Adoption Services Locations Locator Map and Directory

From Wikipedia

Types of adoption (by effect on the parties involved)

In most jurisdictions, the adoption process begins with the decision of the birth mother (or in some cased, both parents) to place the child for adoption. Birth parents may be able to choose what family they would like their child to belong to. Depending on jurisdiction and local law, they may already know of a family that want to adopt, or they may find people who want to adopt by going to a lawyer, social services, or by finding a private or state adoption agency (though privately arranged adoptions are illegal in some jurisdictions). The birth parents may have the option of choosing whether they want an open, semi-open, or closed adoption. They may be given Parent Profiles to look at and choose from, or the agency may choose a family for them. In addition, some states have recently passed laws allowing birth mothers to leave their unwanted infants at any nearby hospital, fire departmant, or police station within 10 days after birth, with no questions asked.

Open adoption

Open adoption is where the adopted person has access to their file and/or original records. This may be a right available at certain ages - e.g., at age 18, a person adopted in the United Kingdom becomes automatically entitled to their birth certificate and may access their adoption records.

Another definition of open adoption is where birth parents decide that they would like to meet the adoptive parents before they choose to place their biological child with them. If the birth parents are comfortable with the family, the relationship may continue to grow. Even when the adoption is finalized, the relationship can be very personal, and can include visits, phone calls, and exchanging letters, pictures or e-mails. The adopted child can meet his/her birthfamily and communication is as open as the parties involved decide upon. In some jurisdictions, open adoptions are not legally enforceable agreements. As of December 2005, for example, 22 U.S. states have legal provisions for enforceable open adoption contact agreements, while 28 do not.

Semi-open adoption

In a semi-open adoption, the birth parents may meet the adoptive parents one or several times and then have no more physical contact. Letters and pictures may be exchanged directly or via a third party, such as an adoption agency, throughout the years. The relationship may remain semi-open or may evolve into open or closed.

Closed adoption

In some closed adoptions, non-identifying information is shared between the parties involved, such as medical history, up to the point of placement. After the adoption is legalized, no further information is shared between the adoptive and birth parents.

In other closed adoptions no information is shared between the parties involved. This may occur because of the law in the jurisdiction concerned, or court order, such as when a child is removed from the home by the state because of abuse or neglect. It may also occur because the parties involved do not want any contact.

Types of adoption (by location and origin)

Domestic Adoption

A domestic adoption is the placement of a child for adoption within the country in which he or she was born and normally resides. A special case is an interstate adoption - where an adoption occurs across state lines in the U.S. or Russia, for example, or within different Canadian provinces. In such cases, additional regulations may apply.

Foster care adoption Foster care adoption is a type of domestic adoption where the child is initially placed into a foster care system and is subsequently placed for adoption. Children may be placed into foster care for a variety of reasons, including removal from the home of the birth family by a governmental agency because of maltreatment of the child by the birth family. Maltreatment can take the form of neglect or abuse. In most adoptions regarding foster children, the foster parents decide to adopt and become the legal parents. In some jurisdictions, adoptive parents are licensed as and technically considered foster parents while the adoption is being finalized. Altogether, of the 127,500 adoptions in the U.S. in 2001, about 51,000 occurred through the foster care system.

The National Adoption Center found that 52% of adoptable children (meaning those children in U.S. foster care freed for adoption) had symptoms of attachment disorder. A study by Dante Cicchetti found that 80% of abused and maltreated infants exhibited disorganized attachment styles.

Children with histories of maltreatment, such as physical and psychological neglect, physical abuse, and sexual abuse, are at risk of developing severe psychiatric problems.[ These children are likely to develop Reactive attachment disorder (RAD). These children may be described as experiencing trauma-attachment problems. The trauma experienced is the result of abuse or neglect, inflicted by a primary caregiver, which disrupts the normal development of secure attachment. Such children are at risk of developing a disorganized attachment.[ Disorganized attachment is associated with a number of developmental problems, including dissociative symptoms, as well as depressive, anxiety, and acting-out symptoms.

Effective treatment for children who have experienced early chronic maltreatment generally must be multi-modal and family-based. See main article at Complex post-traumatic stress disorder.

Intra-Family Adoption

Not all adoptions are from outside of the family. An intra-family adoption occurs when a child is adopted by an existing close family member and/or his or her partner. A common example is a "step-parent adoption", where the new partner of a parent may legally adopt a child from the parent's previous relationship. Intra-family adoption can also occur through surrender, as a result of parental death, or when the birthparent cannot care for the child and a family member agrees to take over.

International Adoption

International adoption is the placing of a child for adoption outside that child’s country of birth. The laws of different countries vary in their willingness to allow international adoptions. Some countries, such as China and Vietnam, have relatively well-established rules and procedures for foreign adopters to follow, while others, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for example, expressly forbid it. Some countries, notably many African nations, have extended residency requirements that in effect rule out most international adoptions. And some countries such as Romania are closed to international adoption altogether.

Recognising some of the difficulties and challenges associated with international adoption, and in an effort to protect those involved from the corruption and exploitation which sometimes accompanies it, the Hague Conference on Private International Law developed the Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption, which came into force on 1 May 1995. To date it has been ratified in 70 countries.