Nicolas McCandie Glustien and his wife, first met Kwadwo in the Ghanaian orphanage that was his home. The couple volunteered there for two months, spending much of their time with Kwadwo. They eventually decided to adopt him, and went home to Canada to start the process.

As McCandie Glustien reported in an Oct. 28 article on The Globe and Mail website, things haven't gone smoothly:

Our first requirement was to find an adoption agency willing to work on a pre-identified adoption, which is not the normal route. Imagine Adoption was interested in working with us. Along with their services, the staff provided a lot of support to us in a difficult time, trying to help us navigate numerous hurdles, including the Ghanaian election and change of governments.

Earlier this year, Imagine Adoption filed for bankruptcy numerous families in limbo. Several families agreed to help restructure Imagine to keep it operational, but questions still remain. And while kids on the other side of the world wait for families, families in Canada continuing working to bring their adoptive kids home.

Labels: Canada, adoption_agencies

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Nov. 1 marks the beginning of National Adoption Month in the United States. Organizations, individuals and government agencies across the country will rally to support the National Adoption Month 2009 campaign.

According to information provided on the Child Welfare Information Gateway website, the theme of this year's celebration is "You Dont Have to Be Perfect to Be a Perfect Parent."

National Adoption Month, which has been observed during November since 1990, serves as a tool for reminding people about the thousands of children in foster care who are still waiting for permanent homes. Currently, about 130,000 foster children are available for adoption.

Labels: awareness, foster_care

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In America, adoption is widely accepted, and commonly celebrated. But in Japan, issues such as tradition, family name, and inheritance often make adoption more about practicality than anything else.

Writer Matt Holland explored the challenges facing adoptive parents and children in Japan in his Oct. 21 article on the website Global Voices Online:

There are presently a number of conflicting forces at play: a disapproval of adoption from those valuing past norms, yet many of these people are the ones adopting heirs into their family near the end of their lives. This negative viewpoint also clashes with the many younger families who are seeking to adopt, rejecting past ideals and placing the importance on their present family.

International adoptions involving Japanese children can be just as challenging. In 2008, a combination of obstacles meant that just 35 families from the United States adopted Japanese children. The Japanese government says changes are being made, Holland reported -- but the changes are happening slowly, while thousands of children wait for permanent homes.

Labels: international, japan

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The Hallahan family thought they had done everything right. Pat and Sharon knew that their adoption of Dang Quang Tran had to be finalized before he turned 16, and their lawyer told them it was.

But according to an article in the Delano (MN) Herald Journal paperwork discrepancies threaten the Hallahan's family and their son's ability to remain in the United States:

Now, looking back, there were some red flags that made Pat and Sharon concerned about the adoption, according to Pat. One of them was when they received Trans birth certificate saying he was adopted, but at the bottom, it said, this is not proof of citizenship, Pat said.

It wasnt until the Hallahans filed Trans citizenship papers that they found out his adoption hadnt been completed until after he was 16, the Herald-Journal reported. Pat and Sharon have contacted their senator, who has recommended an immigration attorney and is now helping walk the process through the proper channels.

Labels: international

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When Tom and Debra Ritter married in 1995, they created a family that included three children from previous marriages. Fourteen years and 22 adoptions later, that family  and the Ritters dedication to each other and their children  has grown in remarkable ways.

An Oct. 17 article by Amy Bertrand of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch provided the following glimpse into the life of this unique family:

Many of [the adopted children] have special needs, some have had life-threatening illnesses. All of the adopted kids, ages 7 to 26, still live at home.

Most of the kids head to the one-room schoolhouse on the farm where they'll stay until early afternoon; Mom and some of the older kids teach. Others go with Dad to work in the restaurant at the bed and breakfast they own in nearby Vandalia, Mo. Sometimes, the older sons will work in construction. Money from all of their endeavors goes into the family pot. &

Marcia Jones, a former adoptions specialist for the state of Missouri, helped the Ritters with many of their adoptions. "What impressed me most about them is they said, 'Give me the kids that nobody wants,' and that usually meant teenagers."

