I’m Pregnant
If you're facing an unintended pregnancy or have recently given birth, we're here for you with free and confidential all-options counseling, resources, and support. Call our pregnancy counselors 24/7 at 800-439-0233.
Media Recommendations for Birth Parents and Professionals
Browse our library of books, articles, podcasts, and resource organizations which we recommend to expectant & birth parents as well as adoption professionals. Various topics are included with resources either explicitly directed to birth parents or explore relevant subjects.
Supportive Media for Birth Parents and Professionals
We maintain curated lists of resources that offer valuable insights, guidance, and reflections pertinent to expectant/birth parents and professionals looking to provide informed care. You’ll find voices of lived experience and other experts exploring personal narratives, histories both individual and systemic, trauma and psychology, and investigations into the structures that impact birth parents.
Paths for Families is proud to offer counseling to expectant parents and birth parents no matter how long ago they placed, contact us to learn more.
For Expectant Parents
All-Options Talkline
Contact the Talkline Anywhere in the US and Canada
Pregnancy Option Workbook: A Guide for those Facing a Pregnancy Decision
Download from pregnancyoptions.info
MD, DC, VA: Call or Text Our Team for Free, 24/7 All-Options Counseling
Books: Adoption Specific
Adoption Nation
Adam Pertman
Adoption Unfiltered Revelations from Adoptees, Birthparents, Adoptive Parents, and Allies
Sara Easterly, Kelsey Vander Vliet Ranyard & Lori Holden
American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption
Gabrielle Glaser
Birthmothers: Women Who Have Relinquished Babies for Adoption Tell Their Stories
Merry Bloch Jones
Finding Hope: A Birthmother’s Journey into the Light
Hope O. Baker
Life Givers: Framing the Birth Parent Experience in Open Adoption
James L. Gritter
God and Jetfire: Confessions of a Birth Mother
Amy Seek
Seven Core Issues in Adoption and Permanency
Sharon Kaplan Roszia & Allison Davis Maxon
Relinquished: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood
Gretchen Sisson
The Baby Market: The Case for Adoption Reform
Anne Moody
Saying Goodbye to Baby: A Counselor’s Guide to Birth Parent Loss and Grief in Adoption
Patricia Roles
The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade
Ann Fessler
Books: Grief and Loss
Finding Meaning
David Kessler
It Didn’t Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who we are and How to End the Cycle
Mark Wolynn
It’s Ok That You’re Not Ok
Megan Devine
Man’s Search for Meaning
Victor Frankl
Mother Brain
Chelsea Conaboy
The Body Keeps the Score
Bessel van der Kolk
The Grieving Brain: The Surprising Science of How We Learn from Love and Loss
Mary-Frances O’Connor
The Healing Choice: Your Guide to Emotional Recovery After an Abortion
Candace De Puy & Dana Dovitch
The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief
Francis Weller
You Can Heal Your Heart: Finding Peace After a Breakup, Divorce, or Death
Louise Hay & David Kessler
Alan Wolfelt grief booklets:
- Expected Loss: Coping with Anticipatory Grief
- Too Much Loss: Coping with Grief Overload
- The Guilt of Grief: How to Understand, Embrace, and Restoratively Express Guilt and Regret after a Loss
- The Other Losses: Acknowledging and Mourning All Your Losses Along Life’s Path
- The Anger of Grief: How to Understand, Embrace, and Restoratively Express Explosive Emotions after a Loss
- Complicated Grief: How to Understand, Express, and Reconcile Your Especially Difficult Grief
- Cherishing: The Art of Fully Living While Still Loving and Honoring those Who’ve Died
Journals
Birth Parent’s Guide to Grief: A 12 Step Process
Jessalynn Speight & Alysia Foote
Grow, Flower & Flourish: A Birth Parent Journal
On Your Feet Foundation
How to Carry What Can’t Be Fixed: A Journal for Grief
Megan Devine
Revealing You: A Journal for Birth Mothers
Michelle Thorne
(Please note: This resource is a Christian workbook)
Resource Organizations
AdoptMatch Resource Database for Birth Parents
https://www.adoptmatch.com/birth-parent-resources-database
Birth Mammha app
Birth Moms Today
Brave Love
Knee to Knee
On Your Feet Foundation
Postpartum Support International
Tied at the Heart
Weaving Threads
Podcasts
Birth Mothers Amplified
Muthoni & Emma
adoption.org/birth-mothers-amplified
Birth Moms Real Talk
D. Yvonne Rivers
Twisted Sisterhood Podcast
Ashley Mitchell & Kelsey Vander Vliet Ranyard
Creating A Family
Creating a Family
creatingafamily.org/radio-show
The Triad Podcast: Straight to the Heart of Adoption
Hope O. Baker, Sharon Obazee & Shelbi Walker
For Professionals
Birth Parent Grief in Adoption
Meshan Lehmann
Non-Death Loss and Grief: Context and Clinical Implications First Edition edited
Darcy L Harris
Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy
William Worden
Loss, Trauma, and Resilience: Therapeutic Work With Ambiguous Loss
Pauline Boss
Out of the Shadows, a film about birth moms
Next Resource
Expectant Parent FAQ
Considering adoption? Discover answers to common questions in our expectant parent FAQ. Get 24/7 support, legal insights, and guidance on choosing an adoptive family. Learn about financial assistance and the emotional journey of open adoption.