Poll of the Day > Why do people who so desperatly want a child just adopt?

(+) Yeah! (+)

This is something I am seriously having trouble wrapping my head around.

I'll go on the internet or I'll be watching TV and I'll be seeing stories about how these couples are unable to have children due endless miscarriages and one of the spouses being sterile.

Well, ok then. If you're so upset that you can't have a child, why don't you just adopt a child instead to fill that void in your heart that you think having a child

Oh, sometimes I also hear about Christians praying and crying to God about not being able to have a baby. And I just think to myself "Why don't you just adopt?". Stop being so self centred and think about others instead of yourself and adopt a child that wants and needs a family.
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Well, a lot of people finally do. Though, most people want to try to have a baby on their own first. A child who is more like them. I wouldn't say trying to have a baby you and you SO made on your own is self centered. It's just human nature. Plus, I think adoption has a lot of qualifications. And I think it can possibly take a while, too. Maybe even longer that a normal pregnancy. Plus, sometimes people want to raise a child from a young age, like from when they were born. But it's rare to find a baby, I believe. Most of the time, you'll find an older child. Personally, I would probably prefer that because babies are a lot of work. But, eh... Anyway, people like to try on their own first, then adopt normally if it doesn't work... Well, after trying like the fertility drugs and possibly having a surrogate...
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Despite the fact that "there are so many kids that need to be adopted", the adoption process is long, tedious, and most people who want to adopt are not actually qualified to do it. It's not like adopting a pet where pretty much anyone can do it, they actually have standards.

Not only do you have to have steady income (and make over a certain threshold), but you have to go through a background check, have social services inspect your home to make sure it meets their standards, take something like 50 - 100 hours of training courses, then once you are a "certified adoption household", you are put on a waiting list for a child. You can be on that waiting list anywhere from a few months to several years (more if you are looking to adopt a newborn). Then once you have the adopted child, you need to have regular check-ins from social services to make sure the adopted children are being taken care and are happy. Anything looks fishy and the kid is taken away and put back into the adoption system.

Conversely, what does it take to have a child naturally? A woman being pregnant for 9 months and 24 - 48 hours of labor. Not to undermine child birth but that does sound a bit easier don't you think?
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I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you haven't actually looked up the process for adopting a baby. It's not as easy as "just adopting." It's an long, expensive, grueling process. Often costing tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the state, and can take up to 7 years.
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thedeerzord posted...

Well, ok then. If you're so upset that you can't have a child, why don't you just adopt a child instead to fill that void in your heart that you think having a child

Quite a few folk do adopt or even foster. For most having their own children would be the proffered option but if for whatever reason that can't happen the next best thing is adoption.

My dad's ex GF can't have kids for example and she's always wanted "her own". That could never happen though. She looked after me and my siblings for several years with my dad but eventually left and adopted some kids. I get it as my dad was always like "they are my kids" and that meant she had very little say in how we were brought up. Adopting her own kids would put her in charge. Didn't work to plan though as she wanted my dad to move in with her and help raise the kids but he wasn't interested in raising someones kids that are not his own. Still I digress. Adoption is a last resort for a lot of folk if every other option fails. Of course some folk adopt anyway even though they can have their own kids. Personally if I couldn't have kids I'd take that as a sign that it wasn't meant to be and wouldn't adopt. Different strokes, different folks though.
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thedeerzord posted...

Why do people who so desperately want a child just adopt?

They do.
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Adopting is very involved process. It's not like you can just waltz into an adoption agency and walk away with a baby.
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Dikitain posted...

Despite the fact that "there are so many kids that need to be adopted", the adoption process is long, tedious, and most people who want to adopt are not actually qualified to do it. It's not like adopting a pet where pretty much anyone can do it, they actually have standards.

Not only do you have to have steady income (and make over a certain threshold), but you have to go through a background check, have social services inspect your home to make sure it meets their standards, take something like 50 - 100 hours of training courses, then once you are a "certified adoption household", you are put on a waiting list for a child. You can be on that waiting list anywhere from a few months to several years (more if you are looking to adopt a newborn). Then once you have the adopted child, you need to have regular check-ins from social services to make sure the adopted children are being taken care and are happy. Anything looks fishy and the kid is taken away and put back into the adoption system.

Conversely, what does it take to have a child naturally? A woman being pregnant for 9 months and 24 - 48 hours of labor. Not to undermine child birth but that does sound a bit easier don't you think?

no having the child is not easier. don't be stupid.

you need to have money to have a kid (duh). you need to not have a shitty home. you need to fill out paperwork. it takes money (which kids do too). big whoop.

