Adoption Under One Roof

A reader wants to know my opinion on a “birth mother” breastfeeding a baby that she plans to place for adoption. To be respectful, I will refer to the woman as a “placing mother” because, until her parental rights terminate, this woman is not yet a “birth mother.”

I had actually hoped that my son’s then-placing mother would do the same thing. Every baby book I read drove home the importance of breastfeeding and that “breast is best.” I did try to breastfeed my adopted baby, but I never succeeded in lactating. Even if I had, I could not produce colostrum, which is very healthy for a newborn baby. Only the mother of a newborn baby can provide this.

I did not ask my son’s then-placing mother to do this, though, because the process of breastfeeding is incredibly bonding, which would have made placing the baby for adoption even harder on her than it already was. Whether or not she wanted to breastfeed her newborn baby was her personal choice. It was not my place to ask her to do or not to do it.