Many people have asked us why we chose to work with an adoption consultant. This is a good question, because, by law, most states require that private domestic adoptions be performed through a licensed agency and/or lawyer. With an estimated 3,000 adoption agencies in the United States, not including adoption lawyers, consultants, intermediaries, and facilitators who work in the industry, how do you pick one? And who can you trust?
Following the advice of friends, and, because we knew next to nothing about the adoption process, my husband and I decided to work with an adoption consultant.
Consultants are independent, unlicensed adoption experts who charge a flat fee for 12-18 months of their service. These services include helping design a profile book, connecting Hopeful Adoptive Parents (HAPs) to ethical adoption agencies, presenting cases from their own personal outside sources, and providing accompaniment during matching, potential disruptions, and successful adoption placement. They also provide personal experience, emotional support and explanation of legal requirements.
Ethical Adoption
During our initial research, we learned about what is often called the “adoption industry.” This term has a negative connotation and is used to describe the business or for-profit side of adoption. Agencies, lawyers, facilitators and consultants all make a living from uniting birth parents and HAPs, and this cost has skyrocketed since the pandemic. Immoral practices also exist and impact birth parents and HAPs. One can easily find stories about lawyers and agencies taking advantage of mothers in vulnerable situations and/or HAPs being deceived or swindled by scammers.
Questionable situations – such as a mother flown in from another country to deliver in the US and then sent home without her child – have populated news stories for years. When a mother is treated unethically, she does not receive the care necessary to bring her unborn child to term and she is not given the tools she needs to improve her situation, whether that be housing, counseling or other basic needs. An ethical agency does not try to manipulate an expectant mother by withholding support or exacting penalties, and they do not expect repayment even if a mother changes her mind and decides to parent.
An expectant mother looking for help should not feel coerced or manipulated into placing her child for adoption. Women in exceptionally vulnerable situations, such as those addicted to substances or serving a prison term, are often at higher risk for exploitation. This does not mean that incarcerated women or substance users should not place their children for adoption; however, every opportunity should be provided for them to improve their situations, reclaim their lives, and raise their children if they so desire.
Risk to Adoptive Parents
The risks faced by HAPs include susceptibility to intended and unintended injury.
Intentional harm occurs when a HAP is deceived or swindled by a disreputable agency or an agency itself is duped by a scammer. This can result in financial loss, emotional pain, and general distress for all involved.
Unintentional harm occurs in the form of disruptions. This occurs when a birth mother changes her mind and decides to keep her child, which can occur even after the child is born and has been placed with an adoptive family. The time interval when the mother can still legally change her mind is called the “revocation period,” and can last anywhere from 2 to 45 days after birth, depending on the state where the baby is born. There is also a separate amount of time set aside for the biological father to assert his parental rights (during which the birth is listed in a putative father registry). This registry was created to protect the rights of fathers who may not be aware of a child until after he or she has been placed for adoption.
In addition to potential emotional injury, the HAP is also subject to financial risk. Some agencies require the payment of non-reimbursable fees at the time of matching. Called “at-risk fees,” the money is used to cover the mother’s needs during and after her pregnancy. At-risk fees typically range from $5,000-$20,000 per match and the amount is regulated by state law, although it can be altered by a court order. With this model, HAPs stand to lose a large amount of savings if they are unfortunate enough to experience several disruptions.
Notably, during the pandemic, many agencies closed while others faced financial set-backs caused by a significant decrease in the number of children being placed for adoption. It is understandable that these agencies wanted to increase their own financial stability by transferring at-risk fees to the HAP, but not all agencies adopted this practice. During our wait, I felt it was unfair that some agencies were asking us to risk money we had set aside for our adoption. Not everyone can afford to lose $15,000 over a disruption! There were many cases we did not present to because we did not feel it was wise to risk a large amount on “at-risk fees.”
Thankfully, not all agencies incorporate this practice. Our agency provided complete care for birth moms, including affordable housing, medical insurance, prenatal care, and mental health counseling until 6 weeks postpartum. To decrease the likelihood of disruption, they waited until the third trimester before facilitating a match. The agency also absorbed any loss from a failed match, and did not require payment until the day the HAPs signed adoption paperwork and took guardianship of their new child. I think this was possible because the agency was very small and had very little overhead, but I share this to give an example of what we felt was an ethical agency.
Our Adoption Consultant
Thankfully, as mentioned above, not every agency requires HAPs to pay “at-risk fees,” and using a consultant was very instrumental in helping us connect to those agencies.
Our consultant, an adoptive mother herself, was very knowledgeable about the “adoption industry” and had vetted and chosen reputable agencies and adoption lawyers with ethical practices and affordable sign-up fees for us to review (some agencies have large sign-on fees, precluding you from going to any other agency). From this list we chose ones that appealed to us and applied to be prospective parents. We also received multiple cases a month from the consultant herself. This provided us with greater exposure and likely shortened our wait time.
I don’t think using a consultant is necessary for everyone. If you are knowledgeable about which agencies or lawyers are honest and trustworthy and you know what to expect during the adoption process, then you can probably forgo using a consultant and find your own way. We started off feeling inexperienced and overwhelmed, so using a consultant benefited us immensely.
If you are going to work with a consultant, it is very important to find one you trust. We interviewed three different ones with excellent reputations, and during the interview we asked how they vetted agencies, how many families they worked with, and how many times their families had successfully adopted in the past year. We eventually decided to work with a Christian consultant. She shared our religious values, had adopted two children, worked with only ten families at a time, and had worked with multiple families who successfully adopted.
To share one example of her support: After being matched for several months we encountered a disruption (the mother decided to parent the week the baby was born), our consultant called and talked to both of us on speaker phone for a long time. She consoled us, reassured us that the Lord had a plan, and she made a point of telling my husband to take extra care of me, because “women experience disruptions differently than men.” It made a huge difference in how we felt during that time and helped us to remember that this was a time for my husband and me to draw closer together.
Months later, our consultant walked us through each step as we received the phone call to leave the next day for Texas to get our baby girl, to bring specific paperwork, and advised us on car seats and baby clothes for the hospital. She spoke directly with the agency and was able to answer our questions, guiding us through an entirely foreign process.
When we eventually finalized the adoption of our beautiful daughter, our consultant sent us cards and gifts, sharing in our joy. She also understood some of the mixed feelings I personally was working through, because she too is an adoptive mother. Welcoming a child through adoption is a huge blessing, but it is also hard, because it comes at the expense of someone else’s loss and sorrow.
I whole-heartedly recommend a good adoption consultant and, looking back, I can say that in addition to giving us peace of mind over finding an ethical agency, it also provided us with a knowledgeable friend who walked beside us on our journey.
Returning author Celeste has been married to Patrick for almost five years and writes from southeastern Connecticut. Read more about her adoption journey.
