When You Adopt A Child
The Commitment Is For Life
At a mere 25 years old, my best
friend and her husband were told that children would not be possible for them.
She had some medical issues that had never been a concern until she decided to
try to start a family. Of course, she was devastated. I cannot imagine my life
without my daughter, so I can only imagine being told that I can’t have
children. After a few depressing months, they decided that they would that begin
the process to adopt a child.
They had a great deal of concerns about looking to adopt a child
from our own country. We’ve all heard the horror stories about the birth parents
who return to take their child back years later. Though it is very rare, those
instances do exist. That isn’t something that they even want to think about
dealing with. As a couple, they attended some seminars that pertained to
international adoptions and met with an adoption agency. Amazingly, to adopt a
child from another country isn’t as easy as one would imagine. In fact, it can
end up costing even more money than an American adoption. Plus, to adopt a child
internationally, there are quite a few more restrictions and concerns. It didn’t
sound like it would be a happy experience until they arrived back on American
soil to start their new lives as parents.
Her husband’s company would aid in adoption fees, but that only
amounted to $2,000 of aid. Sure, every penny counts and it was more than a
wonderful offer, but the costs and legal fees are still a small fortune.
Somehow, it doesn’t seem fair that it would cost so much money to adopt a child,
but that’s just the way it works. I would think that giving a child a safe and
loving home shouldn’t need to cost a small fortune. My friends were looking into
getting a home equity loan just to be able to adopt a child. The bank bent over
backwards to get them that money and they began the international adoption
process. Along the paths of their research, they learned about some of the
strange requirements that some countries require for international adoption.
China has some strict guidelines that they didn’t meet, which left out the
possibility of being able to adopt a child from China.
Finally, after a year of research and exhaustion, they decided
that they wanted to be foster parents first and hoped to adopt from that
experience. Once you decide to adopt a child that was in foster care, the fees
are almost nonexistent. Plus, the process is a lot less painless. It is now a
year later, and they have managed to adopt a child, an infant, through a foster
program. I’ve never seen her smile wider, or more exhausted.
It is sad to say it, but I
think a lot of people get by in this world by ignoring all of
the hardship and injustice that goes on around them. I have just
decided to adopt a child because I have been like this for too
long. I cannot stand by any longer while innocent people suffer.
There is war, famine, poverty, and injustice all around the
entire globe. I felt that adopting a child was my way to make a
personal difference.
Of course, you cannot adopt a child for political reasons alone.
Even if you are only deciding to adopt a foster child, you must
have enough love in your heart to take care of him or her.
Adopting a child, after all, is not easy. Children for adoption
tend to have some very severe mental and emotional problems.
Often, they have been abandoned more than once in their lives,
and have trouble trusting adults and opening up to them.
When you adopt a child, you have to be willing to be there for
the long run. Adoption agencies are very rigorous in their
standards, and if you are not willing to go through with it, you
might as well not even start. After all, deciding to adopt a
child is not like deciding to adopt a pet. The commitment is not
for five years or seven years. The commitment is for life.
Before I decided to adopt a child, I spent a lot of time talking
to an adoption agency. I wanted to know what it was like to
raise a child, what would be required of me, and how hard it
would be for me to get a child of my own to take care of. The
adoption agency was very helpful. Nowadays, there is such a
demand to adopt a child that many adoption agencies act like
they are doing you a favor. The one that I found, however, was
not like this. They basically bent over backwards to help me.
They addressed every concern that I had. By the time I decided
that I really wanted to adopt a child, they had spent literally
hours helping me make that decision. It was important for me,
because I wanted to do what was right. I did not want to decide
to adopt a child only to turn around and change my mind. Nothing
could be more cruel and unjust than that.
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