Labels: families, adoptees

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A member of the U.S. House of Representatives has introduced a bill that would limit federal funding to states whose adoption or foster care rules discriminate on the basis of marital status or sexual orientation.

An Oct. 19 Washington Blade article by Chris Johnson provided the following details about the efforts of U.S. Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.):

Stark said in an interview that he introduced the legislation, H.R. 3827, in part because thousands of children each year "age out" of the child welfare system without finding homes.

"We got 25,000 kids a year maturing out of the welfare system without permanent foster care or adoptive care, and the prospects of those children having a successful adult life are diminished greatly," he said. "These are kids who end up in the criminal justice system, or end up homeless."

States with explicit restrictions on adoption that the pending legislation would affect are Utah, Florida, Arkansas, Nebraska and Mississippi. Florida, for example, has a statute specifically prohibiting gays from adopting, and in Arkansas, voters last year approved Act 1, which prevents unmarried co-habitating couples, including same-sex partners, from adopting children.

The legislation, Stark said, also would restrict funds for states where restrictions are put in place by agencies, individual social workers or judges, or where restrictions are part of the common law of the state.

Labels: legislation, adoption rights, same-sex couples

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In a commentary that appeared in several U.S. newspapers in October, Michael Reagan -- the adopted son of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy -- issued a call for widespread improvements to the nation's adoption processes:

In this country, there are 129,000 children waiting to be adopted. Most of those are already legally severed from their birth parents and could therefore be adopted into new families with no delays. But last year alone, over 28,000 children were left without families.

This does not need to be the case. Improvements to the adoption system in our country have made the process smoother, faster, and less expensive than it once was. Children in foster homes can be adopted without legal complications. Those who choose to adopt an infant can be paired with their child from before birth and even build a relationship with the birth mother.

Children left in foster care not only struggle with being bounced from place to place in shifting relationships, but also face a terrible struggle when they leave the system and are left with no family support, no adequate resources, and a lack of practical preparation.

Conversely, children who are adopted -- either as infants or later in life -- have proven that strong, successful families do not require ties of blood, and children can rebound from early trauma and experience deep healing and love.

Labels: adopted children

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When Eric Roach (who was adopted as an infant in 1955) was 40 years old, he requested a copy of his original birth certificate and access to his sealed adoption records. His requests were denied.

Now, according to an Oct. 14 article by Mary Garrigan of the Rapid City Journal, Roach and others are appealing to the South Dakota legislature to change the rules to provide all adopted adults with access to their original birth certificates:

"I can't have what other people get automatically," [Roach said]. Any biological child can go to the state of South Dakota and request a copy of their birth certificate and, with the appropriate documentation, they'll get it -- no questions asked. As an adoptee, if you want a copy of your birth certificate -- hang on for the ride. The answer is 'No. You're adopted.' The laws ought to be equal across the board."

As part of South Dakota Support and Education for Adoption Legislation, Roach is one of about a dozen members -- including adoptees, birth parents and adoptive parents -- who will lobby the 2010 Legislature to allow 18-year-old adoptees to obtain their original, unamended birth certificates from the South Dakota Department of Health.

Under current state law, adoptees need a court order from the county where their adoptions were finalized to access their adoption records or their original birth certificates, requests that can be arbitrarily denied by a judge.

Nine other states already have laws that allow adopted adults to access their original birth certificates, Garrigan reported.

Labels: laws, adopted adults, birth_certificates

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According to a Sept. 25 article by Richard Foot of Canwest News Service, a Canadian mother is worried that her adopted daughter may have been kidnapped from her birth parents:

"I'm very, very scared," says Cathy Wagner, who wants the federal government to stop all Canadian adoptions from China until fears about the true origins of orphans there can be properly investigated.

