When non-custodial parents have made the tough decision to go ahead and terminate their parental rights to their biological child in order for the child’s stepparent to adopt him or her, the next tough question that they will face is whether or not they should speak directly to their child about the impending adoption, or to just let the custodial parents handle it and for lack of a better word, disappear?

Already having made the tough decision to give up their parental rights and no longer have any legal say in the life of their child, many non-custodial parents don’t seem to have it in them to then explain their choice to their child, or perhaps it isn’t that they do not wish to speak with their child, but feel as though they have already lost the right to do so, since they have decided to allow a stepparent adoption to occur. Whatever the reasons are; many adopted stepchildren do not get any closure from their non-custodial parents before, during, or after the stepparent adoption takes place. If there was a limited amount of contact between the non-custodial parent and the child, that contact simply ceases, and it is the custodial parent who is left to answer all of the child’s questions.

In the cases where there has been no contact between the non-custodial parent and the child, either in quite some time, or ever, the idea of contacting the child to tell him or her that the non-custodial parent will not be contacting the child may seem a tad bit ludicrous to the non-custodial parent, after all why introduce yourself just to say that you won’t be back around? In these cases all of the adults involved may agree that it is best to just leave the situation as it is, and not have the non-custodial parent contact the child.

However, in the situations where the child knows his or her non-custodial parent, even if there is not a strong bond or relationship between the two, some form of closure should be offered to the child, so that the child is not left with questions as to why their non-custodial parent has chosen not to be a part of his or her life. When children are offered no reasons as to why a parent cannot be a parent, they will blame themselves, thinking that if they would have done something better, or been a better kid, then their non-custodial parent would not have left them.

The non-custodial parent does not have to go into great detail as to all of the reasons that he or she cannot parent, but simply reassure the child, either in person, on the phone, or even through a letter, that this was a decision that was made in the best interest of the child, he or she is loved and did nothing wrong or to make the parent leave. While these are all things that the custodial and adoptive stepparent can tell the child, children will tend to dismiss the information when it comes from anywhere but the parent who is no longer around. The children tend to feel as though the adults are only trying to protect them from the truth; which is that they were not good enough for their non-custodial parent.

Making the decision to terminate your parental rights to your child and allow someone else to become his or her legal mother or father is most certainly an agonizing one, even when it is made in the best interest of the child, and the non-custodial parent knows that he or she is doing the right thing for the child. It is important for the non-custodial parent to continue to make decisions that are in the best interest of his or her child, no matter how silly, unnecessary, or impossibly difficult those decisions may be. Making the decision to terminate your parental rights is only the first in a series of difficult decisions that must be made. The next difficult decision that should be faced is not if closure should be given to the child, but rather how closure should be given to the child so that he or she does not suffer through a childhood of self blame and feelings of inadequacy. While closure will not eliminate the grief and loss that adoptees feel, it will greatly help to reduce them and allow the child to begin to heal from his or her loss and move forward.

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