Birth after adoption... RIGHT after.

There is a serious lack of blogs about raising two kids who are 8 months apart. I know, I know, my family make-up is somewhat rare but still, someone should be documenting this amazing time. At least that's what I said to myself during my pregnancy... and again when my son was born in mid-Feb... and yet again when he hit the one month mark! The truth is, there is a very good reason that there are so few blogs about two babies under one year old. Who has the time!? 

 
I now have a 9-month old (almost 10 months now, but lets not make a mommy cry just now, ok?) and a 7-week old. My older baby LOVES screen time- phones, tablets, computers- she has mastered touch screens (which occasionally are apparently lick-screens), so when I use an electronic device, I have to keep it hidden from her. I have texted with my mom behind the couch pillow, yes. This obsession of hers makes blogging very difficult. Additionally, much of my day is generally spent in this way: diaper, bottle, diaper, bottle, bottle, diaper, bottle, bottle, bottle. Sprinkled liberally with crying babies. But right now, in an amazing twist, BOTH babies are still asleep! 

A family friend recently found out she was pregnant as she was in the process of adopting a second child. It got me thinking again about how difficult it was to find kindred spirits for me & the blogs/message boards I did find were all from many years ago. So, I wanted to at least get general thoughts about the birth soon after adoption out there before the babies start waking up. I hope to delve further into this stuff in future posts, but let's be honest, it may be a couple months before that happens.

For me, the pregnancy & birth were very emotional and sometimes difficult as I couldn't help but think of my daughter's biomom as I felt the baby move, etc. I had a lot of tears for her biomom particularly in the days around the birth. I also had some unexpected feelings after the baby was born (i.e. twinges of weird defensiveness for my daughter when people talked about who my son looked like). It was also difficult for us because people assumed we were told we couldn't have kids and that we had gone through treatments and such before deciding to adopt, which was not the case. It is difficult and awkward to correct people who we hear talking about our miracle baby that we never thought we could have, when in fact we chose adoption on purpose. It is equally awkward (internally, anyway) to just let them tell the story and not correct them.

I think if my daughter was older at adoption, it would be a whole different set of emotional sticking points, and probably there would be time to take some of them on before the new baby (and without being pregnant & emotional already!), so hopefully some of it is easier for most people.

The best part though is the rush of relief & light heartedness as time goes on and you realize there is no paperwork nor social worker visits! This is particularly important since having two babies (and two dogs) means the house is a disaster at all times. 

Oh, and now i hear crying, so I must cut this off. Until next time!

Adoption Day! What happens at the adoption hearing.

We had our finalization hearing on Nov. 20th.  It only took about 15 minutes, but was amazing and perfect. Our daughter, now 5 and a half months old, slept through it, of course, since it was during nap time. First they basically introduced the case for the record and asked to see the baby (she was sleeping in her stroller).  Our lawyer joked that they'd have to come to see her because we weren't going to wake a sleeping baby, but I picked her up and held her.

They called my husband to the stand to testify first and had him spell his name for the record. They reminded us that she would not qualify for a stipend, since she was "practically perfect in every way" & asked him if we'd be financially able to handle the burden of raising this child.  They asked what sort of work my husband does, what type of dogs and cat we have, and how he would describe the baby.  His description was pretty much how every new dad would describe their 5 month old daughter, except in our case she really IS the most adorable, most clever, and most fun baby in the world!

I was called next, passing the baby to my husband on his way back. Aside from spelling my name, was spared a lot of the questions because the judge asked if I would have answered the same as my husband.  I was then asked to describe the baby, which I think is more for the parents than the courts.  It's really a chance to gush on about how much you love your baby in front of a court recorder, which is a chance I welcome, personally!  :) Let it be on the record that my baby is fantastic!   I told them we are honored and lucky to be her parents.

The judge ordered that we are officially her legal parents and said he would issue the decree!  Before we left, the official adoptive parents/kid/judge photos were taken and our family could come up and take some camera phone photos at the same time.  Actual cameras were not allowed through security! (IKR?!)  Our little one started waking up as picture time began so we have some photos of a very confused looking baby!

