Triple the Love! The Gift of Open Adoption
I am an adoptive mom and an open adoption pioneer. In 1993 when my husband and I decided to adopt a baby, we signed up with an agency that was practicing a new kind of adoption called Open Adoption. This is an arrangement in which the biological parents and the adoptive family know each other’s identities and choose to remain in contact after the adoption is finalized. This arrangement surprised us as we assumed that most adoptions were closed, sealed, and secret since that had been the prevailing practice for many years.
We found ourselves in uncomfortable and unchartered territory with little guidance for such a lifelong commitment. Would it be complicated or awkward to raise a child with the birth parents in the picture? After adopting twice, four years apart and both in open arrangements, we learned just how much we wanted our children’s birth parents in our lives for everyone’s emotional health – including our own.
Recently our youngest daughter, Sofie, graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder with a Master's Degree in Civil Engineering and we had the privilege of celebrating together with our family and Sofie’s birth families. We wanted to make it a wonderful celebration -– not only for how incredibly proud we are of our daughter -– but we also wanted to revel in all the love from everyone who traveled to the beautiful mountain town to see her graduate.
Sofie’s birth parents were teenagers at her birth and did not stay together. They both are married now and her birth mother has five children and her birth father has two children. Sofie has met and loves every one of her seven birth half-siblings.
When Sofie talks about her birth family and her birth siblings she proudly says: “I am so incredibly grateful to my brave parents and birth parents for making the tough decisions they did….because of their courage, I have double the family and double the love! And most importantly, I get to be a big sister to seven perfect humans.”
On her graduation day, surrounded by family and birth family, something struck me. Today is not double the love - it is TRIPLE the love. Very early on as we planned this event, her birth father told us that he would like to attend her graduation along with his wife and their two children. We were thrilled and knew that Sofie would be delighted to share this day with us and her birth father’s family. Before we knew it, Sofie’s birth father’s parents said they were coming too! Sofie is the first of their grandchildren and has always held a special place in their hearts. And because our parents, Sofie’s grandparents, are all deceased, we knew that sharing this day with birth grandparents would be a welcome gift.
But then something remarkable happened. Sofie’s birth mother said she would like to come too. She reflected that she missed a lot of other events as Sofie was growing up and that it would do her heart good to see Sofie graduate from college. We were delighted when she and her husband joined us for the celebration too.
As I looked at the group I could not help to think, this is simply the best of what open adoption has to offer. Three families that love my child — our family, her birth father’s family and her birth mother’s family.
Life is never easy. And it was not easy for everyone to show up together, especially for Sofie’s birth parents. Being together again brought up memories and reminders of a very difficult time in their teen lives. But the north star of any adoption is always love for the child, what is best for them. And today was the day that we all put Sofie at the center of all that love, just like her birth parents did the day she was born, and it sure felt right and good.
Our oldest child, Sawyer, is now twenty-seven and we are so grateful for the relationship with Sawyer’s birth parents too. Sawyer’s birth parents married each other when Sawyer was nineteen and gave birth to a beautiful boy only two years ago. Sawyer has a full baby brother and since they live only three hours apart, they see each other a few times each year without fear or guilt. Just another beautiful gift of Open Adoption!
- Linda R. Sexton
Author of the upcoming book The Branches We Cherish: Twenty-Five Truths About Open Adoption. Please my website to sign up for my blogs: lindarsexton.com