The adoption process is a bit mysterious but once you do your research it all makes sense! As I've stated before we are expanding our "brand" through a domestic infant adoption.
Domestic- Right here in the United States!
Infant-
In most cases this is considered 0-12 months old.
We have personally selected 0-6 months old as our definition of infant.
If you're interested in looking into more details about domestic adoptions vs. international here is a great resource. I spent a lot of time reading through all this to help give us direction and get started. www.howtoadopt.org
So we have selected our agency. They are who have provided "The Process" in which we are going through. This post is the specific steps we have completed thus far in our journey.
1. Attend an informative meeting about the agency. We learned about how ASC was founded. What is the pricing structure and payment plan. How do they handle the process start to finish. What are their networks with hospitals, counseling, birth moms, legal connections, etc. This meeting was about a 3 hour event. It was packed full of information and is what helped us determine they were our agency.
2. Submit Application and Registration Fee.
3. Attend Interview #1: While we were on our fabulous vacation in Florida we had a ginormous packet of information to complete for our first interview. This packet included a bunch of information in regards to our family trees. It covered aunts, uncles, parents, and grand parents. The basic information of birth dates and deaths if applicable. Wedding dates and explanations of siblings, step, half, etc. Wowza! The real kicker was describe this person with 5 adjectives. Then describe the relationship you have with this person and how they have influenced your life. Once this document was as complete as we could get it, WE MADE A COPY!!!! There was some serious research to get all that together!
In the actual interview we met with the woman who would be responsible for creating our bio. (Bio explanation to come). She asked questions about our upbringing, relationships with family members, relationship with each other, details about ourselves and the kids. Her goal was to collect as much information as she could so she felt she had a descent picture about us and our family. If you're good at talking this step was a walk in the park! If not a talker a little brainstorm session before hand is very helpful!
4. Home Study Workshop: All adopting families attend ASC's home study workshop. This was a more in depth workshop than the informative meeting. We were able to meet other families in the process at the same stage we were in so that was exciting. We learned about what kind of situations to expect. We learned about the legal side of adoption. This is specific state to state! (More details to come) A birth mother who placed her child through the agency came to speak with us and that was wonderful. She shared why she placed, how she's doing, what kind of relationship she's kept, and what her struggles are. That was probably the best part of the entire workshop. Also at this time we turned in:
Bio information, Dear Birth Mom letter, & pictures
Alcohol & Substance Abuse Questionnaire
Birth Certificates for all Members in the home
Copy of Marriage License
Copy of Driver's License
National & State background checks
Sex & Violent Offender Registry Search Results
Child Protective Services History for every state resided in the last 5 years
Local Police Records
Signed Agency contracts
Health History questionnaire for each member of our family
Health History selection for birth mother and expectant child
Birth Mother Additional Drug Use selections (outside of Agency basic requirements)
Health Physical Consent Form from Family Doctor
Certificate of Financial Status
Review of Life Insurance Policy
1040 tax form from the previous year
Recent Check Stubs
Three Reference Letters
Program & Advertising Fee $$$
5. In Home Home Study: After completing the required workshop the next step was to have the social worker actually come into our home. My one goal was to make sure I had the Christmas decorations down! It was mid-January and clearly Santa was on vacation already! This was a wonderful experience. The social worker got comfy with her lap top in the living room and asked a bazillion more questions. Most of the questions were just going into more specific descriptions of what we had already answered in our handouts and initial interview. She did have some state mandated questions to ask. My favorite, "How do you anticipate your lives will change with the new baby?" Um, We're out numbered! That cute little side table will have to get moved so a swing can go there and forget sleep! Haha! She was also really helpful in sharing what trends they had been seeing in adoption cases the last couple of months. Since she was the social worker she was also there to physically go through our house. Don't worry there was no white glove test! We would have failed! She made sure we had the appropriate carbon monoxide and fire detectors in each room. State law requires the child has their own room or space to share with a same sex sibling so she was making sure our bedroom situations met that requirement. Also we had to have a fire extinguisher for each level of the house so she had to identify where those were located. All in all very easy part of the process. She was in and out in less then two hours.
6. Bio Approval: This is a very important part of the adoption process. Birth mothers are deciding on what family to place their child with. Infants are not already with an agency waiting to be placed. They are in their mother's wombs! These women are in a place where they feel they cannot raise their own child for whatever numerous reasons. In order for them to get a glimpse inside your life and family these bios are created. From the information collected in our first interview, bio answers, and pictures we submitted a mini scrapbook was created about our family. At this time we had to approve the pictures and what was written. Also at this time we paid Birth Mother Coordination Fee.
After all these steps we went LIVE! The state had approved our adoption request. All of our fees were paid.
We now sit and wait! Not exactly the most entertaining post but hopefully you can see into the process a little bit better.
PS. Check out our Coffee Shop! All purchases donate funds to our bring home Baby J
