Adoptees

Children or adults who have been placed and raised in an adoptive family are referred to as adoptees in the adoption community. There are 1.5 million adopted children in the United States, which accounts for about 2 percent of all children in the U.S., according to data reported by the 2000 U.S. Census Bureau. Additionally, there are between 6 to 10 million adults in America that were raised in adoptive households.

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Growing up as an adoptee can bring unique challenges for children. According to the chartbook Adoption USA, adopted children are more likely than their peers to have attention disorders, anxiety and depression. This doesn't mean all adopted children have these problems, but there is a stigma that adopted children should experience emotional problems and issues with identity. Whether this is true or not really depends on one's lifestyle and biological circumstance.

As an adult adoptee there may come a time when you find questions and curiosities easily ignored at a younger age may need to be addressed for peace of mind. This may be for medical reasons, general curiosity or the desire to access important documents, such as a birth certificate. Luckily, most adoptees who find holes in their history can pursue their right to access information from their pre-adoption past, although the extent of information varies from state to state.

Since 1971, the Adoptee Liberty Movement Association has fought for the rights of adopted children to resolve any missing pieces in an adoptee's life, although the process by which to retrieve medical and personal information varies by state. There are still plenty of kinks in the system, but triad members have never been more understood by agencies and the law than now.

A majority of U.S. states allow birth parents, adoptees and adult siblings to access non-identifying information on an adoptee or birth mother from sealed adoption records. Six states currently allow adults that were adopted access to their birth certificates without mutual consent from both adoption parties, while a majority of states require both parties to mutually register for a sealed file to be opened.

International adoptees are likely to face geographic and cultural disparities from their birth place, although certain countries, such as Korea and Lithuania, tend to have thorough medical and social histories. There's a good chance adoptive parents may already have requested this information before adopting.