Adopt A Child From India

Domestic, international, foster adopt, open, closed, transracial. Before stepping into the adoption world, I had no idea there would be so many choices. One of your first steps will be to decide upon an adoption agency to help you along your way.

You should attend informational sessions on both domestic and international adoption and learn everything you can about the process, the cost, the time frame, and available children in each type of program. Talk with people who have gone through both domestic and international adoptions, and start reading books and familiarizing yourself with agency personnel.

Once you feel thoroughly overwhelmed but armed with facts, it will be decision time. This is a highly personal decision. There is no right or wrong way to do it. Each option has its own set of benefits and challenges, and you have to choose what works best for your family.

Domestic

Domestic adoption takes place within your own country. It may happen locally or across state lines. Either way, the birth mother typically chooses the adoptive family.

After attending an orientation session and filling out paperwork, the adoptive parents schedule their home study. Once approved, they begin to compile their family profile.

In the most traditional case, adoptive parents create a scrapbook or website to introduce themselves and their family to potential birthmothers. This will include a letter to her, photos of themselves and their home, biographical information about themselves, their plans to care for the child, and even letters from their family or friends about their ability to parent.

Birth mothers are matched by agency staff with potential adoptive parents, and they then review the family information provided in the scrapbooks. Once a birth mother selects a family she wants to meet, a facilitated phone conversation takes place for her to talk with the potential adoptive parents.

If both parties are comfortable with the match, they meet in person prior to delivery of the child. At this point it is their collective decision as to how much time to spend together and how involved they will be with one another until the adoption takes place.

Once the baby is born, the birth mother and father must wait 48 hours to sign the forms setting the adoption into motion. If the birth father is out of the picture, another 31 days must pass before his parental rights are relinquished. If this is the case, the baby will reside in a transitional care home pending the termination of paternal rights. At six months post-placement, the adoptive family appears in court for a legal proceeding to finalize the adoption.

You can anticipate a wait time of at least a year after approval to have a baby in your arms, but the wait time varies widely based on a number of factors. For example, if there are only a handful of birth mothers in the program while you are, there will be fewer babies available. Expect to spend at least $25,000 to complete your domestic adoption.

Foster adopt

There is no shortage of children in the foster care system in the United States. These children have either been abandoned or removed from their homes.

Couples go through rigorous screening and training to receive approval to become foster parents. When a child is initially placed into foster care, parental rights are still in place and efforts at family reunification may still be underway. However, once parental rights are severed, the child becomes available for adoption.

If dual approval to foster and adopt is available in your state, it is the quickest route to being able to finalize an adoption. It will include paperwork, formalized training, CPR certification, a safety screening of your home and a home study.

Once parental rights are severed, the adoption can be approved in court. The time frame varies widely depending on the birth family scenario. Costs of foster adoption are low, compared to other types, and may actually be free.

International

There are numerous options for an international adoption. Many agencies operate in Bulgaria, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, Honduras, Russia and Taiwan. However, the international climate changes frequently and adoption is a hot political topic, so it will be important to keep yourself well-informed as you decide which program to enter.

Regardless of the country you choose, the process will include an orientation to the program and a ton of paperwork. Each country’s program has its own requirements, which will entail paperwork for your agency, the United States and the foreign government you will be dealing with.

Once your paperwork is complete, the wait for a referral of a child begins. The referral process is unique in each country program. In some programs, you will receive referral information on a child prior to traveling to meet the child in person, while other programs require you to travel to the country to obtain the referral information before meeting the child in person. The amount and quality of information you receive at the time of referral varies by country.

Once you decide to adopt the child, legal proceedings will occur in the foreign country to finalize the adoption (in most cases). The length of time to complete this process varies by country and multiple trips to the country may be necessary.

Once the child has been adopted and brought home to the United States, it is in the best interest of the family to reaffirm the adoption in an American court. This is a fairly straightforward proceeding, without the mountains of paperwork and home study.

Post-placement visits are required for an amount of time, depending on the country of origin. They consist of a home visit by a social worker who will write a report to be filed with your agency and sent to the foreign agency as well.

The wait time for an international adoption ranges widely, depending on the program you choose. Kenneth and I waited two years for our first adoption and 18 months for our second one. I have known others, though, who have waited both shorter and longer timeframes. Most children available for international adoption are at least 12 months old and can be adopted into their teens. The likelihood of bringing an infant home is becoming less and less common.

Costs per country vary as well. Expect to spend at least $20,000.

Bringing Home Baby

However you choose to grow your family, the day you bring your child home will be one of the most joyful days of your life.

