Popular culture often portrays the adoption of a child who is in an unfortunate situation by a very loving and, often, well-to-do adult who just enters their life through a set of fortuitous circumstances.
While this scenario does play out in real life, it is relatively rare. Movies rarely show all the legal work that even an uncontested adoption requires.
Furthermore, most adoptions are not a matter of a child just meeting their adoptive parent and it being a match. There are many family circumstances that might make adoption an option for a resident of the greater Augusta area:
- Often, stepparents will effectively take the place of a child’s biological mother or father. This happens, for example, when a Georgia resident marries but has children from a prior relationship, and the other parent of those children is not involved.
- Many times, a grandparent or other close relative assumes the role of a child’s primary caregiver. This can happen when biological parents have physical or emotional issues or are deceased.
- Most adoptions involving adoptive parents who are not friends or relatives of the child will involve an adoption agency. Both the cost and the quality of these agencies vary.
- Many adoptions happen through Georgia’s foster care system. Foster parents may even adopt their foster children as their own.
- Sometimes, adoptive parents will want to cross state or even national borders to adopt. Interstate and international adoptions have their own set of complications, but parents can nonetheless find them very rewarding.
Adoption is not a one-size-fits-all process
Because adoption might be necessary in many different family situations, one should not think of it as a one-size-fits-all process.
The basics of an adoption are the same in that, if a court grants the request, the adoptive parents have all parental rights and responsibilities over the child. Likewise, the process is the same in many respects no matter who wants to adopt and through what channels.
However, in many other important respects, each type of adoption has its own quirks and legal challenges. It is important that a person who is pursuing adoption to understand what these challenges are.