What is the process?

Many people have asked us about the process of adoption and so I thought I would explain a little. We chose to get our home study done through LDS Family Services. A lot goes into a home study including four reference letters, a letter from the bishop of our ward, a home inspection, doctor examinations, background checks including fingerprints, an interview with our caseworker together and individually, classes about adoption, a whole lot of paperwork asking about the details of our lives to assess if we are an appropriate placement for a child, and putting together our online profile.

Then all of this information goes into a home study that is presented to a committee by our caseworker. The committee decides if every area has been assessed appropriately and if the couple has any reason they should not be approved for adoption. It sounds like a lot, but would you feel comfortable placing your child in a home that hadn't gone through this process?

We buzzed through all of this as quickly as we could and here we are!

Now what? Well, we have an online profile that you can link to from our picture to the right. Birth parents can go online and look at these profiles. They choose the adoptive parents for their child. Some of the material from our classes had some information in it that I found very helpful. It talks about what you can do once you are approved. It compared the words "wait" and "find".

Wait: A passive word implying little control

Find: An active word implying some control

It gave different ideas on how to find your child. Of course, one of the biggest ways is to share with people that you are hoping to adopt. This is sometimes a little scary because you become vulnerable. Vulnerable to everyone's thoughts and opinions about something very personal to you. Opinions about whether or not it is time for you to adopt, maybe they should have tried infertility options longer, people's opinions on open vs. closed adoption, interracial adoption, etc. etc. We feel very confident in our decision and comfortable sharing this with anyone that we come in contact with. We are going to do our best to FIND our child and not just wait by spreading the word the best we can!

Jon and I are both so excited to adopt! It is no longer something that we are doing because of infertility but because we feel like it is how we will find OUR child. We are so excited for this special experience.