How To Determine What Type Of Private Adoption Is Right For You
How To Determine What Type Of Private Adoption Is Right For You
Are you thinking about adopting a baby but confused about which type of adoption is right for you? Have you been looking at Google and maybe even Facebook groups, and they're just as thoroughly confusing? You may be thinking, what are all of these words? And what are these people talking about? And what in the world do I do? When all you want to know is how do you get started? Don't worry, friend, I've got your back. In this blog, we'll walk through how to determine which type of adoption is right for you. If you've already picked your type of adoption and you're considering maybe adding another type of adoption to your process, I'm going to walk you through how you can determine if that's right for you as well.
The process of getting started can be frustrating, and sometimes you just want someone to give you the step-by-step process of what to do. I am here to help you in your adoption journey from start to finish. Today we will use my 4 step process to help us pick what type of adoption is right for you.
Step One: Understand the different types of private domestic adoption
The first step is really understanding what in the world all of these different names are. But really understanding what are the different ways that you can privately domestically adopt a child.
Agency - An adoption agency is typically a group of different professionals in different disciplines that are all together in one kind of service for you by finding expectant parents for you to match with. There are two clients who use an adoption agency which are the expectant families and the hopeful adoptive family. You might actually also see EP as an abbreviation for expectant family and HAP for a hopeful adoptive parent. Agencies walk you through the process of connecting with an expectant family. The primary benefit of using an adoption agency is that they bring multiple adoption professionals throughout the adoption process. They're going to have licensed social workers and counselors. Believe it or not, both expectant families and hopeful adoptive families are going to need both of those resources at different times. They might also have an adoption-focused doctor on staff that can answer medical questions. They're also going to have someone to help you with your profile, or they're going to give you the option of working with someone else on your profile. (I’m raising my hand to help you with your adoption profile). The next thing they're going to have is someone to finalize the adoption or to make it legal, which is going to be your adoption attorney.
Consultant - An adoption consultant can be confused with facilitators, but they are two separate things. An adoption consultant is going to work with multiple agencies to represent you. When you're working with an adoption consultant, you will be paying fees to the adoption consultant for their services of outreach, as well as to the agency that you end up matching with. The reason why some people choose to use a consultant is that they have a broader reach. They are talking to more people through an adoption agency perspective, and they might be working with five or 10, or maybe even 20, adoption agencies looking for opportunities. Now, if you're like me, when I was going through the process, I was thinking, why in the world would an adoption agency go to a consultant versus just going to its client roster? That's because some agencies are small, and they just don't have a lot of hopeful adoptive parents. Therefore, they're using an adoption consultant to really expand their pool of people that are working with them. That way, the consultant is doing the work on bringing in those hopeful adoptive families to match with.
The second reason an adoption agency may not be presenting an opportunity to someone on their own client roster but instead sharing that with a consultant might be because they don't match the qualifications that someone has set out. Whenever you become a waiting family with an agency, you're going to go through a questionnaire that's going to talk about what you feel equipped to parent. And what type of situations are you looking for, and all of those things. When an adoption agency gets an opportunity to place a child for adoption, they're looking and matching those qualifications. So if a smaller adoption agency doesn't have anybody on their roster, then they're going to go match with a consultant because the likelihood of them having someone is much greater. That's the difference between an agency and a consultant.
Attorney - The basic principle is that an attorney or facilitator finds an expectant parent to match you with. This is when someone has come to them and said they are looking to place their child for adoption, and then the attorney or the facilitator will connect them with you. The main difference between a facilitator and an attorney, of course, is that the attorney can do the legal side of the adoption for you. It doesn't matter which method of matching you're choosing; you will still need an adoption attorney in the end. The downside of using an adoption attorney by itself is that an adoption attorney typically is not advertising to expectant families; they're typically waiting for expectant families to come to them. Oftentimes, this happens through word of mouth, through people who have placed through somebody who has seen this person or had some sort of interaction with this attorney, and they have made a connection point. The reason why I group attorneys and facilitators together is that they typically have lower volumes. This is not true in all cases, but typically they have a lower volume of cases coming their way. Therefore they have lower match opportunities for you. It's also really important to note that in some states, it is illegal to use an attorney as your method of finding and matching with an expectant parent, as well as a facilitator.
