Adoption

How Do I Know If I Might be Eligible to Adopt in California?

Determining your eligibility to adopt is usually based on a process of mutual assessment and preparation by the prospective adoptive parents and a social worker, a state agency, or an Orange County adoption attorney. Adoption is the legal process by which you establish a legal parent-child relationship when you, as the adopting parent, are not the child's biological or birth parent. Once the adoption is final, then you as the adoptive parent(s) hold all the legal rights and responsibilities that a birth parent-child relationship would provide. This new parent-child relationship…

Why Are Adoptions So Complicated In California?

Adoption became a formal legal process rather than just an informal practice back in the 1850s. For well over a century, adoption has changed, evolved, and grown more complicated. Today, about 135,000 children are adopted every year in the United States. With a heart as big as the Pacific Ocean it borders, the state of California leads the nation in adoptions, and adoption lawyers can help. Legally speaking, there are four distinct types of adoption: Domestic adoption: adopting a non-related child from while in the U.S. International adoption: adopting a…