As you learn about adoption and decide how to adopt in method that is right for you, educate your extended family.
A large number of adults come to adoption via a long, hard struggle with infertility. Making the decision to adopt is a positive move toward the baby of an infertile couple’s dreams, but past difficulties, if consciously acknowledged, will make an infertile couple even better adoptive parents.
Extended family may be surprised, pleased or dismayed by an individual’s or couple’s decision to adopt. The negative reactions may come as a shock to the prospective adoptive parents, and may cause some initial friction within the family. Realizing that the extended family may not have moved through the same steps as the prospective parents, and may not have had time to process the new direction toward adoption, will help the adopting couple or single be patient with relatives’ responses.
Single parent adoption choices are not as varied as those for married couples, but there are programs for individuals available domestically and internationally. Savvy singles plan past the adoption process; as sole primary caregivers, singles have all aspects of this central role to consider when investigating parenthood.
Expert Viewpoints:
- Joni Mantell, LCSW :
- Making the Transition from Infertility to Adoption
- Surviving Infertility
- Patricia Johnston M.S. :
- Speaking Positively: Using Respectful Adoption Language
- What Should We Tell the Kids?
- Dr. Janet Jaffee :
- Knowing When to Stop Trying
- How Do You Grieve a Reproductive Loss?
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