The court workers, including the judge told us how adorable she is and congratulated us ... and poof!  we were parents!   We were given a few copies of the decree a few minutes after leaving the courtroom.

Oh, Baby!

I am so very sorry for delay in updates since I announced rather shortly that we were chosen to parent the newborn girl!

First, I can't even begin to describe how wonderful this little girl is.  She is very self-structured and has slept through the night since the 4th day home as well as taking regular naps in the morning and afternoon.  According to her pediatrician, we should be prepared to parent a very intelligent child because she is far ahead of the curve on all of her milestones.  She loves being passed around at family functions, but when she's feeling sleepy, she wants her parents (that's US!).  She will be 4 months old in a couple of days & is just a joy.

All of that being said, the first couple of months were tough. I got to spend every day with this amazing newborn who was practically the dream child of everyone who has ever had a newborn.  And I could barely get off the couch.  It started just a few weeks after she came home & began to really worry about myself-  was I experiencing post-adoption depression? was I much less fit than I thought and a newborn, even a magically easy newborn, was just wiping me out?  I cried a lot and slept as much as she did. I hated eating anything and woke up in the middle of the night with a terrible nauseous headache that usually resulted in my throwing up or collapsed on the bathroom floor for an hour.

Finally, on the advice of my mother, I called the doctor and scheduled an appointment... which they lost due to a 'new system' error... twice. I asked them if they could just order a blood test, since I assumed that would be the result of the appointment anyway.  I was particularly interested in a thyroid screening since those sorts of issues run in my family and Dr. Google seemed to point me in that direction.  They did, and did a general panel as well.

A few days later, I got an after hours call  from the doctor himself (not an assistant or nurse!), which of course I missed.  His voicemail message asked me to call first thing in the morning if I didn't hear from the assistant first.  Naturally I assumed the worst about the results and started wondering if we could keep on with the adoption if, say, I had to go through chemo... or whatever.  The next morning, the phone rang at 7:45.  The assistant said:  Everything looks good- you are very healthy!  But... well, you know you are pregnant right?

UM... NO!??!

So, that is also going on now.  The adoption should be finalized, according to our lawyers, by the end of October, if all goes smoothly with some other dates coming up.  Then, in late February, we will have our second child.   It's ok, you can laugh. That's what we did for the first week after finding out!

Lots more to update, of course, but for now, the baby is sleeping and I would like to join her.

Match Interview & finished nursery!

On Friday, we went to our match interview.  I believe about 6 families were interviewed as prospective parents, but I'm not completely sure.  We got so see a couple of pictures of the little girl they are trying to place & she is beautiful.

There were ten people on the panel as interviewers, however the head of the department was the one who asked us almost all of the questions.  It was fairly painless, with questions about our hobbies, our financial status, and our expectations for a child.  To be clear, the financial questions were mostly just verifying some of the things written in the home study as well as making sure we understood that this child will not have a stipend or be covered by medicaid, like many kids adopted from DCS would.  Nothing we weren't expecting.  They asked us how we resolve conflicts and our ideas on discipline.  I feel like it went pretty well, but of course one never knows about the "competition".   We are strong candidates, I think, so if another family is chosen, I'm confident that they are also an amazing family.  Still though, they should obviously choose us.  :)

In the mean time we finished (mostly) our nursery! We began it as a room for foster babies, so it is more complete than we probably would have had it if we were not planning to foster- a room devoted to a baby that may never come is pretty discouraging, but we are fairly confident we'd get placed with a foster sib group that includes a little one... and very hopeful that we might put off the foster scenario for a bit because of a new baby...  I still need to hem the curtains and the fabric draped over the chair is a stand-in for a future rocker or glider, but other than that... yay! At least one room in the house is totally put together.  We have had so many overlapping projects, it has been difficult to keep any order.  THAT, however, is what I'm supposed to be working on now, so... I'll update with news when I have any to tell!  Fingers crossed!

