Hello, My name is Charlyn Spiering. I wanted to be an adoptive mom since before I was married. I had the superficial understanding of a young person who wanted to make a real difference in some people’s lives. The first taste I had that adoption was more than providing all the world’s orphans a home came as we were pursuing an adoption from the country of India. I had given birth to two children and we were in the process of adopting for the first time. I recall a missionary coming to our church and portraying the Indian people as poor unenlightened souls in need of salvation. I knew I would never portray India in that way to my son. I have been proud to educate my son about the beauty and culture of his birth country. As our family proceeded to become involved in foster care and I volunteered as a Guardian ad Litem with foster care we started to see how complex the system was. We saw the inefficiencies, the prejudice, and the heartbreak that went along with a system that was pieced together without the needs of children or first families at the forefront. Eventually, I gave birth once more and finally we invited our second daughter to join our family from a placement in foster care. Now we were up to five children and we felt our family was complete.

While raising my family I often thought about all we had been through along our path to adopt. We had learned so much about what doesn’t work in adoption and foster care and what we would like to see fixed. I thought there must be so many other people out there with other experiences and ideas we could learn from. I knew that fixing adoption could touch so many other worlds. Within adoption there are connections to poverty, women’s issues, international relations and the care of children and orphans. I wanted to start conversations and initiate creative problem solving around the issues in adoption and foster care. So in 2022 I started a podcast called Adoption Uncovered. My hope was that people inside and outside of the world of adoption could learn more about what needs to be fixed and creative ways to address those problems from listening to the experiences and ideas of people who should know. I have learned so much from interviewing adoptees, first parents, social workers, and other adoptive parents, and I have been immensely grateful for being able to connect with such amazing people. 

Now, as I watch my children grow and become adults I am turning my focus toward new ways to interact with the adoptive world that has been a part of our lives for the past 20 years. I want to combine the knowledge I have been gifted from people touched by adoption and foster care, with the training I have gained to help people from all parts of the adoption world accomplish their life goals in a way that is genuine and ethical.