Search Results for: a

An adopted child dealing with holiday separations

Easy Does It!

Even preschoolers can get stressed by holidays. A few simple games and activities can ward off the meltdowns.

Adoption Timeline

How Long Does It Take to Adopt a Child?

The adoption timeline can vary dramatically, depending your chosen route. This general overview explains a typical adoption schedule, requirements at each step, and common expenses.

Jaxon, whose parents decided on adopting a child from foster care

A Child to Love

The path to adopting a child for many involves becoming a foster parent first. Learn about the risks, rewards, and responsibilities of caring for children in the U.S. foster care system.

Gotcha Day

Parent-to-Parent: The Great Gotcha Debate

The term "Gotcha Day" has ardent fans and strong detractors in the adoption community. We asked Adoptive Families readers how they feel about it, and whether they use the term in their family. Here's what you said.

Two preschool girls engaging in make-believe

The Tales They Tell

Preschoolers love stories. Listen carefully and you might learn a thing or two.

adoption conversation

The Continuing Adoption Conversation

Around age six or seven, children start to wonder, "Who am I?" This is when our children can truly understand that joining your family through adoption means they left another.

Adoption Experts answer your questions.

Ask AF: Sharing Negative Information

My nine-year-old daughter was adopted as an infant. She's been asking me about her birth parents, so I searched. I was devastated by the information I found, and have no idea when and how to reveal the details. Her birth mother died from complications due to alcoholism; her birth father has done time in prison and is now AWOL.

Deciding Where to Adopt From

“Choosing Which Country to Adopt From (Twice)”

Growing up in a mostly white, Midwestern town in the late 1970s and early 80s, watching reruns of The Donna Reed Show and Leave It to Beaver, I figured I would finish school, find a girl to marry, buy a little house with a white picket fence, and have a couple of kids who looked like me. This was the middle-class American dream, and at the time it never occurred to me that life would turn out any other way.

Top