Right after she turned 14, Macy found out she was pregnant. She felt scared, stressed out, sad and lost.

“We didn’t know what we were supposed to do,” she says today through a video call, sitting in her backyard in Wisconsin with Liam. It’s nearly a year later from this time she’s describing — the beginning of their unplanned pregnancy and adoption story.

When Macy got pregnant, Liam was also just 14. For him, money was one of the biggest obstacles  — he had no clue how they would financially support a child.

It was late May and they were just finishing their freshman year of high school. Liam was excited to play football over the summer and in the fall, and Macy couldn’t wait for school to be out so she could spend more time with friends and family.

But suddenly, instead, they had a huge decision to make.

With the support of family and friends, they decided to go to a pregnancy center that referred them to Holt in Wisconsin. Here, they met Sheri, an adoption social worker, who talked them through all of their options.

Over the course of five months, Sheri met with them to talk about how they were feeling, about their hopes and dreams for high school and beyond, and about what they wanted for their baby. She helped them process their thoughts and questions, and never pressured them about their final decision.

“[It’s] kind of like counseling because it was a lot to handle — but kind of in a good way,” Macy says. “We learned about options.”

One of these options was open adoption. Open adoption is when the birth parents choose the adoptive parents for their child, and remain a part of his or her life as they grow up. Birth parents and adoptive parents make this unique arrangement together, and it can change over time if the birth parents wish. Birth parents’ involvement in their child’s life can be anything from receiving regular photos and email updates to occasional visits to regularly attending birthdays and holidays and soccer games throughout their child’s life.

Macy and Liam decided to move forward with an open adoption plan.

“We just kind of realized, like, we’re 14 and have our whole lives ahead of us to have kids,” Macy says, “and there’s so many families looking to adopt, so we should give them a chance.”

Their next step was to choose their baby’s adoptive parents.

Holt Wisconsin presented them with the profile books of several different adoptive families. In these profile books, potential adoptive families share about themselves, their jobs, what they like to do, why they’re adopting, and anything else about themselves that they think is important for the birth parents to know.

“We just kind of realized, like, we’re 14 and have our whole lives ahead of us to have kids, and there’s so many families looking to adopt, so we should give them a chance.”

This step in the process was a bit different for Macy and Liam because Macy’s parents knew of a couple that wanted to adopt — Sarah and John. Macy and Liam’s parents met with Sarah and John several times, then Macy and Liam decided they’d like to consider Sarah and John in addition to some of the other families whose profile books they viewed. Macy and Liam decided to meet them.

“It was at a restaurant,” Liam says about their first time meeting. “It was a little awkward at first.” But by the end the conversation felt easy, and they all left smiling. Macy and Liam had a good feeling about this family.

Even though they had already met, Sarah and John still put together a quick digital version of a profile book so that Macy and Liam could learn more about them.

“They like to travel,” Liam says about what stuck out to him from their profile. “The biggest thing we liked about them is that they’re younger, they like to do fun stuff with friends.”

Macy and Liam saw that if they placed their baby with Sarah and John, he or she would have an active, fun and full life.

“Reading their profile book gave us a good feeling,” says Macy, “like, these are the type of people we would want to be when we’re older and having kids.”

Throughout Macy’s pregnancy, she and Liam continued to get closer to Sarah and John. Although, they still had some doubts.

“We were 95 percent sure about it,” says Liam, about choosing adoption. He and Macy still wondered what it would be like to meet their baby, to hold her. They wondered if they would be able to go through with their decision.

Then one day in early February, the time finally came. They all rushed to the hospital, and after a very quick delivery, Macy gave birth to a baby girl. Sarah and John joined Macy and Liam in the delivery room just minutes after she was born. They named her Chloe.

“They had their own room in the hospital right next to us,” says Macy about Sarah and John. “So we got to spend the whole two days together, we were in each other’s room a lot of the time.”

“Reading their profile book gave us a good feeling, like, these are the type of people we would want to be when we’re older and having kids.”

Macy and Liam got their own special time with Chloe while in the hospital, too. They loved her, but knew that they weren’t ready to be parents.

“For me, I don’t think there was an exact moment I realized it was 100 percent what I want,” Macy says. “It was more like we took little steps, like the step meeting with Sheri and her teaching us about adoption, that was a good step. Meeting [Sarah and John] definitely made us feel better about the whole adoption process. Then, actually having [Chloe] and having her in the hospital, seeing her with them now, seeing them raising her so good… There were definitely times that I was like, ‘This was definitely our best decision.’”

Now, Chloe is a happy and healthy 6-month-old and Macy and Liam see her every three to four weeks. They often meet over dinner at Sarah and John’s house, and will usually stay late — talking long into the evening. Sarah and John also send them photos and updates about Chloe all the time.

“She knows we’re her biological parents,” Liam says about Chloe. “Not second parents, but mutual family.”

Seeing Chloe thrive with her adoptive parents continues to affirm the decision for Macy and Liam. And they’re so thankful they get to be a part of her life.

She’ll grow up a loving, supportive group of family and “mutual family” all around her. This is what’s most important for any child. Similarly, it was a strong support system of family, friends and Holt in Wisconsin that helped Macy and Liam along their adoption journey as well.

“I think if people, like high schoolers, are going through this, it’s definitely really hard,” says Macy. “[But it helps to] open up about adoption and accept the fact you’re young and you’re pregnant and you have to deal with everything that comes with that. So I would say, be positive, and there are so many people out there and talk about it.”

