Adoption Used as an Option for Many Struggling by Terri Rimmer - originally published by Associated Content, 2009

As my birth daughter's ninth birthday approaches this month I am filled with such gratitude and wonder regarding my most painful yet smartest decision I ever made.

Like a woman recently profiled in USA Today recently, I, too placed my daughter for adoption when I was in my 30s at the age of 34 though I had no other kids and still don't. In this day and age it still amazes me the horrible view so many people have about adoption. Yes, of course, there are "bad" adoptions but I know my daughter has a great life because I get visits with her and I see it in her eyes, laughter, and personality.

When I was pregnant and after it was unbelievable the amount of vicious comments I got from other women who called themselves my friends as well as co-workers and even the general public. These people clearly still have a backwoods mentality when it comes to adoption - no awareness whatsoever of what the birth mom goes through or why she made the decision she did - a heart-wrenching one by the way that is not so easily wrapped up like a gift as it was in the movie "Juno" with only a few shed tears.

A celebrity adoptee recently featured in People Magazine lamented that her birth mom made a mistake placing her for adoption. But did it ever occur to this actress that she probably would not have had the success she enjoyed on TV if her birth mom didn't make the decision she did?

As a result of my experience, I published an e book on booklocker.com under the family heading called MacKenzie's Hope about my journey as a birth mom.

The percentage of women who place a child for adoption is relatively low according to one expert because single parenthood is widely accepted and abortion is legal.

"As parents struggle to raise children in a weak economy, a half-dozen adoption agencies are reporting that more women with unplanned pregnancies are considering placing their babies for adoption rather than keeping them," states the article. (http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-05-18-mother_N.htm). "Finances are also prompting more women to question pregnancy and to inquire about abortion."

Wendy Koch, who wrote the above story, states that the bond between the two families regarding adoption reflects a trend toward openness.

In a letter to the USA Today editor, Ann Wrixon, executive director of the Independent Adoption Center in Pleasant Hill, CA, says that as the article pointed out, 90 percent of domestic adoptions are open, where adoptive families remain in contact with birth families.

"Just as important is making a commitment to sat in contact so that the child knows the decision was made out of love, as it clearly was in the case of the family profiled," Wrixon writes. "Stories such as the one USA Today reported help tell the positive side of adoption that was often taboo not long ago."

The Independent Adoption Center has been providing open adoption placements and counseling to birth and adoptive families since 1982 in an effort to ensure that every child grows up feeling loved and supported, according to Wrixon.

Planned Parenthood reported in June that legislators renewed the "Alternatives to Abortion" program and increased its funding from five to eight million.