November is National Adoption Month, a cause that is particularly meaningful to Carol Wild, the co-founder of Rhode to Adoption. This agency assists clients who are preparing for private adoption by providing home studies, educational workshops, training, and post-placement services. Wild’s experiences as a parent of an adopted child, along with her background in foster care and private adoption, inspired her to partner with Janelle “JC” Roussel to establish Rhode to Adoption in January 2025.
ON THE JOB: At Boys Town New England in Portsmouth, I worked with parents whose children were in the foster care system, teaching them skills to help them reunify with their kids. I transferred into another role working with families, couples and individuals who were foster parents. It was an opportunity to see the other side of the system to help these parents with the behavioral challenges many of these kids have because of their trauma history. At Jewish Collaborative Services, I served as the adoption coordinator for Adoption Options, which welcomes all regardless of faith.
JOURNEY TO ADOPTING: I loved working in foster care. I could feel the need for (more) foster parents. There are so many kids who need homes. My ex-husband and I became licensed as foster parents and ended up adopting our daughter through foster care. She was eight years old when she came to live with us. We separated when she was 10, but we continue to co-parent and maintain a totally amicable, good relationship. We both adopted her when she was 13. It’s a real gift to be able to share with families that I’m an adoptive parent myself.
DIFFERENT PATHWAYS: Through foster care, the goal is usually reunification for those children. That can change and become adoption, if things are not working out. With private adoption, the couple/individual has a home study, education and training, and then works with a placement agency to match them with a birth mother or birth parents who have made an adoption plan before the baby is born.
PROFESSIONAL FULFILLMENT: One of the first couples that came to us at Rhode to Adoption was a couple I had worked with when I was at another agency. I had conducted their home study, and they ended up adopting a baby boy. They learned that I had started my own adoption agency and wanted to work with me again for their second adoption. We completed their home study, and they are now in the waiting process. I felt very honored that they felt safe with me and wanted to work with me again to expand their family.
Rhode to Adoption partners with Adoption Rhode Island for this free event which includes special guests, speakers, and more. Warwick Public Library, Warwick. Learn more at RhodeToAdoption.com
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