1.15.06 Part II - Questions You Have

So now I suppose you have a lot of questions: Why? From where? How long? Tell me the details! :-) All right, I'll go back to the beginning. One day in early 2002 I was at work and I don't even remember the circumstances of the day. What I do remember though was that during lunch, I just felt this overwhelming voice speaking to me and putting the words "Adopt a little girl" on my heart- and in my brain, and into the very tingling of my finger tips. Now like most people I thought this voice and reaction was crazy, but nonetheless I researched international adoption during lunch that day. I didn't say anything to Jim. I just kept thinking about it and looking at websites. Finally it got to the point where I couldn't contain myself any longer. I sat Jim down and I intro'd the conversation with, "Please don't laugh at me, and please don't say no right away. Just think about it. Please." He listened and he didn't laugh. He didn't give an answer right away. The biggest thing he had to think about as I'm sure most people who adopt think about, and even the grandma's and grandpa's to-be have to think about: "Can I love an adopted child like I could a biological child?" It didn't take Jim very long to come to the conclusion of YES!!

So we started sending away for information packets and birth certificates and marriage certificates. We researched and even went to a meeting at one of the local agencies. We decided if we were going to do this, we would need room for a child so we started looking around for bigger houses. And of course a bigger yard for our dogs. Ok, ok, the bigger house and bigger yard were both for our dogs, but we also moved because of our desire to adopt.

After that, three years went by. It wasn't that the desire wasn't there, it was financial issues as well as remodeling projects as well as... Well you know how life sometimes interrupts important plans. :-) I truly believe we just weren't in the right place at during those past years. Jim and I have done a lot of growing in the past few years. Of course we brought it up every now and then and we talked about it. It was always "when we adopt" not "if we adopt." We kept this from everyone. No one really knew about it. It's a very scary process. Much like I would imagine trying to get pregnant is. You want to tell people you're starting your family planning, but really that's just too intimate and besides, "What if nothing happens???" Same thing here.

Except now we've decided we're going to go for it!!! :-)

Isn't all that ambiguity I mentioned just a moment ago still here though? (I knew you were going to ask that!) Well yes, it is of course. But for us, nothing will be certain until "Gotcha Day" which is when we will bring our child home, where as when a pregnant woman starts showing- she pretty much goes public. So we have to draw the line in the sand somewhere- or to continue the similarity- the day we "conceive." We decided that was decision day. Decision to formally start the process.

So what were some of the other questions you had? Oh yes- from where? Don't know yet. We're still looking at a whole bunch of countries. We won't have to formally choose until after we go through the homestudy and are ready to choose an agency. What's a homestudy? A homestudy is where we fill out hundreds of documents stating our reasons, our complete list of employers, our letters of reference, fingerprints that go to the FBI (no joke), criminal reports in any Police department anywhere, child abuse records, how much we make a year, etc, etc. Every aspect of our life that can be probed into will be probed into. And to top it off, we'll have a social worker visit us at our home to talk with us in person to determine if we will be fit parents, if our home is a good place to raise a child, if we have adequate living area for the child, what type of health insurance we'll be able to provide, who will take care of the child once we bring him/her home, and the list goes on and on.

The next question you asked ;-) is how long? It depends on many things some of which we can control, most of which we can't. Pulling together all those documents and getting them notarized takes times. The home study takes time. Each country has a certain amount of time to translate the documents provide us with a referral or letter of invitation. Essentially from the day we fill out our application from to the day we bring our child home could be anywhere between 8 months and 24 months.




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