At "Adoption Under One Roof" we enjoy entertaining different opinions and voices in the blogs and comments.  For that reason we have always had guest bloggers whenever possible. For example, a whole book based on the life of an adoptee was published on our website two days a week for almost two years. Additionally we have received and posted blogs from: a birthmother (this is an ongoing series),  contributions from single adoptive father who adopted special boys from foster care,  a single adoptive mother who has adopted through intercountry adoption, same sex parents of adoptees, an adoptee in a domestic adoption, a  birth father who has "lost" his child to adoption, an adoptee in an intercountry adoption who returns to Korea to research her roots, an adoptive parent with children adopted from foster care with  specific challenges (and here), a family attempting to adopt from foster care,  an adoptive parent who has had to dissolve an adoption, to name just some of the contributions from our guest bloggers.

"Adoption Under One Roof" has been enhanced and enriched thanks to these and other  guest bloggers, and equally important they present diverse opinions from the different "angles" of the adoption triangle (birth parents, adoptees, adoptive parents) – so very important in the creation and maintenance of a dialogue between the three groups.

I recently posted a blog about an Indian family who travelled to Holland in an effort to retrieve the child they claimed had been stolen from them. They asked the Dutch court to insist on a DNA test, but their request was turned down. The adoptive parents would not meet with the couple from India; the child stayed with his adoptive parents.

One of our readers living in Israel sent me information about an adoption case in Israel that ended differently, perhaps tragically so. An Israeli couple adopted a little girl named Bruna from Brazil in 1988. At that time there were many children adopted from Brazil by Israeli couples. Not unlike most Israeli families, life revolved around their daughter – they loved and adored her. Then when Bruna was two years old, her birthparents Rosilda and Luis arrived in Israel claiming that she had been kidnapped and no one had ever given permission for the adoption.

Where did this poor couple from Brazil get the funds to travel to Israel and petition the high court to return their daughter? A British TV crew who learned about this incident decided to fund their appeal. They also rented the whole floor in an expensive hotel in Tel Aviv for journalists around the world. It was a media circus.

Patricia Dischler is the author of "Because I Loved You: A Birthmother's View of Open Adoption", a speaker, child care professional and birthmother. Read more from Patricia here.

I often told my son's adoptive mother how much I loved her and was thankful she was a part of my life. But, like many things I've told her over the years, Kathy would already know. Back in 1985 I chose open adoption for my son. Being a birthmother has changed my life forever, and I know that becoming an adoptive parent changed Kathy's, too. We've traveled the road of adoption together, with respect and honesty. We've shared our hopes, our fears and our dreams for the boy we both love.

However, often adoptive parents do not get the chance to build this type of relationship with their child's birthmother. While most domestic adoptions are open, most children adopted from other countries are not. This disconnect from a child's beginnings can make it difficult for adoptive parents to provide answers their child will need as they grow and explore the issue of being adopted.

While a birthmother's experience after placement may be different in open versus closed adoptions, the process leading to the choice of adoption is much more likely to follow the same thread - love. Regardless of our place on this planet, birthmothers share the journey of facing a decision in a pregnancy and letting our love for our child lead the way. The individual circumstances may be very different from culture to culture, but ultimately we come to a place where we feel that what is best for our child is to have a life different than what we can provide and we choose adoption.

There are 10 things every birthmother thinks about, wishes for, and hopes for when placing their child for adoption. If you are in an open adoption, you may have heard some already; if not, they are important to know. They are:

A reader wants to know if a birth child who was placed for adoption is entitled to the death benefits of his birth mother. The short answer is no. When a judge terminates the birth mother’s parental rights (TPR), in the eyes of the law, the birth mother and birth child cease to have any legal connection. The birth mother’s rights and responsibilities toward the child were forever terminated, so the birth mother has no responsibility whatsoever for the welfare of her birth child.

Because the birth child is no longer legally connected to the birth mother, he does not “benefit” from the birth mother’s death. He is not entitled to any death benefits, nor is he considered a “child” of the birth mother under her will or under intestate law (when a person dies without a will). Of course, a birth mother can choose to include a birth child in her will or death benefits.