Does Placing My Baby for Adoption Make Me a Bad Person?
You may be feeling conflicted about your adoption decision. Maybe you don’t have a strong support system right now or you’re experiencing financial, emotional or physical difficulties. Perhaps there are people in your life who are strongly recommending you keep the baby for their own reasons. All of these circumstances might be adding to feelings of guilt or inadequacy.
We hope if you are experiencing feelings like this you will understand that placing your child for adoption does not make you a bad person! On the contrary, it is a compassionate and wise choice that shows how much love you have for your child. Now more than ever, choosing adoption is recognized as the brave and loving decision it has always been. You’re choosing the best life for you and your child based on complex circumstances. Sometimes only a few closest to you know what those are. You’re making a choice based on healthy love for yourself and your baby and there can be nothing “bad” about a choice like that.
It’s normal to feel apprehension and doubt about this decision. You should know there are many benefits of your adoption—for you, your partner, your child, and the adoptive family. It’s not an easy process but it’s a rewarding one that can give you and your child a happy path into a future filled with family and fulfillment.
How a Birth Mother Benefits
Your benefits are many. You will feel the joy and blessing that comes from making a choice to place your baby in a loving family, ensuring a happy and successful life. Because you are involved in each step of the process and make the final decision, there is great comfort in securing a nurturing home for your baby.
There may be difficult financial circumstances in your life. You may be facing the prospect of delaying or abandoning plans for your education and career. You might not have a support system ready to surround you with the resources any mother needs to raise a child. When you choose adoption, these important plans become open to you again, all in the context of your selfless decision.
If you choose an open adoption, you will receive pictures and letters about your child’s life as they grow up in a loving home. You make this choice during the adoption plan stage of the process. In a closed adoption, you choose to have no contact with your child or their adoptive family. Whatever you choose, you can feel comfort knowing it is your decision and it is based on love.
Women who choose adoption are more likely to finish school, more likely to marry and more likely to be employed a year after their child is born. They’re also less likely to live in poverty and less likely to divorce. While it’s not an easy decision to make, you’re making a decision that can bring happiness and peace to your child and yourself.
Women who choose adoption have been shown to benefit in many ways. Many women have made the same decision as you for the following reasons:
- You will know you secured a happy, stable home for your baby
- You will be able to continue your planned education, career and goals
- You have the power to choose to stay in contact with your child and their adoptive parents or not
- You are more likely to finish your education and be employed
- You are less likely to divorce or live in poverty
How Your Child Benefits
When they grow up with parents in a stable home, they’ll have access to resources and opportunities they wouldn’t have otherwise. When a child grows up in a loving home the birth parent carefully secured for them, they are more likely to have greater health, long-lasting friendships in their youth, and direct, compassionate, one-on-one attention.
As your child grows into adulthood, they will understand their birth mother made the selfless decision to introduce them to this family and experience the joy and blessing of growing up in this stable, loving environment. They’re more likely to attend college, form lasting, long-term relationships, and enjoy a successful life and career.
Even though it can be hard to give your child to another family, consider the advantages of adoption and privileges your child will have:
- They will grow up in a stable, two-parent home with resources and opportunities
- They will have greater health, attention, and long-lasting friendships and relationships
- They will understand the decision you made for them to grow up in a loving home
- They are more likely to attend college and enjoy a happy, productive career
How the Adoptive Parents Benefit
The adoptive parents and family will feel the joy and blessing of adding a child to their family. Whether they are choosing to adopt because of painful struggles with infertility or other reasons, they see adoption as a beautiful way to raise a child.
If you choose to involve the adoptive family in the birth process, imagine what that will mean for parents who have faced issues with infertility. Being a part of the birth and holding a baby they will raise for the first time is a priceless, beautiful moment. It’s an experience they may not have in any other way.
They will experience the love that comes from preparing a home for a child, parenting a child into adulthood, and preparing them for life’s difficult, wonderful, complicated opportunities and experiences. These benefits are the benefits of a lifetime.
The adoptive parents will be thankful for your choice and will have many wonderful experiences because of your decision:
- Experience the wonder and joy of childbirth
- Know they have been lovingly selected to add a child to their family
- Experience the lifetime of joys that come from raising a child
The Beauty of Adoption
The process of adoption is difficult, beautiful and rewarding. You will love yourself, your child and the family you choose through a process of careful preparation, selection and adoption. You will feel strength knowing you have made a selfless, loving decision that involves another soul. And you will open the way for both you and your child to experience a full and satisfying life.
You are not a bad person for making this choice. You are a wise and loving mother with a bright, happy future, and whether you choose to share it with your child and their parents, we hope you will experience the lifetime benefits of adoption.