Adoption Questions & Answers
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Q. What is an adoption home study?
Q. Who should complete our home study?
Q. When should we start the home study?
Q. What is an adoption facilitator and should I use their services?
Q. I am single, can I adopt a child through your agency?
Q. I do not live in the United States. Can I work with your agency?
Q. I have a DUI conviction on my record. Will this hurt my chances for adoption?
Q. I have a medical condition. Can I still adopt?
Q. I am interested in adopting a special needs child.
Q. Does your adoption agency only handle infant adoptions? I am interested in adopting an older child.
Q. Can military couples adopt?
Q. Can same sex couples adopt through your agency?
Q. I am interested in international adoption, can I do that through your agency?
Q. How does American Adoptions find healthy
babies faster than other programs?
Q. Approximately, how many families are on your waiting list at this time? Also, how many birth mothers are you working with at this time
Q. What is the total cost for the entire adoption?
Q. Why is there a cost difference between the Traditional I and Traditional II programs?
Q. Why do adoptions from the Agency-Assisted Program cost less than your Traditional programs?
Q. What type of budget is reasonable and within the average for your agency?
Q. Would you try adoption versus spending $10,000 for in vitro?
Q. Do you ever have adoption seminars?
Q. Do we need to retain our own attorney?
Q. What type of adoption does your agency handle? Open? Closed?
Q. Can we choose the gender of our baby?
Q. Will we receive any medical or background information on the expectant mother?
Q. Does your adoption agency require drug testing for your birth mothers?
Q. At what point can the birth parent(s) sign over their parental rights?
Q. I hear that birth mothers can change their mind and take back the baby, how safe is our adoption?
Q. If the birth mother chooses to keep her baby, what happens to the money that we have paid?
Q. What does it mean when your internet available situations mentions that the mother used daily cigarettes, weekly marijuana usage, etc.?
Q. If we are on “active” status waiting to adopt and I should become pregnant, what happens next? Would we still be able to adopt, or can our fees be put "on hold" for a period of time?
Q. Your packet of information states that the average time spent on your waiting list is 1-18 months. What happens if a baby has not been found for us after 2 years? Will any of our fees be refunded?
Q. Would you be able to supply me with a copy of your adoption agency's most recent annual report. I understand that non profit organizations publish these and that they detail the agency's revenues and expenses.
Q. What is the next step?
Q. Can we fill out our pre-application online?
Q. What if I’ve already received the application packet for adoption but the packet is 60 days old or more?
Q. What is an adoption home study?
A. A home study is a basic overview of your family’s life, history and home. A home study is a review of you, your spouse and anyone else living in your home. It highlights items such as relationships and history, interactions with children, your childhood and your home and neighborhood. Initially, the home study process frightens some families until they actually complete one. With American Adoptions, our goal is to make the process both easy and relaxing. The home study allows the courts and our agency to determine if a stable environment exists for a family to receive an adoptive placement. Collecting documents for the home study can be time consuming. Items such as birth certificates and marriage license are required to confirm your identity. Since the home study can be the lengthiest piece of getting ready to adopt, it is recommended that you begin this process as soon as possible.
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Q. Who should complete our home study?
A. If you reside in a state where American Adoptions is licensed to complete home studies, American Adoptions can complete your home study and ensure that it is completed to the best standards. Under no circumstances should you allow just anyone to complete your home study. We work with families from across the United States and constantly see the difficulty they endure with home studies. Many pay hundreds of dollars more than they should have, while others are forced to have their home studies redone because of insufficient information. This is often due to the Home Study provider’s inexperience with requirements for states outside their own. American Adoptions works nationally; therefore we have discovered the best format for our home studies to prevent unnecessary complications.
It is important to note that many states, adoption agencies, and courts will only accept home studies from licensed adoption agencies. In those situations, if you have selected someone other than a licensed adoption agency to complete your home study, you may be required to have a qualified adoption agency perform another home study for you. This often means an increasing waiting period to receive your child and doubling your costs. The Interstate Compact for the Placement of Children (ICPC) accepts American Adoptions’ home studies across the United States. ICPC is each state’s general review of all adoption paperwork and supporting documents to make sure it is in proper order. It has been our experience that ICPC offices can deny or delay approval of the adoption due to the home study NOT being completed by a licensed child placing agency.
