Clean It Like A Social Worker Is Coming Over



Today is the day.

It is the day that we will check the very last step off of our "Adoption Certification To Do List."

Today is our last home study visit!

In case you have never gone through the foster/adopt certification process, let me fill you in a little bit on what we have had to do to get to this point. Beginning in September 2012 and continuing [mostly] steadily through the past 6 months, we have:

• Made original intake phone call. Answered approximately 15 minutes of intake questions.
• Filled out initial application (containing all the same questions as the phone call, of course)
• Attended 2+ hour orientation seminar
• Were fingerprinted and background-checked through 3 different national registries
• Filled out huge application packet (including 30 pages EACH of autobiography), turned in with copies of entire family's birth certificates, SS cards, drivers licenses, marriage license, passports.
• Each of us and our children underwent an extensive physical exam (at our own doctor), including blood work for the fella and I
• Our friend (staying in our upstairs bonus room until August) had to be fingerprinted, background checked through 3 registries, and get similar physical exam
• Attended 2 separate 7 hour foster care training classes
• Insert positive pregnancy test here.
• Attended 6 hour adoption training class
• Home inspected by Fire Marshal and Health Department
• First home study visit with home inspection and interview

 

Each of these steps came one at a time, and none was too stressful or overwhelming. Until those inspector people started coming to my home. Now, please don't get the wrong idea about me. I maintain and mostly clean, orderly, safe home. I mean, we live in it, so it isn't perfect, but it's more than sufficient.

If you have never gone through this, the only way I can describe it is this; Imagine you are in your third trimester of pregnancy. 3 different people are coming to your home to inspect it and determine if it is a safe and comfortable place for your child. And their opinion determines whether or not you get to deliver your baby.

While it is admittedly irrational to think that whether or not my baseboards have been scrubbed will determine whether or not we get certified, these were the types of emotions and thoughts that ran through my head.

Before the Fire Marshal and Health Department came, I went insane with cleaning and organizing. Days upon days, from sun up to sun down, I cleaned every crevice and organized every closet and cabinet. The fella dutifully installed the fire extinguisher, hung our fire escape plan in the children's rooms, and put safety latches on all of our cabinets. Comically enough, the visits were extremely short (no more than 20 minutes each) and the things I most worried about were not even checked. (Glad I spent an hour organizing my bathroom closet, they didn't even look in the bathroom let alone the closet!)

You would think that those experiences would have calmed me for the home study. Nope. The 24 hours before the social worker came for the first of two visits, I once again entered "nesting" mode. This time my mania was focused on my kid's rooms. If the rooms don't look clean and fun and stimulating and safe and......they won't trust us with more children. Once again, irrational, but that is how it went down. The visit went smoothly and I really had nothing to worry about, yet again. Now here I sit, 7 hours and 50 minutes until our last home study visit. It has not been even a week since my last cleaning frenzy. The house just needs a quick FlyLady-style Home Blessing Hour. Will I do those 7 simple tasks and calmly wait for our lovely worker to show up?

 Well...what do you think?

 

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A Little Update

 



Here I sit, 16 weeks into my third pregnancy, and 6 months in to our adoption certification process. What a ride it has been, what a life-changing shift of plans and priorities.

Yesterday I was angry. I heard about a couple that is further along in the process of certification then we are, despite starting later than us and having done less of the "To Do" list than we have. Up until that moment, it was easy to say "God's timing is perfect," yet suddenly it all felt so unfair. Yes, I know that life is not fair. I know that the 6.1 million women in America that are diagnosed with infertility would look at my life and say "That's not fair." But I had a little pity party anyhow. And then I sent an email to our case worker, asking what the hold up is. And then, finally, I prayed about it. Probably not the correct order of events, but that is how it happened.

The surprising thing is, our worker responded first thing the following morning (there is usually a 2 week turnaround time for an email response). She had a very rational, reasonable explanation for the delay. But I was not satisfied. I responded back again, and again. I will spare you all the details, but will sum it up like this: at the beginning of the conversation I was told it could be another 120 days before we were ready to complete the home study. By the end of the conversation I was told that my file was in a supervisor's hands and ready to go to an investigator to complete the home study. I call that VICTORY!

So here is what I know:

-You have to stay persistent. These people have the best intentions, but they are simply overworked and overwhelmed.

