Different Levels of Openness

Open Adoptions

  • Direct interaction between birth and adoptive families
  • Fully identifying information is shared

For Birthparents:

  • Healthier grief reconciliation
  • Comfort in knowing child’s well-being
  • Sense of control over decision-making in placement
  • Potential for more fully defined role in child’s life
  • Potential to develop a healthy relationship with the child as he or she grows
  • May make the decision to place for adoption easier
  • Full responsibility for setting relationship limits and boundaries
  • Potential abuse of trust (fewer safeguards)
  • Potential disappointment if the adoptive family does not keep promises or meet expectations

For Adoptive Parents:

  • Increased sense of having the “right” to parent and increased ability for confident parenting
  • Potential for authentic relationship with the birthfamily
  • More understanding of children’s history
  • Increased empathy for birthparents
  • Less fear of birthparents reclaiming the child because they know the parent and their wishes
  • Delight of being “chosen” as a parent
  • Full responsibility for setting relationship limits and boundaries
  • Potential pressure: accept openness or no child
  • Potential difficulty navigating relationships with birthparents
  • Potential for supporting both child and birthparents (emotionally)

For Adoptees:

  • Direct access to birthparents and history
  • Need to search is eliminated
  • Identity questions are reduced (Who do I look like? Why was I placed?)
  • Eases feelings of abandonment
  • Lessening of fantasies: birthparents are “real”
  • Increased circle of supportive adults
  • Increased attachment to adoptive family (especially if the birthparents support the placement)
  • Preservation of connections (e.g., with siblings, relatives)
  • Lessens loyalty conflicts (according to recent research)
  • Exposure to racial and ethnic heritage
  • Ability for evolving, dynamic, and developmentally appropriate account of the adoption
  • No clean break for assimilation into the family, which some feel is necessary
  • Potential feelings of rejection if contact stops
  • Difficulty explaining the relationship to peers
  • Potential for playing families against each other

Mediated (Semi-Open) Adoptions

  • Non-identifying contact is made (via cards, letters, or pictures) through a third party (e.g., agency or attorney)

For Birthparents:

  • Allows for some information transfer between birth and adoptive parents (and perhaps the child)
  • Some privacy
  • Loss of potential for a direct relationship with adoptive family (and/or child)
  • Loss of contact if the intermediary changes or leaves (i.e., staff turnover, policy changes, or agency closings)

For Adoptive Parents:

  • Greater sense of control over process
  • Roles may be more clearly defined than in either confidential or open options
  • Increased sense of entitlement compared to confidential adoptions
  • Enhanced ability to answer child’s questions about his or her history
  • Loss of the full relationship with the birthparents
  • Lack of ability to have questions answered immediately
  • Potentially troubling cards, letters, or pictures

For Adoptees:

  • Only true when relationship is “shared” with the adopted child
  • Genetic and birth history known
  • Birthparents are “real” not “fantasy”
  • Positive adjustment is promoted in adoptee
  • Similar to confidential adoptions, if information is not shared with the adoptee
  • Potential perception that it is unsafe to interact with the birthfamily directly

Confidential Adoptions

  • No contact between birth and adoptive families
  • No identifying information is provided
  • Only non-identifying information (e.g., height, hair color, medical history, etc.) is provided through a third party (e.g., agency or attorney)

For Birthparents:

  • Privacy
  • Some feel this provides a sense of closure and ability to move on with life
  • Less grief resolution due to lack of information about the child’s well-being
  • May encourage denial of the fact that child was born and placed with another family

For Adoptive Parents:

  • Privacy
  • Increased fear, less empathy for birthparents
  • No access to additional medical information about the birthfamily
  • Less control: agency controls the information

For Adoptees:

  • Privacy
  • Possible adolescent identity confusion (unable to compare physical and emotional traits to their birthfamilies)
  • Limited access to information that others take for granted
  • Potential preoccupation with adoption issues

Adapted from The Pros and Cons of Different Levels of from the Child Welfare Information Gateway

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