Fam_Fam posted...

no having the child is not easier. don't be stupid.

you need to have money to have a kid (duh). you need to not have a shitty home. you need to fill out paperwork. it takes money (which kids do too). big whoop.

Plenty of people have (multiple) kids while having no money and a shitty home.
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Maybe because they want to experiment pregnancy.
Many women who want to give birth, can't because they are unfertile
Many women who can give birth, have abortions, because they don't like the idea.
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Adopting can take like 2 years of paperwork

Having a baby is as easy as putting ketchup on eggs
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The Popo posted...

Fam_Fam posted...

no having the child is not easier. don't be stupid.

you need to have money to have a kid (duh). you need to not have a shitty home. you need to fill out paperwork. it takes money (which kids do too). big whoop.

Plenty of people have (multiple) kids while having no money and a shitty home.

^^^This X1000

While having money and a nice home would be nice, they certainly aren't a requirement for a natural birth.
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thedeerzord posted...

This is something I am seriously having trouble wrapping my head around.

I'll go on the internet or I'll be watching TV and I'll be seeing stories about how these couples are unable to have children due endless miscarriages and one of the spouses being sterile.

Well, ok then. If you're so upset that you can't have a child, why don't you just adopt a child instead to fill that void in your heart that you think having a child

Oh, sometimes I also hear about Christians praying and crying to God about not being able to have a baby. And I just think to myself "Why don't you just adopt?". Stop being so self centred and think about others instead of yourself and adopt a child that wants and needs a family.

yeah no shit, most of the pro life people are like, it's so easy put the kids up for adoption, but the fact is most couples only want to adopt if they can't have their own.

it depends on the person. some WILL adopt. but others just want their own genetic baby and they just cry about it. even the ones who adopt though, often just want a baby and not a child. that's how I got my youngest sister. my mom was reading about older chinese girls and how nobody adopts them one they hit like 3. if you get to 3 and still are not adopted, there is a 99% chance your gonna just stay there till 18 and then get abandoned to the world. so my mom got an 8 year old to rescue her. I went with my family so we could all meet her together at the orphange. and we were part of a big adoption group of families. but we were the only family not getting a baby. somewhere there is a picture of my sister on a couch surrounded by infants.

My point is even the adoption people often can be selfish. they want a fresh start baby they can raise from the beginning to mold in their image. and ignore the older children who are actually old enough to realize how sad they are, unlike the babies.

Zikten posted...

it depends on the person. some WILL adopt. but others just want their own genetic baby and they just cry about it. even the ones who adopt though, often just want a baby and not a child. that's how I got my youngest sister. my mom was reading about older chinese girls and how nobody adopts them one they hit like 3. if you get to 3 and still are not adopted, there is a 99% chance your gonna just stay there till 18 and then get abandoned to the world. so my mom got an 8 year old to rescue her. I went with my family so we could all meet her together at the orphange. and we were part of a big adoption group of families. but we were the only family not getting a baby. somewhere there is a picture of my sister on a couch surrounded by infants.

My point is even the adoption people often can be selfish. they want a fresh start baby they can raise from the beginning to mold in their image. and ignore the older children who are actually old enough to realize how sad they are, unlike the babies.

really you family adopted a chinese girl a while ago? are you chinese?

I am white. only my sister is chinese. but yea, my mom got all empty nestish. she wanted another little kid. and she wanted to help someone out of a tough spot. she ended up getting an 8 year old orphan girl. She's 21 now though. this was years ago.

thedeerzord posted...

This is something I am seriously having trouble wrapping my head around.

It sounds like you don't actually know what's involved in the process then.

First of all, there are a lot more families who want to adopt than there are kids needing adoption. Since having a child out of wedlock stopped being gauche, most single/unwed mothers have opted to raise their kids themselves rather than giving them away to strangers.

And while there are always kids in the system, the overwhelming majority of them either have physical or mental disabilities that require a high level of care from prospective parents, behavioural concerns due to previous abuse/neglect, and/or are age 10+, which most families do not want to adopt because the "cute" phase has ended.

Trying to adopt is both expensive (as in tens of thousands of dollars expensive) and time consuming (minimum time from starting the process to adopting is usually about two years, but that's only for an adoption with no strings/conditions attached; if you have demands about what kind of child you want to adopt, that number goes up - in my area for kids who meet the criteria of "no major health issues, <2 years old", which is by far the most common request for hopeful parents, the waiting list is ~10 years long).

