I know it's been mentioned before, but I am really really seeing this more and more. Talked to one agency typically had 20 adoptions a year, last year 1, this year 3.
Others were about 50% down.
Are births down in general, or just adoptions? Anyone know?
Re: Adoption down 50%?
I keep thinking maybe there are so many agencies now, that adoptions are just more spread out, not down?
I know, I have been thinking how discouraging it is. If I thought that more woman were keeping their babies, that would be a good thing, but I've also been wondering if the slew of day after pills they now push doesn't have something to do with it.
I agree about the loss, grief, & pain. But I can't imagine my life without my son!
Ah yes! Forgot about Teen Mom!
She's Forever Ours! Finaliaztion-12.26.12
Are you in OC, Ca? If so, we live by each other!
I am in OC! We live in Fullerton.
She's Forever Ours! Finaliaztion-12.26.12
I really, really don't think this is the reason. I work in a pregnancy resource center, and counsel a lot of adolescents and women in "crisis pregnancy" situations, and adoption just isn't something many of them think very highly of. I often have clients considering abortion or parenting, but who are entirely opposed to adoption. I've even had a client tell me a woman who gets pregnant should parent regardless of her ability to provide for the child or her desire to be a parent, because she has to live with her mistakes. Yikes. I'd be more inclined to attribute lower rates of babies being placed with adoptive families to higher rates of parenting and to surgical abortions and miscarriages being fairly common than to Plan B.
BFP #1 9/7/10, EDD 5/14/11, Violet born 5/27/11.
BFP #2 4/9/12, EDD 12/16/12, M/C Rory 4/24/12.
BFP #3 10/6/12, EDD 6/16/12., Matilda born 6/17/13.
I just saw your blog, I think you used our old agency! Congrats on your baby btw!
I adopted privately. My wife and I knew, even though we live in a liberal state, that there are several things about us that would be undesirable to most adoption agencies, since the majority of adoption agencies in our area are religious institutions. We also didn't want to deal with the pain of waiting for placement, the home visits, the bureaucracy, and because I wanted to breastfeed our adopted child (I was still breastfeeding my son when we decided to adopt, so I kept pumping) we just didn't have forever to wait for a child. We met our BM through someone we knew and completed the adoption with a lawyer.
I don't know if overall adoption is down, but it's very possible adoptions through agencies are down. I'd definitely believe it if people are disillusioned with the idea of agencies, especially people who don't fit into the cookie-cutter family that most adoption agencies look for. I know we're disillusioned with agency adoptions. Harsh truth is all forms of adoptions have drawbacks, but we think that going privately was a much better decision.