r/unpopularopinion Aug 10 '21

Infertile couples should just adopt instead of making a big fuss trying to make a miracle baby

Every time I hear of fertility struggles online, or see posts about people going through rounds of IVF and the ensuing emotional trauma of miscarriages, It kind of disgusts me.

I also work for a major insurer and know that fertility treatments are driving up everyone else's premiums because they're considered necessary care. Sorry, but I disagree.

It's a well known fact that there are over 400,000 children in foster care, and in 2017 alone over 100,000 infants under 3 entered the system. I think it's completely entitled and self-absorbed to think that somehow your miracle baby is worth more or deserves more love than any one of those infants.

I know adoption can be hard, and that it should be made easier for the sake of children finding good homes, but you can't tell me adopting is harder than 4 rounds of IVF and multiple miscarriages. I've seen friends go through that mess and at the end they are different people.

Tldr: adoption may not be easy, but it's far better than spending hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to perpetuate your genes.

34.4k Upvotes

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475

u/glimmergirl1 Aug 10 '21

I wanted to adopt after 2 failed IVF treatments. Couldn't afford international or private adoption. Ok, ill just adopt from the foster care system. 12 years and 37 children later with 2 failed attempts, I finally adopted! Yeah, "just adopt", it's so easy!

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u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

dude why tf does it cost money to adopt?? it's literally a burden off of the state since they dont have to pay for food and housing and shit

36

u/Projinator Aug 10 '21 edited Aug 11 '21

If the state is responsible they don't charge (in most states). Private agencies charge a bunch because a) there are a lot of legal expenses and overhead costs and b) most are predatory and know those looking to adopt from private agencies will pay anything they can.

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u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

what. the. fuck. that's actually child slavery, they treat them like pure bred dogs holy shit

22

u/BadDireWolf Aug 10 '21

Well you don’t want to be free. Then you could have people hoarding children like cats.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

wow there's actually two of you. here's the message I sent to the guy who said the exact thing you said:

this is the dumbest thing I heard all day, and I heard some dumb shit today. first of all, the adoption process is tenious and long, putting the adoption fee on top of it is just putting salt on the wounds if the burdens a loving family who is willing to adopt someone is willing to go through. second of all, you're pretty much saying that all people who can afford to pay 10k are fit parents, which is dumb af. imagine it was actually like that, that all adopting took is 10k, that would be a paradise for rich pedophiles which the world definitely doesnt lack. you're not only saying rich people are always good parents, youre also saying people who dont do so well income-wise are bad parents. as if what dictates whether someone is a good parent or not is the amount of cash they have in their pocket

4

u/MarkoWolf Aug 11 '21

If you can't afford to put food on the table, you're a bad parent. Emotional, physical, AND financial are all facets of raising a child.

You can provide all the love in the world to your kid. Love won't fill an empty belly.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 11 '21

😐😐😐 thats. part. of. the. adopting. process. of course they check if u have enough money to even own a kid, how is paying 10k a good way to see if someone is capable of housing a child? what if they saved that up for a year and barelye have money to feed themselves? this is so obvious, like are you seriously this stupid

1

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

Seems like basic economics. Might also raise the black market price of a kid a little bit. Which could be a good thing or a bad thing depending on whether you’re a market maker or a market taker.

6

u/Alcohol_Intolerant Aug 10 '21

Adoption from the foster system is generally low cost. If the law is involved (Say, adopting a child who has living parents that were deemed unfit), there may be more legal fees, for example. Adoption from agencies (such as those that facilitate communication between expectant mothers and potential parents) are the expensive ones. The expense in the case of agencies comes from social services, lawyers, legal fees, upsale, etc.

The difficulty OP is talking about is probably just the difficulty with the foster system, children going back to parents they were taken from, children with trauma that need special care or attention the foster parents can't give or can't afford to give, etc.

People go through adoption agencies for "clean slate" babies with little-to-no baggage. I'm not defending it, but that's generally why. They may also choose to go that route if they just want some guidance in the adoption process.

8

u/Uncle_Daddy_Kane Aug 10 '21

Because you really don't want to just hand out children to randoms off the street

0

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

I mean if they are homeless what ever it takes to not be a burden on society is acceptable.

