Wondering what questions to ask prospective adoptive parents?

Once you’ve made the decision to choose adoption as the right path forward for your unplanned pregnancy, you’ll probably start thinking about the kind of parents you want to adopt your baby. The good news is that there are a lot of parents who want to adopt, and pregnant individuals have a lot of control over which prospective adoptive family gets chosen. However, this wealth of choice can be daunting. How do you choose?

When you work with Friends in Adoption, you’ll be assigned a caring and experienced counselor who’ll help you through this and all the other steps in the adoption process. This article will give you an overview of the process of choosing an adoptive family as well as questions you might ask prospective adoptive parents. But rest assured, you won’t be alone. We’ll be there to support you throughout your adoption journey.

Choosing an adoptive family

The process of choosing an adoptive family for your baby comes down to these steps:

• Decide what’s important to you – There are many aspects of parenting – attitudes toward childcare, education, discipline; family type/size; community; religion; family income, and more. Some of these will be more important to you than others. Define your priorities before you start reviewing family profiles.

• Review family profiles – Friends in Adoption has profiles of already-vetted, legally-approved families that you can look over. Use your list of priorities to develop a list of top prospective families.

• Talk to the families on your shortlist – Your Friends in Adoption counselor will help you set up communication with these families. Perhaps it’ll be in-person or virtual meetings or a series of phone conversations, meetings, and texts. The mechanism is flexible, but be prepared with a list of questions that reflect your priorities for a prospective adoptive family.

Your meetings with prospective adoptive parents are hugely important, but they should be enjoyable, too. Your level of comfort with each family is crucial to your decision so don’t let stress get in the way of your getting a feel for the family.

Ideas for questions to ask prospective adoptive parents

Depending on your priorities, you might ask prospective adoptive parents:

Adoption

• Why do you want to adopt a child?
• How will you explain adoption to this child?
• What kind of relationship do you foresee having with the birth mother/parents?

Parenting and Family

• Do you have other children? How many? Ages?
• If you have children, what have you enjoyed most about being a parent? What’s your least favorite aspect of parenting?
• What do you like to do as a family?
• What are your strengths and weaknesses as a parent?
• How do you approach discipline?
• What’s your extended family like? How close is your family? How involved will your extended family be with this child?
• What are some of your favorite family traditions?

Childcare/Education

• What are your plans for childcare?
• What are your thoughts on public education, private education, home schooling?
• How important is education to you?
• How important is post-high school education to you?

Religion

• What religion do you follow? 
• Are you active in a church community?
• What role will religion play in this child’s life?

Personal

• For couples: How long have you been together? How do you describe your relationship?
• What are your hobbies?
• Do you volunteer? Where? What do you do?
• What work do you do?
• Describe your community.
• Describe your home.

The list can go on and on, but hopefully this will get your thinking started. 

Questions about adoption? Come to us for answers.

Overwhelmed because you’re facing an unplanned pregnancy? Friends in Adoption can help with our team of compassionate and knowledgeable professionals who’ll counsel you through all the major decisions you’ll face. Not only can we help you determine what questions to ask prospective adoptive parents, but we can also walk you through every step of the adoption process.

Friends in Adoption is a licensed, infant adoption agency based in New York. We work with birth parents throughout the U.S. to craft adoptions that benefit all involved parties, especially the child. If you’re facing an unexpected pregnancy, come to us for compassionate counseling, knowledgeable advice, and helpful support.

Our experienced adoption professionals provide the information and helping hand birth parents need to make their adoption choices. Contact us. Let’s work together.