Forward Focus Therapy, LLC

Adoption: Creating Family, Carrying Loss

Adoption creates a permanent legal parent-child relationship. In Pennsylvania, adoptive parents become the child’s legal parents, and the original parents’ legal rights are terminated.

Adoption is often described as permanency, safety, and belonging. Research shows it can provide those things—but also recognizes adoption as a lifelong experience involving loss, grief, identity, and attachment complexity.

Potential benefits: adoption can provide legal permanency when a child cannot safely return home; reduce instability after foster care; and is associated with improved safety and developmental outcomes compared to long-term foster care for many children.(Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2019; ACF/OPRE NSCAW Adoption Follow-Up Study, 2017)

Potential costs: adoption permanently severs the original legal parent-child relationship. Research and clinical literature document that adoptees may experience grief, identity disruption, loss of family connections, and adoption-related stigma—even in stable, loving homes.(Child Welfare Information Gateway, Impact of Adoption, 2013; Brodzinsky, 2011; Baden, 2016)

What research suggests supports better outcomes:
stable, well-supported placements
adoptive parents trained in trauma, attachment, and identity
honest communication about origins
maintained connections to siblings, culture, and safe family relationships
ongoing post-adoption support
openness in adoption when safe

Research consistently shows openness and access to information are associated with better identity development and psychological adjustment.(Grotevant & McRoy, 1998; Grotevant et al., 2013; Donaldson Adoption Institute, Openness in Adoption, 2012)

Children—especially older youth—should be meaningfully involved in permanency decisions. Youth who report having a voice in planning and relationships (not just legal status) show better outcomes.(Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative, 2013; ACF “Youth Involvement in Permanency Planning,” 2019)

Adoption can provide stability and permanency.

It can also involve loss, identity work, and lifelong complexity.

Both can be true.

Sources

Child Welfare Information Gateway (2013, 2019) – Impact of Adoption; Adoption
ACF/OPRE (2017) – NSCAW II Adoption Follow-Up Study
Brodzinsky, D. (2011) – Children’s Adjustment to Adoption
Baden, A. (2016) – Do You Know Your Real Parents?
Grotevant, H. & McRoy, R. (1998; 2013 follow-ups) – Openness in Adoption research
Donaldson Adoption Institute (2012) – Openness in Adoption
Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative (2013) – Youth Permanency Research
American Academy of Pediatrics (2012) – Health Care of Adopted Children
Vandivere, Malm & Radel (2009) – Adoption USA
Miller et al. (2000) – Adoptee mental health utilization research

How does guardianship fit into the bigger picture of permanency?

When a child can’t safely stay with their parents, the goal becomes permanency — a stable, long-term place to grow up.

There are a few different ways the system tries to do that:
• Reunification
• Guardianship
• Adoption
• Long-term foster care

Guardianship is one of those options — not the only one.

It’s typically used when:
Reunification isn’t possible
A child is already living with a stable caregiver
That situation needs to be made legally secure

What it offers:
Day-to-day stability
A committed adult raising the child
Legal authority for that adult to act as caregiver