As a North Carolina resident hoping to adopt, you must do plenty of research first. You need to decide whether you want to adopt domestic or international. You must decide how much support you are currently capable of giving. This will help you choose your child.
Among the decisions you make, one will include whether you want an open or closed adoption. This decision is crucial to how you plan on moving forward with your child.
What are closed adoptions?
Family Education looks at both open and closed adoptions. Closed adoptions mean that you break contact off with the birth parents of your child. This often happens after finalizing the adoption. In some cases, you do not even have contact with these parents before the adoption takes place. Some parents choose to do this to protect their identities. There are many other reasons parents may wish for a closed adoption, too.
What are open adoptions?
Open adoptions mean the opposite. In this process, birth parents and adoptive parents stay in touch. The degree of openness and interaction differs from adoption to adoption. What one parent may find comfortable may cross another parent’s comfort lines. It is important to consider this when deciding how open you want the adoption to be. But these days, most agencies do encourage a level of openness.
You may fear the birth parents interfering too much in the child’s life. Some adoptive parents also fear a child may confuse who their “real” parents are. The major concern of closed adoptions is that there is less control in decision-making. There is also more mystery. Children may also have a harder time coming to terms with their adoption when they discover it.