If you or someone you know is experiencing unplanned pregnancy in Illinois or Wisconsin, Holt is here for you. For confidential, compassionate and free options counseling, please call us at 800-Baby-Mom or text 630-205-5117.

*Names changed for confidentiality

The post Pregnant at 14, Macy & Liam Made a Loving Open Adoption Plan appeared first on Holt International.

So, you want to adopt! After months, or maybe years, of deliberation and prayers, you’re ready to move forward. Maybe you’re still at the very beginning of your journey, researching agencies and reading every adoption blog post you can find on the internet. Or maybe you already have an agency and are eagerly awaiting the next step. Either way, your life is about to change forever.

As you probably already found out, the adoption process brings with it some big decisions. Many of these decisions challenge you to be more “open.” You learn that boys wait longer than girls. That the children most in need of families are older, or have more involved special needs.

Before you know it, the picture in your head of the child who would be joining your family looks different. Maybe you feel ready to welcome a child who is different than you originally thought. Or, like a lot of adoptive parents, you may feel a bit overwhelmed and unsure.

On paper, everything from age and special needs to eligibility requirements for different country programs can significantly change what you thought it would look like to adopt. But we’re here to tell you that the adoption process — and your future son or daughter — might not be so different from what and who you initially imagined. Flexibility doesn’t mean a 180-degree turn. Sometimes, all “being open” means is a small, single step beyond where you are now. And taking this small step might be what brings you to the child you’ve dreamed of parenting. And most importantly, to the child who needs you.

That’s exactly what happened for the Etsebeth family.

Openness to Special Needs

“My heart leapt,” says Hannah Etsebeth, describing the first time she laid eyes on her daughter’s photo. Anya, with her beautiful dark eyes and ponytail on top of her head, caught Hannah’s attention. And for some reason, her image stayed in Hannah’s memory.

From the time she was 19 years old, Hannah felt that God was calling her to adopt a little girl from China. Her husband, Johan, grew up in South Africa and spent the early part of his career advocating for children in orphanages in places like Rwanda, Thailand and India. This experience opened his eyes and heart to children around the world who needed families.

So when Hannah and Johan got married, they already knew adoption would be a part of their family’s story. They had two biological children, and then began to discuss the timing of their adoption. In the beginning stages of their adoption process, they learned a lot about the profiles of children who most needed families. They learned that almost every child who needs a family has some sort of special need — whether that’s a medical or developmental need, or being older in age.

They decided to go into the adoption process with a mindset of openness.

“We wanted to stay open-minded,” Hannah says, “and open-hearted.”

A Child Is More Than a Checklist

One of the first tasks in the adoption process is for families to go through a checklist of special needs, noting which needs they are open to, and which they don’t feel equipped to meet. While your social worker will also take time to get to know you in person, this list helps them understand the profile of child you feel most comfortable parenting. And while this is a critical and necessary step in the adoption process, going through the list of special needs you’re open to — and not open to — can itself feel uncomfortable.

“It’s really hard and awkward,” says Johan, “to view a child as a checklist.” But when it was time for Johan and Hannah to fill out this part of the paperwork, they did so the best they could.

And it wasn’t long before they learned about Anya.

At the time, Anya had an unrepaired heart condition, as well as developmental delays. The Etsebeths, captured by this sweet little girl across the world, began to consider what it would look like to become her parents.

“With her heart condition,” Hannah says, “we were definitely aware that her needs were a bit more significant than we had originally thought we could care for.”

This is a huge turning-point decision for every adoptive family — the moment when the needs you noted on a special needs checklist manifest into the description of an actual child who might join your family. It’s the moment all the hypotheticals suddenly turn into a name and a face.

“When considering the profile of child a family would like to adopt,” says Celeste Snodgrass, Holt’s director of clinical services, “families need to be very honest with themselves about the conditions they are open to considering.” While Holt strives to find a family for every child with special needs, it’s so important — for both the sake of the child and the family — that a family doesn’t pursue a profile of child whose needs they cannot meet. Being open doesn’t mean stretching beyond what you can realistically handle.

Beth Smith, Holt’s director of services for the China region, affirms this. She says that families shouldn’t feel bad if they review a child’s file, and decide not to move forward.

“We’re not going to judge,” Beth says. “We don’t put you on the ‘naughty’ list! Now we just know you better and will keep working to identify a child whose needs you feel comfortable meeting.”

For Johan and Hannah, they wondered if an involved heart condition was more than they could manage.

“If you’re open to a child,” Johan says, “I think you’ll feel that your heart opens to a certain child as a whole being.” And although her special needs were daunting, Johan and Hannah felt their hearts opening to this special little girl.

Not long after Hannah and Johan first received information about Anya, Beth called to tell them that Anya’s heart condition was repaired in China. Without an active heart condition, Anya officially fit the profile of child the Etsebeths had initially identified as being open to.

But while Anya’s heart condition had been repaired, she had other special needs — developmental special needs. Although they were open to developmental delays, as they learned more, it became clear that Anya’s delays were more significant than they had imagined.

“We loved her before we even held her, but even still, I kept thinking ‘I’m not a ‘special needs mom,’” Hannah says. “Those moms wear capes and fly around saving the world. I’m not that!” In the beginning, Hannah had doubts and insecurities about whether or not she could be the type of parent that Anya was going to need.

“She was really delayed,” Hannah says of Anya when she was a year old and living in China. “She had been in a silent environment, she didn’t have core strength, she hadn’t taken a bite of food. It was a lot more than we ever anticipated.”

