What It Feels Like to Be Adopted at 17

Re:What It Feels Like to Be Adopted at 17 by aidenn0 on Friday January 01, 2016 @09:09PM (#10824614)

I'm a foster parent and know several people that have; in addition a friend's fiance was just adopted at 20 years old. In nearly all of these cases there was a preexisting relationship for a few years first. Most kids who have been abused or neglected are slow to trust, but I do know one family who adopted a 17 year old who had been in foster care for 6 years and wanted a permanent family to come home to from college.

Right now, some friends who have been fostering a boy since he was 10, are now in the state that he can be adopted legally, but he feels like it would be a betrayal to his roots.

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Re:What It Feels Like to Be Adopted at 17 by TeMPOraL on Saturday January 02, 2016 @07:20AM (#10825976)

> I do know one family who adopted a 17 year old who had been in foster care for 6 years and wanted a permanent family to come home to from college.

It's interesting how people can have totally different needs and dreams depending on their upbringing / life history. 17-20 is about the age when people I know (myself included) try to separate themselves from their families, to assert themselves as individuals and protagonists of their life stories. The last thing I cared about at that age was "a permanent family to come home to from college".

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Re:What It Feels Like to Be Adopted at 17 by aidenn0 on Sunday January 03, 2016 @01:10PM (#10831519)

Similarly in the article how the author was touched by being grounded; most healthy 17 year olds take it for granted that when they leav,e they have a home to go to, and that their parents want them to be safe. The majority of foster youth do not.

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