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Separated At Adoption: Addressing The Challenges Of Maintaining Sibling-Of-Origin Bonds In Post-Adoption Families, Rebecca L. Scharf

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This Article explores the ways children, many of whom are in foster care, are psychologically harmed by the law’s failure to ensure that the bonds they have with their siblings-of-origin are not permanently broken when one of the siblings is adopted; it therefore proposes ways that courts can better protect children from the psychological harm of having a biological sibling permanently removed from their life. It suggests that what is needed is a framework that allows visitation by biological siblings with whom children have formed attachments without unnecessarily intruding on the fundamental liberty interest of the adoptive parents at issue …