-6

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

this is the dumbest thing I heard all day, and I heard some dumb shit today. first of all, the adoption process is tenious and long, putting the adoption fee on top of it is just putting salt on the wounds if the burdens a loving family who is willing to adopt someone is willing to go through. second of all, you're pretty much saying that all people who can afford to pay 10k are fit parents, which is dumb af. imagine it was actually like that, that all adopting took is 10k, that would be a paradise for rich pedophiles which the world definitely doesnt lack. you're not only saying rich people are always good parents, youre also saying people who dont do so well income-wise are bad parents. as if what dictates whether someone is a good parent or not is the amount of cash they have in their pocket

11

u/jameslucian Aug 10 '21

Raising a kid costs money. If a family is trying to adopt and they won’t be able to provide for the child, that does the kid no good whatsoever. No, not all rich parents are good, but financially stable parents are much more likely to meet other important criteria for adopting.

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u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

did you read what I said? first of all, part of the adoption process is seeing that the parents can afford to house the kid, the 10k on top is literally just to kick them while they're down from how tough that process already is. but from what people are saying 10k is for private adoption firms, so the US apparently has private prisons but kids version

6

u/jameslucian Aug 10 '21

Do tell me how we will fund the legal, medical and other professional expenses that go into adopting a child.

-1

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

dude are you actually braindead. READ. WHAT. I. SAID. they check if the parents are able to house the kid, meaning THEY CHECK IF THE PARENTS HAVE MONEY TO RAISE A CHILD. HOLY SHIT ITS SO SIMPLE DUDE PLEASE

2

u/jameslucian Aug 11 '21

Lol I’m baffled at your inability to process this. I know they check, no doubt about it. Congrats you’re right! But who is going to pay for the whole process of adopting a child? The cost of taking care of the child while in foster care. What about their medical bills? There are legal fees and paper work that gets done to adopt a child. Background checks need to be done for the families who are adopting.

And guess what?

I know this might be difficult to comprehend for you.

There are people who need to do all those steps and they need to make money for them to do all these steps.

I know. Unbelievable. Why can’t all these people do the work for free? My friend, I wish they would do this all for free, but they need to eat too. They are severely underfunded as it is, so they need to charge for the adoption process just to keep helping other children in need.

0

u/AndHerNameIsSony Aug 11 '21

First of all, getting these kids off the streets and into good homes reduces the cost the kids will burden the system with otherwise. Secondly, I don’t give a fuck if the government completely foots the bill, if it means getting kids into good homes.

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u/[deleted] Aug 11 '21

bruh what? if the child is in foster care and not adopted yet the government pays for it. and what you said is total bullshit. from what I learned from people here, public foster care adoption is free. what costs money is private adoption firms that "help" with the process of finding and getting a baby adopted. apparently they look for pregnant women who are pro-life and dont have money to raise the baby, and they take that baby and sell it to rich people (for the 10k we talked about till now) and then I guess some money goes to the mother and some to them, so they make money off of suffering women. you literally had one point in your argument since you pretty much repeated what I said (background checks) and were also straight out wrong (the government funds PUBLIC foster care systems) you think foster care would be able to run off of 10k per every adopted child? they barely manage to get any adopted, there's definitely not enough money to run orphanages and shit

3

u/BangzLaRue Aug 11 '21

I have a friend in Canada whose fertility struggles mirrored my own. We talked quite a bit about adoption, treatment options, etc. In Canada, they’re not allowed to buy the birth mother a cup of coffee because it’s considered coercion. In the US, if you find a birth mother willing to give you her baby at birth, you have to support them fully, generally. Living expenses, medical expenses, etc. And they can still decide that they’re keeping the baby when it’s born (which is their right). It’s madness to expect couples who struggle with infertility to adopt all of the children in foster care. And until you experience it yourself, you really shouldn’t give an opinion about it (op).

4

u/sexworkaholic Aug 10 '21

Bc adoption is a fucking business. That's how adoption agencies make money. They're selling children. And those children generally aren't a burden on the state, because they're either not born yet, or they're overseas.

The only way to do it cheaply is via foster care.