If you need assistance locating a licensed adoption agency in your state to complete your home study please contact 1-800-HOMESTUDY, visit
1-800-HOMESTUDY
or ask your Adoption Coordinator for assistance.
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Q. When should we start the home study?
A. You should begin your home study process as soon as you are ready to begin the adoption process. If you are using American Adoptions for your home study services, your home study will take an average of four to six weeks to be completed, depending on your state of residence. You should submit your Preliminary Application to American Adoptions and begin the steps of having your criminal and child abuse clearances processed around the same time, as these should occur parallel to each other.
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Q. What is an adoption facilitator and should I use their services?
A. An adoption facilitator is an unlicensed for-profit company providing adoption services. Adoption facilitation is illegal in many states and is strongly discouraged to adoptive families. Adoption facilitators have no central licensing authority nor are regulated by their state. In addition, they do not provide needed services to birth parents and adoptive families, and therefore the number of their failed adoptions is extremely high. Adoptive families are initially drawn to adoption facilitators because of the promise of low fees and short waiting times only to find out too late that they had been taken advantage of by an unscrupulous organization. Adoptive families are encouraged to contact the licensing departments of the adoption professional that they plan on using before they commit to a particular adoption program.
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Q. I am single, can I adopt a child through your agency?
A. Unfortunately, we are not currently handling single parent adoptions. Here are some referrals for you to check into:
Spence-Chapin
A Childs Waiting
Adoption.com
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Q. I do not live in the United States. Can I work with your agency?
A. In most cases, the answer to this question is yes. As long as you are able to have a home study completed in your country, we should be able to work with you. A home study is required for all adoptions in the United States. Most families complete their home study through the Social Services Department of their government.If you are a military family stationed outside of the U.S., the military or the U.S. Embassy should be able to help you with this step.
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Q. I have a DUI conviction on my record. Will this hurt my chances for adoption?
A. A DUI will not automatically preclude you from being able to adopt. Every adoption agency has their own policy regarding convictions. Our agency looks at each situation individually. In most cases, if a significant amount of time has passed since the DUI occurred, and the individual has followed all of the steps required by the court, this is not an issue.
A DUI, or any other conviction, will need to be addressed during the home study process. Please explain to your social worker the circumstances of your conviction and the details of how the court handled it. The social worker will summarize the situation in your home study report. Your home study report will be a part of the court proceedings for your adoption. This is not something that birth parents would ever see or know about your family unless you choose to inform them.
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Q. I have a medical condition. Can I still adopt?
A. We look at medical conditions on a case-by-case basis. As part of the home study process you will be required to have a current medical statement from your doctor. The medical statement asks your doctor to rate your physical and mental ability to parent a child. Every family who adopts completes this part of the process regardless of their health. We have worked with many people with special health considerations that have successfully adopted.
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Q. I am interested in adopting a special needs child.
A. Our agency mainly deals with healthy newborns and infants. If you want to adopt a special needs child, please visit:
Adopt America Network
Adoption Advantage
Spence-Chapin
Gladney Center for Adoption
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Q. Does your adoption agency only handle infant adoptions? I am interested in adopting an older child.
A. Our agency mainly works with healthy newborns and infants under six months of age. If you are interested in adopting an older child, you may wish to contact your local Social Service agency to inquire about older children available for adoption in the foster care system.
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Q. Can military couples adopt?
A. Absolutely - We have worked with many military couples. This will not preclude you from being eligible to adopt!
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Q. Can same sex couples adopt through your agency?
A. We are not currently working with same-sex couples. For more information, please visit:
Open Adoption and Family Services
A Child's Waiting
Spence-Chapin
Family Builders by Adoption
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Q. I am interested in international adoption, can I do that through your agency?
A. We are a domestic adoption agency that handles mainly newborns and infants born in the U.S. If you have any questions please e-mail us at info@americanadoptions.com or call us at 1-800-ADOPTION.
We encourage you to research and understand the difference between international and domestic adoption before you make your choice. There are pros and cons to both choices and it is important to be as informed as possible so that you can make the best choice for your family.
Many adoptive families choose international adoption versus domestic out of fear that birth parents will come back and take the child. As it is true that with most international adoptions the birth parents are not involved and therefore are not going to interfere with the adoption process, this often leads to a lack of important information about your child’s social and medical background. It is unfortunate that the media dramatizes the bad adoption cases because they are truly the exception. Our agency is involved in over 300 successful adoptions annually. Please feel free to contact us for more information.
