Disruption (adoption)

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Disruption is ending an adoption. While technically an adoption is disrupted only when it is abandoned by the adopting parent or parents before it is legally completed (an adoption that is reversed after that point is instead referred to in the law as having been dissolved), in practice the term is used for all adoptions that are ended (more recently, among families disrupting, the euphemism "re-homing" has become current).[ citation needed ] It is usually initiated by the parents via a court petition, much like a divorce, to which it is analogous.

Contents

While rarely discussed in public, even within the adoption community, the practice has become far more widespread in recent years, especially among those parents who have adopted from Eastern European countries, particularly Russia and Romania, where some children have suffered far more from their institutionalization than their parents were led to believe.

Reasons for disruption

Despite the intense and careful screening that most who wish to adopt children must go through, sometimes the adoption does not succeed. The child may have developmental or psychological issues that the parents cannot handle, had not been informed of prior to the adoption, or both. Or the parents may have had unrealistic expectations of the child, and they just may not get along. The adoptive parents themselves may have psychological or family issues themselves that led them down the path to adopt. These adoptive parents adopt thinking that the new child in their life will somehow enhance their life.

Aftermath of disruption

A child who is disrupted is usually put first into foster care, pending placement with a new family, unless they reach the age of 18 and legally become adults before this happens. In more and more recent disruptions, however, the disrupting adopters have been in direct contact with a family wishing to adopt and the child can be directly adopted by the new family.

Some adoption agencies and facilitators have even begun specializing in post-disruption placements.

If the child was placed privately, either through a lawyer or an adoption agency, that party is usually required by law to ensure a second placement of the child. However, that requirement is not always enforced, and many parents of Eastern European adoptees in particular have found their agencies to be of no help in finding a new home for their children.

Some don't find state social-services agencies to be much help either, since they're already so overwhelmed and they would have to pay child support. Authorities believe that an underground, possibly illegal, network has arisen in the U.S. over the past decade to help these parents disrupt their adoptions. [1] Some of the people in this have taken in large numbers of children at the same time and have sometimes been arrested for child abuse and neglect.

Attitudes toward disruption

Few parents who have disrupted adoptions have been willing to talk about the process, since it carries a strong social stigma. It is seen by many as essentially legally sanctioned abandonment, especially since there is no corresponding legal procedure available for biological parents who find their children beyond their ability to handle, apart from giving their children up for adoption.

Those who do disrupt and discuss it describe the experience as, unsurprisingly, extremely painful, almost like a death in the family, and shameful but ultimately worth it for both the parent and the child. This resolution, however, usually cannot be reached without undergoing extensive counseling and therapy.

High-profile disruptions

One of the rare public accounts of a disruption took place in 2000 when the CBS News program 48 Hours told the story of Jesse and Crystal Money, an Atlanta-area couple who ultimately decided to disrupt the adoption of their nine-year-old Russian-born daughter and return her to the orphanage in Moscow she had previously lived in. The girl had severe reactive attachment disorder and the family feared for their physical safety due to her increasing violence. Since the girl had not acquired U.S. citizenship, her treatment options for that were more limited than they might have been for a domestically-born child. [2] [3]

An Indonesian boy adopted by an Irish man, Joe Dowse, and his Azerbaijani wife, Lala. Tristan Dowse was abandoned at the Indonesian orphanage from where he had been obtained and adopted, when, according to the Dowses, the adoption "hadn't worked out." At that stage, his adoption had been recognised by the Irish Adoption Board and he had been granted Irish citizenship. He could only speak English. In 2005, investigative journalist Ann McElhinney and Irish Production Company Esras Films reunited the young boy with his natural mother, Suryani. The resulting documentary “The Search for Tristan's Mum” was broadcast by Irish television station RTÉ. In 2006, an Irish court ordered the Dowses to pay an immediate lump sum of €20,000 to Tristan, maintenance of €350 per month until he is 18 years of age, and a further lump sum of €25,000 when he reaches the age of 18. In addition, Tristan would remain an Irish citizen and enjoy all the rights to the Dowses’ estate. Tristan’s adoption was struck off the Register of Foreign Adoptions held by the Irish Adoption Board and Suryani was appointed his sole legal guardian. [4]

In 2010, seven-year-old Artyom Savelyev/Justin Hansen's adoptive mother, Torry Ann Hansen, sent him back to Moscow alone with a note explaining why she no longer wanted him. [5] After this incident, Russian Children's Ombudsman, Pavel Astakhov, said: "We must, as much as possible, keep our children in our country" and urged for more restrictions on international adoptions in Russia. [5] [6] The Chairwoman of the Russian parliamentary committee on family and children, Yelena Mizulina, pointed out that 30,000 children were sent back to institutions by their Russian adoptive, foster, or guardianship families in the last three years. [7] She added: "Specialists call such a boom in returns a humanitarian catastrophe." [7]

