Sunday, December 21, 2008
Here We Go Again
It only took me 3 years to forget enough about how hard adoption is to make me ready to start down this road again. Everything worth having comes at a price, and I know that the child that is out there waiting for us will bless us immensely and it will be totally worth all the heartache. The adoption journey has many highs along the way but I'm also trying to prepare for the lows we will face as well.
Deciding where to adopt from was a very hard process for me. We really want to go back to Guatemala after seeing the conditions there and all the suffering children. Their program is still closed though and even if it were not there is the expense hurdle that I'm not sure we could jump again. Then we started thinking...there are children here who need homes too so why not us?
After much thought and discussion we decided that we are going to adopt from the US foster care system this time. I've been against this idea for a long time because of all the risk involved, (or so I thought anyway) but I learned that we can be strictly adoptive parents and not have to foster so the risk of a child be taken away once placed with us is very very low. However, the process with this adoption is TOTALLY different from Isabella's adoption and I 've had a lot to learn so far.
So where to begin?? John and I did 8 weeks of training for 3.5 hours a night once a week. That is in addition to 2 all day Saturday trainings and all of the training we already had from the first adoption. We trained through Lutheran Family Services and I'm so thankful for the staff there. They have been amazing so far and when John and I graduated that class we felt like we can handle anything that comes our way. They guided us through the moutain of papework, though it was a considerably smaller mountain than the international process. We have a great home study case worker too and she made the home study process very comfortable for us. We found out on Friday that our home study has been signed off and we are officially beginning the matching stage. So now my adoption obesessed side kick in. It's like this switch inside you turns on and you are on a mission to find your child and nothing will stop you until you get there kind of feeling. Thank God, I have Isabella this time around, I know that meeting her needs will help keep me more balanced and not so obsessed :-)
The hardest thing about this adoption for me so far is that there is even less control than there was with the international adoption. We're being judged more in a "we will have to turn you down", kind of way. They're not usually turning you down because you're not a good enough parent...it's usually something very simple that makes that child not a good match for you, but still you get that feeling you're being judged and it's hard to remember not to take it personal. I imagine it will be espeically hard when we really feel a connection to that child but the caseworkers think otherwise. It's really hard not knowing what to expect. Even with all the uncertainty of international adoption we did know that once we fell in love with our referral that that child was %95 ours. We also had a clear outline of all the steps needing to be done so I could track our progress.
With this adoption, we have no timeline at all as to when things "should" be done. Our agency will start sending us profiles of children that match our criteria. If we like a certain child we can submit our home study to that child's caseworker, who then has an unlimited amount of time to collect other home studies to compare and then she chooses which family she thinks is best for that child. That means we could be turned down many many times before we actually have a child placed with us. It seems absurd when you consider how many waiting children are stuck in the foster care system, but that's how things work. If a caseworker likes us, then we will meet with the child and their care team a few times for many rounds of interviews, and then finally a transition plan will be made based upon our childs age and needs.
John and I are hoping for a child near Isabella's age, but we are trying to keep our minds and hearts open to whatever God brings us. He knew the plan when we thought we wanted a boy during our first adoption so I'm sure he will surprise us again. It is very hard to look at a childn's profile and know that they need a family and be able to say this is not the one for us. All children deserve a home and a family, but we have to remember we can't save them all. Until God's plan is revealed, we will continue to consider all the profiles of children we are given, until we find that one special child he has intended for us. I will keep you updated during this "Journey to ???".
Deciding where to adopt from was a very hard process for me. We really want to go back to Guatemala after seeing the conditions there and all the suffering children. Their program is still closed though and even if it were not there is the expense hurdle that I'm not sure we could jump again. Then we started thinking...there are children here who need homes too so why not us?
After much thought and discussion we decided that we are going to adopt from the US foster care system this time. I've been against this idea for a long time because of all the risk involved, (or so I thought anyway) but I learned that we can be strictly adoptive parents and not have to foster so the risk of a child be taken away once placed with us is very very low. However, the process with this adoption is TOTALLY different from Isabella's adoption and I 've had a lot to learn so far.
So where to begin?? John and I did 8 weeks of training for 3.5 hours a night once a week. That is in addition to 2 all day Saturday trainings and all of the training we already had from the first adoption. We trained through Lutheran Family Services and I'm so thankful for the staff there. They have been amazing so far and when John and I graduated that class we felt like we can handle anything that comes our way. They guided us through the moutain of papework, though it was a considerably smaller mountain than the international process. We have a great home study case worker too and she made the home study process very comfortable for us. We found out on Friday that our home study has been signed off and we are officially beginning the matching stage. So now my adoption obesessed side kick in. It's like this switch inside you turns on and you are on a mission to find your child and nothing will stop you until you get there kind of feeling. Thank God, I have Isabella this time around, I know that meeting her needs will help keep me more balanced and not so obsessed :-)
The hardest thing about this adoption for me so far is that there is even less control than there was with the international adoption. We're being judged more in a "we will have to turn you down", kind of way. They're not usually turning you down because you're not a good enough parent...it's usually something very simple that makes that child not a good match for you, but still you get that feeling you're being judged and it's hard to remember not to take it personal. I imagine it will be espeically hard when we really feel a connection to that child but the caseworkers think otherwise. It's really hard not knowing what to expect. Even with all the uncertainty of international adoption we did know that once we fell in love with our referral that that child was %95 ours. We also had a clear outline of all the steps needing to be done so I could track our progress.
With this adoption, we have no timeline at all as to when things "should" be done. Our agency will start sending us profiles of children that match our criteria. If we like a certain child we can submit our home study to that child's caseworker, who then has an unlimited amount of time to collect other home studies to compare and then she chooses which family she thinks is best for that child. That means we could be turned down many many times before we actually have a child placed with us. It seems absurd when you consider how many waiting children are stuck in the foster care system, but that's how things work. If a caseworker likes us, then we will meet with the child and their care team a few times for many rounds of interviews, and then finally a transition plan will be made based upon our childs age and needs.
John and I are hoping for a child near Isabella's age, but we are trying to keep our minds and hearts open to whatever God brings us. He knew the plan when we thought we wanted a boy during our first adoption so I'm sure he will surprise us again. It is very hard to look at a childn's profile and know that they need a family and be able to say this is not the one for us. All children deserve a home and a family, but we have to remember we can't save them all. Until God's plan is revealed, we will continue to consider all the profiles of children we are given, until we find that one special child he has intended for us. I will keep you updated during this "Journey to ???".
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