Deciding International

Decide if Intercountry Adoption Is Right for Your Family

What You Should Know

Many families consider the following issues when deciding whether intercountry adoption is right for them:

• The process can be more predictable than domestic adoption. Like any adoption, intercountry adoption involves some uncertainty. However, the length of your wait to adopt a child from another country can be easier to predict than when adopting an infant from the United States. The timeframe varies depending on the country, agency, lawyer, and individual child involved, but it generally takes from 1 to 3 years to complete an intercountry adoption.

• Children become available for adoption in other countries for many of the same reasons children come into foster care in the United States. Reasons commonly include abandonment, poverty, illness or death of the parents, or family issues such as substance abuse, child abuse, or neglect. Children often have health problems related to these reasons.

• Younger children are available for adoption. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) reports that in 2003, nearly half (46 percent) of children adopted internationally were less than 12 months old, while 42 percent were between 1 and 4 years old.

• Intercountry adoption offers opportunities for a connection to the child’s first culture. Some prospective adoptive parents are interested in a child’s country of origin and want to make that culture a part of their lives.

• Contact with birth parents is rare. Immigration laws require children to be defined as “orphans” for purposes of intercountry adoption. Therefore, contact with birth parents is not common. However, contact with birth families is starting to take place in a few countries.

What if the child I want to adopt is my relative?

Adopting relatives from other countries can be difficult. The child must still be defined as an orphan according to U.S. immigration law. If the child meets this requirement, an adoption agency that places children in the child’s home country may be able to help you with the adoption. If the child does not meet this requirement, a lawyer familiar with immigration law can help you explore other options.