Now on to the questions...
#1 What is the process that you have to go through? Well, first of all you have to make the decision to adopt. That might be the hardest step. I know it was for us. We knew that adoption was the path that we needed to take, but actually taking the steps took us several months. It seemed like such a hard process that we were afraid to get started. But once you make the choice to adopt there are some choices that you need to make. You need to decide what kind of adoption you are going to do international, domestic, private, foster-to-adopt, what agency you are going to go with, if you are going through an agency, etc. But I think what you are asking mostly is this: The simplified version. First, You need a home study. This is where you fill out background checks, get references, fill out paperwork about you, your family, your background, your preferences, and a million other things. Seriously, it is a lot of work. You also have to have a home inspection where a social worker checks things out and makes sure it is a safe place for a child. Also, if you are going to foster you need to get certified in CPR and First Aid, and take classes - you have to get so many education hours to do foster care, or adopt through the foster system. Once all of that is finished you start the "finding" stage. What this requires depends on what type of adoption you are doing. You can have an agency match you, you can find for yourself (Through blogs, placing ads, "advertising" at doctor's offices, sending out pass along cards, asking your family and friends to spread the word, the possibilities are endless here) you can work with social workers who can help you find a match, you can post a profile and wait to be chosen. I suggest use every option available. Don't just sit around and wait for something to happen, go out there and find your child. Once you are matched with a child and they are placed with you there is a waiting period. The length of that period depends on a few things such as the laws of the state you live in, and relinquishment of parental rights. For example, if you live in Utah you must wait for at least six months after placement. Then if there aren't any other legal hang ups you can then finalize. That waiting period is different in each state. Also if there are any legal problems it could take longer. (for example with our adoption the judge kept delaying the termination of parental rights and the parents contested it, so it was fourteen months after placement before we could finalize instead of six.) Once the waiting period is over you can them finalize that means that you go to court and you have to be sworn in and promise to be a good parent and love the child like your own, it's pretty cool. Then the child's name is legally changed, and they are yours! After that any religious ordinances can then be done- like blessings, sealings, baptisms, etc. So that's the simplified version of the process. I hope that makes sense. If anyone is interested in more specifics of a certain part, or have any questions please email me.
2.I know women who can have babies of their own without problem, but think adoption is the easier. My sister has 2 children and had a stillborn last year. Because she is so afraid of repeating that she thinks that adoption would be the easier way. So she is looking into that despite the fact she can have babies of her own--the stillborn was unrelated to anything associated with her health. I wondered how you felt about these situations considering you have experienced the pain on the other end. What would you say to these women? I would say "bless you". Bless anyone who wants to adopt. I don't care if they have ten biological kids, if they can take care of and love another one, please, please adopt. Adoption is for everyone, not just those who struggle with infertility. It can bless all lives, and there are many, many reasons to adopt. Also, there are literally hundreds of thousands of kids who are up for adoption right now in the United States alone, so I am not worried about someone who can have biological children "gettin' in my turf". There are plenty of children to go around so if they have extra love to give I truly wish them luck.
However I must say that if these women truly believe that adoption is going to be easier they are sadly mistaken. I can't even begin to imagine the pain and heart ache of carrying a child for several months only to lose it. That would be such a hard thing and I don't know how I could endure it. But I knew Ethan for 19 months, he had been living with me for over a year, and I loved him so much, and still three days before we were to go to California to finalize we were told that the judge was going to give him back to his birth family. While I didn't carry him in my body he was in my heart. He was MY son. He belonged with me, and I very nearly lost him. In fact during our adoption process I was told that Ethan would be mine only to be told that he wouldn't be mine NINE times. That is nine times that my heart was broken. Nine times that I wondered how I could go on living. Nine times that my world crumbled. It was far from easy. I realize that my story is the extreme, and many many adoptions are easy. Adoption is a wonderful thing and I don't say any of this to discourage anyone or scare them away. That is not my intent at all. Nor do I want to minimize the pain your sister is feeling. I just want to say that sometimes people change their minds, sometimes Heavenly Father has different ideas than we do, and sometimes adoption is NOT easy.
