Questions that adopted kids often ask

If you’re thinking about adopting, it’s important to consider your future with your new child. Adoption does bring on a unique set of challenges. Below are a few questions kids may ask, so you can begin preparing to answer them.

First off, kids may ask why their birth parents gave them up. It’s not always possible to know, but this is a delicate issue. It’s often wise to explain that it’s nothing the child did wrong, but that parents just can’t always keep their children for a variety of reasons. Through it all, stress that you love the child and that you deliberately did choose to adopt him or her.

Naturally, children may then ask why you adopted them. While answers about the realistic situation may help — explaining that you can’t have children naturally, for example — you really want to focus on how you knew you could provide a loving home for the child and you wanted to do so.

Children may then have many general questions about their birth parents, such as what they looked like or what they did for a living. Experts do warn that some children will put their parents on a pedestal, creating an unrealistic image of them as these perfect parents. It’s important not to talk negatively about the birth parents, but you do want to keep kids from having these fantasies.

When going into adoption, you also want to think about the agreement you’ll make with the birth parents. What type of contact will they have? Do you want to set up any regulations? How involved do they want to be with the child? Having a solid plan in place is wise, and you can look into this while investigating all of the legal steps needed to adopt the child in Maryland.