It’s been a while since I worked on an adoption journey book, but I have recently gotten a few inquiries about them and thought I would share some helpful tips on how to best preserve your memories of this transformational time in your life.

What is an adoption journey book?

While a life book is your child’s story, an adoption journey heirloom book is your story—you as an adoptive parent, and you as a member of your growing family.

Your adoption journey book might include:

• memories of the first meeting, the long journey home, first weeks together, first bonding experience...the memories that you don't want to fade

• a visual timeline of the adoption process

• photographs through the years

• maps of your child’s birthplace and where you physically traveled

• handwritten notes from your journal, especially during the early days as a new parent

• typed or handwritten letter with dreams for the future

• thoughts on what it means to be a parent—and a family

• memorabilia such as your ticket to your child’s birthplace, or the email alerting you to your approval as adoptive parents

• insights and feelings—the inner story of your adoption journey

There are so many paths to parenthood. Your journey, though, is the one that matters to you and your family. An adoption journey heirloom book is a beautiful means of honoring your family’s unique story and of preserving the memories and emotions for your children—and, just maybe, for the next generation.

How to keep track of your adoption journey

Did reading the above list give you palpitations? Angst at realizing you have no idea where you would dig up all that info, or guilt at not having kept a journal? If you are eager to create an adoption journey book but unsure how to access your memories, I can help you.

But if you’re thinking about this earlier in the process, first, I congratulate you; and second, I offer you a road map for keeping track of your journey so documenting it in a book later will be an even smoother process. I generally recommend undertaking making an adoption journey book around the first or second anniversary of your adoption (also called a “Gotcha Day” or “Homecoming Day”).

Some ideas for what to save:

1 - Keep an accordion file of things to help you fill in a timeline of your adoption process:

• all adoption paperwork (including email correspondence, postponements, requests for new forms, etc.)

• airline boarding passes

• postcards from the locations you travel through

• ticket stubs or restaurant menus

2 - Save photos of:

• your travels, in the airport, at the adoption locale

• first family photo

• milestones for your child(ren), including new foods, first American travel destination, first friends, etc.

• any photos showing you in the country of origin for your adopted child

• photographs of special, everyday moments (parents feeding a baby, reading to your children, hugs)

• images that show your child’s personality (active kid running, a funny child laughing).

Ideally, you will have a mix of photographs that will help you recall this special time in your family’s life, including both the monumental (the day of adoption) and the everyday (bath time).

Consider keeping a journal.

While a journal will of course help you preserve memories for an adoption journey book down the road, writing about your feelings will also have an immediate benefit: Journaling has been shown to have a positive impact on physical well-being and to be a helpful stress management tool.

A few topics to consider journaling about:

• forging bonds in the early stages of adoption

• how you choose to share details about your child’s origins

• ways you intend to incorporate your child’s culture into his/her life (traditional foods, holidays, language)

• moments of grace

• moments of struggle

Adoption is a lifelong journey.

Adoption is a lifelong journey. And while an adoption journey book such as I am recommending typically focuses on the process of adoption and the first year of settling in and becoming a new family, you always have the option to delve into your stories later in the journey, too.

I focus on these early months because, for one, they are so emotional and life-changing; and two, because they are often the most difficult to remember in detail in later years—when you will undoubtedly want to share them with your child(ren) as they mature.

For those of you who are in the midst of your adoption journey or who have already made an heirloom book, what other things might you suggest?

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