Can My Ex Adopt My Child?
It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes a divorced parent will want their former spouse to adopt their child. This can happen where the parties are together for a long time and the child comes to see the step parent as their father or mother. The Virginia legislature has put this kind of adoption on the same footing as a step-parent adoption.
Virginia Code Section 63.2-1201.1 provides as follows:
Previously married persons who stood in loco parentis during the time of the marriage may adopt in the same manner as married persons.
A man and woman previously married to each other who stood in loco parentis to a child during their marriage to each other, and who could have adopted or readopted the child pursuant to this chapter while married to each other, but whose marriage is void, has been annulled or has dissolved, may adopt or readopt the child pursuant to the provisions in this chapter that are applicable to married persons.
So long as the former spouse had a parental relationship with the child, the former spouse may adopt under the same procedure that would apply if the divorce had not taken place.
Total Adoptions to the United States
According the Office of Children, United States Department of State this are the adoptions statistics by country in the fiscal year 2009 (a fiscal year begins on October 1 and ends on September 30):