New Group Promotes Adoption Awareness
29.03.2018
A new website to promote awareness of adoption as an option for women facing crisis pregnancy has been launched by its founder, former Senator Fidelma Healy Eames. The website is intended to be a resource for women and girls who are in unplanned pregnancies.
Dr Healy Eames, who has two adopted children herself, says she is forever grateful to the two birth mothers who chose to have their babies and give them up for adoption. My Adoption Story aims to support women in crisis pregnancies who may be considering their options. The first goal of the campaign is to help women keep their child, by lobbying the government to improve services for women. Where this is not possible, they ask if the mother has considered adoption or fostering for their baby.
Dr Healy Eames says she is disappointed how the 8th amendment debate has largely ignored adoption as a viable option for pregnant women. She is shocked that abortion is the only thing the government is offering women in crisis pregnancies, with Ministers Simon Harris, Regina Doherty and Katherine Zappone continuously omitting adoption from the debate.
The shameful way that adoption was spoken of at the Oireachtas Committee on the 8th Amendment prompted Healy Eames to think of practical ways she could help women in unplanned pregnancies. Abortion is not the only option Irish women should be offered. Life is always an option. This is why the tag line of the website is "the gift of life is in your hands”.
The website offers links to key agencies in Ireland with information on adoption and fostering. Modern adoption places the best interests of the child at the centre of the process, as determined by the wishes of the birth mother/parents. These are the rules of the Hague agreement under which adoption takes place, which the campaign fully supports.
My Adoption Story invited stories from birth mothers, adopted children and adoptive families from all over the country. The response was overwhelming. One birth mother who responded, Mary, says “we have no idea what journey this life growing inside us will take. We don’t know what they’ll become or how many lives they will touch. All I know is I am grateful I gave my daughter life.”
Laura, who was an adopted child, said “I will be eternally grateful to my birth mother for putting me up for adoption. She could have chosen to have me aborted but she wanted me to have a better life than she could give me, so she selflessly gave me away. She is a hero in my eyes.”
These are the amazing first-hand stories of people grateful for adoption. No birth mother has regretted choosing life and every adopted person is grateful for being given the gift to life. This is the message of My Adoption Story.
My Adoption Story. March 28. Family & Life. March 29.