Adoption
Open-SemiOpen-Closed
What has been your experience with open and semi-open adoptions. Have there been issues down the road with BM wanting extensive contact? Especially when she may not be a positive influence. With an open or semi-open is there any confusion for the child or issues that you had not considered when choosing an open or semi-open adoption?
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Re: Open-SemiOpen-Closed
Our experience is with an open adoption. You can read more about it on my blog if you would like to (the link is in my siggy.) But basically, we have contact through email, mail,phone, and in person with dd's birthmom. She lives 2 hours away and she and her family have visited us 3 times since she was born (dd is 13 months now.) We had agreed upon letters/pictures and 1 visit/year but we were allowed to add to that if we all agreed.
We get along very well with dd's birthmom and her family. They're wonderful. They love seeing dd. We invited them to her birthday party and we were so happy that they could come.
If she had not been a positive influence, that may have caused us to ask for a different type of plan - -maybe semi-open instead. But I think you have to look at each situation and decide.
We haven't had any issues up to this point -- it's just been a very good situation overall.
Good luck!
Our adoption is semi-open. DD is only 8 months, so we have limited experience so far. At this point we have sent letters and pictures every month up to her 6 month birthday, and will send annual ones around each birthday from now on.
We were open to 2 visits a year, as was DD's BM (we'll call her J). So far we've met up with J once, at an event sponsored by our agency. We haven't heard yet if she wants to visit again this year, or again at all. So in that respect we're having the opposite--we may end up with fewer than 2 visits a year. If she was not a positive influence, we would be discussing the situation with our agency and deciding what was in DD's best interests.
We also have set up a blog that I try and update at least weekly so J can see pix of DD at her convenience, and comment if she wants.
So far there is no confusion. When we had our first post-placement meeting with J, it was clear that she wasn't ready to deal with a small infant, so in some way I think it was more of a relief to her to see that she made the right decision. We're actually hoping we still get to visit her. She is an amazing woman--smart, great to talk to, extremely generous, and an all-around nice person. We hope that DD will be able to see that as she grows up. We are also aware that contact can wax and wane over time, so we're preparing for that to be a possibility.
We technically have an open adoption, with pictures, letters, and visits one or two times a year. Unfortunately, the BM and BF does not feel she is ready to meet us, or DD, and has chosen to not stay in contact.
We have told them that if they change their mind, we'll still be here, and will still be open to contact. That's really all we can do.
DD's Birth grandmother really wanted contact, and we were okay with that, we really liked her, and thought she could have a grandmotherly role, but the first visit we scheduled with her, when DD was 5 weeks old, she just didn't show up or call till 5 hours after she was supposed to be here.
We decided we'll give her one more chance, since we don't want people coming in and out of DD's life, and the birth grandmother has never contacted us again, which is so strange, because prior to her not showing up, she emailed or texted every week, and we shared photos.
Just remember, just because an adoption starts as open or semi-open, there are so many ways for it to evolve, but it's your job to make sure that all contact remains in the best interest of the child, and if you do that, everyone wins.