This week the Los Angeles Times published explosive evidence that Chinese babies, particularly those in rural villages, had been kidnapped from their parents and sold to orphanages by corrupt adoption officials cashing in on the vast sums of money made available by the foreign demand for Chinese children.

The newspaper also said local authorities had tricked or coerced Chinese families into giving up newborns for adoption, only to sell those children to orphanages.

The paper quoted parents in the provinces of Guizhou and Hunan who said their babies had been stolen, sold, and adopted overseas in recent years.

Officials from the Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs have told foreign diplomats that, while there have been abuses in the past, they no longer occur, Foot reported.

Labels: international, China

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Indianas Supreme Court has ruled that child-welfare officials in New Jersey must review a four-year-old adoption case.

Stephen F. Melinger adopted twins in 2005 from a surrogate mother, but the Indiana high court is concerned about false statements given by Melingers attorney, Steven Litz.

During adoption proceedings, the high court found, Litz had told a Hamilton County, Ind., court Melinger lived in Indianapolis when in fact he had lived in Union City, N.J., for 10 years, according to an Oct. 2 United Press International (UPI) article.

The Supreme Court is allowing the twin girls, now 4-years-old, to stay with Melinger, while the case is reviewed, the UPI reported.

Labels: adoption fraud

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In a Sept. 8 feature on Mardie Caldwell, the founder of Lifetime Adoption Center, Liz Kellar of TheUnion.com noted that much has changed in the adoption world since Caldwell opened her agency in the mid 1980s:

The adoption process has changed dramatically since the days when a mother gave birth and never saw her child again. Records were sealed and adoption was considered a stigma.

Open adoptions, in contrast, mean the birth mother participates in the adoption process, often choosing the adoptive parents and maintaining contact with the child.

A closed adoption leaves every day open to wondering for the rest of your life, Caldwell said. Leaving them open is my driving force.

International adoptions have gained in popularity, but Caldwell wants Americans to realize there are plenty of children right here who desperately need a home.

Many Americans seek a foreign child to adopt because they have a fear the birth mother might take the child away, Caldwell said.

They also perceive adopting a child from a third-world country as a humanitarian gesture, she added.

They want to give the child a better life, but there are a lot of children waiting right here, she said.

Labels: adoption_agencies

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On Sept. 26, about 1,000 people gathered in Vermont's Champlain Valley Expo fairgrounds for the annual Lund Family Center Adoption Picnic. John Briggs of the Burlington Free Press described the event in his Sept. 27 article:

This is the first year Lund Family Center has opened the picnic to the media. They had been concerned about privacy, said Wanda Audette, the center's adoption director, particularly for parents who adopted through the center's partnership with the Vermont Department for Children and Families' Project Family. Those children, she said, have been removed from their birth parents because of abuse or neglect.

But the center decided this year that the event was too big and too cheerful to keep quiet about.

"Adoption isn't focused on in school," said Kitty Bartlett, who handles public relations for the center. "This is pretty joyous. For a child to come to a picnic where everyone is connected through adoption is a pretty powerful thing."

Lund Family Center is well established in the area, Briggs reported, having helped to find homes for about 8,600 children since opening as the "The Home for Friendless Women" in 1890. (And no, that's not a typo -- the organization has been in existence since the final decade of the 19th century.

Labels: celebration

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Some parents in China are making claims that their infant children (mostly daughters) were forcibly taken from them and placed for adoption with foreign families. The Boston Globe reports that the claims are fueling speculation about the legitimacy of some adoptions.

A Sept. 30 article on the Medical News Today reported the following:

The conventional wisdom is that the infants, mostly girls, were abandoned by their parents because of Chinas one-child policy and a cultural preference for boys, the Globe reports.

Although this is likely true for tens of thousands of the adoptions, some Chinese say that government officials took their children by coercion, fraud or kidnapping to collect money from orphanages.

The Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs declined to comment on the allegations, Medical News Today reported.

Labels: international, adoption fraud

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