Open Adoption and Older Children
What about the placement of older children? These can take two widely divergent paths. Generally speaking, when a child has bonded to a birth parent (perhaps being raised by her or him for an extended time) then a need for an adoptive placement arises, it is usually critical for that child's emotional welfare to maintain ties with the birth parent. It's like uprooting a tree. If it is not transplanted in special manner, serious consequences can follow. Sometimes a parent raised a child, but a problem has arisen, and parenting is no longer possible, and there are no family members able to take over the parenting role, so adoption is the best option.
Another way older children can be placed for adoption is where the birth parents' rights were terminated by a court due to improper parenting: abuse, et cetera. Although the child may still foster idealized feelings for that failing parent, it is not uncommon in these adoptions for there to be no contact between the child and adoptive parents, and the birth parent.
Read more about this topic: Open Adoption
Famous quotes containing the words open, adoption, older and/or children:
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—Anonymous Parent of Adult Children. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, ch. 5 (1978)