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Should hopeful adoptive parents pay the living expenses of women considering adoption?
I’m of two minds about this one.
Mostly I dislike the idea.
To be quite frank about it, having your living expenses paid for nine months is a pretty big incentive to hand over the kid at the end. If the expectant mom begins to realize that she wants to parent, the daunting prospect of having to come up with all that money is a significant enough burden that she’ll probably go along with the original plan, despite her misgivings.
I also think there’s a small taint of babyselling to this type of exchange, even though it is usually intended to be nothing more than a sincere helping hand. Good intentions aside, the facts are that a woman receives a financial benefit, in exchange for what she can offer: a child.
But at the same time, I do understand that many women, deeply in crisis, truly need the help, no matter what their ultimate decision. I just wish they had somewhere else to turn, rather than potential adoptive parents, who also stand to suffer a loss if she decides to parent.
The need for housing while pregnant is hard for me to fully fathom, since that was not my situation—I had my own home and I was financially secure. But if I put myself in the shoes of someone who is broke and scared, and maybe without a place to live, I can see how accepting help from the child’s potential parents would seem like a fine idea.
So what’s the answer? I think one solution might be to have agencies create a housing expense fund, subsidized by donations and fees from prospective adoptive parents. Women in crisis could apply for a grant from the fund, without having to pay it back should they decide to parent.
That way, no one couple is paying the way of any expectant mother, so there isn’t that personalized feeling of obligation. Prospective parents would not be able to hold it over the expectant mom’s head: “But we’ve spent all this money on you! You can’t back out on us now!”
I hear that this actually happens in some of the more enlightened agencies. Of course, my scholarship plan does nothing to address what happens in private adoption. I don’t know what the solution is there. I guess there is no good way around it…sometimes money is going to change hands. Sometimes maybe it should.
Just don’t get me started on the “baby farms”—you know, the ones with the dormitory style housing and the swimming pools, and the stipulations that you must pay the “helping organization” back in full if you decide to parent.
My point is this: no one should give up their baby because they feel indebted to people who have more money than they do.
I think that is a great idea. I thought the same thing when I saw a recent Dateline with several adopting couples who had been “scammed” by the same expectant mother. I also wondered how ethical it was for THEM to offer her cash & assistance, and of course they all then felt “entitled” to that baby. There should be ways to supply the needs of moms in crisis pregnancy, without it coming directly from anyone who would have an interest in if they place that child for adoption or not.
My husband and I adopted three children (as newborns) non-agency and we paid no type of assistance to any of the birth mothers, but then they had not needed any.
being a birth mother my self i can see the side of recieveing the finacial help. i think part of the cost of adoption should be used to assist thoes bmothers in need of additional help, but that the money is given to the agency to disperse to the ones who need it. I think that way it can keep it a little impersonal untill the papers are actually signed. because untill then the prospective bmom can still change her mind and keep the baby.