Self-Matching or Private Adoption or Independent Adoption - The last type is self-matching. You might also hear it be called private adoption, independent adoption, or adopting without an agency. For self-matching, you are marketing and advertising your family to expectant families to match with. You are matching directly together, typically through social media or in other forms of communication in real life, because you happen to know somebody or you've come across each other in real life in some way. Then you're working back with typically a social worker to support you both throughout the journey as kind of a counselor, as well as an adoption attorney to then finalize the adoption.
Step Two: Create your adoption financial plan
The second step is to write your financial plan and understand that there are different budget levels that go along with the different types of adoption. If you are curious what those are, read through some of my other blog posts, I've got a million different articles there that give you ranges, and that gives you kind of best practices and all those types of things. You can grab my getting started guide, which is full of great resources for you as you begin your adoption journey. Either way, you want to create your adoption financial plan, which is just a fancy way of saying, what do you plan to spend on your adoption? You may be thinking how the heck should you know at this point; you would know that because I walk you through it in the guide. Inside that financial plan, we'll do things like understanding how much it costs for a home study. If you're going to use an agency or an attorney, what are the ranges from a budget perspective? What type of support materials will you need for your expected family, and what kind of support and adoption professionals will you need to be ready to match with an expectant family. I'll walk you through all of it step by step. Before you determine which type of adoption is right for you, you really need to have a financial plan because that could sway or impact the method that you choose.
Step Three: Be clear on what your level of openness is for when the adoption is finalized.
The third step is to determine what level of openness or contact you want after the child is placed for adoption with you. Understanding if you want an open adoption, a semi-open adoption, or a closed adoption could also impact what road you choose or what partner you choose. There are some agencies and consultants out there that do require you to have a fully open adoption or a semi-open adoption. I will say closed adoptions are very rare these days. If you're self-matching, that could also have an impact as it relates to your level of openness. The majority of my clients who self-match end up with a semi-open adoption, which means that they communicate through pictures and letters and sometimes on social media. Still, they actually don't meet in person. Knowing what you want at the end of this journey is really important because that will help you determine which method of adoption is really right for you.
Step Four: Cast your vision and pick a path
Finally, you need to cast your vision for your adoption. You need to know what the end is like for, not only the actual adoption but understanding things like communication methods. Think about what life will look like. Consider are you now a stay-at-home parent, where before you maybe were a dual-income household? Are you currently working part-time? Is your child going to go into care? Or is your child going to be cared for by a grandparent? Thinking through those little details of how your life expands once a child joins your family really will actually help you impact your financial plan, maybe your level of openness, and potentially, of course, the method of matching that you are choosing. I do encourage you to take out a blank piece of paper and write out what life is like for you and what you want to achieve, where you want to go, etc.
Tips to those of you that have already picked your method of adoption
If you've committed to one method of adoption, you could always add another one in. The majority of the time that people show up in my DMs, it is there with an agency that they've been waiting for over a year, and they're very worried. What I coach them to do is to consider adding self-matching to their adoption journey and to the method of matching that they're either choosing and how this really works. Just a secret little inside tip; you work with your adoption agency to finalize your adoption and to support the expectant parents throughout the journey. You've already paid the fees; why not use them, right? I coach you through how to set up and have your profile away from your adoption agency because you need a different profile for this, and then how to share it with expectant families that are considering placing their child for adoption. You're really putting yourself in the driver's seat to self-match your adoption. That will make a difference in the overall speed of your adoption. If you have questions on how to do that, hit me up in DMs on Facebook, and I will walk you through the process is actually a lot easier than most people think.
Okay, so there you have it, friend, the four steps to determining what type of adoption is really right for you, and a little plan and a few tips on what to do. If you're worried that you've picked the wrong method of matching, and you want to really put yourself in the driver's seat of your adoption journey. I trust that today's episode has been incredibly valuable for you. Remember, anything is possible with the right plan and support, and I am only a Facebook message away! See you soon, friend!
Hi, I Am Amanda
I am an adoption profile expert on a mission to help you create and share your family's story more affordably!
