Adoption is the legal process of establishing a parent/child relationship in which one person takes the child of another person as his or her own and assumes complete legal custody and responsibility for that child. The biological parent(s) give up their parental rights and responsibilities severing all legal ties to the child. The adopted child has the same legal rights as a biological child of the adoptive parent(s).
North Carolina adoption laws are specifically written to advance the best interests of the child by finding good adoptive parents. Adoption is carefully regulated by statute to accomplish that goal.