Beth says delays like these can be common among children coming home from China.

“China has some wonderful orphanages and good caregivers,” she says. But no matter how well an orphanage cares for a child, an institution is never a good-enough replacement for the love and nurturing that only a family can give.

“In orphanages, the focus might be on the child’s medical condition and making sure all their primary needs are met,” Beth says. “The basic things.” But as is often the case in orphanages, especially large ones, children just don’t get the stimulation and connection with a caregiver that they need for typical development. As was the case with Anya.

But once again, Hannah and Johan felt their hearts drawn toward this beautiful 1-year-old girl with a repaired heart and developmental delays. So they decided to be open to learning more about her, and exploring what it would be like to be her parents.

Openness to Learning

“One of the best ways for families to be open as they begin an adoption process,” Celeste says, “is to be open to education surrounding international adoption and parenting a child who has special needs or has had some difficult experiences.”

Whether it’s a heart condition or cerebral palsy or developmental delays or a history of trauma, education is key. Before a family accepts a child referral, Holt recommends they consult a pediatrician or specialists to help explain medical terms and conditions mentioned in their child’s medical file, and so they can ask questions and learn about the types of medical care or therapies their child may need upon coming home. Many families also benefit from joining adoption- or special needs-specific support groups in their community or even online or through social media. These support groups can help you answer questions and prepare for the knowns and unknowns of your child’s needs — both before and after they come home.

For the Etsebeths, this meant identifying community resources and healthcare that Anya would likely need if she joined their family in Fort Worth, Texas. They talked with friends and family and prayed over their decision to move forward. And through this process, they felt more and more confident and at peace with the notion of parenting a child with more involved developmental delays than they initially felt like they could manage.

“Anya became more than a list of information,” Johan says. “A child is more than a list of information or a checklist.”

An Open Heart

One morning, Hannah finally felt like she got the confirmation she needed.

The night prior, they were looking up the meaning of Anya’s Chinese name, and found that it meant “wisdom.” And as Hannah was reading her Bible the next morning, from Proverbs 3, she came across a verse that says, “Joyful is the person who finds wisdom … for wisdom is more precious than rubies, nothing you desire can compare with her.”

“I just knew God’s hand was on Anya. I knew she was to be our daughter,” Hannah says. “It wasn’t an immediate confidence in myself, but I had a knowing in my spirit.”

Knowing they had the resources to care for Anya, with a deep confirmation in their hearts that she was to become their daughter, Hannah and Johan stepped out bravely — with openness to what lay before them in becoming her parents.

“I think special needs are always scary to anybody and we need to be realistic in what we feel we can handle,” says Johan. “At the same time, I don’t feel like parents plan to parent a child with special needs any more than a child chooses to have special needs. At a certain point, it becomes less about choosing a child and more about choosing to be the type of parent who is willing and determined to walk through anything with your child.”

Johan and Hannah say they are honored to navigate special needs as a family with Anya.

Openness to Country Program, Age & Multiples

While being open to special needs is one of the biggest ways for families to be open, it isn’t the only way. For Bre and Drew Traver, openness in regard to country program, age and sibling sets led them to their two sons.

“Originally,” says Bre, “we were thinking that we wanted to try and adopt a baby.”

Bre and her husband, Drew, always knew that adoption would be their path to parenthood, and when they decided it was time to build their family, they initially felt drawn to adopting a child in the U.S. foster care system.

But after several classes and trainings for Holt’s foster care and adoption program, they ultimately decided it wasn’t the right fit. Changing directions, they began to pursue international adoption.

And in choosing international adoption, they wanted to go into it with an open mind.

“We didn’t necessarily have a specific image of a child or children in mind,” says Drew. “We just knew we wanted to provide a safe and loving home for kids.”

Based on eligibility and timeframe and the needs of children who were waiting, they felt that Holt’s China program was the best fit for their family. They applied, and were accepted.

But as they sat in their home, completing their first adoption homestudy visit with their social worker, she mentioned to them that Holt just opened an adoption program in Colombia.

“We were immediately interested,” says Bre. “We live in an area where Spanish is commonly spoken, and we knew we had a great opportunity to make a child — or children — from Latin America feel more at home.”

So they transferred from the China program to Holt’s Colombia program. And it wasn’t long before they were matched with 7 and 4-year-old brothers William and Jeison. For several years, William and Jeison had lived in an orphanage where they were well taken care of. They never lacked for food, clothing, medical care — even educational and emotional support. But they lacked the most important thing, the love and care of a family.

And now that they’re home, they are learning how to live in a family — not a care center. In the care center, William and Jeison were two children among dozens in the same living environment. So being part of a nuclear family of four has been a big adjustment.

“At this point,” Bre says, “they’re working to fully understand a consistent family structure, ample one-on-one time with adults, and the idea of having their own space and their own things.” But as they navigate and adjust to everything that is new, William and Jeison have their parents to love and support them every step of the way.

On paper, the difference between adopting an infant from the U.S., and two older boys from Colombia, seems drastic. But for the Travers, it was a series of natural-feeling decisions, made over time as they moved forward in the adoption process one step at a time.

“For us, openness meant several things,” Drew says. “It meant considering referrals for children outside of the age range we had imagined and it meant considering adopting more than one child. Openness also meant exploring and digging into the special needs checklist and being real with ourselves.”

Openness to Birth Family

Another way that families need to be realistic and honest throughout the adoption process is on the topic of birth family.

