Media Monday: Forever Fingerprints: An Amazing Discovery for Adopted Children

Forever Fingerprints: An Amazing Discovery for Adopted Children by Sherrie Eldridge

We give this book 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Here is a summary from EMK Press:
"For adopted children, learning about their beginnings and how they understand what that means to them is a process. It doesn’t happen at one point in time, but rather throughout the experiences of life. In this heartwarming children’s book, Forever Fingerprints uses a common occurrence–a relative’s pregnancy–as a springboard for discussions on birthparents, where adopted children are before they are born, and how that makes one little girl feel about it. Lucie is excited to feel a baby moving in her Aunt Grace’s tummy but it makes her think of how she understands her adoption story in a different way. The tools offered in this book help her to create a unique connection to her birthparents, allow how she is feeling to surface and to be discussed, and give Lucie’s parents the chance to reinforce their love for her, to empathize with her feelings and to honor her past."

We liked that this book talked about the feelings an adopted child might experience (that they did something wrong that made their birth parents not want to keep them). We didn't like that this adopted girl didn't know anything about her birth parents. The adoptive parents did a good job of trying to explain that her fingerprints were a connection to her birth parents. We liked how open they were to her feelings and to talking about her adoption. However, we are looking for an open adoption so that the child knows their birth parents and knows that the decision to place their child for adoption was made out of love. We plan on being very open with them and allowing them to discuss any feelings they have, as well as reinforcing how much we love them as well.