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The decision to adopt is one of the most giving decisions that a person will ever make. It is also one of the most rewarding. However, there are situations that make it difficult, most especially if the adopted child comes with a laundry list of ailments or troubles that will afflict their future and that of the adoptive parents and family. A child in crisis or in poor health is a heartbreak to the parents that love and care for them, whether it is a birth parent or an adoptive parent.

When a couple is ready to begin a family, one of the things that many discuss is their respective family histories. They go through past generations of people that share their genetic lines to address any problems that could come up in their own children. This is one difference between those who have their children naturally and those who choose to adopt. These couples have no opportunity to do such research, whether they wish to or not. For this reason, DNA testing should be an option for these couples in situations where it is desired. Of course, this isn't a guarantee of anything, just as birth parents never have a guarantee, but it does give them the chance to know if there is something that can show up right away.

This does not mean that a child with potential future problems would not be adopted if that was known up front, either, but it might mean that they would be adopted by a family that was prepared to handle these problems better than others. For example, I know of a couple that only adopted "drug babies". This was a calling that they felt and they provided the enormous amount of care that these children required without ever voicing a complaint. Other families may not have the patience and willingness to give that this adoption requires, but they do and they do it wonderfully. There are other families that have a particular love for the mentally handicapped, physically deformed. or other special needs children. Children that are adopted into these families are very fortunate. They are with people that love them the way they are and are capable to meet their needs.

If DNA testing were to be available to potential adoptive parents, there may be more people who would be willing to take a child into their home. With so many children without permanent families in this world, this could be just the change needed to ease the minds of some people who worry about the child's background and health history. There would also be many children who would be adopted into families that were more capable of meeting their needs, especially when the potential need will be great. Advances in medicine have made many things possible and confident adoptions could soon be one of those things.

Learn more about this author, Victoria Tiegert.
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