And we are waiting... and waiting... and waiting.

There have been no updates.  We have our home study sent to strangers, we watch the children's posts with fingers crossed, and nothing ever happens and we never hear anything else. Eventually, we assume the children whose summaries and photos we poured over are living in a happy home and doing ok, that we were not the chosen family. Then we find a new set of sibs that we pour over and imagine in our house.  Repeat. and repeat. and repeat.... and repeat.

It is such a strange time.  People ask us how the adoption is going and we shrug. We have no idea.  Is this normal?  Why don't the social workers have the courtesy to send out a form letter email thanking us for our interest & letting us know that the kids we came to care for in that unique wishful way had found a home?

In the last month, we have gone to a "meeting"  which included us, our adoption specialist, and one other couple we had met in training & we attended an adoption support group that included us and the lady who organized the group.  Blink.  During the meeting, we told our adoption specialist that we are interested in switching to the foster to adopt side of things.  I wrote to her two weeks later and she said she was still waiting for our file to be sent from our home study agency.  Now, it's been a month.  What is the big hold up?  I don't know.

I know that adopting takes a lot of patience, but I feel very much forgotten. It is so maddening to see the ads for adopting kids from foster care when we are sitting here twiddling our thumbs waiting to do just that. We continue to prepare our home, which involves us building a partition wall to divide one giant room into a bedroom and library/playroom. But, other than that, we just go about our lives :)

I'm sorry for venting, but I feel that is all the wisdom I have to offer at the moment.  The process is indeed long and uneventful.   They are not kidding.

intrastate adoption

Our state has a touch of sparsely populated-ness.  Not like some states in the west, but enough that there just are not the amount of kids ready for adoption that you might find in a more metropolitan area.  Particularly lacking are those that fit our "we would be able to handle parenting these"  requirements.  Regardless of the fact that we are looking for siblings, we just don't have any in-state choices.  We put our home study in for one set that appeared just after we were approved, but since then, there just have not been any.

This issue wasn't a huge deal, because we are registered with adoptuskids.org & we have found a handful of out  of state sibling sets that we have also been interested in & inquired about.  We had no idea there were so many issues with this.  But, there are.  I found the statistic that in 2010, there were more people struck by lightning in the US than were able to successfully adopt across state lines. (see Washington Post link below) There are commercials saying how many kids there are in the country that want a home, implying that there is a chance you might actually be able to GIVE them one, but as it turns out, this kid trade is all about money, and the social services of states are not eager to help their families adopt from another state because they won't get money for it.  It's all very upsetting.

If you are interested in adopting across state lines, please read the linked articles for more information.  Also read about the legislation that is sitting in Washington.  It's heartbreaking.  We are not sure what our next plan of action will be.  I'm very burned out by adoption from foster care right now.  I'm wondering if we will be able to follow through with it, quite honestly. I quit my job working for the state, in part, because I couldn't handle this kind of thing anymore. And here we are, facing this same issue as a roadblock to becoming parents.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-all-the-snags-in-interstate-adoption/2012/06/01/gJQAB4uq7U_story.html

http://www.listeningtoparents.org/

the bill in congress:  https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/s1511

Completing the home study

We have scanned and emailed all of our paper work to our home study agency.  I'm not sure if our SW will want to come back out to the house to visit or not.  I'm guessing so since she hasn't seen our fire extinguishers in place, but she indicated that she was going to try to finish up our home study by the end of the week, with no mention of another visit.

Our first visit was very positive.  The pets all behaved perfectly, our house was pretty well organized, however I did not go too far out of my way to make it any cleaner than I would if it were my parents coming to visit.  We still had that box of mail that we need to go through someday sitting in the corner of our dining room, for instance. All in all, it was a good time and our social worker was very friendly. It was not an intimidating visit in the least.

