A mother who adopted older children asks what to say to her children’s birth grandparent when her children don’t ask for contact.
Keeping Our Children Connected
“We visit and communicate directly with their foster family. These efforts help our sons build and sustain important relationships. They have already experienced too much loss and grief in their young lives.”
Parent-to-Parent: Photographs of the Birth Family
Parents share whether they have photos of their child’s birth family displayed in their homes—where, why or why not, and how they talk about them.
“Meeting My Cousin for the First Time”
Somehow, I turned out to be both an adoptive mom and a member of a birth family.
Letters to Birth Mothers, from Wondering Hearts
Distance doesn’t eliminate a desire to communicate with the birth mothers that children imagine, as these letters demonstrate.
Ask AF: Books for Understanding the Birth Mothers’ Perspective
Do you know of any books, like I Wish for You a Beautiful Life: Letters from the Korean Birth Mothers of Ae Ran Won to Their Children, written for kids adopted from China?
Ask AF: Explaining Kinship Adoption
My younger daughter adopted her sister’s child. My granddaughter’s now eight, and knows that she was adopted, but she doesn’t know that her “Auntie” is her birth mother.
“Googling Her Birth Parents”
Would it really be possible to fill out my daughter’s hazy memories by typing names into a search engine?
“A Past Without Pictures”
My daughter was eight years old in the referral photo we received during the international adoption process. That’s the oldest photo she will ever have of herself.
When Teens Find Birth Family Online
Got a Web-savvy teen on your hands? Here’s how to set safety guidelines for online birth family contact.
Ask AF: What to Say in a Letter to Birth Parents
I send letters with pictures to my children’s birth parents via our adoption agencies.
“Intimate Strangers”
She was going to have a child but couldn’t keep it, I wanted a child desperately but couldn’t have one. She was the mother at birth; I was the mother right after. It sounds simple, but it wasn’t.
Ask AF: Sharing Difficult Birth Parent Information
Answers to your parenting questions.
Ask AF: Continuing Contact with the Birth Family?
Answers to your parenting questions.
Ask AF: Birth Sibling in Another Family
When I adopted my two-year-old son, I was told that he has a biological sibling who was adopted by a family who lives in another state. My son is my only child, but his brother has adoptive siblings. How do I explain this to my son?
Ask AF: When to Share Birth Parent Information
Answers to your parenting questions.
[Book Review] The Mystery of the Multiple Mothers
An engaging whodunit with adoption themes.
[Book Review] Red Thread Sisters
A brief review of Red Thread Sisters, an engaging novel your middle-schooler will enjoy.
“Visiting Our Daughter’s Orphanage”
One of the cold realities of adopting an older child from China is that she comes with a lot of questions, many of which you can’t answer.
“Our Love Stayed with Him”
As foster parents, you hope that the love and security you offer will stay in a child’s heart. When we reconnected with a boy we fostered through two reunifications 14 years ago, we found that it had.