I feel that all of society should be responsible for helping adoptive families. More importantly I believe that all Christians should help play a role in adoption. The role you play might not include you adopting a child. Your role might not be helping to fund adoptions but there are things that you can do to help adoptive families.
First and foremost you can pray for people who are in the midst of the adoption process or thinking about adoption. You can pray that they make the right decision. You can pray for their child in waiting. You can pray for the extended family, as adoption impacts everyone in the family. Adoption is a long hard road and much prayer is needed and appreciated.
Always use positive adoption language. When a friend or family member tells you that they are thinking about adoption or moving forward with adoption don’t say things like, “you know the kid will hate you when they find out.” Do not tell your friend or family member all of the horror stories you have heard about adoption. I can assure you they have researched and know more horror stories than they ever really wanted to know. Arm yourself with a few positive stories and when a conversation comes up about adoption and someone shares a horror story you can share a positive uplifting adoption story. Who knows, maybe the story you tell will be the catalyst to encourage others to adopt.
Never pry into details of the adoption or why the child was placed. Some people like to tell all of the details of the adoption of their child, others (like me) do keep some things that are for us and Madilyn only. When Madilyn is older it will be her decision if she wants to tell the details that we have kept private. Simple questions like, “how old was she when she was placed?” are fine. Questions like, “Did her birthmother do drugs?” are not acceptable.
Offer practical assistance to the family once they are home with the child. I can tell you after having had one child and adopting my other child both are physically and mentally exhausting. Offer to prepare a meal, offer to assist with laundry, or offer to help clean the house. Offer to sit with the child so that mom and/or dad can get a nap. The days following our return with Madilyn were long and hard. It would have been a wonderful thing if anyone would have offered us any practical assistance. I remember asking David, why don’t people offer to help with adoption. Everyone is all over offering help when the baby is a natural born child. I think people just do not realize how exhausting the hours leading up to placement and the days following placement really are. You can read more about that in my blog titled “The process of adoption is labor.”
Every child deserves a loving “forever” home. It is our responsibility to help children make it to these homes. Remember that simple acts can make a big difference.
Tags: Adoption, Ways to help adoptive families