If you have decided on adoption, here are a couple routes you could take to start placing your child.

Working with Agencies

Before you speak to any families, have a list ready of exactly what you want for your child. Order your list with your must-haves on top and the things you believe would be nice to have toward the bottom.

There isn’t a single family who’s going to be absolutely perfect, but there may be families who just seem right to you. One item to talk about is the level of openness the adoptive family wants. In open adoptions, birth families are still able to stay connected to their children, even though the child is being raised by an adoptive family.

Consider families who have already adopted if you’re looking for a really open adoption. This gives you the ability to see how they’ve upheld their agreements with the first child’s birth family. You may also be able to speak to their other child’s birth family.

Unless you know you’re going to want to see your child more than a couple times a year, consider families who live a little farther away from you.

Most of all, go with your gut, and follow the deepest connection you feel to a family. Your child is going to inherit many traits from you. Your feeling connected to a family increases the chances that your child will feel connectedness and belonging in that family too.

Searching on Your Own

Many expectant moms like the freedom and privacy to start finding their child’s family on their own without an agency’s involvement. The internet empowers expectant moms who want to look online for their child’s family.

Adoption profile sites, like Parent Profiles, house hundreds of adoption profiles for hopeful adoptive parents. This allows you to narrow down your results based on what you’re looking for. You can read all about the families, see their photos, read testimonies from their loved ones, and see how to get in touch with them, which you can do whenever you feel ready.

Most of the time, the hopeful adoptive families are already working with an agency, so you’ll have to see if you feel comfortable working with their agency too.

Facebook, Instagram, and Google have also proved to be effective ways of finding hopeful adoptive families.

Decisions

There is no real “guide” for how to start placing your baby for adoption. This is your life and the life of your child, and you should never do anything you feel uncomfortable with.

Educate yourself throughout this process. Do your research on what you want: There are open, closed, and semi-open adoptions, all with varying degrees of openness, so do your research about what that means.

Consider the fact that having some level of contact with your child gives you the ability to make it very clear they were wanted, that your decision to place them with another family was born of sacrifice and not lack of love. It also provides your child with a connection to his or her biological roots, something researchers have found to be invaluable in creating a sense of identity.

Considering adoption? Choose a family to adopt your child. Visit Parent Profiles on Adoption.com or call 1-800-ADOPT-98. 

Written by Melissa Giarrosso