It's very exciting setting up the kids' rooms, although we are holding off any decorating until we know for sure who we are getting. Part of the reasoning behind this is to involve them in the decor decisions as part of transitioning.  We want them to feel like the rooms they move into are really THEIR rooms. We want them to take ownership of the spaces, but also doing things to set up their rooms gives us something concrete to do as a family those first few weeks rather than staring terrified at each other wondering what to do next. On some level, I'm also hoping that doing these things during the "honeymoon" period & giving them some pride of ownership will prevent them from destroying everything once the "testing our love" phase begins.

After the home study is complete, our social worker will present us to the state's adoption board.  The state will then approve us (hopefully!) as adoptive parents. We will then be in contact with our state adoption specialist and will start the matching process.  At this point, the kids I've considered my "inspiration kids"  are still posted online.  If they remain there when we are approved, they will be the first inquiry we make.

Home study: Paperwork begins

A couple of days ago, we had first contact with the social worker from the agency which will be preforming our home study.  She emailed a lot of forms to be filled out as well as a list of documents we need to gather.  I already emailed back with a lot of questions regarding these forms  & am trying to shrug off what I feel was a rather curt response from the sw.   The forms contained almost no instruction & were very much geared toward foster care applicants, not adoption-only. Most of my questions revolved around that wording.

One of my main goals early in this process is to develop a thicker skin.  This is going to be a long, difficult journey & the questions will  be getting really serious. THEN the profiles of children will be very very difficult to process. THEN the kids themselves will do and say things that I should not take personally. All of this is wrapped up in dealing with a state agency. Having previously worked for a state agency, I know that these forms are originally processed with less care than a slaughterhouse. Having a font-change in the middle of an answer is to be expected and is NOT a sign of disrespect to the applicants.  (Yes it is, forms management workers! These forms are difficult enough to get through without these types of annoyances.)

The checklist of documents we'll need:

• Birth Certificate x2 (mine, his)
• Marriage License, 
• Drivers Licence x2
• Pet Vaccine Records x3 (2 dogs, 1 cat)
• Homeowner's Insurance
• Car Insurance x2
• Car Registration x2
• Recent Pay Stub x2
• Last Year's Tax Return. 

We'll have to update the cat's shots, I think.  & I will need a new copy of my BC, which is in the works.

The list of forms we'll need to complete:

• Foster Care License application (yes, we need to do this, even though we don't want a FC license)
• Criminal History Background Check Application x2
• Child Care Plan (where will the kids go if not with us or at school) 
• Child Protective Services History Check Application x2
• Medical Approval Form x2 (doctor fills out saying we are healthy & probably not on drugs)
• Acknowledgement of Role Form (we understand the care of children is what we are signing up for)
• Water Agreement (check box & sign to say we are on city water) 
• Home Safety Checklist (what they will be looking for, more on this later) 
• Quite Imposing Awkward Question Form x2

Post-class nerve-citement

We finished our adoption classes Saturday afternoon!  I found the classes very informative.  I was asked by family if the classes made us want to run away & the surprising answer is no!   I guess this was the goal of DCS, but we actually came out of the classes feeling more prepared & with a better understanding of not only the process, but the emotions involved with the process.  We feel relatively secure in our positions of future mommy & daddy.  AND not all of the information was what we'd already seen online, which was our fear... Okay, a lot of it was... but the anecdotes were good add-ins and made it seem more real. :)

I even made a friend-  another mommy-to-be who is interested in adopting sibs. We both look forward to having someone to call who knows just what we are going through.  This was a great surprise since all sources seem to indicate people looking to adopt siblings are rare... even more rare are those who don't have kids at home already who are going from 0 to 3 (which is what we both are interested in).   She also has a set of "inspiration kids"  and we were both very glad to hear that her set and my set are not the same set, although our similar frequenting of the adoptuskids.org site let us each be familiar with the other's set of "inspiration kids".  Additionally, the trainer overheard us talking about these kids and said she had wondered who we were interested in.  I don't know why that made me feel good but it did.  Someone who knows us a little more than through email knows we are interested in THIS set of kids. And didn't seem to think it was a crazy idea... :)

Theoretically, of course, they are JUST inspiration kids, we should not get too attached to a photo and mini-bio. But, let's be honest. It was an amazing relief to realize we aren't dreaming about the same kids so we didn't have to see each other as competition.  Also, there is a possibility that I will be heartbroken if (yeah, ok, when) these kids get adopted before we've gotten to the point to throw our parental hats in the ring, or, worse, if we have reached that point and are not the chosen parents.