For some families considering adoption, birth family involvement may be one of the deciding factors between international or domestic adoption. While every child’s situation is unique, domestic adoption has a much higher likelihood of a child maintaining a connection with his or her birth family. And some families feel more comfortable than others with the idea of ongoing contact between their child and their child’s birth family.

When adopting through Holt’s domestic infant adoption program in Illinois and Wisconsin or our domestic foster care and adoption programs in Oregon and Washington, in nearly all instances, families need to be open to some sort of contact with their child’s birth family. While this adds an additional layer of complexity, study after study has shown that an arrangement in which the adoptee knows their history and maintains a safe and appropriate relationship with their birth family ultimately benefits everyone involved. Most importantly, it benefits the adoptee as they grow up and explore their identity.

“It’s important for an adopted child to know that their past, including their birth family, is something they can ask questions about and freely discuss with their adoptive family,” says Celeste. “This helps lay a foundation for health identity development and processing the story of their life as they grow into adulthood.”

For families pursuing international adoption, who often have limited or no information about their child’s birth family, they sometimes assume that birth family won’t be a factor. But as families in any adoption process soon learn, a child’s birth family will always in some way be a part of their lives — whether they are known or unknown, in a neighboring state or across the world. And this, too, is so important to be open to.

“A huge part of adopting, especially an older child,” says Celeste, “is respecting their past experiences and the important people in their life — whether it’s friends from their orphanage, foster parents or birth parents.”

For the Swartz family, openness to birth family meant a little bit of everything and looked different for each of their seven adopted children — whose birth countries include China, Korea, Ethiopia, Vietnam and South Sudan.

“Each child has an important history that is special and unique,” Danna Swartz says of her children. “Adoptive families must be open to all the pieces that come with an adopted child.”

They’ve learned that there’s a wide range in what it can look like to be connected to a child’s birth family. And that this oftentimes depends on the child’s birth country and all the different factors that led to their adoption.

In age-appropriate ways — and within the safety of their family — Danna and her husband, Patrick, have stood committed to helping each of their children navigate their birth family connections.

Just last July, Danna and Patrick and five of their children traveled to Ethiopia to meet the birth families of their 17-year-old son, Daniel, and 13-year-old daughter, Lydia.

“The experience was life-changing for us and extremely positive,” Danna says. “Their birth families have become part of our extended family.”

They also traveled to China to help their daughter Hannah learn more about her past. Although Hannah wasn’t able to connect with her birth family in China, she visited her former orphanage and met her caregivers, who told her stories about her early years. They even visited the place where she was initially found, and learned everything they could about the people and the region. Even though she wasn’t able to find her birth family, she was still able to fill in important parts of her story that used to be unknown.

Danna and Patrick follow their children’s lead when it comes to birth family. Sometimes this means traveling across the world, and other times, it means researching their culture from afar and being open to conversations about the wonderings and unknowns of their past.

“Each of my children has had varying degrees of interest in their adoption story and their birth family, and we have shared with them as appropriate as they have asked,” Danna says. “It’s important that children know their adoptive parents are secure in their role as parents and that they don’t feel threatened by inquiries into the past.”

As you decide on the right adoption path for you and your family, openness to birth family involvement may or may not be a topic you have considered. If you do pursue domestic adoption, how much and in what ways your child’s birth family will be in your child’s life will be a decision you make together with your child’s birth family. And if you adopt internationally, birth family involvement may or may not resemble the Swartz family’s experience. But just like all the other steps of openness you can take, openness to talking about and recognizing the importance of your child’s birth family is a critical step in adoption — and one that will, in the end, benefit both your family and your child.

How Openness Leads You to Your Child

Today, Hannah and Johan still don’t wear capes — like those “parents of children with special needs” that Hannah had long admired. But they’ve been the perfect match for Anya — and she for them.

“She’s a little champion,” Hannah says. “She’s the most courageous child.” In the year since Anya joined their family, she has transformed with their love and care.

“Sitting there in China,” Hannah says, “I thought, ‘Is she ever going to walk, is she ever going to talk?’ But she was given a chance to thrive.”

This fall, Anya began attending preschool. She’s walking. She talks. She loves music and playing pattycake. Now that she has the love, support and care of a family, Anya is catching up quickly in her development, and the concerns they had in the beginning seem to be a thing of the distant past.

In the Traver household, William and Jeison are also thriving.

“Of course, we are still adjusting and learning about one another,” Bre says. “But we are so lucky to get to be their parents. We are thankful every day that we were willing and open enough to change directions in our process. Today, our family makeup is very different than we initially imagined, but it ended up being exactly what we needed.”

Neither the Etsebeths nor the Travers would have been matched with their children had they not been open throughout the adoption process. And for the Swartz Family, being open has enriched and grown their family in ways they never expected. Openness doesn’t have to be drastic — and it never means pursuing a program or profile of child that you’re not comfortable with. But it’s allowing yourself to change and be changed throughout the adoption process as you learn more about yourself and about the children who are waiting.

“It’s a beautiful story that you can allow yourself to be a part of,” Johan says. “I think anybody who loves a child… it’s just so much bigger. It’s one of the most amazing things that we can be open to as human beings.”

Learn More About International Adoption

We work with families in all 50 states to find loving homes for children from 11 locations around the world!

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The post With an Open Heart and an Open Mind appeared first on Holt International.

Below is a detailed “Dear Birth Mother” letter update. Consider writing something along these lines when the time comes for you to write to your child’s birth parents.