One other wrinkle is that most adoptions in developed countries these days are now "Open Adoptions", which encourages regular contact between the child and the birth parent(s). Depending on what kind of people the birth parents are and how opinionated they are on how their kids should be raised, this can provide its own challenges and some adoptive parents sometimes feel like the kid is not wholly "theirs" the way a biological kid would be, or that they are relegated to second-class status as a result.

You can go with overseas adoption instead, but that's even more expensive and comes with its own headaches, depending on where you're going (mountains of paperwork, paying off corrupt authorities, gaps in health history of child, having to do due diligence to make sure you're not dealing with human traffickers operating in disaster zones, etc.)

Basically, adoptions are not like the portray it in the movies, where you walk into an orphanage (those don't even exist in most developed countries anymore), take a look at the anklebiters, pick the one you like best, plonk down some money, and go home with it. There's a lot of time and money that's required and it's not an easy process at all. It's a route I'm strongly looking at for parenting, but I can absolutely understand why others would shy away from it given all the complications.
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yea my parents had to pay the government of china for my sister. which I thought was kinda fucked up.

Zikten posted...

yea my parents had to pay the government of china for my sister. which I thought was kinda fucked up.

how much did they have to pay? so it's hard to adopt boys from china? btw i'm chinese.

I don't remember.

and I don't know if you can adopt boys. maybe, but I don't know if most people want to. I think generally it's the girls who usually are in a tough spot. we visited the orphanage and it was 100% girls, from what I remember. most boys I think are kept. but girls usually get abandoned if it's their first born and then the mom gets pregnant with a son. I think that's what probably happened with my sister. my theory is she has a younger brother in china somewhere.

anyway, it might change now. I think they got rid of the One Child rule recently

Dikitain posted...

Despite the fact that "there are so many kids that need to be adopted", the adoption process is long, tedious, and most people who want to adopt are not actually qualified to do it. It's not like adopting a pet where pretty much anyone can do it, they actually have standards.

Not only do you have to have steady income (and make over a certain threshold), but you have to go through a background check, have social services inspect your home to make sure it meets their standards, take something like 50 - 100 hours of training courses, then once you are a "certified adoption household", you are put on a waiting list for a child. You can be on that waiting list anywhere from a few months to several years (more if you are looking to adopt a newborn). Then once you have the adopted child, you need to have regular check-ins from social services to make sure the adopted children are being taken care and are happy. Anything looks fishy and the kid is taken away and put back into the adoption system.

Conversely, what does it take to have a child naturally? A woman being pregnant for 9 months and 24 - 48 hours of labor. Not to undermine child birth but that does sound a bit easier don't you think?

Then people like Angelina Jolie get to adopt instantly due to money.
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If the process had not been so long, and I had been in a better place emotionally/mentally, I might have considered adopting after my wife passed away. Always wanted to have kids but my wife was too sick.

It's too late now though, even if I adopted a 6+ year old, I don't want to be 60+ when they turn 18.

If I ever start dating again, and get involved with someone with a child, that might work, but not gonna have one myself at this point, and won't adopt either, not unless I have a partner at least who also wants to adopt and then probably a child over 10 for sure.
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Revelation34 posted...

Dikitain posted...

Despite the fact that "there are so many kids that need to be adopted", the adoption process is long, tedious, and most people who want to adopt are not actually qualified to do it. It's not like adopting a pet where pretty much anyone can do it, they actually have standards.

Not only do you have to have steady income (and make over a certain threshold), but you have to go through a background check, have social services inspect your home to make sure it meets their standards, take something like 50 - 100 hours of training courses, then once you are a "certified adoption household", you are put on a waiting list for a child. You can be on that waiting list anywhere from a few months to several years (more if you are looking to adopt a newborn). Then once you have the adopted child, you need to have regular check-ins from social services to make sure the adopted children are being taken care and are happy. Anything looks fishy and the kid is taken away and put back into the adoption system.

Conversely, what does it take to have a child naturally? A woman being pregnant for 9 months and 24 - 48 hours of labor. Not to undermine child birth but that does sound a bit easier don't you think?

Then people like Angelina Jolie get to adopt instantly due to money.

And then there is that.

When you think about it too, it is kind of fucked up. She basically goes to a foreign country, plops down hundreds of thousands of dollars and takes home a kid. Hell, she even got some US laws to bend for her for her first adoption. If anything she is treating them more like pets. I mean I adopted a dog and take care of him just fine, but I am smart enough to know that doesn't qualify me to be a good parent to an actual human.
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Because creating a human is a completely different thing.
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