Vocabulary Words of the Day:

• Domestic Adoption- adoption of a child born in a US state
• American Adoptions- our adoption agency
• Jane- our social worker
• Home Study- the document that will prove that we are fit to be parents
• APQ (Adoption Planning Questionnaire)- the criteria Eric and I have for the type of pregancy we’ll accept (medical issues, drug/alcohol usage during preganacy, etc)
• Profile- pictures and information about ourselves that will be shown to birthmothers
• Activated- when our paperwork is done and we’re ready to be presented to birthmothers
• Matched- when a birthmother has selected us and we’ve agreed to parent her child

When Eric and I first started in on this process, we were completely clueless about how the adoption process works.  I have spent dozens of hours researching, reading books, and talking to people in order to understand it.  To help you journey with us, I thought it might be helpful to give you a little adoption tutorial.  I’m going to liken adoption to pregnancy, as most of you are familiar with how pregnancies go.

The First Trimester:  Paperwork

The first trimester will almost certainly take longer than three months.  During this stage we’ll be gathering a ridiculous amount of paperwork that will prove that we are fit to be parents.  Our social worker will need to see our birth certificates, marriage license, Eric’s divorce decree, our bank statements, our rental agreement, our FBI clearance, our criminal clearance from our state of residence, child abuse clearances for the states we’ve lived in for the last five years, health certificates, etc, etc, etc.  In addition, we are filling out a 26 page questionnaire that requires us to write essays about every detail of our lives.  Our social worker will also visit our home to make sure it is suitable for kids.  She will then type up her report, which will be given to our agency.  Our agency will require additional copies of our paperwork as well as our APQ and the pictures/information we’ve prepared for our profile.

The Second Trimester: Waiting for a Match

Once all of our paperwork is complete, we will be “activated.”  At this point our profile will be presented to birthmothers that meet our criteria.  If a birthmother decides that she likes us the best, our agency will call us to give us all the medical information they have on the birthmother.  If we like what we hear, we’ll be matched.  Because we are hoping for a biracial child and there are more birthmothers than adoptive families, our agency tells us that we won’t be waiting long.  There is a good chance that this part will be quicker than three months.

Third Trimester: Waiting for Our Baby To Be Born

Once we are “matched,” we simply wait for our baby to be born.  The length of this time depends on how far along the birthmother is when we are matched.  I’ve read everything from having as little as one day notice to three months notice.  We’ll really have no idea until we’re matched.  Our agency will mediate contact between us and the birthmother (depending on what both sides are comfortable with).  I hope to learn as much as I can about our child’s birthmother because as our baby grows up, that information will be really special.  We’ll plan to fly to the States for the birth of our baby.  During this part of the process we’ll be holding our breath, hoping that the birthmother doesn’t back out.  When this happens, it’s called a “disrupted adoption” and would bump us back to the second trimester again.  We’re bracing ourselves for this, but hoping it doesn’t happen.  A couple days after the birth the the birthmother will (hopefully) sign all the paperwork.  We’ll stay in the state where the baby is born while our agency gets all our paperwork finalized.  Finally (!) we’ll be able to bring our little one home!

Post-Natal Care:  Finalization

I honestly don’t know a whole lot about this part yet, because let’s be honest, there are a TON of bridges to cross before we there!  At this point I know that Jane will come do some follow up visits and we’ll need to files some reports with our agency showing our child’s healthy development.  After about six months, we’ll return to the States for the court hearing where it will be good and done, forever and ever amen!

So there you go!  Now you know.  The Paper Pregnancy.  It’s not an easy process, but it’ll be worth it when we see that little one that was set apart just for us!