The advent of changing adoption legislation, policy and practice is impacting on all people touched by the adoption experience. Open adoption is now considered to be best practice. In South Australia adoption legislation was changed in 1988. All adoption records were made available retrospectively to adopted people and birth parents unless a five-year veto was placed by either the birth parent or adopted person requesting no contact with the ‘seeker’. As a consequence to these changes, the role of adoptive parents has changed considerably. This change has not been adequately planned for and adoptive parents have few supports in redefining their role in the adoption experience. Susan Mann presents a practitioner's view of the experiences of adoptive parents with recommendations about how to create a more positive and productive dialogue among all parties affected by varying adoption practices. Confidentiality is maintained throughout the paper by the use of pseudonyms.
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