Hi Katie,

Brian is continuing to keep very, very busy. He is furniture surfing with ease, he barely has to hold onto the table/toy box. Brian is able to transfer from one thing to the next without any real effort. He is also crawling around the entire first floor of our house, he is really happiest exploring the kitchen and living room.  Brian was at his Aunt and Uncle’s (and cousin’s) on Sunday and he was so excited for the new large open space to explore.

We have a number of globes in the living room, and Brian loves to sit and spin them. He also really likes looking out the front windows. Dan was raking leaves and Brian crawled right over to the window, and stood there watching him work for more than 5 minutes (that is a long time for Brian).

Brian also really likes to watch the neighborhood landscaping guys that come through from the office window. We have a large field behind our house, and the city has a team come out every Wednesday to mow, and now mulch the leaves. I happened to be home sick with the flu a few weeks back, so I was able to see my mom with Brian. She rolls her chair to the window, and Ben will sit on her lap for the entire time the team is out back, craning his neck every which way to see them as the weave in and out of the trees.

Brian is developing a ton of hand-eye coordination, so much so that he is starting to be able to use his toys as they were intended, My mom had bought him a set of smallish wooden cars. Once she opened them and sat on the floor with Brian, he immediately started pushing them around. All while my mom made “vroom vroom” sounds for him. He also had a dump truck that has a place where you can put a ball in, and it shoots into the basket part of the truck.  Brian had gotten really good at lining up the ball and pushing it in, I have included a video. Brian has also begun to stack toys that are intended to be stacked. An example would be the toys that place rings on a post. Sometimes he gets them right on, sometimes he needs a bit of assistance.

Brian is also showing that he is incredibly determined. We used to keep his books along the inside edge of the family room. One day last week, Brian and Dan came in from daycare, Brian crawled right over to the gate and tried to use his books as a step to get to his car. I’ve included a picture, needless to say we have moved the books to the outside of the gate unless we are using them. We do still read to Brian every night, our routine is bath, then books, then bed. Brian is able to turn the pages himself.

Also, he loves to sit on his push car and be rolled back and forth while you say “vroom vroom.” He makes a very serious face while doing so but don’t be fooled, he loves it. When you stop he immediately protests. He also makes a b-line for the car when he sees it, so much so that we had to hide it in another room.

Brian is also growing so much, I have included a picture that is a side by side of him from 9/25 and yesterday. It’s amazing how much taller he is, I think we will have to move him to 24 month clothes this week. We had his 9 month check up about 2 weeks ago, he is 24.5 pounds and 31.5 inches long. Brian has now had his full flu shot since it comes in two doses for infants. He did really well at the appointment, the only time he wasn’t good was when the pediatrician went to look in his mouth at which point he clamped down. He really does not like people looking in there. Speaking of Brian’s mouth, it looks (and feels) like he has two molars coming in, the top and bottom left. Hopefully they should cut through soon, they have been working their way in for about a week now.

We hope you are doing well.

-Liz

Read these tips for sending pictures and letters to birth mothers! 

The post How to Write a Meaningful Update to Your Child’s Birth Mother appeared first on Holt International.

Fifteen years after placing her son for adoption, Gina Ledesma got in contact with Holt earlier this year.  When we asked her if she was open to sharing her story, her response was an enthusiastic “yes.” While the environment and circumstances are different from country to country and individual to individual, Gina’s domestic U.S. adoption story is one that may resonate with any birth mother. And understanding stories like hers is important for everyone who is touched by adoption.

Gina will never forget the three hard, precious days she had with her son.

“I just counted all the toes and fingers,” she says, remembering those days in a hospital bed in Eugene, Oregon. “I looked at every little piece and part — and said my goodbyes.”

Twenty-nine years ago, Gina chose adoption for her son.

—–

At Holt, we share adoption stories of all kinds. Stories about the children who wait, and about families working through the adoption process. Stories about the moment a child and family come together for the first time, and about the beautiful and complex transformation that occurs throughout the lives of adoptees and adoptive families. Whenever possible, we also strive to share a third, critical voice in the adoption story: the voice of the birth parents. Whether due to issues of confidentiality or lack of information about who the birth parents are — as is often the case in international adoption — birth parents’ stories are often unknown, and seldom heard.

But their voices deserve to be heard.

While Holt is most known for our pioneering legacy in international adoption, Holt has through the years also championed domestic adoption — both in countries overseas, and in the U.S. Today in the U.S., Holt has a foster adoption program in Oregon and an infant adoption program in Illinois. And for over two decades, from 1978 to 2001, Holt had a domestic infant adoption program in Oregon.

In 1990 in Oregon, Gina placed her baby for adoption through Holt.

—–

Nineteen years old and a mother to a 4-month-old son, Adryan, Gina was living in California when she found out she was pregnant for a second time. She and her child’s father had just broken up, she worked a minimum wage-paying job, and she lived in an apartment with her son. She didn’t know what to do. She wanted to remain independent and provide for her children — but this seemed impossible.

“I knew I wasn’t capable and didn’t have the tools,” Gina says. “And really, I just didn’t want that [difficult life] for either of my kids or myself. I knew that I couldn’t do it. So I kept talking about adoption.”

In 2018, women experiencing unplanned pregnancy can face many of the same hardships that Gina did nearly 30 years ago. They desire to raise their child, but don’t have the resources to do so.

