Most of the respondents had direct contact with their child's other families. For adoptive families this was 69% and for first families this was 77%. (13% of adoptive parents and 14% of first parents answering the survey have no contact at all.) Types of contact broke down like this:
I was a little surprised by how many families are meeting each other in a neutral location. I also took note that a number of families are having direct contact but aren't having visits. For OpenAdoptionSupport.com, that means I need to think on ways to help families maintain what are essentially long-distant relationships (even if they may live near each other). I am hoping to find site contributors who are currently living in these kinds of open adoptions.
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We have a long distance
We have a long distance relationship...also a 10 hour drive away from my daughter's birthfamilies. As far as how we handle the visits...it has been on neutral ground so far...as we get more familiar with one another. I'm trying to arrange a visit with the birthfamilies for this summer. Now that I feel a lot more comfortable with the birthmother and her family, I feel certain that we will be meeting at her parent's house....with all her brothers, sister, and maybe cousins, aunts, uncles...etc. Which will be just fine with me.
The birthfather, however, and his parents, I still am not comfortable with and will arrange to meet them at a neutral location. The reason for this is because they have not respected boundaries and made threats against us. For this reason, we had considered closing the adoption to the birthfather and his parents, but held on to hope that we could work things out....for our daughter. Although things seemed to have gotten better, after my husband and I had a heart-to-heart with the birthfather about his parents' behavior towards us....I still am extremely uncomfortable with them and, almost instinctively, keep them at (at least) an arm's distance. This, I believe, is a matter of trust more so than a matter of "willing to be open". Does that make sense?
We live about a 10 hour
We live about a 10 hour drive from DS's first families, and have frequent visits in our home. First mom always stays with us, first dad and grandparents seem to prefer a nearby hotel (we live in a resort area so they make it a combo vacation/visit) but have stayed with us as well, with activities in our home and around town. In two years we have had visits from various people approximately twice a year each, and just had first mom and her parents, sister, and nephew here for Easter.
We are planning our first trip to their state for this Fall, now that DS is 2.5 and better able to travel the distance (portable DVD players are miracles).
Basically we treat the whole issue as we do other out of state family. DH's family are on the other side of the country...visits when possible and convenient for everyone, frequent spontaneous calls and emails, a photo website that everyone can access to print or download photos as they wish.
Count me in if others need support maintaining relationsips long distance.
It's quite possible I'm
It's quite possible I'm confused, but didn't this question allow for some overlap in answers, so the totals should add up to more than 100%? I think I checked both "family's home" and "neutral location" because sometimes we meet in parks or whatnot. So maybe the 21% aren't just meeting in neutral locations?
Heather, that's a really
Heather, that's a really good point. I should have made it more clear in the post that I got the numbers like this:
--Every person who had visits in their home was in the visits in their home part;
--People who said neutral location but NOT visits in their home were in the neutral location part;
--People who said cards/email/etc. but NOT neutral location and NOT visits in the home were in the other part.
Ah, that makes sense. I
Ah, that makes sense. I should've trusted you. :)