ADOPTION ATTORNEY

The Barrows Firm attorneys are active in supporting the cause to increase awareness about adoptions, as well as other juvenile matters. Our knowledgeable team can guide you through the experience of expanding your family through adoption and help clear any legal hurdles that arise. We will work tirelessly to help bring you and your adoptive child together, forever.

The role of adoption attorneys is invaluable for representing adopting parents during Texas adoption procedures. On National Adoption Day, the Barrows Firm closes its doors, and our entire staff goes to the courthouse to assist in bringing adoptive parents and foster children into permanent homes. Our founder and lead attorney, Leslie Barrows, has been involved with the Tarrant County National Adoption Day program for years and has even served as event chair.

Adoption is a permanent decision, and it is a major responsibility to a child in need of a forever home. Sometimes family situations lead to adoptions and while that can be good for everyone involved, it is important to understand the long-term impact of adopting a child. In the case where family members are involved in adoption, consider how much of a role the natural birth parents may play in the adoptive child’s life. These situations often arise when a child is born to a mother with substance abuse issues and the child is placed in foster care with a family member who later adopts.

Learn more about adoption within formation from the Gladney Center for Adoption in Fort Worth. Attorney Leslie Barrows has worked with the adoption professionals at the Gladney Center for many years and highly recommends their resources.

To become a foster or adoptive parent, the applicant(s) must meet several requirements by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS), the agency overseeing foster child placements and adoptions. At an information meeting, the applicants learn the scope and requirements of being foster or adoptive parents. Then DFPS staff can select an applicant to attend training to help with any parenting areas that might be challenging. A family home study is performed by a department caseworker to work with an applicant and their family to visit about the significant life change that occurs, getting prepared to welcome a new foster or adoptive child. Read more, on the DFPS website.

Texas adoption laws require an applicant to be at least 21 years old, be financially stable, responsible, mature, and be able to complete the application process and home study, making a showing that they are a proper person to be a good parent. Attorneys at the Barrows Firm assist clients with legal advice and representation during the process which culminates with the Judge signing the adoption papers, the final step in the process.

Children who are removed from their parents by the Child Protective Services are placed with foster parents. When approved to become a foster parent a family or single foster parent might want to adopt their foster child, giving them a forever home. The Department of Family and Protective Services oversees the adoption process, and they have requirements for foster parents seeking to adopt a foster child in their care. The Barrows Firm attorneys can advise and represent these parents through the path to adoption.

When families lose a loved one who is a parent, or parental rights are terminated, and a grandchild, niece/nephew, or cousin can be adopted by relatives. Kinship is a valuable element in a situation where relatives are seeking to adopt, and while many of these discussions among families are informal, it is necessary to follow legal formalities in the State of Texas, including the legal termination of parental rights of both birth parents before beginning an adoption process.

When families lose a loved one who is a parent, or parental rights are terminated, and a grandchild, niece/nephew, or cousin can be adopted by relatives. Kinship is a valuable element in a situation where relatives are seeking to adopt, and while many of these discussions among families are informal, it is necessary to follow legal formalities in the State of Texas, including the legal termination of parental rights of both birth parents before beginning an adoption process.

At the Barrows Firm, one of our favorite days of the year is Tarrant County National Adoption Day, which is held each year in November in collaboration with the Family Law Courts of Tarrant County. The committee solicits attorneys to volunteer to take and process one adoption. Many families are made whole during this annual event supported by local family law judges and their court staff. The courtrooms are decorated with balloons and stuffed animals to signify the joy of the occasion.

Adoption is extremely special for both the parent and the child, and we feel privileged to help create lifelong connections and forever homes. Uniting families is one of the greatest joys our team has the honor to experience.