Our Blog

  • The Secret of Success in Open Adoption

    This guest post is by Michelle Erich at Michelle Erich Law. To find success in open adoption, you have to spread the word about your dream to adopt and communicate effectively. In my experience as an adoption attorney over the past two decades, I’ve found that successful adoption efforts are more about open communication than anything else. Hopeful adoptive parents frequently ask me if wealth, religion, ethnicity or age are factors that may aid or hinder adoption efforts.  I can tell you that

  • Why I Love Open Adoption

    Valentine’s Day may have come and gone, but I still feel like celebrating. The roses (or tulips, in our case) still haven’t wilted, the chocolates still haven’t melted, and the sense of connectedness that the day brings still hangs in the air. Earlier this week I told you what others love about open adoption. Today, I’d like to share what I love about it.

  • 20 Reasons To Love Open Adoption

    Happy Valentine’s Day! Since this is the day for lovers, we figured it was the perfect time to celebrate what people love about open adoption. Adoptive parents, birth parents, waiting parents, adoptees and adoption professionals–they’ve all weighed in with their thoughts. Open adoption, how do we love thee? Let us count the ways.

  • How To Write About Infertility In Your Adoption Profile

    I don’t know the exact statistic–one study I came across says it could be as high as 80 percent–but it’s safe to say that most people who pursue an open adoption do so as a result of infertility. That’s what brought us to it, and it might be what led you there as well. For many couples, infertility isn’t simply the starting point of their adoption journey.  It’s the catalyst that sets the whole process in motion. It plays a

  • Tired Of Waiting To Adopt? Here Are Some Unexpected Benefits You May Have Never Considered

    Remember that old Tom Petty song, “The Waiting Is The Hardest Part”? Boy, he wasn’t kidding. Waiting, of course, is part of life. It’s also part of the open adoption process. A big part. In fact, if you’re going through it now, you can be forgiven for thinking it’s the only part. From beginning your home study to finding a match, it seems like every step of the way you’re either waiting for something or waiting for someone.

  • How Not To Begin A “Dear Birthmother” Letter

    If you’re trying to build your family through open adoption, chances are you have more than a passing familiarity with what’s known as a “Dear Birthmother” letter. “Dear Birthmother” letters have been around for as long as open adoption has. Visit any open adoption agency or networking website today and you’ll find scores of them–sometimes dozens, sometimes hundreds–prominently displayed throughout their pages. First and foremost, a “Dear Birthmother” letter is a a marketing tool–a document written by hopeful adoptive parents

  • 39 Excuses Stopping You From Adopting A Baby This Year (And What To Do About Them)

    Now that we’re well into the New Year, how are you making out with your resolutions? Lost a bit of weight? Nice. Kicked the nicotine habit? Great. How about adoption? Any big news on the open adoption front? Right, didn’t think so. Adopting a baby isn’t as easy as losing a couple of pounds or giving up cigarettes for a month. You need willpower for those. Adoption takes willpower, too–and so much more.

  • Adoption Nation’s Adam Pertman On How Openness Has Changed Adoption–And How Adoption Has Changed Us, Part 2

    Here are more highlights from my recent conversation about open adoption trends with Adam Pertman, author of Adoption Nation, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, and adoptive father. You can learn more about Adam here. And you can see Part 1 of my conversation here. Honoring a child’s right to know Some adoptive parents don’t tend to think of the baby’s biological or first families. Some don’t even think of that baby as anything but a baby or that

  • Adoption Nation’s Adam Pertman On How Openness Has Changed Adoption–And How Adoption Has Changed Us, Part 1

    What do you do for an encore when your first book is not only called an instant classic, but is hailed as “an invaluable resource on all aspects of adoption” by the Sexiest Man Alive? (That would be Hollywood hunk and adoptive father, Hugh Jackman). Add new material and update it, of course. And that’s just what Adam Pertman has done with the new, revised version of his 2001 bestseller, Adoption Nation. “How The Adoption Revolution is Transforming Our Families–And America”

  • Writing Your Parent Profile? Ask Yourself These 5 Essential Questions Before You Start

    Starting your parent profile? Good luck! And I mean that in the nicest way possible. Next to word of mouth, a parent profile is the best networking tool you have as a hopeful adoptive parent to connect with prospective birth parents. And that’s a good thing and a bad one. Good because your profile could be a game-changer in your efforts to become an adoptive parent through open adoption. Bad because…well, if you know anything about writing a profile, you’ll