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Q. How does American Adoptions find healthy
babies faster than other programs?
A. There are four key reasons why we locate babies so quickly:
First, we do not limit ourselves to advertising in one state. Our national advertising program, combined with our marketing research, allows us to be efficient in locating birth mothers. In fact we are contacted by over 150 pregnant women each month inquiring about our adoption services.
Second, we balance the amount of adoptive families with pregnant mothers. Many adoption agencies will accept an unlimited amount of families on their waiting lists, thus pushing the time to receive a baby well beyond 3-5 years. By limiting the number of families, we reduce the waiting time to receive a baby.
Third, our staff is the main reason we find babies so quickly. At American Adoptions, we develop a special relationship with our expectant mothers. Our adoption counselors know what information to provide so as to inform and not overwhelm. Furthermore, we are readily available for them by providing 24 hours a day, seven days a week counseling services.
Finally, we have the best adoptive families in America, which attracts more expectant mothers to our agency.
Through national advertising, time management, quality staffing and superior adoptive families, our adoptive placements average 1-18 months for all of our programs combined.
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Q. Approximately, how many families are on your waiting list at this time? Also, how many birth mothers are you working with at this time
A. This number varies according to the number of birth mothers with which we are working. We try to keep the ratio as close to a one-to-one ratio as possible so we are giving accurate wait times to our adoptive families.
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Q. What is the total cost for the entire adoption?
A. There are several factors that determine the total cost for an adoption, including the program you choose. Variables such as medical bills, birth mother expenses and legal fees vary for each adoption. We strive to maintain affordable adoptions without cutting corners. Please see the "Our Programs" section for further details.
Fee estimates do not include home study or travel expenses. Adoptive families are allowed to place a limit on their adoption budget. Our free adoption information provides fee descriptions, waiting times and family eligibility for each of our adoption programs.
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Q. Why is there a cost difference between the Traditional I and Traditional II programs?
A. The total agency fees for both programs are identical. The difference in the cost lies in the fact that there are higher living expenses and medical expenses required in a Traditional II adoption. Because there are fewer families that are able to afford these higher adoption costs, the waiting time is significantly reduced. Families in the Traditional I Program also must accept specific requirements regarding the race of the baby, druge usage and birth parent medical history. For more details, contact one of our Adoptive Family Coordinators at 1-800-ADOPTION.
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Q. Why do adoptions from the Agency-Assisted Program cost less than your Traditional programs?
A. This special program was designed by American Adoptions to bring attention to the need for families to adopt African-American or part African-American children in the U.S. Across the nation, there is a vast shortage of families seeking to adopt children of an African-American descent. Due to this shortage, American Adoptions created the Agency-Assisted Program to bring light to this need and to aid families seeking to adopt African-American children.
As part of the Agency-Assisted Program, American Adoptions subsidizes the advertising costs to make the adoption process more affordable for families. By subsidizing part of this cost, our agency has been able to locate more families for this program, as well as help make parenthood a reality for many couples hoping to adopt on a limited budget.
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Q. What type of budget is reasonable and within the average for your agency?
A. A match budget of $25,000 is fairly average with our agency. The match budget is the amount an adoptive family has available to spend on their adoption after they have paid their preactivation fees (profile fee, home study fees, activation fee, etc.) It is hard to say how long of a wait one will have with this budget as it depends on other variables. Filling out the Adoption Planning Questionnaire (APQ) will help our staff understand what additional variables your family is open to. The more quality a family’s profile is and the more flexible their APQ is, the greater chance they will fall within our average wait times.
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Q. Would you try adoption versus spending $10,000 for in vitro?
A. This is a very personal decision and a sensitive one as well. We encourage families too look at all the facts. Your family needs to weigh the pros and cons of both choices and decide what feels comfortable for you. We can tell you that most families that join our agency become parents. Adoption is a wonderful option for families who want the experience of becoming parents, without the heartache and difficulty of multiple attempts with drugs and medical procedures.
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Q. Do you ever have adoption seminars?
A. Please check our Web site for an update of the status of our seminars by clicking here. Our Adoptive Family Coordinators would also be glad to work with you and answer any of your adoption questions. Feel free to contact one by calling 1-800-ADOPTION.