Right now is a waiting period.  We have finished our classes, but do not have any information about the home study yet.  I'm busying myself with beginning to clear out closets & otherwise organize all the catch-all type piles that have lived in the rooms which will belong to the kids.  Not the most glamorous aspect of preparing for kids (I'll let you know if I do find a glamorous aspect), but necessary.

becoming a new parent is scary.

If you build your family in the traditional way, there is a good two-year long period where you can mess up without the kid remembering what a terrible first time new parent you were. When you adopt older kids, there is no grace period.   You better be somewhat competent from the get-go, really.

This is my fear.

So... it makes me nervous that I have absolutely NO experience in making decisions about a child with someone else's input involved. But that's ok, right? Because what first-time-parent HAS that experience?

With adopting older kids, I also feel like we will not get as much of a grace period from our mommy & daddy peers, either.  If we were pregnant for 9 months and bringing home a tiny new baby, I can imagine people exchanging those knowing & amused looks with each other. "Aren't they cute? New parents are so fun to watch! such nerds..."

 (This scenario also includes several stories about poop.  I'm not sure why.  Parents love talking about their kids' poo stories from baby & toddlerhood.)

Will we get the same freedom to call our family and tell them "we need a break NOW" or to confess that we have no idea how much food to put on a 9 year old's plate?

I'm honestly feeling a little bashful to even type this stuff out.  I am fully aware I'm over-reacting. DEEP BREATH. The last adoption class is in two days, so it's all feeling suddenly very real & there is a lot of  pressure that comes with that.

Being responsible for the lives of children is scary stuff.  I need to be easier on myself if I expect  anyone else to be, eh?

September: one classy month!

In the last month, my husband and I have taken all but one of the required classes we need for our pre-adoptive training.  These classes are the introductory training sessions for foster families, except for the last one which is all about adoption.  After that class is complete, we will begin the process of completing our home study.  Really, we don't know much about the adoption process, since the classes thus far have been geared toward foster homes, so I'm very much relying on knowledge gained from other people's blogs about adoption home studies & the checklists I've found for my state's foster care "environment"  rules.  I figure if we are on target to be a safe foster home, we should be good to adopt, eh?

Although these are the source for our general guidelines, we have decided to only pursue adoption.  We just do not feel like our hearts are tough enough to handle legal-risk placements. Additionally, worth note, I have quit my job last week.  My husband is currently doing a lot of freelance work in addition to his full-time work, and we have a LOT of projects that we need to complete around the house in preparation for the kiddos.  Oh, yes.  KiddoS.   Did I mention we are definitely looking at sibling groups exclusively? So, yeah. It's been quite a month!

The kids I wrote about last post are still listed on the web.  I call them my "inspiration kids".  They continue to inspire me to do what needs done for my family-to-be, but I really don't know their situation & they may have a different mommy by the time I'm having my fingerprints sent in, let alone get to the "seriously consider actual kids" point of the adoption process.

nope.

The two week wait is officially over; no exciting news to report.   I bought a couple of books about adoption.  One a history of adoption in America, which is just interesting.  The other is one of those for idiots kinds.  We are talking about adoption on a theoretical level in my house, but we have yet to really set foot on the path.

As far as a bio-kid goes, we are not particularly interested in spending money on a reproduction specific doctor (which is not covered by either of our insurances), since that money could go into an adoption... HOWEVER, I still think maybe an appointment with an ob may be in order.

Sigh.  I don't know.  Nothing will be happening today though.
It's been a rough week.