In 2020, it emerged that YouTubers Myka and James Stauffer had decided to "rehome" their child, Huxley, who was adopted by the couple from China in 2017. The Ohio-based couple had made popular videos on YouTube featuring their son which attracted millions of views. 27 of these videos were related to their "adoption journey", with one video titled "Huxley's EMOTIONAL Adoption VIDEO!! GOTCHA DAY China Adoption" having been viewed more than 5.5 million times. [8] The couple was aware the child has mental disabilities before the adoption but had decided to proceed after "God softened [their] hearts". [9] After medical professionals determined these disabilities specifically include autism and a brain cyst, the couple proceeded with rehoming when allegedly told "he needed a different fit". [10]

Statistics

Since no records are kept or required to be kept of how many disruptions occur beyond those filed in court, which are confidential, there is no way to be sure how many are occurring. Anecdotal evidence, however, has suggested that while they may have decreased as a whole through 1997 (when the Adoption and Safe Families Act was passed), for adoptions of Eastern-European born children they may well have increased, and thus the rate may have stabilized.

A U.S. Department of Health and Human Services review of what was known as of 2004 suggests that overall, 10-25% of adoptions are disrupted or dissolved, and that the rate tends to rise with the age of the child at adoption. It admitted that much data remains to be collected before any clear policies to prevent disruptions can be formulated and implemented. [11]

A similar review in 2002 by the British Department for Education and Skills, done to lobby for changes in data collection procedures, also reported the lack of any centrally collected data [12]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adoption</span> Parenting a child in place of the original parents

Adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting of another, usually a child, from that person's biological or legal parent or parents. Legal adoptions permanently transfer all rights and responsibilities, along with filiation, from the biological parents to the adoptive parents.

Child abandonment is the practice of relinquishing interests and claims over one's offspring in an illegal way, with the intent of never resuming or reasserting guardianship. The phrase is typically used to describe the physical abandonment of a child, but it can also include severe cases of neglect and emotional abandonment, such as when parents fail to provide financial and emotional support for children over an extended period of time. An abandoned child is referred to as a foundling. Baby dumping refers to parents leaving a child younger than 12 months in a public or private place with the intent of terminating their care for the child. It is also known as rehoming when adoptive parents use illegal means, such as the internet, to find new homes for their children. In the case where child abandonment is anonymous within the first 12 months, it may be referred to as secret child abandonment.

Filiation is the legal term for the recognized legal status of the relationship between family members, or more specifically the legal relationship between parent and child. As described by the Government of Quebec:

Filiation is the relationship which exists between a child and the child’s parents, whether the parents are of the same or the opposite sex. The relationship can be established by blood, by law in certain cases, or by a judgment of adoption. Once filiation has been established, it creates rights and obligations for both the child and the parents, regardless of the circumstances of the child’s birth.

Same-sex adoption is the adoption of children by same-sex couples. It may take the form of a joint adoption by the couple, or of the adoption by one partner of the other's biological child.

International adoption is a type of adoption in which an individual or couple residing in one country becomes the legal and permanent parent(s) of a child who is a national of another country. In general, prospective adoptive parents must meet the legal adoption requirements of their country of residence and those of the country whose nationality the child holds.

Closed adoption is a process by which an infant is adopted by another family, and the record of the biological parent(s) is kept sealed. Often, the biological father is not recorded—even on the original birth certificate. An adoption of an older child who already knows their biological parent(s) cannot be made closed or secret. This used to be the most traditional and popular type of adoption, peaking in the decades of the post-World War II Baby Scoop Era. It still exists today, but it exists alongside the practice of open adoption. The sealed records effectively prevent the adoptee and the biological parents from finding, or even knowing anything about each other. However, the emergence of non-profit organizations and private companies to assist individuals with their sealed records has been effective in helping people who want to connect with biological relatives to do so.

In the United States, adoption is the process of creating a legal parent-child relationship between a child and a parent who was not automatically recognized as the child's parent at birth.

Open adoption is a form of adoption in which the biological and adoptive families have access to varying degrees of each other's personal information and have an option of contact. While open adoption is a relatively new phenomenon in the west, it has been a traditional practice in many Asian societies, especially in South Asia, for many centuries. In Hindu society, for example, it is relatively common for a childless couple to adopt the second or later son of the husband's brother when the childless couple has limited hope of producing their own child.

Interracial adoption refers to the act of placing a child of one racial or ethnic group with adoptive parents of another racial or ethnic group.

The China Center of Adoption Affairs (CCAA) was established on June 24, 1996 by China's Ministry of Civil Affairs. The CCAA is responsible for the welfare of children in the care of Child Welfare Institutes (orphanages), domestic adoption, and international adoption.