3. Why can't you guys have babies? Well, if you ask my daughter it is because I have bad gas. (Although, I know people who have way worse gas than I do, and they are baby making machines--LEVI, so I'm not sure I agree with her;) Really, the actual causes are one of the few things that we are actually private about, so I'm not going to go into great details for the world to know. I did say that nothing is off limits though, and I am happy to share a little without giving the graphic details. I have a genetic condition that basically makes it difficult to conceive. Troy has seizures, and his medication makes it hard to conceive, and the longer he is on it the harder it is to conceive. So it's not impossible, it's just unlikely that we will ever get pregnant. We could have waited around to see what would happen, but our kids were in a hurry to join our family (Ethan was in such a hurry that he was born 4 months before we were married) that they wouldn't wait for our bodies to figure things out. I have a belief, and it isn't just because of infertility, I believed it long before I even tried to have kids. I believe that we already picked our families before we came to earth. I already have kids that were always supposed to by mine. It doesn't matter how that happens, whether biologically, through a crazy misplaced memo from a social worker, or if they are left on my front porch by the stork, we will find a way to each other because we belong together. If you know my kids and know me then you KNOW that we belong to each other. We are exactly the same. They couldn't be more mine. Sorry, I guess that was a bit of a tangent, but it seemed like it fit here a little:)
4. I just wanted to know if it was hard to keep in contact with the birth family. Did you cut ties? If so how long after the adoption did you do it? When we adopted our kids our family got much bigger, and that doesn't just mean Ethan and Adia. We have an entire other family that came along with them. We love them and care about them, and keep in touch with them. We call them and write to them, and even visit them whenever we are in California. We owe them a lot. They gave us a gift that we wouldn't have had if not for them. And it wasn't easy for them. It was a really hard choice to make, one that took a lot of prayer and soul searching. In the end they did the thing that they knew was best for the kids. It wasn't the easiest choice, or the funnest choice, but every day I try my hardest to make sure that they always feel it was the right choice. I will always love that part of our family. They mean so much to me. Their selflessness literally made my life what it is today, and I will never be able to express my appreciation and love for them enough. That being said, it is a relationship, and like all relationships it takes work. Yes, sometimes it is hard to keep in contact with them, but it is totally worth it. As long as it remains a positive thing for our kids we will always keep in contact with them. I will love them for the rest of my life.
5. I have an open adoption but the birth mom really has kinda pulled back from me and I really want to keep our adoption open, so what can I do to tell her my feelings? Or should I just let nature take its course? I would hate to lose her and not have her be a part of her own sons life? This is a hard question to answer. I can't tell you what to do, not really knowing the situation or the birth mom. I do know that sometimes a birth mom needs a little space in order to heal and move on. I also know that even if she doesn't respond to you or tell you how she feels, many birth moms really love and even need to hear from you. So my advice would be this. If you really want a relationship with her, and think that it would benefit your son you should keep trying. Send her letters, call her sometimes. let her know that you think about her and that you appreciate her, and when the time is right for her I think she will let you know.
6. I have been searching for different agencies here in Utah to try and talk to someone about adoption. What agency would you recommend? There are endless options when it comes to choosing an agency. The only ones I have personal knowledge about in the state of Utah is the foster care system and LDSFS. I know other people who have used other agencies and either loved or hated them, and I could put you in contact with those people if you would like, but I don't feel comfortable recommending one over another without having any personal knowledge of them. I can tell you a little about the agencies we used though. The foster care system here in Utah seems pretty good about trying to find a good fit. They want to make placements that are going to last, and end in an actual adoption. They seem to put quite a bit of thought into what is right for the child as well as the family. That is a great thing, as I know from experience that all states aren't so worried about happy families. They can also be a little colder than a regular agency because they are government run and not as touchy-feely. LDSFS is great. They are very affordable and offer counseling, which I think is very important. I like the idea behind the way they operate, though it doesn't always run as smoothly as they would like it to. There is sometimes a long wait if you just leave the matching up to the agency, but if you take an active roll in the finding process, it can be a pretty short wait. All in all I am very pleased with both.
7. Also How did you and Troy know that Adoption was right for you? When we first found out that we had fertility problems we looked into all options. We always knew that adoption was something we would do eventually, but we weren't sure if that was where we should start. We really just got a lot of information. We looked at the pros and cons of each option, and prayed a lot about it, and eventually all of the options fell away until it was clear that adoption was our option. For some people the choices aren't so cut and dry, and it takes a long time to decide what to do. Often, they don't even decide on one option, they set to work on a few different things, and the way that is supposed to work will eventually show itself. The main thing is keep praying, and when you feel right about something go with it, don't second guess.
