Grandparents Adopting Grandchildren: The Darlings Are in the Details

grandparents adoption grandchildren

Can Grandparents Have Legal Adoption Rights Over Their Grandchildren?

Grandchildren Adoption Not Always Automatic. Grandparents Not Always First Choice; Best Interest Of The Child Is Also Considered!

grandparents adoption grandchildren

Deciding to adopt a child into a family is a serious undertaking, one that hopefully will bring great happiness for many years. While adoption laws vary from state to state, the process is always a lengthy one, with the applicant needing to meet many detailed requirements before being qualified to adopt. Among them are:

  1. Providing a thorough family and social history;
  2. Being physically and mentally healthy;
  3. Demonstrating financial stability;
  4. Showing moral integrity, with no significant criminal background history;
  5. Demonstrating other factors that the state or agency believe are relevant to the adoption.

At an increased pace, grandparents are petitioning courts to adopt their own grandchildren. This is occurring as result of the incarceration of one or both parents, substance abuse issues the parent(s) are dealing with, or as a consequence of domestic violence, etc. In fact, more than 2.6 million children are living with grandparents, relatives, or close family friends without either of their parents in the home.

Approximately 7.6 million children live in households headed by a grandparent or other … Read More... “Grandparents Adopting Grandchildren: The Darlings Are in the Details”

Custodial Grandparents: Stress From Raising Grandchildren

Increasing Number of Grandparents Becoming Custodial Grandparents to their Grandchildren

Custodial Grandparents Have Higher Stress Levels than Grandparents Who Are not Caregivers of their Grandchildren According to Recent Studies

What children need most are the essentials that grandparents provide in abundance.  They give unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life.  And, most importantly, cookies.

~ Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

custodial grandparents grandchildrenI believe Mayor Giuliani’s wonderful quote about grandparents resonates in most of our hearts when we think of our own grandparents.  However, in today’s society we are seeing an increasing number of grandparents becoming custodial grandparents to their grandchildren.  Custodial grandparent or grandparents are best defined as grandparents who take over as the primary caretaker to their grandchildren.  Collectively, custodial grandparents often face a number of different and unique difficulties associated with the caring of their grandchildren, when compared to the traditional nuclear family structure of two birth parents raising and caring for their children. Some of these difficulties include increase of stress in their day-to-day lives, financial struggles due to fixed incomes, and health related limitations as custodial grandparents are usually at a different stage in life when caring for the children.  This article will … Read More... “Custodial Grandparents: Stress From Raising Grandchildren”