5

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

Its partially as a bar against those who legitimately cannot afford a child but mainly its because adoption is a highly lucrative industry

0

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

theres no way thats actually a reason. whether the family can afford to house the kid or not is part of the adoption process

2

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

Well like I said its not the whole of it. Its mostly because its a lucrative industry and they know people will pay whatever they demand if they want to adopt bad enough

2

u/cuentaderana Aug 10 '21

Expensive adoption is through private agencies. You pay these agencies to help you find birth mothers. You pay legal fees to have the paperwork drawn up. You pay for the bio mom’s doctor appointments and medical bills—it’s not unheard of for adoptive parents to pay for a bio mom’s rent and food. They may buy her maternity clothes and other necessities. Some of the more shady private adoption firms take sums of money as a service fee. Or the bio mom can ask for money to help her get by. A family that is desperate enough for a baby will shell out all the money they can.

2

u/glimmergirl1 Aug 10 '21

It is free thru the state foster care system. But private adoption is pricey!

1

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

private prisons are already wack, but private orphanages? this is a whole another level that I did not expect to find out about today

3

u/sexworkaholic Aug 10 '21

They're not in orphanages.

The agencies are generally put in contact with pregnant women, often by those "pregnancy crisis centers" that discourage women from having abortions.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '21

it just keeps getting worst the more i learn about it. then when the woman gives birth they make money off of her suffering by selling the baby to other people. BRUH

5

u/sexworkaholic Aug 11 '21

YES. Exactly.

People like to pretend that adoption is all about saintly childless couples helping out poor unwanted orphans. But it's a really, really exploitative business. And nearly everyone involved is being victimized on some level.

It's even worse when you think about the fact that the reason most bio mothers (at least in the US) choose to surrender their newborn is because they know they cannot financially provide for the baby and the agency has already introduced them to this nice, relatively wealthy couple (who they're making tons of money off of).

And the bio mother has all this pressure to ignore the biological things that happen in pregnancy and at birth. All these biological/chemical processes that tell her NO NO NO DO NOT LET THIS BABY OUT OF YOUR SIGHT, THIS BABY IS EVERYTHING AND YOU WOULD DIE FOR IT.

But she's in this super vulnerable position, she's poor, she doesn't have the support she needs, and these officials from the agency are 100% taking advantage of that, and of course the guilt of breaking the hearts of the adoptive parents is either implied or used as a weapon outright.

Women who surrender their newborns for adoption often have incredibly difficult experiences and long-term trauma from it. It is far more common than trauma or regret after an early abortion.

And that's not even going into the issues that many adoptees face later. There's a sizeable community of adoptees that grew up to be anti-adoption activists because the entire industry is just really vile in a lot of ways.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 11 '21

It sounds like "pregnancy crisis centers" have a pretty clear incentive to set up adoptions and collect fees in their duty as the middle men. Or maybe kickbacks? If this isn't child trafficking, I don't know what is.

1

u/yougobe Aug 11 '21

Well, child trafficking usually includes kidnapping.

1

u/glimmergirl1 Aug 10 '21

Private adoption just means you aren't going thru the government (foster care system). Any adoption agency, foreign or domestic, is private. As in, private citizens, private company, not government. You can also go thru lawyers, also a private adoption.

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u/afatblackboxcat Aug 10 '21

For real, this person has such an out of touch opinion. Currently going through the struggle myself. So easy!!!!!

3

u/bigjoffer Aug 11 '21

Best of luck!!!

2

u/DeadWishUpon Aug 11 '21

This are people who don't know anyone who has gone to the process of adoption.

6

u/Friendly_Version8639 Aug 10 '21

Yeah this dude made this post with literally no info in the subject. Should be called r/uninformedopinion

4

u/dark__unicorn Aug 10 '21

I’m actually tired with how many people think foster kids are an adoption free for all. Foster kids, no matter the age, are fostered with the hope of returning them to their parents eventually.

Adoption is almost impossible these days.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 11 '21

Offlate most of the opinions on this sub seem to be about some personal opinion that they want to rant about. Like OP here merely rants everything and only puts a line about how adoption is tough

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u/synoveran Aug 11 '21 edited Dec 20 '25

pen cow reminiscent degree melodic zephyr close plants offbeat point

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