them at home. Talk with your CCD teacher about what they need to be brought up to speed with their agemates. He/She may have some books for you to use. You can make their supplemental catechesis a part of the family devotion time or a separate bit of instruction. It’s too important to neglect, though.

Names? You can always treat their former family name as an additional middle name if it’s important to them. If your family name is Smith and they were Jones before, they become John Mark Jones Smith. Hyphenated or not. My personal take is that hyphens are confusing. When you petition the Court for adoption, you will be asked to specify the name for the new birth certificate that will be issued for them (may not be an automatic thing with older children in some states) – tell your attorney what you want so it can be placed in the Petition as you wish. It’s important that the kids receive your name; it is a subtle reminder that you’re a FAMILY now, that they aren’t some totally separate entity (even if they feel they are, from time to time)

You have my prayers – this is WONDERFUL of you!
 
I would love to be able to adopt internationally. Our problem is the huge amount of money needed. How have those of you who have adopted or are in the process of adopting internationally come up with all the money needed?
 
There’s several things that concern me about the international adoption, and like Lorik, high costs is one of them. Especially with us wanting so many children–I see the costs getting very high. Going with domestic children through the county, it looks like there are not only no fees (other than lawyer costs, which I think you end up with regardless), but you have a good possibility of being eligible for additional assistance–medicaid, therapy costs, that type of thing. With international adoption, I’d think we’d have to pay all those ourselves, and not have the possibility of getting assistance if needed.

Does language become an issue with older children?

On a separate note, I’m a bit discouraged right now. We told my parents that we were looking more seriously into adoption, and getting sibling groups (they have known that we’ve been talking about adoption for several years, so it shouldn’t have come as too much of a surprise). The response that I got was heavily negative. Since there was only my brother and I, my parents think that I don’t have the experience with a large family, and therefore should only adopt one child at a time. I’ve “adopted” my husband’s family since we got married, and it’s a very large family (our record is 72 people at Thanksgiving!). I’m comfortable with large families, thanks to experience with his family. I’m just … well, rather dismayed at their thought process.
 
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Almeria:
On a separate note, I’m a bit discouraged right now. We told my parents that we were looking more seriously into adoption, and getting sibling groups (they have known that we’ve been talking about adoption for several years, so it shouldn’t have come as too much of a surprise). The response that I got was heavily negative. Since there was only my brother and I, my parents think that I don’t have the experience with a large family, and therefore should only adopt one child at a time. I’ve “adopted” my husband’s family since we got married, and it’s a very large family (our record is 72 people at Thanksgiving!). I’m comfortable with large families, thanks to experience with his family. I’m just … well, rather dismayed at their thought process.
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Well, I can’t give much insight into the adoption issue (we had our foster-adopt paperwork filled out and were about to start the process when we found out we were expecting DD, who is now 5 weeks old) but I was reading through because we’d like to adopt someday, and just felt called to give you a little support and encouragement about the family issues.

I come from a teeny tiny family (1 sibling, 2 cousins, spread out across the country) and DH has a huge family (4 siblings and 30 some cousins) Actually, if you have ever seen the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding…change the Greek family to a farm family, and you’ve got our lives!
Obviously, I like you have had to adjust to a big family. And we plan to have a big family. My mom constantly says things like “Now do you see why we only had two?” etc. Also, my family isn’t Catholic, so they really don’t understand the big family thing or the no contraception thing. I’ve just come to terms with the fact that my mother is never really going to understand me, and that is okay!

I would respond to your mother in a loving way, and let her know that your heart is full of love and that you want what is best for the kids. Assure her that you are not jumping into this without a lot of thought and prayer. Tell her that you plan to make sure you have support networks in place before taking on a bunch of kids at once. Remind her that though you are open to larger sibling groups, there is a chance that God may send you a smaller sibling group. Point out that even people who have biological kids sometimes end up with more than one at a time! And explain that God is not going to send you more than you can handle.

If your mom is like mine, she may not understand or believe these things, but at least you get the point across that this is not just a whim. My mom has a really hard time thinking of me as an adult (I’m the baby) and I just have to keep in mind that this is probably natural…after all, she raised me, and I went through all sorts of phases!

Don’t worry too much, my parents were a little wary about becoming grandparents (they thought they were too young) and I was a little worried that they wouldn’t really be into my daughter, but they are already hooked. I think that your mom will end up loving your kids very much! She’s just worried about you, that’s all! You’ll do the same for your kids when they are all grown up.

-Lori (who should probably register herself instead of hijacking DHs screenname!)

P.S. I love the idea of adopting a pregnant teenager! I had never even thought of that before!
 
You might check with your states child welfare group and see about taking the foster training.We are foster parents in KY and the training does help.

Sibling groups can be fun, but there can be previous issues especially if the oldest was left in charge. It is often difficult for that child to leave “parent mode” when you get them and there can (will !) be conflicts there as you try to adjust the child back into the child role and to move yourselves into the parent role.

Pray, Pray, talk with your husband, pray, make sure it is what you want to do, plan, pray, prepare and finally pray some more.

-at night, leave your problems with God. He’s going to be up all night anyway.😃
 
Dear Almeria,

My husband and I are Catholic and adopted a sibling group of three half-sisters ages 8, 5, and 3 four years ago. We absolutely are raising them Catholic. I feel that is the biggest gift we will ever give them. We did not give them a choice, but they accepted it willingly. We made a big deal out of their sacraments and they were really excited.

I would encourage you to become a foster parent before adopting any children through the system, so you will know what type of children you are dealing with. My husband and I were very naive about this aspect and thought if we were careful in the screening process, we would weed out the kids who were the really hard cases. The social workers told us our children were the cream of the crop.

We soon found out that we had been mislead. The older two children especially have many psychological problems. In fact, after our middle daughter’s antics, which included fire-setting, cruelty to animals, breaking my nose, extreme violence to her sisters, defecating on our floors, and threating the life of our unborn child and punching me in the stomach when I was pregnant, and falsely telling her teachers that we weren’t feeding her, we had to make the difficult decision to place her in a children’s home. When she was leaving she told us that she could care less if she ever saw us or her sisters again. We still retain custody of her and have visits with her.

I tell you this not to scare you, because I know that most of the time these adoptions work out wonderfully, but there is something known as reactive attachment disorder, and love can’t fix everything. Our daughter saw about seven psychiatrists and psychologists , had hospitilizations, and received more therapy in the three and a half years that she lived here than most people get in a lifetime, but it didn’t help her. There is a good book on this subject by Dr. Foster Cline called “Can This Child Be Saved ?”

I encourage you to proceed prayerfully and give this a lot of thought. It is a very selfless thing you are considering, and the children will clearly benefit. It is the single hardest thing I have ever done in my life.

God be with you.

Mary
 
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