This is what happened the year I met my other mother.In 1965, Robin, unmarried and pregnant, comes to Melbourne to give birth and give her baby up for adoption, then returns to Perth to resume her life having never seen her baby. After 10 days alone, the baby, is taken home, named Susannah, and made part of a wonderful family that loves her. The adoption laws at the time guarantee that there can be no contact between birth mother and child. Ever.In 1984, th...

"A beautiful and brilliant reexamination of love and its perils."—Barbara Fisher, Boston GlobeCommon wisdom has it that love is fragile, but leading psychoanalyst Stephen A. Mitchell argues that romance doesn't actually diminish in long-term relationships—it becomes increasingly dangerous. What we regard as the transience of love is really risk management. Mitchell shows that love can endure, if only we become aware of our self-destructive efforts to protect ourselves from...

In 1994 an American writer named Emily Prager met her new daughter LuLu. All she knew about her was that the baby had been born in Wuhu, a city in southern China, and left near a police station in her first three days of life. Her birth mother had left a note with Lulu's western and lunar birth dates. In 1999 Emily and her daughter–now a happy, fearless four-year-old--returned to China to find out more. That journey and its discoveries unfold in this lovely, touching and sensitively observ...

In these wonderfully straightforward accounts of what it means to children to be adopted, nineteen boys and girls, from eight to sixteen years old—and from every social background—confide their feelings about this crucial fact of their lives. It is deeply affecting to listen to these children as they reveal their questions, frustrations, difficulties, and joys with an honesty that is immediate, convincing, and stirring. Their generosity will provide solace and strength for thousands of oth...

What Readers are SayingAn amazing captivating story.Itgivesgrandparents raising kids the comfort of knowing, youare not alone.-Bill Trammell, a single grandfather from Wisconsin, raising his adopted grandson.Karen is honest and vulnerable and takes even the worst of what happened and makes something beautiful out of it. A compelling story, from someone whos been there!-Laura Montan Bailey, LMFT, author of Courageous Lo...

Through words, pictures, photographs, certificates and other 'little treasures', a Life Story Book provides a detailed account of the child's early history and a chronology of their life.   This clear and concise book shows a new family-friendly way to compile a Life Story Book that promotes a sense of permanency for the child, and encourages attachments within the adoptive family. Joy Rees' improved model works chronologically backwards rather than forwards, aiming to reinforce the child'...

An international textbook designed as a quick introduction for students from around the world studying sociology of family, this text provides comprehensive coverage of the major topics in the sociology of family life.Written in an easy access style it opens with a chapter on defining family and family structures. It then moves on to discuss over a dozen major topics; from interaction and meaning in families to sexuality. David Cheal provides coverage of these topics by drawing on ...

Transnational surrogacy – the creation of babies across borders – has become big business. Globalization, reproductive technologies, new family formations and rising infertility are combining to produce a 'quiet revolution' in social and medical ethics and the nature of parenthood. Whereas much of the current scholarship has focused on the US and India, this groundbreaking anthology offers a far wider perspective.Featuring contributions from over thirty activists and scholars from ...

With essays by well-known adoption practitioners and researchers who source empirical research and practical knowledge, this volume addresses key developmental, cultural, health, and behavioral issues in the transracial and international adoption process and provides recommendations for avoiding fraud and techniques for navigating domestic and foreign adoption laws. The text details the history, policy, and service requirements relating to white, African American, Asian American, Latino an...

In recent decades the concept of kinship has been challenged and reinvigorated by the so-called “repatriation of anthropology” and by the influence of feminist studies, queer studies, adoption studies, and science and technology studies. These interdisciplinary approaches have been further developed by increases in infertility, reproductive travel, and the emergence of critical movements among transnational adoptees, all of which have served to question how kinship is now practiced.

Written by an experienced adoptive parent, this clear, sensitive and practical handbook is designed to encourage and support adoptive and long-term foster parents, their children and adolescents. An adopted child may well have suffered abuse, neglect or inconsistent parenting in the past; he or she will certainly have experienced painful separations and losses. These early traumatic experiences, often expressed in emotional and behavioural problems within the family, can conceal a broad ra...

Children are frequently cared for by relatives and friends when parents, for whatever reason, are unable to care for their children themselves. Yet there has been very little information about how well children do when placed with kin or how safe they are in these placements.This book compares formal kinship care to traditional foster placements in order to ascertain which children are placed with kin, in what circumstances, how well such children progress, and how often these plac...