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Q. Do we need to retain our own attorney?
A. No - American Adoptions has established relationships with some of the best adoption attorneys in the nation. It is important to note that adoption laws vary state-to-state and often even county-to-county. As such, it is important to utilize the services of an attorney that specializes in adoption in the state the adoption will finalize in, which we will not know until you are matched with an expectant mother. Retaining your own attorney at this time is not necessary and may be an additional expense to you that is not needed.
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Q. What type of adoption does your agency handle? Open? Closed?
A. A small percentage of our adoptions are completely open. The majority of adoptions that our agency does are what would be considered “semi-open.” This means that there is contact between that adoptive family and the birth parents in the way of conference calls and/or face-to-face meetings, but no identifying information is exchanged. Most birth parent(s) will know your first names and the state in which you live. They will not know your address, phone number, etc., unless you choose to share this.
In addition to the conference calls and meetings, most birth parent(s) request that the adoptive family sends pictures and letters at regular intervals. Our standard picture/letter agreement requires adoptive families to provide pictures and letters through the age of 18. Picture and letter correspondence is typically handled via the agency.
We do not allow completely closed adoptions in which there is no contact with the birth parents whatsoever. There are so few birth parent(s) that want no contact or future correspondence that this would lead to a significant wait time.
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Q. Can we choose the gender of our baby?
A. In the traditional programs we do not allow our families to be gender specific. In the majority of traditional adoptions, the adoptive family is matched with the birth parents prior to the birth and the gender is unknown. We would never want a family to reject a baby because is ends up being the “wrong” gender. This would be very offensive to the birth mother.
In the Agency-Assisted Program we do allow our families to be gender specific. Matches in this program typically occur after the birth of the baby and therefore we are sure about the gender of the child.
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Q. Will we receive any medical or background information on the expectant mother?
A. Yes, hospital records and extensive medical and social history forms are completed by the birth parents, which provides a wealth of information. This type of information is extremely important and is a valuable tool to you and your child as they grow.
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Q. Does your adoption agency require drug testing for your birth mothers?
A. We do not require drug testing for our birth mothers for several reasons.
- No matter what type of drug testing is performed, there are ways that the tests can by thrown off and therefore we cannot rely on their accuracy.
- Many birth mothers are offended by this request and as a result choose to work with another adoption professional who does not require this.
- A little over half of our birth mothers receive prenatal care. With regular prenatal care, we are able to monitor the prenatal records.
Our agency’s philosophy is that if the baby tests positive for drugs at the time of birth, or if something unexpected is discovered in the medical records, you do not have to continue with the match. Any time new medical information develops in an adoption match, we allow our adoptive families to re-evaluate the situation. If you decide not to continue with a match, you can go back to the waiting list without being penalized for your decision. We would never want a family to be in an adoption that they are not comfortable with, as this would not be in the best interest of anyone involved.
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Q. At what point can the birth parent(s) sign over their parental rights?
A. In most states birth parents cannot sign over their parental rights until after the baby is born. A common time frame is 48 – 72 hours after birth. Once you are in a match, you will be educated as to the legal process for the state in which your adoption will occur. Once the birth mother signs the legal paperwork or goes to court, her rights are terminated. This means she can change her mind up until the specified time frame, after the baby is born. Once she signs the paperwork, or her case goes through the court process, her rights are permanently terminated.
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Q. I hear that birth mothers can change their mind and take back the baby, how safe is our adoption?
A. Safety is probably the most important issue in adoption today. With highly publicized cases such as Baby Jessica, the media has conjured up negative images of adoption without providing the public the whole truth. The facts of these high profile cases are they were marred with mistakes made throughout the adoption. The media sensationalized this and made it seem as if the birth parents could take their child back from the adoptive family at any time and with no cause. This is simply not the case.
To put it in perspective, there have been over 1 million successful adoptions in the last 10 years, yet only a few disrupted placements where the baby is returned to the birth parents. In many instances, smaller agencies and unqualified attorneys made serious mistakes contributing to the failed adoption.
With thousands of succesful adoptions, our legal staff has the knowledge and experience to guide you through the legal steps of adoption. Our total commitment to providing you a secure adoption is upheld by following all legal procedures to the letter of the law. Simply put, we take the worrying out of adoption.
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Q. If the birth mother chooses to keep her baby, what happens to the money that we have paid?
