It depends. Whichever agency or facilitator you work with is probably going to charge some sort of case management fee, which may be between 5 and 15K. Then there is the cost of the home study, which is around 4.5K. Then there are the legal fees, which will also probably be between 5 and 15K, depending on who you use. And there may be interstate adoption fees if you are matched with a birthmom in another state, and that varies between 0 and 4K or so depending on the state. But the big question mark in cost has to do with the birthmom's needs. She may need help covering medical costs, which could become unexpectedly high if there are complications. She may need help with rent, food, and other consumables due to an inability to work. She may not need any help, but then she might lose her job and then unexpectedly needs help with rent for 5 months. It's safe to assume you will spend at least 30K total, but that could easily be much, much higher depending on circumstance.
What Is The Difference Between An Agency And A Facilitator?
A Facilitator just helps to match you with a birthmom. Some facilitators may provide other assistance, including providing counseling to the birthmom so that they are less likely to make a rash decision, or screening birthmoms to make sure you aren't matched with a high risk situation, or even accompany birthmom to doctor appointments. A facilitator may work with larger agencies to get more access to birthmoms looking for adoptive parents. This person may only work with 10-15 waiting families at a time.
An agency is usually a bit larger, and may have more like 50 or 500 waiting families, and may have a lot more birthmoms looking to be matched. They also provide home study services (the process you have to undergo in order to be legally approved for adoption). They may also have legal services you can use.
Is The Child Healthy?
It depends. A facilitator we spoke with said that she is very deliberate in how she screens birthmoms. She doesn't want a baby with known special needs going to an adoptive family that isn't prepared for special needs. She asks if birthmom uses heroin. She asks how much birthmom drinks. She has been doing this long enough that she can tell when people are lying, and she recognizes a risky situation when she sees one.
That being said, even if birthmom makes every healthy choice in the book, the child could still end up with special needs, just like any biological parent may end up with a child with special needs. So there is no guarantee that the baby will develop typically.
It depends. You have some sort of profile with information about your home, your family, your background, etc. Birthmoms look through these profiles, usually with the help and guidance of an agency worker or facilitator, and choose an adoptive family. They may ask for a family that is Catholic, or a family that doesn't have any children in the home yet, or that has a pet, or where one parent stays at home, or a family that is willing to see the birthmom every few months, or a family that is ok with not having any contact with the birthmom again. It's up to them to choose what they want.
This means that once you are legally approved for adoption, you could get chosen the very next day, or you could not be chosen for years. People who are less likely to get chosen by a birthmom include people over 45 years old, people with "unusual" religions like Jehovah's Witnesses, and people who already have multiple kids in their home. Many people seem to get matched within a couple of years.
Once you are matched, you now have to wait until the baby is born. Some agencies will match you with someone who is 3 months pregnant. Others won't allow birthmoms to match until they are 6 or 7 months to decrease risk of miscarriage or birthmom changing her mind.
Yes, but how open? It depends. The definition of an open adoption is one in which the birthparent and adoptive parent have access to each other in some way. This can mean as little as the child being able to get birthmom's contact info through the agency once they turn 18. Or it could mean they write letters to and from birthmom. It could mean birthmom babysits for you or you have lunch with birthmom every couple of months. You decide what you are comfortable with, and birthmom decides what she wants, and you get matched up with someone who wants the same level of contact.
What Happens If Birthmom Changes Her Mind?
There are a lot of ways in which a newborn adoption can be disrupted. There could be birth complications or a miscarriage.
Birthmom could change her mind before the birth, which is more common in women who haven't told their family or the birthfather that they are pregnant. She could change her mind after the birth, especially if she has not been counseled and mentally prepared for the hormonal changes that come with birth and the feelings of guilt and loss that come with the immediate prospect of letting someone else take your baby home from the hospital. She could change her mind within the first 30 days of placement with the adoptive family before the adoption is finalized.
She could also decide to be matched with a different family, or end up finding a relative who wants to parent the child.
In the cases where she changes her mind about placing the child for adoption, she may have to pay back some of the expenses the adoptive parents paid for. But no matter what, adoptive parents will have lost at least half their money. They will have paid their case management fees and their matching fees already, and they will probably have to pay those again for a different birthmom if they want to be matched again.
How Likely Is It That The Adoption Gets Disrupted?
It depends. If you are working with a really good agency or facilitator that screens birthmoms well and provides a lot of support (pre and post birth), then you are far less likely to be matched with someone who is high risk for changing their mind. It's absolutely possible that your first match goes through just fine without any complications. I don't know exact numbers, but it sounds like how often disruptions happen can probably range from 1 out of 20 families experiencing disruption to 10 out of 20 families, depending on the agency/facilitator they are working with.
