Adopting a child with Down Syndrome

Kelly - posted on 07/28/2009

That's so cool Laura! I would love to adopt more. But as a single parent the two I have is keeping me busy for now. I would definitely consider more if I were married! I still think about it once in a while! I will keep you and your family in my prayers and pray for the best health you can all have.

Laura - posted on 07/27/2009

We have 6 kids adopted out of foster care. Our youngest, Cameron, has DS. We weren't actively looking for any child at that point. We had three boys and two girls and thought we were done. Then one Dec. evening my husband and I were talking about adoption. We agreed then the only way we would ever adopt again was if there was a child with DS that didn't have major medical issues. We didn't talk about it again after that until a few weeks later when someone asked me if we would ever do it again. I told her if we there was a child with DS that didn't have major medical issues, we would consider it. She just happened to know of a 4 1/2 month old baby boy that needed a forever home that had DS. Of course I had to call to find out about him. Well they wouldn't give us much info over the phone so our foster care agency set up a meet and greet with his social worker. We saw a picture and got his history, that was it. We were in love. We had not told any of the kids we were even thinking of adopting again because we weren't sure ourselves we wanted to do it. We got home and the picture was tucked in me purse. Our youngest daughter (2 1/2 at the time) pulled the picture out and said, "This is my new baby brother." Well that did it. Cameron came home two weeks later.



If we had the room to adopt more children we would. We already have two kids in each room so we have to be done. We've had calls asking us to relicense, but I can't see putting a medically fragile baby (that's all we do foster care for) in our room until they turn 2 y.o. and then make them leave. That's just not fair to the child. We know once our oldest is out of the house, we will start all over again. I would love to have another DS child. One of my children has a terminal diagnosis so I don't know if I could take one another child that had any major medical issues. In three years time we had three kids in the PICU four times with three of them almost dieing (one due to uncontrolled seizures and withdrawals, one in a coma from a medication, Cameron due to RSV, and the same one that was in a coma had residual issues from the coma requiring another hospitalization that ultimately ended with a g-tube.

Kelly - posted on 07/20/2009

Hi Anne -

Thanks for writing... I too was not specifically looking for a child with a disabiltiy but was very open to the idea. For my son, the younger of the two, the adoption agency called me and said "We have a baby boy no one wants. He has Down Syndrome. Do you want him?" My family didn't come right out and say it wasn't a good idea but you could tell in conversation. They have all come around though. My daughter is 3 (in Aug) and my son is 18 months.

Anne - posted on 07/20/2009

My child with DS is 37 years old. I adopted him out of my classroom (I was his teacher) when he was 11. I had had him since he was 6. I did not specifically look for a DS child but I always had a love for them and grew up saying I would adopt a child with DS. I've adopted 2more children. One is "normal" and the last one has cerebral palsy etc. and is considered medically fragile. He also came from my classroom. My "normal" one was diagnosed as deaf/blind when he was 5 months old which is when he came to me. Gee someone made a mistake. No one in my family was surprised that I would adopt these special children but they did try to talk me out of it. I've loved every minute and would do it again.