Adoption agencies at “their best”
November 17, 2007The other day, I decided to start browsing around the agencies we could work with for our next adoption, which is a ways off, but I am trying to get a handle on how much costs have risen since we adopted Widget, so I started contacting agencies for information.
I asked what the number of expecting women they counsel is and how many placements they have per year.
Here is the reply I got from one of them:
On Nov 14, 2007 10:10 AM, <contactus@adoptassoc.com> wrote:
HI T and Erin,
On any given day, we are working with about 70-90 birth moms. We are the leading agency in Michigan for placing newborns and we are thrilled to tell you that we have placed 109 newborns with their forever families just this year so far.
Joyce
My reply:
Thank you for your information.
I am wondering if you can give me statistics on the total number of expecting women you counsel, not just “working with on any given day”. Honestly, I’m looking for an agency with low placement number versus high numbers. Higher numbers lead me to believe that the practices used for “counseling” are not ones we would want to be associated with. Adoption is not always the “best choice” or the only “loving choice”. I would rather wait for a long time and know that our child’s natural mother (and father if at all possible) received good, honest and open counseling about what adoption placement means for them, for their child and the future. Parenting is hard, single parenting is harder but this does not mean it is not the right choice for most women experiencing unplanned pregnancies, even if they do contact you about making an adoption plan.
We have adopted before and are in an open adoption with our daughter’s natural mother. We know she received genuinely good OPTIONS counseling and made her adoption plan after truly examining parenting.
Now I have to admit I already know we won’t be using them. They cost about double any other agency does. And their entire “unplanned pregnancy” site makes me want to puke with all its glories of adoption. They even had this column in their “annual newsletter“:
DOMESTIC ADOPTION UPDATEAAI places infants voluntarily released by their birth parents for adoption into stable, two parent families. In an ultimate act of unselfish love, the birth parents plan adoption for their unborn children because they believe that an adoptive family will give their babies a more secure future than they are currently able to provide. Although the reasons why birth parents choose adoption are many, deciding to plan adoption is a selfless and difficult decision—one that we respect our birth parents for having the courage to make.In 2006, 109 couples became parents for the first time, or again, through our domestic infant adoption program. Fifty-four percent of these placements were transracial. With the popularity of transracial adoption on the rise, AAI offers training programs to help prepare couples who adopt a child of a different race for the specific challenges of transracial parenting.
With single parenting or abortion as more socially-acceptable options, statistics indicate that less than two percent of women facing an unplanned pregnancy will choose adoption. Coupled with the fact that out-of-wedlock birth rates are declining, additional efforts are needed to reach women experiencing unplanned pregnancies.
Thus, in 2006, AAI developed www.PlanAdoption.com, a web site intended to reach birth mothers nationwide. This site features adoption information, adoption stories from birth parents and adoptive families, and information about families waiting to adopt a child.
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
This is one agency I would like to go out of business (and soon!!!!) before they can coerce more unsuspecting women into placing their children for adoption because it is “best”.
Ugh is right.
This also gave me the willies:
With the popularity of transracial adoption on the rise
Does that mean that they’re targeting birth mothers of color or those with biracial babies? Ugh again.
‘Scuse me while I vomit.
God bless you for writing that email though. Seriously. Could hug you for that.
The “business” feel alone makes one feel just sick to their stomachs doesn’t it? And so quick to promise you “the moon” for a price of course.
blah.
Hi,
I have been researching adoption lately and I have found that most adoptive parents are not comfortable about discussing the gray ethical areas related to adoption. I find that sad and illogical. What better way to made the adoption process better than discuss and work through problems that exist in the system.