-You can get a lot accomplished by asking questions. No more "I guess that is the way it is." Instead, ask "Why is that the way it is?"

-Don't mistake patience for complacency. I thought I was just being patient with the process, but I needed to be following up (and following up some more!)

-Sausage and potato casserole is the yummiest comfort food on an emotional day (okay, that might not be adoption-related but I'm sure it is in some way applicable).

 

 

The photo above is from www.davethomasfoundation.com. It is a great website with lots of free resources, all related to foster care adoption!



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Thoughts On Our Adoption Journey

My fella and I are well on our way to adopting, and our adoption journey has pretty much gone off the rails. The fella would say "We got hijacked by the Holy Spirit" and I would probably agree with that. Before you comment and email me with a zillion questions, you should know that even if I wanted to, I could not tell you anything, there is much that I don't know. But please pray. Pray for our family and our future kids. And pray that we would have patience with and find favor with those that control the process.

Meanwhile, in all of this unknown, I began to think about ways to make sure that any children that come into our family by way of adoption will know that they were just as excitedly anticipated as those that came by way of birth.

There will never be one of these:

Or one of these:

and there certainly won't be one of these:

I am faced with a home that is full of baby books and maternity photos and birthday collages that show age progression. And no adopted child of ours will ever have that. What they will have is a book of photos that we have been taking along the way, depicting things like me putting the application in the mailbox and us at DSS training. And they will have a journal, written in the form of letters to them, that I have been pouring my heart into. 

While I will never be able to tell them what it was like to feel them kick, or what I foods I craved, or tell their birth story, I will be able to tell them how they were loved, wanted, expected, selected,and eagerly anticipated. I will tell them about how my heart was inexplicably drawn to them, and how from the moment of conception, although it was not in my womb, God knew that they were for our family.

God sets the lonely in families...

Psalm 68:6

To read more about our adoption story, check out my post Questions & Answers About Adopting. I am always happy to answer questions about the process, either by comment or email, so as long as they are not situation specific (we don't know any specifics), keep the questions coming!

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Questions & Answers About Adopting

November is National Adoption Month!

In that spirit, this blog post is dedicated to answering some of the many questions that we have been asked as we have made our adoption journey public knowledge. I also hope to dispel some of the myths that many people have heard about adopting and link you up to some resources that you might find interesting.

It did not even occur to us that our "announcement" that we are adopting would come as such a shock for so many of our friends and family. Although we had not really discussed the possibility with anyone but each other, we just thought that there would be a few "oh, that's cool" or "congratulations" and the like. The wave of questions that followed was unexpected, but we were happy to answer. 

"But wait, you guys already have kids! Why would you want to adopt?"

The truth is, adoption is not just for people who cannot have biological children. Adoption is for anyone with the conviction to adopt, and God's command to care for the orphaned is pretty clear. Some scriptures on adopting include:

Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed.

Psalm 82:3

Take up the cause of the fatherless...

Isaiah 1:17

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress.

James 1:27

"Don't you have to be rich to adopt? I've heard it's very expensive."

You do not have to be rich to adopt through the Department of Social Services (from the foster care system), as we are doing. There is no income minimum, as long as you have "some left over" at the end of the month with which you could care for an additional family member. While private and international adoptions can be quite costly, adopting through the state is absolutely free. The only costs to you are any safety improvements that need to be made to your home in order to pass fire and safety inspections, such as installing a fire extinguisher. The state even gives you a voucher to cover your attorney fees for adoption finalization. The state needs adoptive parents, and they do their best to make it as financially simple as possible.

"Are you adopting a boy or a girl? How old will they be? What if you get a child of a different race/ethnicity than you?"
We have applied to adopt a child between infancy and 4 years old, of any gender and any race/ethnicity. We could not imagine denying an innocent child the opportunity of having a forever family based on race or gender. 
We do not expect to matched with an infant. There are 500 approved and waiting families in our state that are only willing to adopt an infant, and only about 1-3 babies become available each month. 

"Aren't you worried that the child will have problems?"
We are not only aware of the possibility that the child may have issues, we are prepared for the fact that the child will have issues to work through. Children are in the system for a reason, and every single child in the system has been neglected or abused in some way, that is why their parent's rights were terminated. Our heart's are full of mercy for these children. They did nothing to deserve the abuse they have faced, and yet they are looked at as undesirable by much of the community. Again, we are not naive to the challenges that our family will face, but we strongly believe that we are at the center of God's will for our lives, and there is no safer place to be!

