When Adoption Enters the Room

It happens every time I say the word “adoption.” The stories start pouring out. Recently, I was invited to be interviewed on First Coast Living, a morning show in Jacksonville, Florida.

Before the cameras turned on, the guests gathered in the studio—strangers sharing that mix of excitement and nerves that comes from waiting for your turn to go live on air. To pass the time—and calm our jitters—we did what people naturally do: we started talking.

“What are you here for?” we asked one another.

One guest was a stand-up comedian promoting a new comedy club. Three others were volunteer beach lifeguards hoping to recruit more people for their next training class – Jacksonville’s beaches stretch for miles. Another guest was a pilot who had flown around the world giving away a plane full of school supplies to honor his father, who had recently passed away.

We listened. We encouraged and congratulated each other. And somehow, our nerves softened.

Then it was my turn.

I held up my book, The Branches We Cherish, a memoir about open adoption. I explained open adoption allows the biological mom (and dad, if he’s available) to interview prospective adoptive parents. Once they’re matched, they all decide together how to stay connected over a lifetime.

This openness is a dramatic shift from the way adoption once operated, when it was a closed, secretive process built on separating an adopted child from their biological parents rather than building lifetime relationships with them.

And then it happened.

It always does.

The moment adoption entered the conversation, stories began pouring out. One of the volunteer lifeguards told us his best friend had adopted a baby just last week, and he planned to visit them the next day. He thought they were in contact with the baby’s biological mom. (Naturally, I sent a book along with him.)

The comedian spoke next. He explained his career in comedy grew out of grief. He’d been in foster care and moved from home to home before being adopted at twelve by his grandmother—a woman who also adopted a dozen other children.

A staff member quietly told me her brother was preparing to adopt. After one adoption that didn’t go through, they were hopeful this new match would. She asked if she could share my book with him.

When the cameras finally rolled, the host added stories of two adoptions close to his own family.

It never fails.

When adoption is mentioned, people don't just listen. They connect. There's a statistic from Adoption Network that suggests six in ten Americans have had personal experience with adoption. This means they themselves, a family member, or a close friend was adopted, adopted a child, or had placed a child for adoption. The first time I heard that statistic, I was skeptical. But after countless conversations at book festivals—and moments like this one—I'm starting to believe the true number may actually be more than sixty percent.

When I first considered telling my open adoption story, I wondered who would care. Would anyone really want to hear this?

The answer, I’ve learned, is yes.

Many people affected by adoption still carry an outdated view of what it looks like—that it is all right to keep secrets and hide losses. I see their surprise when I explain how much adoption has changed.

When people learn that today’s adoption is less about replacing families and more about expanding them—about connection rather than closed doors—the response is often, “That makes a lot of sense." Those directly involved with adoption are pleased to know about the positive changes.

Adoption today requires a new expectation: healthy, open and transparent relationships with biological families. When we anticipate these positive relationships between adoptive and biological families, we create space for trust, understanding, and growth. And when adoptive parents are willing to nurture those relationships, adopted children benefit most of all. They are more likely to feel grounded in their identity, confident in their story, and secure in the knowledge they have always been loved.

This shift to transparency changes families. It transforms lives. In open adoption, love is expanded, not replaced.

To learn more about open adoption, you can find The Branches We Cherish anywhere books are sold. And you can visit my website lindarsexton.com to preview the book, read my blogs and listen to podcasts.

If you have five minutes right now, you can listen to my First Coast Living interview here.

I would love to hear from you. Connect with me or request me as a speaker at lindarsextonauthor@gmail.com. And please share my website lindarsexton.com with those you know who are touched by adoption.