Today, in 14 countries around the world, Holt partners with sponsors and donors to help families achieve stability and self-reliance— empowering them to stay together. Last year, Holt’s Illinois branch — Holt-Sunny Ridge — began doing the same work for families in the U.S. Through the Empowering Women, Strengthening Families program, experienced social workers come alongside women in Illinois who wish to parent, but feel they have no other option but to place their child for adoption. These women receive support to find stable housing, complete an education, acquire medical care and driver’s licenses, find permanent work or overcome other obstacles in their lives. Ultimately, this program empowers women in Chicago to grow self-reliant, and equipped to independently raise and provide for their children.

But in 1988, there were few services like these for women considering adoption. And sometimes, even if they have these resources, women still choose adoption as the best option for themselves and their child.

“I didn’t want to be a statistic,” Gina says. She was young and had no job skills, but didn’t want to become reliant on “the system.” So she moved to Oregon with her son, began living with her mom, and got in contact with Holt to begin the adoption process.

“We provided counseling and spent a lot of time looking at their options, at whether they could be a successful parent,” says Sunday Silver, Holt’s director of post adoption services and the former director of Holt’s Oregon infant adoption program. While not the social worker who counseled Gina about her options, Sunday has through the years walked many women through the same process.

“We tried to empower them to make an informed decision,” she says.

Through options counseling with her Holt social worker, Gina decided she wanted an open adoption. This meant she would choose her child’s adoptive family and receive regular updates about them throughout their lives. As the fist step, Gina began reading through a stack of letters, each written by a different family who was waiting to adopt.

“I really didn’t have an idea of what I was looking for,” Gina says, recalling this most-difficult process of deciding who the parents of her child — who she now knew was a son — would be. “I just felt I would know when I saw, or read [their letter].” And she did.

“It was just a comforting letter,” Gina recalls. In it, the couple introduced themselves and shared about the life they hoped to give a child. They also took the pressure off — saying it was OK if, in the end, Gina decided to parent instead.

This is who Gina chose — an older couple, steady, responsible, both of them teachers who even had college accounts set up for the two children they hoped to adopt. What impressed Gina most was their compassion and kindness. So she decided to meet them. Today, as Gina sits in the Holt office sharing this part of her story, she begins to cry.

“I was going down the hall and I had my son with me, and I had a big belly. I had all these fears and was nervous,” Gina says, saying she remembers this moment like it was yesterday. “I opened the door and this woman gets up and she had this smile… She just lit up the room. She got up and embraced me, scooped my son up. I just felt her energy and love. Right there, it just clicked.”

—–

A few short months later, Gina was in the hospital. She had just given birth to her son and was waiting the required 72 hours until she could sign the legal relinquishment documents. While sure of her decision, in that moment, she grieved.

“It’s tough,” Gina says. “It’s not something I’d want to experience again. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life. It’s final. And you have to be prepared to live like that.”

Gina’s decision became all the more difficult once she held Alex in her arms.

“You carry this child. You feel the growth. You feel the movement. You give birth. And I had an automatic connection,” she says. “You bond. And that’s hard to get over — not ‘get over’ — but to kind of put that in one box and say, ‘OK. Now I’ve got to let go.’”

But she knew adoption was her choice, and the choice she felt she needed to make.

“It was hard not to be selfish because I wanted to keep him,” Gina says. “But I know [choosing adoption] was better. It was better for him, better for me, better for the son that I already had.”

At the end of those three days, she left the hospital after lovingly placing her son, Alex, into the arms of his adoptive parents. But since that day, he hasn’t left her mind or her heart.

“It’s one of the most painful things I’ve ever witnessed,” Sunday says of the difficult, loving choice that birth mothers make. “It can be a healthy process, [but] very unnatural. The best you can do is try to make it as smooth as possible. And the more open, the healthier it is — for the adoptee, adoptive parents and birth mom.”

In the years that followed, Gina received updates about Alex. The most difficult part, she said, was trust. When she decided to place Alex for adoption, she knew she was also giving up her right to make decisions concerning him or his future. She had to learn trust — to trust Alex’s adoptive parents and how they would raise him and care for him, and to trust herself and the decision she had made. She only dreamed that someday, maybe, they would be reunited.

In their semi-open adoption arrangement, Alex’s adoptive family maintained some confidentiality. While she had some guesses, Gina didn’t know exactly where Alex lived in Oregon, and she and his adoptive parents didn’t have each other’s direct contact information. To communicate, they utilized Holt as a metaphorical mailbox, where each would send letters and updates, which would then be passed onto them by the Holt social worker. In order for them to meet in person, Alex would have to reach out on his own. As she dreamed of this day, she thought that maybe in his late 20s or when he was 30 he would reach out — when he began to have children of his own and would perhaps be curious about his birth family.

But this moment Gina dreamed of came sooner, and differently, than she ever imagined.

—–

Sixteen years after she placed her son for adoption, Gina was again living in California. She had an 11-year-old daughter and her oldest son, Adryan, was 17 and living in Oregon with his father and step-mother.

“I got a phone call,” she says. “It was my son, [Adryan], and he was like, ‘Mom, I’ve got someone who wants to talk with you.’”

“Hello?” … It was as if Adryan had put down the phone and picked it back up again. But it was Alex.

Both living near Salem, Oregon at the time, Adryan and Alex met for the first time on the high school football field. The moment they looked at each other, they knew. They knew they were brothers. Adryan and Alex grabbed each other in a hug and cried. The next thing they did was call Gina.