"What if the child's biological family resurfaces and takes him/her away from you?"
This question likely stems from the recent public attention in our area involving a child that was adopted and later returned to their biological family. It is important for people to understand that this case involved the Indian Child Welfare Act. With the exception of that particular act, once a child has been deemed legally free for adoption, and is adopted, there is no recourse for a biological family member that later comes out of the woodwork. Before a child can be deemed legally free to adopt, the Department of Social Services has done everything within their power to find and notify anyone that might have a legal claim to that child. Once we have adopted them, they are ours.

"What about how this will affect your other children?"
If you want to hear the answer to this question, ask my son how he feels. He is eager to share his room, his toys, and even his parents. We have educated him extensively on the plight of the orphaned, and in his own way, he has a heart for them too. When we asked him how he would feel about getting a brother or sister that isn't a baby and didn't come out of mommy's tummy, his reply was;
"Yes! Let's go get them right now!"
His four year old mind does not understand the wait that is involved in this process. His reasoning is, "If they don't have a mom and a dad, and you want to be their mom and dad, why can't they come live with us right now?"
His personal request is for a 2 year old brother (and a set of bunk beds for them to share).
As for my younger child, she will likely never remember a time without her adopted sibling. God willing, our next child will come into our family before she is 2 years old, and she will never know any other way.

"How long is this going to take?"
As of the date of this post, we have one more training session and two home inspections, one by the Fire Marshal and one by our Family Worker. We have submitted all necessary paperwork and documentation. If all goes as planned, we hope to be completely certified by Christmas. From that point, it could be one day or one year (or longer!) before we are matched with a child. 

"So this must mean that you are 'done' having kids, right?"
This one always earns a laugh from us. Honestly, we don't yet know what the future of our family holds. We can see ourselves as the parents to a large family. We may adopt again and we likely will have more biological children too. Right now all we can say is that we are taking it one child at a time.

"This is all so sudden! What made you make such an impulsive decision?"
Again, this is one that gets a laugh. Just because we didn't talk about it with you doesn't mean that we weren't talking about it. The Lord has been working on our hearts in this area for many years, I would venture to say before we were even married. Yes, once we came to the conclusion that we wanted to pursue this, we moved quickly, but that is just our personalities. If we are going to do something, we are going to do it. Period. No sense dragging our feet about it. We know without a doubt that this time was right for us, and we went for it.
______

This process has not been a roller coaster for us, as many people have described it. We wait excitedly, but patiently. We know that our next child is out there, waiting for us, right now. That is absolutely mind blowing. We also know that from the moment that child was conceived, although it was not in my womb, that the Lord knew that he or she belonged in our family. 
We have received both encouragement and criticism, both of which have come from the most surprising people.
In the end, while the praise feels good and the negativity is hurtful, the truth remains that this is a deep, heartfelt calling and we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is the right choice for our family.
What about you? Maybe you will discover that it is also your purpose and calling to welcome a child into a forever family. Maybe you will find that you are willing to sacrifice some of your space, time, finances, convenience, and routine in order to save a child.
Or maybe you will find another way to help care for the neglected, abused, abandoned, and unwanted in your community. 
I hope that in some way, by reading this, you have been inspired to act on whatever it is that you feel called to do, and I welcome any other questions that you may have.

A few things to leave you with:

• In South Carolina, about 1500 abused and neglected children are in the care of DSS and awaiting permanent, loving, adoptive homes.
• 1/3 of these children are preschoolers, 1/3 are grade schoolers, and about 1/4 are teenagers.
• Of these children, 57% are African American, 36% are Caucasian, and about 7% are other races.
• About 300 children who are legally free to adopt are pictured at www.scheartgallery.org. 
• The majority of young men who age out of the foster care system will become criminals and end up in jail. The majority of young women who age out will become prostitutes.
• Children who are adopted from the state are eligible for Medicare until they are 21 years old. The state may also provide an adoption subsidy to help with the costs of caring for a special needs child.
• In our state, "Special Needs" is the word used to describe any child that is for any reason more difficult to place for adoption than a "typical" child.
• To listen to an audio recording of an excellent message about adoption and orphan care, click here and select "Orphan Sunday."