What laws protect you—as a potential adoptive parent?  

• There are laws designed to protect the rights of babies.
• There are laws designed to protect the rights of birth mothers.
• There are laws designed to protect the rights of birth fathers.
• There are even laws designed to protect the rights of birth grandparents.
• There are no laws specifically designed to protect the rights of potential adoptive parents.

At Heart to Heart Adoptions, we try very hard to protect you.

We try.

Can we repeat those two words, “We try.”

We also try to give every single mother dignity. Giving her dignity means we put no undue pressure on her to place.

This means we allow them space to make a parenting decision.

We must always function within the laws and within human foibles.

So many situations become happy stories, but let us list some horrible problems we have dealt with.

• Men who erroneously claim parental rights.
• Grandparents who pressure the birth mother not to place.
• Birth mothers get arrested just days before giving birth.
• Birth mothers being approached by a private attorney or couple who want the baby and are willing to pay. Payment, of course, is illegal but has been known to occur.

Outside of the agency, there are even more problems: We often hear stories of such tragedies as:

• Women who aren’t really pregnant.
• Birth mothers “choosing” several couples to adopt their baby and then accepting support from all of them.
• Women with no genuine desire to place.
• Drug-affected babies. A condition unrecognized until birth.
• Unreasonable demands from the birth family.

Since the legal system doesn’t explicitly try to protect potential adoptive families, we try.

We try to give you honest answers and adequately screen our birth mothers.

We try.