A. The upfront money that our agency collects when you join our list is used for advertising to locate birth mothers for you. It is a one time, non-refundable fee. Unlike most other adoption agencies, we do not collect fees from you for every attempt at a match. This is good news for you, as many families have lost their entire adoption budget before ever receiving a baby because of agencies charging money for every attempt at a match.
Your family will usually be matched with a birth mother 60 to 90 days before her actual due date. But this time frame can and does vary. At the time of the match, the social worker will tell you about the birth mother and itemize all of the estimated fees for that specific adoption. The social worker will also let you know which of the fees are “at risk,” meaning they are non-refundable should the match be disrupted. Until you are selected by a birth mother and put into a match, we have no way of knowing what the fees for your adoption will be. The fees should fit within your estimate adoption budget your family set with our agency. Once you are in a match, all fees for that adoption will be transferred to our agency. If the adoption transpires as planned, we will distribute the money to all parties involved in your adoption.
If a birth mother changes her mind, all of the agency fees are fully re-fundable. Medical, attorney, and living expense fees are fully re-fundable with the exception of any fees considered “at-risk.” As stated earlier, you will know about the “at risk” fees at the time of match.
Example: Let's say there is a $20,000 adoption and $1,000 of those fees is at-risk for living expenses. If the birth mother changed her mind, all of those fees would be fully refundable for the exception of the $1,000 of at-risk fees set aside for living expenses.
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Q. What does it mean when your internet available situations mentions that the mother used daily cigarettes, weekly marijuana usage, etc.?
A. We have of our birth mothers fill out a social and medical history form that includes drug exposure. Each birth mother fills this out according to her interpretation and level of honesty. Our social workers work hard to obtain all pertinent drug exposure information, but we cannot guarantee that the information we are provided is true and accurate. One birth mother make check “weekly cigarettes” and to her this means five each week, while another will check this same box and mean 17. We do our best to get as much information as possible from each mother.
Remember, we always allow our adoptive families to back out of a situation where new medical or drug information is found out and they are not comfortable with it.
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Q. If we are on “active” status waiting to adopt and I should become pregnant, what happens next? Would we still be able to adopt, or can our fees be put "on hold" for a period of time?
A. If you become pregnant you would be set “inactive”. You would be allowed to be “active/current” (re-join) with the agency once you felt ready to pursue adoption again. Usually families wait until the first child is around 1 year old. However, if the pregnancy results in a miscarriage, you can become “active” when you have healed and addressed that loss appropriately. If you are currently in a match and discover you are pregnant and want to continue with the match, we will need to inform the birth mother of your pregnancy. It is her decision to pursue that adoption plan with you or not. If she does not want to pursue that adoption match with you, she may ask to select another family. Obviously each situation is unique and is handled on a case-by-case basis.
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Q. Your packet of information states that the average time spent on your waiting list is 1-18 months. What happens if a baby has not been found for us after 2 years? Will any of our fees be refunded?
A. When a family stays on our list beyond the average wait time, we continue to work with them for as long as they would like to continue. Should a family decide to stop working with us, they may do so. The only money that they would have paid to us would be the non-refundable Activation Fee that we use for advertising purposes. Ask your coordinator for more details.
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Q. Would you be able to supply me with a copy of your adoption agency's most recent annual report. I understand that non profit organizations publish these and that they detail the agency's revenues and expenses.
A. Non-profit organizations publish reports because they do not pay federal income taxes and this is a requirement for them. We are a not-for-profit corporation and we do pay federal income taxes.
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Q. What is the next step?
A. Simply fill out and submit the Free Adoption Information form. You will then receive information on how to apply to one of our three domestic adoption programs online. After you complete your preliminary application, you will be sent all the necessary paperwork to start the adoption process.
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Q. Can we fill out our pre-application online?
A. Yes, your family can go online to process your application by clicking here or mail in the application to:
American Adoptions
9101 West 110th Street, Suite 200
Overland Park, KS 66210
If you would like for us to mail you a preliminary application please call us at
1-800-ADOPTION.
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Q. What if I’ve already received the application packet for adoption but the packet is 60 days old or more?
A. If you have already received an application packet and it is 60 days old or more you can always get extensions. Now, if your application packet is older than a couple of months we would suggest that you request to receive a new copy of our application packet.
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