This unexpected reconnection — the phone call Gina received — began what is today a close relationship between Alex and Gina. Alex lost his adoptive father at age 3, and his adoptive mother passed away just several years after he reconnected with Gina and Adryan. Through this loss and hardship, he found unexpected support from his birth family. Gina and Alex talk and text regularly, spend holidays together with extended family and are an active part of each other’s lives.

It’s a relationship that Gina never could have dreamed of. But one that is still confusing and complex at times.

“I do my best to try and respect the history that he has with his mother. And in my mind, she is his mother,” Gina says. “She’s the one who was there when he was sick and nurtured him, and all of that. I do my best to stay in my lane.”

But there are still moments, she says, when she needs to remind herself to be at peace with her role not as the mother who raised him, but as his birth mother. “But it’s still good,” she says. “It’s really good. I’m grateful for the time we get to spend [together]. It’s a good relationship.”

Reunions like Gina and Alex’s are rare in the world of adoption. While becoming more common in domestic adoptions, many searches concerning international adoptions reach a dead end. Other times, adoptees find their adoptive parents, but the parents do not wish to meet or have a relationship with the child they placed years ago — often due to stigma or shame. Or the adoptee, once located, is not interested in knowing the parent who placed them for adoption.

But when birth parents like Gina are willing to share their story, they help complete the story. So that adoptees and adoptive parents better understand what many birth parents go through, and why birth parents — whether known or unknown — deserve respect and compassion. We also share Gina’s story so that fellow birth parents know there are others who empathize with the complexities of choosing adoption.

“I love being able to share [my story],” Gina says. “I hope it will maybe give someone comfort, to let someone know that they’re not alone.

Megan Herriott | Staff Writer

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The post The Hardest Thing I’ve Ever Had To Do appeared first on Holt International.

Oftentimes, a birth mother may struggle with finding ways to bond with her child after placement.

When it comes to connecting with her birth child, many birth mothers struggle with:

1. Feeling unsure about the child’s likes or dislikes
2. Doubting her ability to form a relationship with her child after placement
3. Fear that that she will do something wrong and won’t be able to see the adoptive family again
4. Fear of experiencing loss again
5. Not wanting to overstep boundaries

Want to learn some tips for navigating this relationship? Hear from Samantha, a birth mother, about her five tips for bonding between a birth mother and her birth child! 

The post Bonding For Birth Parents appeared first on Holt International.

At Holt-Sunny Ridge in Illinois, domestic open adoption brings birth parents, adoptive parents and their children together as a unique and beautiful family. This photo shows the significant moment of Killian’s birth mother and adoptive parents meeting for the first time — the beginning of a lifelong relationship centered around the love they all have for their son.

Rhianna’s Story

 When I look at this picture, I’m reminded of the love that is shared between us all.

This picture shows the opportunity at a better life for my son, and an opportunity for us all to grow as a strong unit — a family. Looking at this photo, I’m reminded of what I overcame to get to this moment, this point, and how extremely grateful I am for these two amazing people and the bond that we all continue to grow for this little one. I cannot begin to explain how difficult it was in that moment of decision — wondering if choosing adoption was the right choice, and wondering how his future life would be. I can tell you at this point, now almost ten months later, that I’m extremely blessed and grateful — not only to these two very amazing people, but also to Holt-Sunny Ridge for this experience, this opportunity.

We have all grown as a unit for the sake of this little boy, because ultimately he is the reason we are all here. I can say choosing open adoption has not only become a rewarding experience, but an incredible journey for us all. The relationship that we share is one-of-a-kind. We are in communication a few times a week, and have visits every few months. They never miss a chance to share a moment, a new experience, a new thing he has learned, and for that I love them even more.

I look at this picture and I can truly say I was blessed with such an amazing experience, a journey, a new family and the opportunity to watch Killian learn and grow. And I’m blessed to be a part of it.

Rhianna | Illinois

Erin’s Story

This picture reminds me how amazing it is that time can fly by, yet seem slow at the same time. This day was the first time that my husband, Josh, and I met our son’s amazing birth mom, Rhianna. Our son, Killian, was almost 3 months old at the time and looked so cute in his Stitch outfit. We were nervous to meet her in person, although we had been emailing each other on a weekly basis with pictures and updates on how he was doing.

So many questions raced through my mind: What if she didn’t like us? What if she wished she didn’t choose us? What if…about a million other things!

This visit was the beginning of all of us, together. So, let me tell you our amazing adoption story.

It all began a few years ago when my husband and I decided to try adopting. We chose to pursue domestic adoption and preferred to work with a local agency. We began this whole journey thinking that we could “never possibly do an open adoption,” because all of the information we had came from bad movies and stories of adoption gone wrong.

Along the way, we attended classes on adoption through Holt-Sunny Ridge and our eyes began to open to the idea of open adoption. We learned that it would make the life of any child we adopted very hard to not know anything about their birth family. We attended multiple CAFFA (Chicago Area Families For Adoption) conferences that backed up this idea and added more food for thought. We came to realize, more people loving our child would be a very good thing and would actually benefit him and his birth family.

Fast forward to late on a Saturday morning in January 2016 with me sleeping in again. I heard a text message ding through the fog of sleep and opened my very blurry eyes to see that it was from Nancy — one of our adoption social workers at Holt-Sunny Ridge. Suddenly, I was wide awake and saw, “Please call me ASAP.” I can’t tell you how excited I was. Honestly, there are no words. You see, my husband and I were almost ready to give up. We were so disappointed that the right situation just never seemed to happen. To have hope in the darkness was terrifyingly amazing.

