“Well why don’t YOU adopt these babies from unwanted pregnancies, then?” This is a common objection to the pro-life cause. Abortion supporters have argued that there are too many children who need homes and too few adoptive parents. The “right” choice is clear.
But what if this weren’t true? Nightlight Christian Adoptions, an adoption agency in Loveland, just doesn’t see the veracity of this objection because of their experience working with expectant mothers and potential adoptive parents.
“We have families that wait five years for a baby and there is absolutely no shortage of families willing to adopt these babies,” said Kelsey Prouty of Nightlight Christian Adoptions. “That’s one of the most common myths we have. So, when women do place for adoption, it’s not who’s going to adopt, but who gets to be the lucky family chosen for that baby.”
“It’s a lie when people say there are not families that are willing to adopt these babies,” shared Katy Clasquin, the Pregnancy Counselor at Nightlight Christian Adoptions. “At Nightlight specifically, there’s about two families for every one mom that we work with.”
With such a pool of families able and willing to adopt, expectant moms have a breadth of options in front of them. And it’s Clasquin’s job to walk with each mom and find support for her to make the best, life-affirming choice possible. “Throughout the entire process,” she shared, summarizing her work, “a mother has all freedom of choice throughout their entire pregnancy. So, a mom can come to me and say, ‘I want a place for adoption.’ But the next day she decides, ‘You know what? That’s not the best plan for me.’ She can [do that] without any cause and/or manipulation. She can tell me, ‘I want to parent,’ and Nightlight is not going to just drop them and say, ‘okay, good luck with that.’ Part of my job is to help counsel her through that decision. If she determines it’s in her child’s best interest for her to parent, then we’ll help support her by connecting her to community resources. That’s when the pregnancy centers are amazing and help us out in supporting their moms, providing resource referral, all kinds of stuff.”
Once they decide to place their child up for adoption, moms can set standards, given potential adoptive parent profiles — not in short supply at Nightlight — and connected with the families before choosing anyone to adopt them. Even after all is said and done and the child is born, moms still have the freedom to make a different choice and be parents. Regardless, throughout the entire process, Clasquin said, “We want to make sure that our moms have total peace and confidence in the family they’re choosing.”
On the other hand, while it seems possible, adoption is also quite the challenge for many families. It’s expensive; it’s an emotionally exhausting journey of ups and downs; it’s difficult, a labor of love. But one thing it isn’t, Clasquin asserted, is impossible.
“One of the biggest barriers is a lot of people will say adoption is so expensive,” she told the Denver Catholic. “’How could we ever afford to be able to adopt an infant?’ What a lot of people don’t realize is that there’s a significant amount of help in place to be able to help people be able to afford to adopt. If people are willing to put their efforts towards applying to a lot of things. There’s a lot of grants. There’s a lot of no interest loans that people can apply to be able to afford. But then there’s also a ton of people, especially within the pro-life movement, that don’t necessarily feel called to adopt, but want to be able to help provide options to people they can give to families that are choosing to adopt. Nightlight also has a specialist that helps families be able to fundraise, and she helps give them ideas around what that should look like.”
Difficult — challenging even — but possible. And for the families lucky enough to be chosen to adopt — a miracle.
To read more stories of adoption in the midst of unplanned pregnancy, visit https://nightlight.org/snowflakes-embryo-adoption-donation/embryo-adoption/family-stories/.