The promise of 'openness' lures vulnerable mothers-to-be

Jane

Promises of openness is a common gambit used to separate a mother from her newborn.  We at First Mother Forum believe that if an adoption has to happen, a fully open adoption in most cases is better for all than a closed or semi-open adoption. Unfortunately, too often an open adoption is offered as a panacea to persuade a mother who would otherwise nurture her child to give her/him up.  Too late the mother learns that promises by prospective adoptive parents for openness are not enforceable.

In 2004 first mother Cindy Jordan killed herself after the woman who adopted her child, psychologist Susan Burns, wrote a book on how she and her husband Scott, had conned Jordan into giving up her child with false
promises of openness.

Fathers: Are they necessary?

Jane

The adoption industry uses fathers--or the absence of them--as a wedge to convince mothers to give up their babies. Fathers who stick around, create a problem for the industry. The industry characterizes them as an obstacle to the best interests of a child. The adoption industry's message to single pregnant women: your baby needs a father, but not the bum who got you pregnant.

LOSING A MOTHER TO GAIN A FATHER
"A child needs a mother...and a father." I'm sure I heard these words more than once in a TV show, spoken by an all-knowing social worker (or parent, teacher, clergyman) to a scared single woman who wanted to keep her baby: The words repeated endlessly in my mind when I was faced with having a child without a husband.

How the adoption industry convinces women they aren't 'ready to parent'

Jane

Recent first mothers often explain they gave up their babies because "I was not ready to parent," adopting the language which the adoption industry prefers to the more homey "nurture a child." "To parent" gives child rearing a kind of mystical quality beyond the skills of single mothers-to-be..

Adoption practitioners typically use close-ended questions--the kind answered "yes" or "no" on their websites and in their literature to create doubt and nudge mothers-to-be into thinking they are not ready to be mothers. American Adoptions, for example, encourages pregnant women to ask themselves: "Am I ready to be a parent? This the most important question of all....If you have aspirations to attend college, pursue a career, or simply just want to maintain your current lifestyle, you may find that you aren't ready to raise a child, when another family out there is ready to adopt and give a child the greatest life imaginable."

How money rules infant adoption

Jane

Lorraine and I gave up our newborn daughters because we believed we would be our child's disgrace and they would be ours. Today, though, with 40 percent of children born to single mothers, politicians and celebrities having love children a-plenty, adoption as prime time TV entertainment, shame is not part of the equation. Adoption practitioners have new ammunition in their arsenals. We'll be writing about these over the next several weeks. 

First up is the influence of money although that term is never used. Rather, Catelynn and Tyler of 16 and Pregnant fame and thousands of other parents give up their children in order to give their children and themselves "the life they deserve."

How an Open Adoption becomes 'Closed'

Ken Robbins, Houses by the Bay, Archival Digital Print

A few months ago we heard from a young woman who had recently relinquished her child. She was full of pain when she wrote to us, five months after surrender of her daughter. Her "open" adoption turned into a nearly closed one after the adoptive parents of her baby read about her sorrow on her blog. She went through an agency, American Adoptions, based in Kansas, but deals with placements all over the country. Their website shows many pictures of happy couples, with dogs, without dogs, whatever you are looking for. It makes the process of giving up your child seem like the ideal solution.