Networking for baby

Today we received our first info packet in the mail.  I was sorry to see that pretty much everything in the packet was also on their website. Nice folder though, I guess.  This one was for a domestic adoption agency.

This particular agency does not make me feel very comfortable. I've discovered through blogs of parents using this agency that they heavily recommend networking as a method of sourcing out a baby.  Networking seems to me to be a fairly slimy ordeal.  Perhaps I'm just naive, but I almost feel like the exchange of a child, as it were, is more sacred than telling your local grocer that you are hoping to adopt and to keep you in mind if someone mentions to you that they don't plan to keep their baby.  Part of my mind just finds this to be unethical. As if a child should be sought in the same way a used car might be.  Craigslist anyone?  I'm also pretty sure I read that advertising as adoptive hopefuls outside of the agency structure is illegal in my state- I'll have to double check that.

On top of the yicky-ness I feel about this, I also feel like for 25 grand (or 20 or 15), they should be doing my networking for me.  It isn't that I'm not willing to put it all out there for a child. My concerns are that there are a lot of legal, ethical, psychological, and just plain kindness issues that a person should be trained, retrained, mentored through, and experienced at involved in discussing anything of that magnitude with a pregnant woman.  If I were to, say, be contacted by a woman who offered up her child to me directly, I would immediately feel the red flags of scam artist come up.  No. matter. what.  People who are as emotionally involved as an adoptive hopeful should not be the point person for this. Especially not after going to all of the trouble to research and find an agency.

I'm looking for other options this evening. I have a lot of questions though, which I am going to rattle off in case anyone out there knows the answers:   I've seen that in an international adoption, the adoptive parents can choose an agency from anywhere in the country.  Is this true with domestic adoptions as well?  If I were to go through an adoption lawer in my state, or a local agency,  do they have access to birthmoms outside their neighborhood, generally?  And if there was a child in state next door would I need to hire a second lawyer from that state?

I'm a little weary of asking too many questions from the adoption professionals until I am really ready to jump in with both feet, although I know that will eventually be the source of many of my answers.

A year and a half into the beginning of a journey.

So, I'm thinking that I want to be a mom.... and at this point, I'm not sure what that means for me. Will this become an adoption blog?  an infertility blog?  a new mom blog?  The hubs and I have been trying to join our cute little gametes for 1 year and 6 months.  There was a brief stint with a short-lived pregnancy a few months ago, but it failed miserably on our first wedding anniversary (as in: happy anniversary honey, I'm going to go miscarry the baby now. yeah. so... that happened.)  I guess technically the amount of time TTC is less the 11 weeks we had, in fact, C-ed.

The beginning of July marked the crossover from the time I might've been a first-time mom before I turn 35 and the new reality that I will be at least 35 when I become a mom.  That is, of course, if my children have not been conceived and/or born by now. And even then, the chances are slim I could become their mom in the next 9 months.  This is, in reality,  not a huge deal, but in my head it is.  I'm still coming to terms with the fact that I'm over 30- or that I'm actually one of the grown ups, for that matter.  Having an automatic 'elderly primigravida' written on the chart seems unreal. 

Already,  I have misled you a little.  I do know one thing for certain. This will not be a traditional TTC blog.  Although we are, in fact, TTC, I am not interested in medical intervention to make that happen. I am not willing to drug myself up or think about my ovaries in bloom or any of those other magical things that I have to skim over in other blogs so I don't end up over-thinking anything and... let's be honest, passing out. I'm just not awesome at handling unnecessary invasive procedures. This, in addition to the overwhelming costs associated with it (neither of our insurance plans cover infertility in any way- do any?),  leads me straight down the path of adoption.  

We are currently just poking around the adoption idea, really. We are also still watching every month for the smiley face to stop flashing on the LH surge tests, and it has actually only been three months since the miscarriage, although it seems much much longer.  I'm very tired of that smiley face. very tired. Researching adoption has been a fresh source of hope for me. 

And so here I am.  Almost a year and a half into the beginning of a journey.