Placing Your Baby for Adoption during the Holidays with Adoption Choices of Missouri

The holidays can be pretty stressful and overwhelming, but putting your baby up for adoption doesn’t have to be. Adoption Choices of Missouri is here to help you navigate your adoption journey this holiday season. Our adoption specialists will help take the frustration out of arranging your adoption and birth plans, as well as choosing which post-placement options best suit your needs. Give yourself and your baby the ultimate gift of love this holiday season with the gift of open adoption.

If you need adoption help now, call us toll free at 877-903-4488 or, in Missouri call or text us at 1-816-527-9800

What is Open Adoption? Why is it the Right Choice for You this Holiday Season?

The holidays can be so lonely and demanding all at once. That’s why an open adoption in Missouri may be the right choice for you. Open adoption is now one of the most common types of adoption in the United States, and the type of adoption our adoption agency encourages all birth and adoptive parents to consider. We believe that keeps everyone’s best interests at heart, as it allows birth parents, the child and adoptive parents to stay in touch by sharing contact information and remain connected to varying degrees. 

Different forms of staying in touch look different for each family, and these can vary anywhere between simply sharing information like names and letters, to phone calls and emails, all the way to a fully-open adoption that includes in-person visits, especially during any future holiday seasons.  Your level of involvement is entirely up to you, but your child will have a bigger and better support system either way. 

The Gift that Keeps on Giving

Granting an adoptive family’s dream come true is the gift that keeps on giving. You will also be bestowing your child with the gift of a better life. We know that this can be a very difficult process at the best of times, but that it can be especially tough placing your baby for adoption during the holidays. 

At Adoption Choices of Missouri, we are here to help you pick out the right adoption plan that is based on your needs. This is about what you feel is best for you and your baby. You can help a wonderful adoptive couple or individual make their family bigger while still knowing and learning about your child every year as he or she grows up. 

Thanks to open adoption, now no one has to feel alone during the holiday season. 

Plan for Future Holidays and Manage Your Expectations 

What do you want your future holidays to look like in regards to your relationship with your baby and their adoptive family? Try to imagine what holidays lie ahead and the level of involvement you want in them. Discuss different plans and ideas with your adoption specialist to get started, and to help you decide what degree of communication and participation you want. You can even choose to buy the baby a gift if you would like. The important thing is that the financial burden and parental responsibility is not all on you anymore. 

Maybe you want to pass on certain holiday traditions that were important to you when you were growing up, or you can make your own new ones that better reflect your relationship with your child and their adoptive family. It can be fun to make your own nontraditional holiday traditions. 

But while you are fantasizing about what fun holiday traditions you want to share in the future, it is important to also be realistic and manage your expectations. Try to understand that your level of involvement may naturally fluctuate over time. While the winter season is a great time to catch up on achievements or accomplishments from over the past year, you or the adoptive family may be too busy visiting other family members to meet up for every major holiday. Things happen and life just gets in the way of making plans sometimes, and that’s okay too. The main thing to focus on is that the focus is not all on you anymore, but you don’t have to miss out on getting to know who your child grows up to be.

Don’t Forget to Focus on Yourself this Holiday Season

This is always a stressful time of year, but being pregnant is a great excuse to pamper yourself. De-stress and be your healthiest, best self now so that you can breathe a sigh of relief. While you’re busy worrying about your future and giving the gift of life, don’t forget to give yourself some self-care and R&R. It is important for your health as well as the baby’s that you try your best to not let the pressure and anxiety of the holidays stress you out. 

Treat yourself to a nice, calming bath and some soothing lavender scents. Try some meditation mixed with some light and gentle exercise to clear your mind. Don’t forget to focus on yourself and what is best for you during these nerve-wracking and wearisome times. After all, a healthy and happy birth mother means a healthy and happy baby.

The Holidays Should be a Source of Joy, Not Anguish 

Our adoption specialists at Adoption Choices of Missouri are here to help you with all of your adoption needs this holiday season, whatever they may be. It is very important that the birth mother chooses what level of impact she wants to have over the course of her baby’s life. You can be involved as much as you want, but now the burden is not on your shoulders anymore. 

Think about any future holidays and what you want them to look like. You do have to be realistic — you may not be able to see your baby every winter as they grow up and into a life of their own. But you don’t have to miss out on knowing the person they will become. The holidays don’t have to be a source of loneliness and anxiety. Instead, they can be a chance for you to connect with your baby and their adoptive family. Take this opportunity to take care of yourself. Reflect on what you want and need to make adoption work for you. We are here to help you make the process of placing your baby for adoption during the holidays less stressful and more empowering.

Adoption Choices of Missouri serves birth parents statewide and beyond, please call us or text us to learn more! Call us toll free at 877-903-4488 or, in Missouri call or text us at 1-816-527-9800

Meet the Author: Kelly Felix is a graduate from the University of New Orleans. She holds a BA in English as well as a BA in Sociology. Her English concentration is in journalism, and her specialties in sociology are gender studies and environmental sociology.

When she isn’t voraciously guzzling coffee or devouring books, Kelly can be found either bent over a canvas working on her art or at her computer playing video games. She has hands-on classroom teaching experience from her time working as a substitute teacher for Kelly Services. Kelly also completed an in-house editorial internship at Pelican Publishing Company, and she finished the goal internship program at Green Light New Orleans. Kelly generally exists in a state of suspended disbelief, but when she’s not there she resides in New Orleans.