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Originally Posted by Elibellamiah

Thank you for saying that. I don't know if it will ever happen, but I've thought a lot for many years about adopting or foster parenting someday. I think there are a lot of reasons behind why I would do it, but recently I was on a foster parenting board to learn more about it and at some point felt really attacked and like people thought I was just doing it for selfish reasons. It was after I asked if most people want babies, because if I fostered I think I would like to foster babies but I have the impression everyone wants babies. Is the fact that I would like to care for more babies selfish? So I wondered a lot after that, is there a not selfish reason to foster or adopt? Most people do so because they want children. Is it better to do so just because you want to help someone? It's not like my focus would be on fulfilling my own desire, I just think there are babies who need to be taken care of and even though this is probably my last pregnancy, I don't feel ready to be done taking care of babies. Or if I adopted, I would really like another daughter and I would like my daughter to have a sister. Is that wrong? Should I be more focused on just wanting to help a child in need? I don't know if this makes any sense, it's just part of where I was coming from with that.

I think for a lot of people there is a "selfish" element to wanting to adopt. I wanted to be a mom. My body wasn't cooperating. So I adopted. It was about *me* in a lot of ways. Our children were both newborns when we adopted them. We were in the delivery room both times. They weren't in "need" per se. It wasn't about that. I'm not going to go into more of their story on a public board, but I will say this. The FAR vast majority of infants who are placed by their parents voluntarily are not in "need" in the traditional sense, and never would have been. That doesn't mean their parents don't have valid and important reasons for placing them, but they weren't in "need" because they were true orphans, or removed from their families because of severe abuse.

Everybody needs to pray about their adoptions, and what they want them to look like. Wanting to raise more babies is a fine reason to want to adopt, but it is vital, no matter what path you choose, to be as educated on ethics as possible. You can't approach adoption from the point of view of wanting to save a child, or rescue a child. Sometimes there is an element of adoption in that, but to move entirely from that motivation is dangerous. It leads to children being put in the position of needing to be "grateful" No child should be made to feel grateful that they were adopted. If they choose that feeling, that is one thing, but when parents go into it with the express purpose of rescuing a child, that sets up a bad dynamic.