8.If you could change anything would you and what would it be? That is a tough question. I would certainly be ore educated about adoption before we started. When we found out about Ethan we kind of plunged in head first. You know in question one where I tell you the steps that you take to adopt? We didn't do it that way at all. We found Ethan first, decided to adopt, and then completed the home study (Actually, don't tell anyone, but the kids were even placed with us before we had the home study completely finished- it isn't supposed to happen that way, but because of the situation we snuck through the system.) I don't recommend that way at all. We had no idea what we were doing most of the time, and our heart could have been spared some pain more than once if we had known how things worked ahead of time. Instead we had to teach ourselves a lot, and it wasn't until AFTER our adoption finalized that I learned the real way things are supposed to go. So I would change that. Part of me also wants to say that I would make it easier. When you adopt there are so many legal hoops you have to jump through. People have to interview you and analyze your marriage, your relationships, your income, your history, your family, your home, everything. You have to have a background check. You have to have letters of recommendation, it is a huge process. Anybody else who wants a baby can just go out and get pregnant, and they are parents. They can be 13 years old, they can be on drugs, they can be mentally unstable, they can live on the streets, they don't have to be married or in a stable relationship, they can be criminals- anyone else can just become parents whenever they want, it doesn't always seem fair. Also, as we were trying to adopt from foster care through another state, and also work with LDSFS in both states a lot of the laws are different, and it's hard to know which ones to follow. I would love it if there were set rules that everyone had to follow. But while part of me wants to say those things the other part of me knows that it is that way for a reason. All of the hoops you have to jump through make it so that these kids are safe. The laws are in place because they need to be, and I'm happy that it is that way, I wouldn't change it.
9.It seems confusing to me that the government pays people monthly to take care of foster children, yet when someone wants to adopt one of these children, and take them out of the foster system, You have to pay so much money to adopt them. Shouldn't they make it easier to get these children homes since once they have homes that is money they won't be paying each month to take care of them? I just don't see why they have to make it so difficult. Yes, they should make it easier to get these children homes. I agree. The price you pay for adoption depends on who you adopt through. In many cases the money that you pay goes to pay for the needs of the birth mother like housing, medical bills, food, counseling. Those are pretty important things, and I don't mind paying for them. But you are right. Adoption does cost a lot of money and much of that doesn't make sense. However, your question is mostly geared toward foster children, and to adopt through the foster system it is nearly free. It would make more sense to process foster care adoptions faster, it would make sense to change quite a few laws in order to make adoption easier. It is one of those things that frustrate me all the time, not just for myself, but for everyone involved. But I have to believe that most of the laws are in place in order to make it the best for everyone involved. You can't make everyone happy all the time. There has to be a little give and take, and not everything can be fair. In order to do what's best for the child sometimes you have to suffer a little. In order to assure that the birth family is given all of the rights that they deserve a few of your rights have to be taken away, and the same is true from the opposite end. I do think that things could be improved a lot, but I don't think that it can ever be a situation where everyone is happy all the time. It will always be hard for someone.
10. How's the book coming? I had it nearly finished at one point. But unfortunately when my computer crashed this summer I lost most of what I had been working on. (That's the importance of backing up people) So I'm working on it, but It isn't going to be finished for a long time. Don't hold your breath:)
11. What do the kids think about being adopted? I don't think they really care. They know about it, they know what it means, but it doesn't define them. They aren't adopted, they WERE adopted. It is part of their story, but it isn't WHO they are. Some kids grow in their mom's bellie, some kids grow in someone else's and then go to live with their parents. They did the latter, it isn't a big deal. That might change as they get older, but I hope not. I hope that it makes them proud of who they are, but that they don't let it become who they are. I hope that makes sense.
12. What is your favorite part of your adoption story? That is much to hard to answer. I love a lot of things about it. I hate a lot of things about it too, but to pick one favorite part is impossible. Of course the fact that I have kids now is the most important part, and I love that. But aside from that I love what it did in my spiritual life. I love that I can believe in miracles now because I truly saw them in my life on a daily basis. I love that I have a stronger relationship with my Heavenly Father. I love that I have a stronger testimony of prayer and fasting and the priesthood. I love what it did to my faith. That is probably my favorite part.
13. Will you ever adopt again? Yes (Please don't pass out Mom!) After the last time we swore we would never adopt again. We were happy with where we were, and that was that. But this spring some things changed and Heavenly Father told us that we weren't finished yet. So we are beginning with the steps to get our home study. Exciting and scary all at once!
Well, that's it. Thanks everyone for participating. It was fun to hear your questions. I hope that my answers made sense. Please be thinking of questions for next year:) Now on to the truly important part, the winner... Drawn at random by the names in the bucket method... Chosen by Adia (Because she is too cute to get mad at if you don't win:)... The winner is...
CarolBeth!
And here's what you will win...
A necklace of your choice from R House Couture!
As I have posted about before, my friend Lindsey is selling jewelry and darling adoption shirts in order to earn money for her adoption. I thought it would be fun to use this contest to help her out. This way YOU become part of baby Gavin's adoption story! How exciting! So go HERE check out what she has, and let me know what you want (She also does customizing, so if you don't find any of the wording that speaks to you she can make you something unique)
Even if you didn't win click on over and check out her beautiful stuff. You will fall in love.
Thanks for playing!
why don't I ever win? I liked the Q&A though
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