Adoption
Adoption
Adoption is the only work we do where the last hearing is a happy one. Bring your questions early; the paperwork is genuinely long, and starting it well saves months.
Stepparent adoption
This is the most common adoption we handle. A stepparent who has been raising a child wants that relationship to be permanent and legal. It requires either the consent of the other legal parent or a finding that their rights should be terminated, usually for abandonment or a sustained failure to support.
If the other parent consents, this is a clean process that takes about four months. If they do not, it becomes a contested termination case and takes considerably longer. We will be honest with you about which one you are in at the first meeting.
Agency, foster and independent adoption
We work alongside Oregon licensed agencies and with families adopting a child already in their care through foster placement. That includes the home study coordination, the interstate compact paperwork when a child crosses state lines, and the final hearing.
For independent adoptions arranged directly with a birth parent, Oregon requires that the birth parent has independent counsel. We can help arrange that, and we will not represent both sides.
Second-parent and confirmatory adoption
For same-sex couples and families formed through assisted reproduction, an adoption judgment is the one document that every state and every country must recognise. Even where Oregon already treats both of you as legal parents, we generally recommend it.
It is not a comment on your family. It is a passport for it.
Questions people ask about adoption
No. Consent is given in a signed and witnessed document beforehand. Most birth parents do not attend, and no one is put in a room together.
Oregon law is good on this and your parentage is likely already secure here. The adoption judgment is about the other forty nine states and about travel. Many families do it for that reason alone.
Yes, and they should. Judges keep the courtroom light for these, take photographs, and there is usually a stuffed animal involved.
More of them on the common questions page, including cost, timing and what happens on the first call.
The other three
Divorce and separation
Ending a marriage without ending up as strangers who hate each other. Most of our divorces settle at a table, not in a courtroom.
Custody and parenting time
Building a schedule your children can actually live inside, and holding the other parent to it when they will not.
Estate planning and guardianship
Wills, trusts, powers of attorney and guardian nominations. An afternoon of paperwork that spares your family a year of guessing.
Start with a conversation, not a commitment
Twenty minutes on the phone, free, with somebody who will tell you plainly whether you even need a lawyer for this.