Going Public

As you probably read on our family blog, this blog is now public!  I've been keeping it for my own purposes since October, and now anyone can read it.  (Anyone could have read it before...but I just hadn't mentioned it to anyone.)  So, to our new readers, welcome and thank you for taking the time to read about this journey (and steep learning curve) we're on together.

I won't post updates as often as on Jonathan's blog, but I'll still post fairly regularly.  You're always welcome to leave a comment below each post by clicking on "Comments."

Happy New Year!

Home Study

We had it today!  Sangeeta came at 1 p.m., and I have to say, I was very nervous.  Jeff wasn't as nervous, but we did spend a lot of time trying to get things in order for her visit.  We had a checklist that we knew she'd be going over, and she did do that.  But, she also spent a lot of time getting a feel for our home and getting to know Jonathan.  It wasn't as tense and rigid as I had thought it might be.

The amazing thing is that we learned that we can start having our profile shown to birthmoms in JANUARY!  We have a few things to do first:

• Finish getting our fingerprints scanned
• Finish our self-study questions
• Get physicals
• Get recertified in CPR/First Aid
• Copy drivers licenses
• Prove that we have health insurance
• Put gates on the stairs
• Lock up the chemicals
• Complete our disaster plan
• Get a fire escape ladder for an upstairs window

This is what's left on the list that we have been tackling.  Now we can get busy on the profile!  Wow, had I known it would come so quickly, I might have been more prepared.  Of course, once we have our profile ready, we're going to be doing a lot of waiting.  But it's still exciting.

Individual Interviews

Jeff and I both had them last week! Jeff had his first, and after hearing about his and all the deep questions he had to answer, I was nervous about mine the following day (Thursday.) Would the "stuff" that we're both bringing into this be a deal breaker? I really hoped not. She asked lots of questions about our childhoods, marriage, personality, parenting, etc. I think it went well. Again, two hours of talking was pretty tiring. Since we're doing this a little bit backwards after they lost our initial paperwork, there are some secondary things Jeff and I are working on that most people have done before the interviews and home study. We're working on self-study questions, getting our fingerprints scanned, getting our home safe for a baby, getting recertified in CPR and First Aid, and a huge list of other things that's pretty overwhelming. We're just trying to take one thing at a time.

The home safety thing alone is daunting. Since we moved here after Jonathan was two, and because he's not a very adventurous boy, there are some things we've never worried about, like gates on the stairs. Those are going to be tricky. I've purchased the required fire extinguisher, and I have a plan for relocating our cleaning products and meds, but the gates are going to take some more work.

It may not have been a good idea to schedule our home study the Friday after Christmas, but since the ball is rolling, and rolling fast, we hated to slow it down.

On a separate note, we had one of our family's Christmas gatherings last night. My dad's girlfriend's daughters were asking questions about this whole process, what age baby we could ask for, etc. I'm really happy for anyone to be asking questions because I know this is a very new experience not only for us but for everyone we're related to. Many of our friends are familiar with adoption or who have friends who have been through it, but I don't think many of our relatives are very familiar with it.

On Thursday when I brought Jonathan to my neighbor's house to play with her son during my interview, I told Jonathan that I would be going to Bethany Christian Services to talk to them about a baby coming to be in our family someday. (And, by the way, he can say "Bethany Christian Services!") He said, "What's the name of that baby?" I asked him what he thought it should be, and he couldn't figure that out. I told him that maybe the baby's name would be Benjamin, or maybe Grace. He said, "That baby's name is Grace." He's absolutely convinced it's Grace. We'll see if he's right.

Intake Interviews

On Saturday, Jeff and I met with Sangeeta for two hours for our joint intake interview.  I was exhausted afterwards!  Not that it went badly, because I think it was all very comfortable and pleasant, but I was just worn out from two hours of talking.  She spent a lot of time getting to know us and learn what our expectations are as we begin the adoption process.  I'm so thankful that Jeff and I are on the same page in all of this, and I hope that God is clearing the path for us as we move forward.