I called Nancy right away and listened to her tell me about a birth mom and her baby boy who was born just a few days before. I called my husband right away and we decided to go for it! After a few hours of waiting on tenterhooks, we were told that Rhianna chose us!!! That whole weekend was filled with friends and family stopping by to drop off baby items. Early on in the process, we decided not to purchase anything for a baby, so we did not have anything in the house… it was glorious chaos. We picked him up on Monday and our lives literally changed in a weekend!!

During the meeting shown in this photo, we really connected. Rhianna is a person who I would have been friends with if I had met her in any other way. We have commonalities that we would never have dreamed and have a lot of fun when we get together.

The part that I love the most is that my son won’t grow up with a huge, glaring question mark when he wonders about his birth family. He can ask her all kinds of questions and they will be comfortable with each other, because he will grow up with her in our lives. In addition, I gained a good friend who will always be in our lives and never get tired of all my son’s pictures and stories. Rhianna is my son’s birth mom, his co-madre — and together, we make a family.

Erin Mitchell | Illinois

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The post The Story Behind the Photo: Together, We Make Family appeared first on Holt International.

These adoptees were placed domestically within the U.S., so contact with their birth families was not difficult to facilitate. One of the big takeaways for many of us was a series of testimonials from young adult adoptees on how much they appreciated contact with their birth parents. It filled a void for them and supported development of their self-identity, which can be a very difficult task for adoptees.

Often, parents are drawn to international adoption because contact with the birth family is not an option. This creates a sense of emotional safety for the adoptive parents. They don’t have to worry about birth parents suddenly entering the picture.  However, the adoptee pays a price. It is clear that adoptees fare better when they can have contact with emotionally healthy birth family members. Sadly we cannot provide that for most of our internationally adopted children, but what we can do is create a climate of openness. Here is how we can do that…

Let our child see and hear us saying respectful things about his or her birth parents. Sometimes, we can feel judgmental about birth parents. We wonder why they couldn’t find some way to keep their child, why our child’s birth mom abused substances while pregnant, or why the birth dad didn’t stay and take care of his family. It is hard to understand all the hardships and cultural pressures parents from other countries have to deal with. Recently, I was in the Philippines and as I was riding in a van with a bunch of other social workers, I glanced across the street and saw a makeshift shelter composed of a part of a fence, a tree, half a sheet of plywood and a tarp for a roof. A woman and several children were huddled inside. The image burned into my mind. That evening, there was a terrible electrical storm of an intensity that only happens in tropical areas. Even the locals were shocked. And I couldn’t help but wonder how that poor family fared during that terrifying storm. How did that mom console her kids and tell them they would be OK. Would they? Who could blame a mother for wanting a better life for her kids, one in which they do not have to fear for their lives something as basic as the weather?

We need to be sure to find good things to say about our children’s birth parents, such as: I am thankful that your birth mother gave you life or your birth father must have been a handsome man because you are such a good-looking boy. Wonder aloud why your child’s birth mother thought it was best to place your child for adoption or how often his or her birth mother thinks about them or if their birth father went to college, or has a trade, or is a soldier. After you have wondered out loud about these things, you could ask your child what he or she thinks. If at first your child is hesitant to engage in this conversation, don’t pressure them. You could end that temptation with simply saying, ‘I wonder about your birth parents and I am wondering if you do, too.’  Your child may not answer or may deny wondering about his or her birth parents. But be assured that they do. And don’t be surprised if weeks later, your child says something connected to this conversation. It is like you are planting seeds of openness — showing your child how open you are to talking about his or her birth family.

Another way to practice openness is to create an atmosphere in which your child’s adoption is discussed honestly and naturally — and just as easily as discussing what homework they have that night. It is up to the parents to create this environment. It can be difficult as an adoptive parent to know how much, when, how and where to bring up this topic. Well-intentioned parents often wait for their child to bring up the subject. The difficulty with this approach is that often, kids don’t want to hurt their adoptive parents’ feelings by asking. So everyone is waiting for the other one to start the conversation. Parents, as the adults, need to be the ones to bring up the topic just like with racism and sex.

Another approach to creating openness is to incorporate traditions into family celebrations that acknowledge your child’s birth parents. You could acknowledge them on your child’s birthday or include spoken thoughts about your child’s birth parents on religious holidays or family vacations. For example, if your family likes skiing or camping, you could wonder out loud or ask your child, ‘Do you think your birth father would like skiing?’ or ‘What do you think your birth mother would say about camping?’ You could really ask this question about any activity or topic, from fishing, shopping and cooking to whether they like dogs or cats.

Once you develop mindfulness about creating openness, there are endless opportunities to bring the birth parents into your child’s daily life. This openness will allow your child to further integrate all aspects of themselves and facilitate a richer, fuller self-identify.  When children can confidently disclose their deepest thoughts and feelings with their parents, the attachment deepens. Young adult adoptees at our Holt camps have always told us that their thirst for knowledge of their birthparents in no way diminishes their love or commitment to their adoptive parents and family. It is not a situation of one over the other. But rather, it is an issue of completeness for your child. Even if they can never find their birth parents, they will find comfort in being able to include you in their journey — from the first musings to a full in-country search — knowing that their safe haven of your love will always be there for them.

Abbie Smith, LCSW | Former Holt team member

The post How to Create Openness in International Adoption appeared first on Holt International.

Read her story here.

The post A Birth Mother’s Personal Experience With Open Adoption appeared first on Holt International.