How to Succeed in International Adoption

By Pat Hoopes, MSW, LICSW

For many, international adoption is a wonderful opportunity for building a family. In 2004, 21,831 orphan visas were granted by the U.S. government for the international adoption of children by American families. As a social worker, I have seen the joy first-hand of families coming together through adoption. It is however, a complex and highly variable process. There are many aspects that one should consider and today, there are numerous resources available to individuals and couples considering international adoption. Your homestudy agency is a key resource to help you with this decision.

Consideration #1: The Known vs. Unknown

One reason there are significant unknowns in international adoption is that we are dealing with countries that have different politics, different histories, and different cultures. Their resources, laws and procedures are all very different from the way we do things in the U.S. As a result, there is a great deal of information about the child you will be adopting that is simply unattainable. For some, that level of uncertainty will not work.

You need to assess for yourself, what is your need to know. If you have a strong need to know a lot of facts, details and history, international adoption may not be a good choice for you or a very difficult process indeed. If you are reasonably comfortable with the unknown, why is that? Is it a desire to "not know" or a result of your faith and willingness to parent a child in spite of difficult or unknown history? Perhaps you understand that parenting under any and all circumstances presents a myriad of unknowns. Perhaps you embrace the unknown with optimism and wonder what unexpected joys await you.

Consideration #2: Assessing the Risks

Risk is another very important issue to consider in adoption. In effect, becoming a parent is risky business. If you are giving birth, no one promises a healthy child. There is no way to avoid risk if you are going to become a parent; however adoption has more risk than pregnancy for most people.

Since there are risk factors in all international adoptions you need to assess a more risky or less risky situation and decide where your comfort level resides. Often pre-adoptive parents will say, "We don't know anything about the birth parents; we have no history, that's a big risk." Sometimes we need to focus on what we do know instead. For example, while birth parents are anonymous in China, the majority are from the rural areas. A combination of poverty, the one child policy, and a strong cultural preference for boys, results in infant girls being abandoned and eventually available for adoption. Teen pregnancy, dysfunctional family situations, alcohol and drug abuse are not common (although these conditions do exist in China). So even though you don't get any history of the birth parents, because you know something about why these children are available, you know "something" about these birth parents.

Another risk factor is related to the type of care a child receives while waiting for a family. The options generally include orphanages that range from large, seriously understaffed and under financed to small with a good child-to-caretaker ratio and better financial support. In addition to orphanage care, some children are in small group homes, or individual foster care. Children cared for in large under staffed, under funded orphanages are more likely to be developmentally delayed, and have slower rates of growth. The good news is that, for many, these delays are transient. Another factor to consider is how long the child has been in care. A child who is in short term institutional care is likely to have fewer associated risks than the one who has been there a long time.

Consideration #3: The Need for Flexibility

International adoption requires a lot of flexibility. It can be a process that takes longer than you expected. Your child may look somewhat different from what you initially expected or might not be as far along developmentally as you had hoped. Here's an example of the need for flexibility: If a family states that they want to adopt a child up to eighteen months, they are indicating some flexibility in age range. If an applicant says, "We want a child less than one year, not a day over", the pool of countries that they can choose is reduced and their wait is likely to be longer. The more flexible the family is, the more options they have.

Consideration #4: Evaluating Your Comfort with Differences

Since many international adoptions are transracial adoptions and most involve differences in ethnic heredity, you need to think about racial and ethnic issues. Often a couple will say, "We're Caucasian, and we want to adopt a Caucasian child, so the child will fit right in." This can be misleading because differences are not just a matter of race. Your child will have some sense of identity with his country of birth. You, as a parent, will need to be prepared to help your child figure out what this identity means to him. In order to do that well, you will need to reconcile whatever issues you may have about racial and ethnic difference.

The Good News

The known vs. unknown, evaluating risk, the need for flexibility, differences vs. sameness. YIKES!!! So much to deal with! All you want to do is parent a child, right?

OK, here's the good news. If you hang in there and are committed, you will successfully adopt internationally. Absolutely you will. It's do-able and it happens every day. The level of uncertainty and the level of risk that you can tolerate is something only you can figure out. Your agency can't do that for you, but they can (and should) help. Just ask.