Two things stand out in my mind that Sangeeta shared with us:  One is that, because we already  have Jonathan, we may have to wait longer for a birthmom to choose us than we would if we didn't have a child.  The other is that, as we are open to a cross-racial adoption, it might help the birthmom be more comfortable choosing us if she knows that we would like to adopt again later on.  Then she won't have concerns about us having Jonathan, and her child (who looks different than our family) and nobody else afterwards.  I keep wondering what in the world we have to offer a baby that comes from a different culture than ours.  We're not exactly diverse or colorful, and although it would be nice to be able to offer that, I'm not sorry for who we are.  So, I guess we'll just be willing to share what we have and hope that God is preparing a baby for us!

Jeff's individual interivew is today and mine is tomorrow.  We have lots and lots more paperwork to fill out after that.

Dear Birthmother, Thank You for Our Baby

Here's another part of our required reading that I really enjoyed.  Everything I read is helping me to get a better idea of what we're getting into-and I'm falling in love with the idea of adoption more and more.  This book, Dear Birthmother, Thank You for Our Baby, is by Silber and Speedlin.  The authors explore what they call the four myths of adoption:

1. The birthmother obviously doesn't care about her child or she wouldn't have given him away.
2. Secrecy in every phase of the adoption process is necessary to protect all parties.
3. Both the birthmother and birthfather will forget about their unwanted child.
4. If the adoptee really loved his adoptive family, he would not have to search for his birthparents.

The authors were part of the closed adoption process back when that was the norm.  Through their interactions with birthparents, adoptive parents, and adoptees, they learned some unexpected truths about all parties involved.  A lot of what they learned and what they share in the book is through letters written by birthparents and adoptive parents.  I loved reading these heartfelt letters.  I couldn't help but feel the love that both sets of parents-birth and adoptive-have for their child.  It was also really obvious that both sets of parents came to love and appreciate each other in many of these situations.

I don't feel like what I have to say has much of a flow to it today...so this may not be making sense.  But, I really enjoyed this book.  It had a somewhat clinical feel to it, but since it was peppered with personal letters, I loved it and got a lot out of it.

The Seminar, the Paperwork, and the Interview

There's so much to talk about, but I'll try to take it one thing at a time.  First of all, Jeff and I attended our educational seminar at Bethany a week ago.  My mom was fantastic and took care of Jonathan for us so that we'd be free for the day, and Jeff took the day off of work.  All this was the day before Jonathan's 3rd birthday party and the beginning of a very full week for our family.

We found the whole day really valuable.  All the presentations went at a good pace with a good balance of discussions, speakers, and breaks.  We heard from case workers, birth moms, and adoptive parents.  It was really amazing to see how much a birth mom could benefit and heal by having a healthy relationship with her baby's adoptive parents.  I knew that it was good for the baby, but I didn't realize how important it was for the birth mom.  There were several times that I got teary and had to count something to avoid crying-mostly happy tears.  (It worked!)  I really wasn't up for crying in front of strangers that day!  We learned a lot, including some helpful information about the legality of everything, but definitely didn't learn anything to dissuade us from this path.  We enjoyed going out to lunch together, too!  There were several other couples participating in our seminar that were at different places as far as deciding whether or not to adopt.  I think we were probably the only ones who already had our paperwork turned in.  We're now in touch with a few of the couples via email.  I wish we had a chance to get to know some of them better, but as we were seated in rows and not facing each other, we only had a chance to do that during breaks and formal discussions.

We got in touch with Sangeeta, our case worker, today.  She asked us if we had made photocopies of our applications, which, of course, we hadn't.  As it turns out, this has never happened before, but Bethany has lost our paperwork.  Unbelievable.  I just felt sick when I heard her say it.  Apparently, everyone at the office is just sick about it, too, and they've looked everywhere.  So, we have to do it all again.  Ugh!  The great news is that they don't want us to give up on Bethany, and, as Sangeeta says, they want to get back in our "good graces," so she's making time to do our intake interview TOMORROW, and we will both probably be able to do our individual interviews next week.  Jeff and I are both very ready to proceed, so this is exciting.  Maybe this mishap will speed our process along-at least, we hope so!

I really didn't expect any action from Bethany for two or three more weeks, so I'm not nervous at all but looking forward to getting going on all these hoops we have to jump through.  (I'm more preoccupied with making sure Jonathan has someone to care for him on such short notice.)  Besides the paperwork we now have to redo, I think there's MORE paperwork ahead that's a lot trickier and thought provoking.  So, the sooner we can get that over with, the better.