In 1997 foreign correspondent Neely Tucker and his wife, Vita, arrived in Zimbabwe. After witnessing the devastating consequences of AIDS and economic disaster on the country’s children, the couple started volunteering at an orphanage where a critically ill infant, abandoned in a field on the day she was born, was trusted to their care. Within weeks, Chipo, the baby girl whose name means “gift,” would come to mean everything to them. Their decision to adopt her, however, would challenge an unspoken social norm: that foreigners should never adopt Zimbabwean children. Against a background of war, terrorism, disease, and unbearable uncertainty about the future, Chipo’s true story emerges as an inspiring testament to the miracles that love—and dogged determination—can sometimes achieve.

From Publishers WeeklyAs a foreign correspondent, Tucker had worked in conflict zones on two continents and seen death in all its gruesome forms. “The steady stream of violence had worn away my natural sense of compassion to the point where I could cover almost any horror but felt very little about anything at all.” Then, in 1997, Neely, a white Mississippian, and his African-American wife, Vita, were posted to Zimbabwe, where the AIDS crisis was feeding an unprecedented wave of sick and abandoned children. “The scale of death, and the depths of misery it entailed, defied the imagination even for someone like me….” Neely and Vita volunteered at an overwhelmed orphanage in the Zimbabwean capital, where diarrhea and pneumonia were killing babies at an alarming rate. Nobody dared whisper the word AIDS, though its specter hung over every crib. Here, Neely and Vita met Chipo, a desperately sick baby girl who had been abandoned under a tree. With temporary permission to take her home, Neely and Vita threw all available resources toward saving her life: round-the-clock feedings, good doctors, medicine and a clean, warm environment. She thrived. Neely and Vita decided to adopt Chipo, only to discover a slew of cultural taboos against adoption by foreigners-a white foreigner in particular. While Chipo grew healthy and fat under their care, the Tuckers negotiated a nightmarish bureaucracy that threatened to tear Chipo away from them; meanwhile, Zimbabwe was entering a period of civil unrest that targeted Americans and journalists. This is a gorgeous mix of family memoir and reportage that traverses the big issues of politics, racism and war.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library JournalAdult/High School–This is the riveting account of how two Mississippians, newspaper reporter Tucker, who is white, and his African-American wife, Vita, adopted a baby. Shortly after their marriage, he was posted to Harare, Zimbabwe, where thousands of children have been orphaned by AIDS and extended families are overburdened with their care. One day, a newborn was rescued from abandonment in the bush and brought into the orphanage where the Tuckers were volunteering. Chipo was tiny and close to death, but she latched onto Neely’s finger, and he fell in love with her. The couple were told that it’s practically impossible for foreigners to adopt a Zimbabwean baby, but they decided to try. Neely traveled around Africa, reporting on uprisings, massacres, and genocides. Intermittently, he returned to Harare to deal with the rigid, arrogant social-welfare bureaucracy and the horrible sadness of the children dying in the understaffed orphanage. Through patience, political savvy, and the help of sympathetic social workers, he was able to get the necessary papers to adopt the child. The story offers insights into interracial marriage, African politics, and daily life in a Third World country. Teens are sure to be fascinated by the Tuckers’ experience.–Penny Stevens, Andover College, Portland, ME
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist*Starred Review* Washington Post writer Tucker has written an affecting, powerful memoir of his struggles to adopt a baby girl in Zimbabwe, where the adoption laws are extremely strict. Tucker, a white man from Mississippi, and his wife Vita, an African American woman from Detroit, settle in Zimbabwe in 1997 and decide that they want to adopt a child. Tucker knows he’s found the one when he holds Chipo, an infant abandoned in a field shortly after her birth. Chipo managed to survive two trips to the hospital and life in the understaffed orphanage, but she’s in sorry shape when Tucker sees her. The couple is allowed to take her home, and through their doting care, she finally begins to rally and eventually thrive. But Tucker and Vita still face an uphill battle to adopt the child they love more than anything. Red tape, heartless bureaucrats, lost folders, and endless obstacles stand in their way. Tucker maintains a sense of immediacy throughout the book; the reader feels his frustration as he tries to track down various caseworkers, and his nervous energy as he and Vita receive the results of Chipo’s HIV test. Utterly heartfelt and truly inspiring. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Most helpful customer reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful.
Great book
By Michael Blyth
“By noon, the ants had found the girl-child.”

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful.
Great story of love across color lines
By Mary Parker
Neely Tucker, a writer for the Washington Post , details his travels in Africa as a correspondent for the Detroit Times with his African American wife and their struggle to adopt a baby from Zimbabwe. This is a truly heartwarming story that wraps you up in their family struggles and at the end you hope the author writes a sequel so you can hear more about their life together.

See all 73 customer reviews…

Adopt A Child From India