WHAT ADOPTAIVE PARENTS NEED TO KNOW
When Someone in the Birth Family Dies
A birth family death is one of the hardest moments in open adoption.
Resources
Transracial right for you?
Cultural identity
Multiracial Community
Explaining race to child
Racial Rudenss is teachable
Raising a Black Child as a White Parent
Compliment that isn't a compliment
Dear Birth Mother
Birth family death
My son got a call last night from his birth mother.
Her husband died.
The boy I raised into a man isn’t doing well. He’s flying to be with his birth mother. I transferred $100 to the 26-year-old. What else could I do?
He doesn’t have the finances for a last-minute flight. He doesn’t have time off from work. Since, by his employer’s definition, the death wasn’t technically a family member. His boss wasn’t amenable to letting him go.
So many times in this adoption journey, I have said that we are grateful to have the birth parents.
"You can never have enough people loving your child."
Our caseworkers have walked this path with hundreds of families. A conversation costs nothing.
Call 877-437-3424
I’ve said that over and over. And it is true. The more people who love your child, the better. Birth family and birth family spouses have added depth, understanding, and love to my children’s lives.
All day, I’ve felt gloomy.
What a Moment Like This Actually Holds
I feel bad for my son because he did love this man. The man was good for him and to him. A part of my son’s life is gone now, and the grief that comes with that is real and legitimate regardless of what an employer’s bereavement policy says.
I feel my son carries so many questions today. Did he provide his birth family with enough love? Did he show enough appreciation to us? How will he comfort his birth mother, who is grieving in a way that is particular to her, in a culture and a family that is different from the one he grew up in?
We know that his identity shifts when he is with them. They have different traditions, a different culture, a different way of moving through the world. The pull to belong to both families is strong. It has always been strong. A moment like this pulls harder than most.
What This Means for Open Adoption
We talk a great deal, in adoption, about the beautiful moments — the placement, the milestones, the relationships that form across what could have been a wall. We talk less about the moments when open adoption asks something hard of everyone involved.
A birth family death is one of those moments. It asks the adoptive family to hold space for grief that is real even if it exists outside your own family structure. It asks the adoptee to navigate loss in two registers at once — as a person grieving someone they loved, and as someone whose belonging in that grief is complicated by circumstance. It asks everyone to remember that love is not a finite resource that gets divided. It is something that expands.
The $100 transfer was not a large thing.
The permission it represented was enormous.
Read more about becoming a biracial family.
Learning everything you can and understanding the experiences of others will help you help your child.
Dear Birth Mom
You have the right to stay in touch with your child and teach them what you want them to understand. Click here. ➔
Talking to Children About Race
What you say about race matters. Read what others have learned. ➔
Cultural Identity in Transracial Adoption
The child may not always acknowledge you in public. Read more. ➔
MORE INFORMATION--Community, Identity & Parenting
Want to Know More
Your Questions, Answered
What should I do when someone in my adopted child's birth family dies?
Take it seriously. Validate your child’s grief fully. Help them attend the funeral or memorial if they want. Provide practical support — transportation, finances, time — without waiting to be asked. Then stay close and let them process on their timeline.
How do I support my adopted child when they grieve a birth family member?
: Resist the urge to manage the grief or redirect it. What they need from you is permission — to love, to grieve, to be present in both families without guilt.
Does open adoption make death in the birth family harder for adoptees?
Open adoption means the relationships are real, which means the losses are real too. The answer to that complexity is not less openness. It is more support.
What if my adopted child's birth family lives in a different cultural community?
Recognize that grief looks different across cultures. Follow your child’s lead. If they need to attend a service reflecting their birth culture, support that. If they need to go and you can make it possible, make it possible.
How does a birth family death affect open adoption contact going forward?
It often intensifies contact in the short term. In the longer term the shape may shift. Let your child lead. Their relationship with their birth family is theirs to navigate.
You don't have to do this alone.
We're here to walk beside you—every step of the way.
Call or Text Anytime
801-563-1000
REVIEWED BY
Reviewed by licensed adoption professionals at Heart to Heart Adoptions.