Child laundering is a tactic used in illegal or fraudulent international adoptions. It may involve child trafficking and child acquisition through payment, deceit or force. The children may then be held in sham orphanages while formal adoption processes are used to send them to adoptive parents in another country.

Adoption in Australia deals with the adoption process in the various parts of Australia, whereby a person assumes or acquires the permanent, legal status of parenthood in relation to a child under the age of 18 in place of the child's birth or biological parents. Australia classifies adoptions as local adoptions, and intercountry adoptions. Known child adoptions are a form of local adoptions.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to adoption:

Until 2017, laws related to LGBTQ+ couples adopting children varied by state. Some states granted full adoption rights to same-sex couples, while others banned same-sex adoption or only allowed one partner in a same-sex relationship to adopt the biological child of the other. Despite these rulings, same-sex couples and members of the LGBTQ+ community still face discrimination when attempting to foster children.

Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, 570 U.S. 637 (2013), was a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States which held that several sections of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) does not apply to Native American biological fathers who are not custodians of a Native American child. The court held that the procedures required by the ICWA to end parental rights do not apply when the child has never lived with the father. Additionally, the requirement to make extra efforts to preserve the Native American family also does not apply, nor is the preferred placement of the child in another Native American family required when no other party has formally sought to adopt the child.

Forced adoption is the practice of removing children permanently from their parents and the subsequent adoption of those children, following intervention by the Children's Services department of a Local Authority in the United Kingdom.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adoption in the Philippines</span>

Adoption in the Philippines is a process of granting social, emotional and legal family and kinship membership to an individual from the Philippines, usually a child. It involves a transfer of parental rights and obligations and provides family membership. The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) defines adoption as a "socio-legal process of giving a permanent family to a child whose parents have voluntarily or involuntarily given up their parental rights."

The second-parent adoption or co-parent adoption is a process by which a partner, who is not biologically related to the child, can adopt their partner's biological or adoptive child without terminating the first legal parent's rights. This process is of interest to many couples, as legal parenthood allows the parent's partner to do things such as: make medical decisions, claim dependency, or gain custody in the event of the death of the biological parent.

Adoption does not exist formally as a practice in Jewish Law (Halacha), although rabbinic texts were not uniform on whether or not they recognized the validity of adoption and several examples of adoption take place in the Hebrew Bible and texts from the Second Temple Judaism. The Hebrew word for adoption ‘אימוץ’ (immutz), which derives from the verb ‘אמץ’ (amatz) in Psalm 80 verse 16 and 18 meaning ‘to make strong’, was not introduced until the modern age. Jewish perspectives towards adoption promote two contradictory messages towards nurture and nature. On the one hand, Judaism expresses favourable attitudes towards adoption across religious movements and is widely viewed as a good deed (mitzvah). Based on the Talmudic teachings that when one raises an orphan in their home, "scripture ascribes it to him as though he had begotten him," Rabbis have argued that the commandment of procreation can also be fulfilled through the act of adoption. However, this interpretation raises a number of questions in relation to lineage and biological status, which is a core value in Halacha.

References

  1. ↑ Koch, Wendy (January 18, 2006). "Underground network moves children from home to home". USA Today. USA Today.
  2. ↑ "The Perfect Child". CBS News 48 Hours. 2000-02-11.
  3. ↑ Walter Goodman (2000-02-10). "An Adoption Dream Turns Nightmarish". The New York Times.
  4. ↑ "The Curious Case of Tristan Dowse". Independent. 2009-02-08.
  5. 1 2 Levy, Clifford J. (April 15, 2010). "Russia Seeks Ways to Keep Its Children". The New York Times . Retrieved April 24, 2012.
  6. ↑ "Quotes of the Day". Time . April 16, 2010. Archived from the original on April 20, 2010. Retrieved April 24, 2012.
  7. 1 2 Levy, Clifford J. (May 3, 2010). "Russian Orphanage Offers Love, but Not Families". The New York Times . Retrieved April 24, 2012.
  8. ↑ "YouTuber Myka Stauffer reveals adopted son with autism has been placed with new family". The Independent. 2020-05-28. Retrieved 2020-05-31.
  9. ↑ "Myka Stauffer: Backlash after YouTubers give up adopted son". BBC. BBC. 28 May 2020. Retrieved 28 May 2020.
  10. ↑ "Myka Stauffer: YouTuber addresses 'hurtful' comments after revealing adopted son from China has gone to a new home". Sky News. Retrieved 2020-05-31.
  11. ↑ "Adoption Disruption and Dissolution: Numbers and Trends". Archived from the original on 2005-10-18.
  12. ↑ "Monitoring Adoption Disruption Rates Post Adoption Order". Archived from the original on 2005-08-02.
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